Brazilian Expeditionary Force in WWII

“You’d be more likely to see a cobra smoking than see Brazilians fighting in Europe.”  Adolf Hitler

 I had known that Brazilians did send a unit to Europe, but until I read Brazilian Expeditionary Force in World II, by CC. Maximiano and R. Bonalume N., an Osprey Men-at-Arms publication, I had very little idea of the details.  I had been past the WWII Memorial in Rio de Janeiro, but hadn’t actually gone inside.

 They sent three regiments – a single division – to Northern Italy in late 1944, which served until VE Day in May 1945.  The units served along the US 10^th Mountain Division and faced 2^nd tier German forces, basically a loose aggregate of leftover Wehrmacht units thrown together almost at random.  As with the Spaniards in North Russia, the Brazilians had to deal with cold temperatures worse than any they would endure in Brazil.  Brazil also supplied a squadron of pilots, who flew P-47s, but the air element operated independently of the ground forces and were not assigned to the same tactical areas. 

 Most of the Brazilian soldiers had little or no combat experience.  Prior to WWII, the Brazilian army had been equipped and trained by the French and wore Adrian helmets.   The training, such as it was, was insufficient and had to be redone along US lines.  Nevertheless, with one notable exception, they fought fairly well.  One particular unit deserted and turned tail, the so-called “Laurindo” battalion: “Quem é que vem descendo o morro? Ê o Laurindo que vem sua turma guiando” (“Who is that going down the hill? It’s Laurindo guiding his gang”, a popular samba song at the time).  For the most part the Brazilians earned the respect of the Americans alongside whom they fought.  The Germans were neither contemptuous of them nor terrified of them; pretty much the Brazilians got the job done.  Of course by that time the Germans really couldn’t resist much, but one division “doing its job” in such a crucial theater as Northern Italy could hardly be considered to have a strategic impact on the war overall.  One Brazilian officer was Lt. Col. Castello Branco, who wound up as Brazil’s general-president during the military dictatorship in the 1960s.

 The standard rifle tended to be the 1903 Springfield, though they received BARs, Thompsons and M3 submachine guns as well.   All the equipment they used was provided by the US in Italy and none of it was brought over from Brazil. 

 The soldiers were issued US clothing and weapons, although they tended to modify the clothing somewhat.  The most noticeable and substantial modifications were: some of the longer jackets were shortened, some of the soldiers wore low jackboots (so-called “Natal boots”), and the soldiers took Hitler’s phrase and made a “smoking cobra” patch in response.  Instead of one white star on their vehicles, they painted the Southern Cross.  Brazilian MPs had a Brazilian flag on the front of the helmet in between the M and the P.  Eventually the uniform tended to morph into a grey version of the US WWII uniform, and has persisted to the present day in the form of the Brazilian police uniforms I recognized in Rio de Janeiro.  Brazilian cops seemed to look less like cops and more like soldiers, especially wearing paramilitary uniforms with jungle boots.  The general impression of pictures of Brazilian troops in Italy was that they look like US troops with slight variations in uniforms, the biggest difference being the multiracial element:  while the US Army was still segregated at the time, the Brazilian Army was not, so blacks, Japanese, Portuguese, and all sorts of mixed multiracial soldiers were all together in the same unit.