The death of Adolf Hitler on April 30, 1945, was a key point in World War II, with many seeing it as the beginning of the end for the Nazi Party. It's true that it took another six days for Germany to surrender. With the allied forces coming from all sides and Hitler not wanting to suffer the same fate as Mussolini, he supposedly took his own life in his Führerbunker, accompanied by long-term partner Eva Braun, whom he had married less than two days earlier.
Now, declassified CIA files have spurred the conspiracy theorists into action, suggesting that Adolf Hitler's death didn't go down quite like we've been told for all these years. As reported by the Daily Mail, CIA agents in South America were convinced Hitler was still alive in the 1950s, with a photo in Colombia supposedly showing a man who looked like the Führer.
Both the CIA and FBI spent a decade trying to track down Hitler following his supposed death, with informants speaking to the former as late as 1955.
In the CIA's declassified files, there's an October 1945 mention of how the US War Department informed the FBI that Hitler could secretly be hiding out at a spa hotel in Argentina's La Falda.
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As well as the owners being Nazi sympathisers who'd donated money to Joseph Goebbels, they were apparently close friends of Hitler himself and shared a hotel with him when they vacationed in Germany.
The War Department's 'secret escape' plan theorized that Hitler would flee to the hotel if he was thrown out as leader of the Nazi Party or Germany lost WWII. An informant known as CIMELODY-3 apparently spoke to someone who served under Hitler, claiming that the Führer had fled to Maracaibo, Venezuela.
Phillip Citroen was a former SS trooper who claimed that as well as Hitler being alive in Colombia, he spoke with Hitler on a monthly basis. CIMELODY-3's unnamed friend claims to have stolen a picture of Citroen and 'Adolf Schrittelmayor', sitting on a bench in Tunja, Colombia, on September 28, 1955. Some Nazi soldiers even say he moved to Argentina as late as January 1955.
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Despite skeptics calling the Citroen photo a 'fantasy', agents continued to look for Hitler. A November 4, 1955 file confirms someone referred to as 'GIRELLA' was authorized to investigate the 'Adolf Schrittelmayor' story.
Intelligence officials admitted: 'It is felt that enormous efforts could be expended on this matter with remote possibilities of establishing anything concrete."
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It's also here that the trail seems to go cold in the declassified files.
Of course, theories about Hitler's miraculous escape are nothing new. Conspiracy theories went into overdrive in 2009, when a skull from the Soviet archives thought to belong to Hitler was actually revealed as a woman's.
This has gained new relevance thanks to Argentinian President Javier Milei vowing to declassify all government documents on the many Nazis who sought a new life there after the war ended.
Argentina became a hot spot for former Nazis, and 80 years after hitler 'died', it's thought that documents could shed some light on the CIA's own case.
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In particular, Argentina's documents are set to highlight its involvement with 'ratlines', which were the secret international escape routes that the Nazis used to get out of Germany both before and after the war.
As for Hitler, the fact he'd be 136 now means that even if he once escaped to Argentina or Colombia, he's sure to be long dead.