I remember while watching “Das Boot” where the poltical officer/2nd in command of the submarine said at one point that he was from Mexico. I also remember the zimmerman telegraph and it’s role of bringing the US into WW1. It made me wonder: Did the German Government have any kind of special relationship between the two nations in the inter-war period? Or am I reading too much into this?
Mexico was in turmoil from 1911 until the early 1930’s, and Germany was an unstable democracy with frequent changes of government from 1918 until 1933. During this period, neither country would have been capable of sustaining a “special relationship” for long even if they had wanted to.
During the early 1930’s the PNR (later PRI) came to power in Mexico, and of course Hitler came to power in Germany in 1933. For a brief time in the late 1930’s, Germany and Italy served as Mexico’s best market for oil exports. American oil companies refused to buy Mexican oil at that time out of anger at the PNR for expropriating their property. But that ended with the outbreak of WWII, and again, it hardly qualified as any kind of long term “special relationship”.
I did a rather brief paper on this topic a few years ago…
Germany’s early 20th century relationships with Latin America were heavily focused on two areas, the presence of emigrant/expatriate communities and the role of commodities such as petroleum and copper.
Mexico never had the large German communities that Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay, and Chile had (aside from a few thousand pacifist Mennonites), but a handful of Germans were present in certain trades such as glass making and beer brewing in the city of Monterrey and Mexico City,
Mexico’s oil production was of far greater interest. When Mexico expropriated foreign petroleum holdings in 1938, British and American companies had the most to lose, The German government viewed this step as a possible opening into Mexico’s oil market, as did Japan.
Mexico’s government was not all too friendly to the Nazis however, unlike some other Latin American governments. Mexico’s regime was generally lef wing, if not truly Bolshevik, it was on the “red” side. For one thing, Mexico was openly sympathetic to the “Loyalist” and Leftist cause of the Spanish Civil War. Secondly, Mexico was a member of the league of nations and protested (to little effect) the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia - partly due to its own history of territorial losses. And some of Mexico’s prominent guests such as Leon Trotsky did not escape international notice. Mexico did host left wing, socialist, or anti-fascist refugees and exiles from Europe - including more than a few Jewish people.
Ther Germans did see Mexico, along with other Latin American countries, as a possible destination for Jewish emigrants - but the migration of Jews to most of Latin America was hardly significant and the Nazis simultaneously encouraged Jewish emigration and made it very difficult to leave the country - by confiscating wealth. It could be said, however, that some of the Latin American countries did more (if little) to assist Jewish emigrants than far wealthier countries managed to do. Some Nazi propaganda did attempt to capitalize on Latin American anti-Semitism (partly provoked by the Jewish immigration which Nazi Germany itslef encouraged).
There were a handful of pro-fascist groups in Mexico, but they tended to be pro-Franco/Mussolini, conservative Catholics, and they railed against the secularized “Bolshevik” government in Mexico City- but they were not pro-Hitler - whose ideology presumably would exclude nearly all Mexicans anyway.
Personally, I think that the Zimmermann note was less a proposal for a meaningful alliance than a ruse - either a British one to involve the United States in the war on their side, or a German one to encourage another wild goose chase expedition into Mexico by the United States army.
Wow, good answer. So… is this the first time that knowledge has come in handy on an internet messageboard?
Yes, as I don’t see many German-Mexican relations questions. Unfortunately, I lost the original paper (my professor might have it somewhere), so I don’t have footnotes/references handy.
Larger libraries might have copies of Third Reich Diplomatic papers, and they reveal a lot more information through embassy communications.
I just finished reading The Zimmerman Telegram by Barbara Tuchman. Excellent book, as are most of the other ones she wrote. Anyway, her research (albeit in the 1950’s… before a lot of information was declassified) indicated that it was a legitimate German communication. Ruse? Probably not. Longshot? Most likely. Germany realized that the declaration of unrestricted submarine warfare would most likely eventually drag the US into WWI, so why not at least take a chance at stirring up some trouble between Mexico (along with Japan) and the US?