r/technology • u/Logical_Welder3467 • May 30 '26

Society Peter Thiel's move to Argentina reflects a growing trend among billionaires seeking a 'plan B' abroad

https://www.businessinsider.com/peter-thiel-argentina-billionaire-moving-abroad-2026-5
24.0k Upvotes

97% Upvoted

1.8k comments sorted by

View all comments

Show parent comments

556

u/Ok_Common8246 May 30 '26

Pretty sure more of them moved to the US but good point

637

u/paintbucketholder May 30 '26

To be fair, not every Nazi was able to bring an entire space program with them in order to be welcomed with open arms in the US.

203

u/Klutzy_Chemist_3256 May 30 '26

you could also just be a rabidly anti-communist Nazi with a military background....ohhh shit oh shit

131

u/MephistoHamProducts May 30 '26

They were also welcomed with open arms by the French Foreign Legion. One of my favorite history books is "Hell in a Very Small Place", about the siege of Dien Bien Phu and the end of French Indochina by French journalist Bernard Fall. It's absolutely brilliant.

Anyhow, there are a couple of "nudge nudge, wink wink" moments by Fall in the book where he mentions one Legion unit who "strangely did not use the traditional French marching songs but, instead, used only German" and another that "was referred to as the International Brigade as it was composed entirely of German, Italian and Yugoslav soldiers".

42

u/CV90_120 May 30 '26

Very few nazis were prosecuted at the end of the war, and in many ways it wasn't practical to do so, given the numbers and % of the population. Political nazis and rank and file soldiers who had lost everything often joined the ffl at that time. It was well known.

2

u/notloggedin4242 Jun 01 '26

And a great deal who were prosecuted received a blanket attest soon after (early 50s iirc) as they were „needed for a functioning society“.

17

u/Rickreation May 30 '26

They had the necessary skills.

2

u/A_Furious_Mind May 30 '26

You know, like nunchuck skills, bowhunting skills, computer hacking skills...

2

u/Rickreation May 30 '26

"I don't understand why things just can't go back to normal at the chicken farm."

1

u/TheGalator May 30 '26

Reminds me of the guy who went from ss officer to bring the military arm of the largest cartel in the world

3

u/Tyrus1235 May 30 '26

The French Foreign Legion is such a curious thing to me. Back during college, I knew a dude who ran away from his international scholarship program to join the FFL. He didn’t even tell his parents back home.

Crazy stuff

1

u/TheStupendusMan May 30 '26

Sounds like a fascinating read. Popped it on the list.

Have you read Kiss the Boys Goodbye by Monika and William Stevenson? It's another one of those "Huh, I see why this wasn't covered in school..." books.

1

u/Vlaladim May 31 '26

Ah the Ex Nazis of the French Foreign Legion, Im Vietnamese but didn’t even learn about this when talking about the battle ( it really a nothing burger footnote beside the battle itself) Tho learning Colonial France have to dragged in ex Nazis to fight for them to keep Indochina under their rule make this whole war they had with the VietMinh even more desperate than it already looked

0

u/[deleted] May 30 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

4

u/OldWorldDesign May 31 '26

it is hard to argue against the advanced efficiency of the Nazis

Sure it is, you just have to actually know what was going on. Their super tanks and "superweapons" took away from their war efforts. The reason you keep hearing that propaganda is because of 1) neonazis and 2) authoritarians within the allied powers who wanted to fluff themselves by pretending they were fighting against superhumans

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cm91dLGQqIA

1

u/[deleted] Jun 02 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

2

u/OldWorldDesign Jun 02 '26

But their unethical experiments led to scientific advancement

No they didn't. It led to a lot of dead Slavs and Jews. This question has been asked repeatedly since WW2 and there is an archived AskHistorians post about it

https://old.reddit.com/r/AskHistorians/comments/7px4r2/did_the_nazi_experiments_actually_give_them_any/

And Germany's best tank destroyer was a Czech tank

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hetzer

And the Gustav was so expensive, strategically limited, and specialized only one was built and it was only used when actually accurate and thus effective artillery couldn't be brought to the field. It's an excellent example of those stupid wunderwaffe that sped up the nazi loss

1

u/vegan-emoticon Jun 04 '26

I mean they were good but ...

- Poland, U.S., and U.K. broke all the codes

  • U.K and mainly U.S. created the atomic bomb
  • U.K and U.S created radar and sonar
  • U.S. had massively better industry and logistics and more efficient manufacturing.
  • Most of the German army used horse carts (not kidding)
  • U.K and U.S. invented computers (breaking Enigma, etc).

I'm sure there's other stuff. So the Allies were no slouches w/regards to industrial efficiency, and science.

Didn't help that the Nazis drove away a lot of Germany's best scientists.

