# Buenos noches mein Fuhrer! (Hitler escaping theories) **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 26, 2014, 11:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278 "2014-05-26T11:11:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Claverhouse](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/13edae/32.png) [@Claverhouse](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Claverhouse)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2014, 2:13am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/21 "2014-05-27T02:13:44Z")
The funniest was that he became a ( lonely ) goatherder in Alpine Switzerland. ---
**Author:** ![Charlie\_Wayne](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4bbf92/32.png) [@Charlie\_Wayne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Charlie_Wayne)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2014, 8:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/22 "2014-05-27T08:12:15Z")
> [@UDS](#): > > The British SIS, in the person of Hugh Trevor-Roper, investigated the matter in late 1945 and concluded with a high degree of certainty that Hitler and Braun had committed suicide in the Fuhrerbunker on 30 April 1945. His researches were written up and published in 1947, and his conclusions were widely accepted. The Americans conducted their own investigation and reached the same conclusion. I’m not saying that nobody toyed with the speculation that he might have faked his death and escaped, but nobody in a position of authority took the speculation very seriously. Do you remember the movie Goodfellas? Do you remember how it ended? Ray Liota was heartbroken because he saw that from now on, he would have to live his life as a “schnook” - a nobody. If you recall the reasons why Hitler killed himself, it had a lot to do with the failure of his party to come out on top. He made some really stupid moves and the result was that he got his ass kicked. How do you think he would have fared living in some Sout American village as a “schnook”? I don’t think he could have handled that. Just imagine! No servants. No armies. No officers to always agree with him. He would have to pretend to be a schnook everywhere he went and in everything he did. I doubt that he could have handled that. He would almost certainly prefer death. What do you think? ---
**Author:** ![md2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/73ab20/32.png) [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2014, 2:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/23 "2014-05-27T14:14:39Z")
> [@Charlie\_Wayne](#): > > Do you remember the movie Goodfellas? Do you remember how it ended? > > Ray Liota was heartbroken because he saw that from now on, he would have to live his life as a “schnook” - a nobody. > > If you recall the reasons why Hitler killed himself, it had a lot to do with the failure of his party to come out on top. He made some really stupid moves and the result was that he got his ass kicked. > > How do you think he would have fared living in some Sout American village as a “schnook”? I don’t think he could have handled that. > > Just imagine! No servants. No armies. No officers to always agree with him. He would have to pretend to be a schnook everywhere he went and in everything he did. > > I doubt that he could have handled that. He would almost certainly prefer death. > > What do you think? He would have had his art to comfort him - painting landscapes of the towering Andes… 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![AppallingGael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@AppallingGael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AppallingGael)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2014, 8:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/24 "2014-05-30T08:48:28Z")
> [@mascaroni](#): > > Eichmann certainly made it to South America, there’s pretty good evidence that Mengele did as well. For a long time it was thought that Bormann had escaped there too, although relatively recent evidence would suggest he died in Berlin. It was thought by some (especially authors of books), but I doubt it was most. Shirer, for instance, in “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” (1960) reports Bormann’s death in Berlin in the waning days matter-of-factly. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2014, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/25 "2014-05-30T15:41:25Z")
Unless there’s a German root (likely), the idea of Hitler having to use the Yiddish word to describe his situation is nice. And, since the tenor of my posts here is at the level of that, and this one: > [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > Hey, Mengele died on my 20th birthday! > > And my wife was born on Hitler’s birthday date! > > Huh. , An update: when told my wife of this significant fact, she said, honestly, “that’s good, right?” (She’s obviously more pissed off than I suspected when I tease her about her anniversary coincidence.) “Because he died.” There’s some Jewish joke with the punchline "any day you die will be a holiday,” btw. FTR: most of her family and mine were killed in the camps. ---
**Author:** ![AppallingGael](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/b9bd4f/32.png) [@AppallingGael](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/AppallingGael)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2014, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/26 "2014-05-30T16:02:45Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > There’s some Jewish joke with the punchline "any day you die will be a holiday,” btw. I first heard that joke told by Jesse Owens on some award show. ---
**Author:** ![mascaroni](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/dc4da7/32.png) [@mascaroni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mascaroni)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2014, 4:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/27 "2014-05-30T16:39:46Z")
> [@AppallingGael](#): > > It was thought by some (especially authors of books), but I doubt it was most. Shirer, for instance, in “Rise and Fall of the Third Reich” (1960) reports Bormann’s death in Berlin in the waning days matter-of-factly. Fair enough, I think “it was rumoured” would have been a better phrase. ---
