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Business / Corporate Complicity In The Holocaust

Spudrick68 said:
The gas chambers I believe were designed by Siemens. Shocking.
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And IBM provided the information infrastructure:

ibm holocaust.png


IBM and the Holocaust is the stunning story of IBM's strategic alliance with
Nazi Germany - beginning in 1933 in the first weeks that Hitler came to power
and continuing well into World War II. As the Third Reich embarked upon its
plan of conquest and genocide, IBM and its subsidiaries helped create enabling
technologies, step-by-step, from the identification and cataloging programs of
the 1930s to the selections of the 1940s. Only after Jews were identified - a
massive and complex task that Hitler wanted done immediately - could they be
targeted for efficient asset confiscation, ghettoization, deportation, enslaved
Iabor, and, ultimately, annihilation. It was a cross-tabulation and organizational
challenge so monumental, it called for a computer. Of course, in the 1930s no
computer existed.

But IBM's Hollerith punch card technology did exist. Aided by the company's
custom-designed and constantly updated Hollerith svstems, Hitler was able to
automate his persecution of the Jews. Historians have always been amazed at
the speed and accuracy with which the Nazis were able to identify and locate
European Jewry. Until now, the pieces of this puzzle have never been fully
assem-bled. The fact is, IBM technology was used to organize nearly everything
in Germany and then Nazi Europe, from the identification of the Jews in
censuses, registrations, and ancestral tracing programs to the running of
railroads and organiz-ing of concentration camp slave labor.

IBM and its German subsidiary custom-designed complex solutions, one by
one, anticipating the Reich's needs. They did not merely sell the machines and
walk away. Instead, IBM leased these machines for high fees and became the
sole source of the billions of punch cards Hitler needed.

IBM and the Holocaust takes you through the carefully crafted corporate
collusion with the Third Reich, as well as the structured deniability of oral
agreements, undated letters, and the Geneva intermediaries—all undertaken as
the newspapers blazed with accounts ot persecution and destruction.
Just as compelling is the human drama of one of our century's greatest minds,
IBM founder Thomas Watson, who cooperated with the Nazis for the sake of
profit.

Only with IBM's technologic assistance was Hitler able to achieve the
staggering numbers of the Holocaust. Edwin Black has now uncovered one of
the last great mysteries of Germany's war against the Jews - how did Hitler get
the names?
 
Indrid Drood said:
And IBM provided the information infrastructure:

View attachment 23366

IBM and the Holocaust is the stunning story of IBM's strategic alliance with
Nazi Germany - beginning in 1933 in the first weeks that Hitler came to power
and continuing well into World War II. As the Third Reich embarked upon its
plan of conquest and genocide, IBM and its subsidiaries helped create enabling
technologies, step-by-step, from the identification and cataloging programs of
the 1930s to the selections of the 1940s. Only after Jews were identified - a
massive and complex task that Hitler wanted done immediately - could they be
targeted for efficient asset confiscation, ghettoization, deportation, enslaved
Iabor, and, ultimately, annihilation. It was a cross-tabulation and organizational
challenge so monumental, it called for a computer. Of course, in the 1930s no
computer existed.

But IBM's Hollerith punch card technology did exist. Aided by the company's
custom-designed and constantly updated Hollerith svstems, Hitler was able to
automate his persecution of the Jews. Historians have always been amazed at
the speed and accuracy with which the Nazis were able to identify and locate
European Jewry. Until now, the pieces of this puzzle have never been fully
assem-bled. The fact is, IBM technology was used to organize nearly everything
in Germany and then Nazi Europe, from the identification of the Jews in
censuses, registrations, and ancestral tracing programs to the running of
railroads and organiz-ing of concentration camp slave labor.

IBM and its German subsidiary custom-designed complex solutions, one by
one, anticipating the Reich's needs. They did not merely sell the machines and
walk away. Instead, IBM leased these machines for high fees and became the
sole source of the billions of punch cards Hitler needed.

IBM and the Holocaust takes you through the carefully crafted corporate
collusion with the Third Reich, as well as the structured deniability of oral
agreements, undated letters, and the Geneva intermediaries—all undertaken as
the newspapers blazed with accounts ot persecution and destruction.
Just as compelling is the human drama of one of our century's greatest minds,
IBM founder Thomas Watson, who cooperated with the Nazis for the sake of
profit.

Only with IBM's technologic assistance was Hitler able to achieve the
staggering numbers of the Holocaust. Edwin Black has now uncovered one of
the last great mysteries of Germany's war against the Jews - how did Hitler get
the names?
Click to expand...

Seems a pretty tenuous link. From a German immigrant family, Hermann Hollerith's tabulating machine was a world-leading piece of kit in the pre-computer days and was sold to a great many countries around the world - including to the UK.
You might as well blame Remington for selling typewriters, some of which were almost certainly used by Germans in WW2.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
Seems a pretty tenuous link. From a German immigrant family, Hermann Hollerith's tabulating machine was a world-leading piece of kit in the pre-computer days and was sold to a great many countries around the world - including to the UK.
You might as well blame Remington for selling typewriters, some of which were almost certainly used by Germans in WW2.
Click to expand...
What Reviewers Have Said About IBM AND THE HOLOCAUST

"An explosive new book. . . . Backed by exhaustive research, Black's case is simple
and stunning." —Michael Hirsh, Newsweek

"Black's book is most interesting when he is dealing with Watson's stubborn and unsuccessful
determination to continue in control of IBM's German operation without
appearing to be doing so. He was able to cut off direct relations between IBM in the
U.S. and the Germans while continuing to deal with them indirectly. He was a master
of subterfuge and made a fine art of being in a position to deny collaboration with
the Nazis while operating through subsidiaries who were responsive to his every wish.
. . . And he never forbade them to supply IBM machines that were used in sending
people to camps, which they did." —Gordon A. Craig, New York Review of Books

