Did the Milky Way dwarf satellites enter the halo as a group?
  The dwarf satellite galaxies in the Local Group are generally considered to
be hosted in dark matter subhalos that survived the disruptive processes during
infall onto their host halos. It has recently been argued that if the majority
of satellites entered the Milky Way halo in a group rather than individually,
this could explain the spatial and dynamical peculiarities of its satellite
distribution. Such groups were identified as dwarf galaxy associations that are
found in the nearby Universe. In this paper we address the question whether
galaxies in such associations can be the progenitors of the Milky Way satellite
galaxies. We find that the dwarf associations are much more extended than would
be required to explain the disk-like distribution of the Milky Way and
Andromeda satellite galaxies. We further identify a possible minor filamentary
structure, perpendicular to the supergalactic plane, in which the dwarf
associations are located, that might be related to the direction of infall of a
progenitor galaxy of the Milky Way satellites, if they are of tidal origin.