**Author:** ![OKW](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/f0a364/32.png) [@OKW](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/OKW)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2014, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/28 "2014-05-31T23:59:03Z")
I doubt the official story simply because of the wide-spread rumors of his body being so badly burnt yet the “de-classified footage” of Hitler’s body by NKVD agents show his body in perfect shape, except for lifeless. Although I do agree, consensus is he was in pretty bad shape during the remainder of the war and by all accounts, seems to have had Parkinson’s or another ailment that would have prevented him living much longer, and understand the current understanding of Suicide being an honorable way out… I first wonder what the current thought was, if suicide was a “wussy way out” and secondly, I just have my doubts one of the greatest military minds in the world, whom probably had multiple doubles, killed himself in Germany. And indeed is his body was badly burnt, who’s to say the confirmations weren’t complete fabrications? ---
**Author:** ![Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/c5a1d2/32.png) [@Harvey\_The\_Heavy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Harvey_The_Heavy)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2014, 9:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/29 "2014-06-02T09:50:05Z")
> [@Charlie\_Wayne](#): > > Do you remember the movie Goodfellas? Do you remember how it ended? > > Ray Liota was heartbroken because he saw that from now on, he would have to live his life as a “schnook” - a nobody. > > If you recall the reasons why Hitler killed himself, it had a lot to do with the failure of his party to come out on top. He made some really stupid moves and the result was that he got his ass kicked. > > How do you think he would have fared living in some Sout American village as a “schnook”? I don’t think he could have handled that. > > Just imagine! No servants. No armies. No officers to always agree with him. He would have to pretend to be a schnook everywhere he went and in everything he did. > > I doubt that he could have handled that. He would almost certainly prefer death. > > What do you think? “So I ordered the Bratwurst from one of these ‘authentic’ schnitzel houses they have around here. You know what I got? A brown hot dog with lukewarm cabbage.” ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2014, 11:51am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/30 "2014-06-02T11:51:28Z")
> [@OKW](#): > > Although I do agree, consensus is he was in pretty bad shape during the remainder of the war and by all accounts, seems to have had Parkinson’s or another ailment that would have prevented him living much longer, and understand the current understanding of Suicide being an honorable way out… I first wonder what the current thought was, if suicide was a “wussy way out” and secondly, I just have my doubts **one of the greatest military minds in the world** , whom probably had multiple doubles, killed himself in Germany. [bolding mine] [Say _what_?!](http://media.giphy.com/media/rGDHqBXTeudTG/giphy.gif) This is ground well trodden but Hitler was not even the best military mind in the room he shot himself; the inanimate portrait of Frederick the Great had more talent for command that he did. The reason the army wanted to get rid of him in '44 wasn’t because they realised how evil he was, but because his constant meddling was losing them the war. ---
**Author:** ![YogSothoth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/8edcca/32.png) [@YogSothoth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/YogSothoth)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2014, 10:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/31 "2014-06-02T22:52:44Z")
What would be Stalin’s reasons for covering up the death? Wouldn’t he want Hitler’s mangled corpse to be paraded through the Red Square as a symbol of his power? I don’t get why he would not tell people that Hitler had died as he did ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Kobayashi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/4af34b/32.png) [@Mr.Kobayashi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Kobayashi)\ **Post date:** [June 2, 2014, 11:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278/32 "2014-06-02T23:22:17Z")
> [@YogSosoth](#): > > What would be Stalin’s reasons for covering up the death? Wouldn’t he want Hitler’s mangled corpse to be paraded through the Red Square as a symbol of his power? I don’t get why he would not tell people that Hitler had died as he did His corpse wasn’t so much mangled as charred beyond recognition, not the greatest trophy. As to why he lied, even before the war things were often pretty tense between the Soviets and SHAEF, Stalin blatantly lied about gunning for Berlin saying “Berlin had lost its strategic importance and only secondary forces would be allotted to its capture”. You’ll remember that this was not the case. Possibly because he was pissed off about the US [grabbing up former German citizens](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Paperclip) he kept the fate of Hitler deliberately vague in order to suggest that perhaps the western Allies had snatched him [from the Soviets](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_of_Adolf_Hitler#Aftermath); "In the years immediately following 1945, the Soviets maintained Hitler was not dead, but had fled and was being shielded by the former western allies.[50] " In May Hitler’s dentist confirmed Hitler was a post-Fuhrer, though in August when Truman asked if Hitler was dead Stalin replied “No.” [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/buenos-noches-mein-fuhrer-hitler-escaping-theories/689278.md?page=1)