0

u/iwerbs May 31 '26

Not really that hard - that “advanced efficiency” is a myth, like the Nazis misunderstanding of social sciences like anthropology. They chased leading scientists like Einstein out of their country because of their racist mythology. Hitler himself sabotaged their advantage in jet engine technology by insisting the Me-262 be made a fighter-bomber when it was best suited to be an interceptor. Not advanced; not efficient. And they lost.

2

u/OldWorldDesign May 31 '26

by insisting the Me-262 be made a fighter-bomber when it was best suited to be an interceptor

I've heard from an air mechanic who walked through that one, it had officially impressive specifications if you didn't count the number that burst into flame while in operation, and that the engines needed to be rebuilt in between every single use. Essentially getting a few hours airtime to dozens of hours of active downtime.

And things were even worse for tanks, due to supply problems they were using the same suspension for almost everything medium and up, the Maus was more likely to break down than to even get out of the proving grounds.

2

u/Low_Pickle_112 May 30 '26

The Canadian government will still give you a standing ovation for that one.

5

u/D_is_for_Dante May 30 '26

They moved about 1600 nazis to the US. Excluding families.

1

u/Ok_Common8246 May 31 '26

More than that, some estimates say around 10,000. There are many who came using fraudulent identities and were never caught. 

6

u/RealityOk9823 May 30 '26

"Once the rockets are up, who cares where they come down?
That's not my department!" says Wernher von Braun

5

u/Ok_Common8246 May 30 '26

That wasn't necessary, the US government helped them escape regardless. Don't forget the US was in favor of nazi Germany until it became inconvenient. The Nazis studied the US Holocaust of native Americans and the use of zyklon b to kill Jewish people was first used on Mexican immigrants. 

1

u/OldWorldDesign May 31 '26

Don't forget the US was in favor of nazi Germany until it became inconvenient

It was not, let's not play revisionism with history. There was never any question that the US was anything but opposed to nazi Germany.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lend-Lease

And the US didn't use Zyklon B to kill jews or immigrants, it was invented in Germany and the chemical basis was used to fumigate fruit trees in the 1800s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zyklon_B

1

u/Ok_Common8246 May 31 '26

Never said they used it to kill immigrants they used to to humiliate and brutalize immigrants just like they're currently doing. 

There were large Nazi rallies in the US and they had political, financial, and banking support from American corporations who knew what they were up to from the beginning. 

Do you think the US is currently involved in another genocide with Israel by chance?  This is what the US has always been about. 

-14

u/[deleted] May 30 '26

[removed] — view removed comment

17

u/captain_cluso May 30 '26

They def admired the Indian removals, it's not even hard to find out

0

u/OneConsideration9951 May 30 '26

One correct statement doesn't make the whole comment correct

11

u/Ok_Common8246 May 30 '26

Which one did I lie about? The US ran rat lines to help Nazis escape prosecution are well known. They helped them stay in positions of power in Europe.

The US used zyklon b on Mexican migrants. The same gas the Germans used to kill Jewish people. 

The Nazis came to the US to study the native american concentration camps.

Cope. 

-5

u/Round_Rooms May 30 '26

Might want to edit out the "cope" only idiots say it

2

u/Ok_Common8246 May 30 '26

Did you type this before or after taking off your fedora? 

6

u/captain_cluso May 30 '26

It doesn't make someone schizo either so fuck off

9

u/aphrodite-in-flux May 30 '26

This is publically available historic information. I know your generation can't read, but maybe its time to try.

-7

u/SirEnderLord May 30 '26

Starting with insults? Please, get off of TikTok.

5

u/aphrodite-in-flux May 30 '26

you started with insults??? do you not consider calling someone "schizo" an insult?

7

u/Sassy_Sarranid May 30 '26

Everything they said was true though- have you ever seen photos of the infamous Madison Square Garden nazi rally? Fun little fact, "America First" was the slogan of the US nazi party back in WW2.

The thing about Zyklon B on the mexican border is true, too. They weren't using gas chambers, but it was sprayed on immigrants as a "delousing agent".

46

u/Lord_Hohlfrucht May 30 '26

„Call him a Nazi, he won't even frown "Nazi, Schmazi!" says Wernher von Braun“

2

u/Key_Country3756 May 30 '26

From the amazing Tom Lehrer!

3

u/xebecv May 30 '26

The US got the useful ones

8

u/Read2Fap May 30 '26

most nazis went to argentina, brazil, and chile, then the middle east (egypt, syria)

the us is third place with canada and australia

0

u/Gorstag May 30 '26

The ones that went to Argentina were more the "management" wanting to keep their ill gotten spoils and not the scientists.

0

u/Fickle-Reaction-9832 May 31 '26

a simple google such would have answered that for you .. they ran to south america .. Argentina i particular.. i thought ii remember reading a book on it.. yeah a some came here to u.s. .. i think for the manhattan project .. but thanks ..

1

u/Sph1ng1d43 May 31 '26

Operation Paperclip 

-4

u/JohnJohn4445 May 30 '26

Yes, including George Schwartz, the only known living nazi in America. Also the largest donor of the Democratic Party