"Black establishes beyond dispute that IBM Hollerith machines significantly advanced
Nazi efforts to exterminate Jewry.... IBM and the Holocaust is a valuable contribution
to our understanding of the Holocaust."
—Christopher Simpson, Washington Post Book World

"Black's study . . . contains a wealth of unknown or little-known details. The author
convincingly shows the relendess efforts made by IBM to maximize profit by selling
its machines and its punch cards to a country whose criminal record would soon be
widely recognized." —Saul Friedlander, Los Angeles Times

"IBM and the Holocaust is a disturbing book—all the more so because its author
doesn't prescribe what should be done about sins committed more than half a century
ago. It is left to readers to decide." —Ron Grossman, Chicago Tribune

"Black's book is shocking. Its contents go against the grain of all that is dear to naive
images of corporate America. . . . This book will be a case study in corporate ethics
for years to come." —Robert Urekew, Midstream

"IBM and the Holocaust is an ambitious book . . . an important contribution to Holocaust
studies." —John Friedman, The Nation

"The book adds much to our knowledge of the Holocaust and World War II. Black
convincingly demonstrates the extent to which it [IBM technology], was central to
the operation of the Third Reich." —Terry W. Hartle, Christian Science Monitor

"Black makes a case that shames the IBM of the mid-20th century.... There will be no
question ... in the minds of readers that IBM officials had the ability to understand
the task their machines were performing. The book succeeds as a piece of excruciatingly
documented journalism." —Karen Sandstrom, Cleveland Plain Dealer

"Black's book is so enlightening [because] it paints a richly textured picture of how a
man [Watson], and an entire company, can ignore all sense of morality while not once
transgressing the lines of business ethics. If nothing else, this book should be required
reading for every first-year MBA student." —Sam Jaffe, Businessweek.com

"Black's argument that IBM made millions from its association with the Nazis seems
almost impossible to refute." —John Mark Eberhart, Milwaukee Journal Sentinel
"Black's book ... is an ugly story, hidden for years, told by a master craftsman in
a compelling way. More than just another Holocaust tale . . . it's a chilling lesson."
—Richard Pachter, Miami Herald

"More than 15 million people have visited the Holocaust Museum and seen the IBM
machine there. Surely some have raised the question: How could this prestigious corporation
possibly be linked to such a heinous stain on human history? With empirical
evidence, Edwin Black has supplied the answer. IBM and the Holocaust makes an
empirical statement. Edwin Black has made his case." —Louisville Courier-Journal
"This damning chronicle of IBM's collusion with the Nazis exposes, in horrific detail,
the corporation's opportunistic ride on Hitler's tail."
—Charles Winecoff, Entertainment Weekly

"This is the stuff of corporate nightmare. IBM, one of the world's richest companies,
is about to be confronted with evidence of a truly shameful history. Edwin Black
reveals Big Blue's vital role in the Holocaust." —Sunday Times, Great Britain

"Black ... shows, in compelling detail, that IBM, 'the solutions company' was also the
company of the Final Solution.... It is a distinctive contribution to the history of the
time. It wholly justifies Black's years of toil. . . a terrible warning from this brilliantly
excavated past." —Peter Preston, The Guardian, Great Britain

"The computer group IBM is haunted by its past. Edwin Black's book now reveals
the company's involvement in the Holocaust. . . . Previously the Nazi past of 'Big
Blue'" was hardly ever a topic. . . . But now IBM is in the dock. Black's meticulous
research documents just how precisely IBM managers were kept informed about the
whereabouts of their machines." —Christian Habbe, Der Spiegel, Germany

"Black's . . . book is the first to give the general public a detailed account of how an
American corporation profited from intimate ties with the Nazis. It strips the veneer
from the cherished myth of the purity and patriotism of American business."
—Marilyn Henry, Jerusalem Post

"IBM and the Holocaust raises startling questions about the technology giant's involvement
with Nazi government officials—and throws the company's wartime ethics into
serious doubt." —Jessica Reaves, Time.com

"Black . . . documents IBM's sins with chilling discipline.... IBM and the Holocaust
lays out in numbing detail the terrible deeds of bureaucrates and business leaders....
In the end, thought this book has a subtler story to tell, one frighteningly relevant to
our lives today. IBM and the Holocaust isn't about evil men at a particularly bloody
point in recent history so much as it's about the dawn of the modern information age."
—Douglas Perry, Fort Worth Star-Telegram

"Edwin Black has put together an impressive array of facts which result in a shocking
conclusion never realized before: IBM collaborated with the Third Reich. This book
should be read by everyone interested in the 'under history' of the Second World War."
—Simon Wiesenthal, director, Jewish Documentation Center, Vienna

"Black's great contribution is that he has tenaciously collected a lot of information
and combined it in an original way. Few others have thought to place this information
in the same context, to see what inferences can be drawn. Black's history makes
two chilling observations. The first is that the Holocaust was possible because the
Nazis had access not only to guns and gas but also to cutting-edge census technology.
The second is that the Nazis had access to this technology because IBM, in its
paranoid zeal, worked very hard to maintain its market dominance of the global market
in data processing." —Anthony Sebok, CNN.com

"A shocking account of IBM's complicity with the Nazis is a reminder that people
bear moral responsibility for the actions of the corporation—a point that critics have
failed to grasp." —Jack Beatty, The Atlantic Online

"IBM and the Holocaust is a story that must be read if one is to understand how Hitler
and the Nazis were able to implement their Final Solution to exterminate European
Jewry.... Once again, Edwin Black has hit the mark."—Abraham H. Foxman, national director, Anti-Defamation League

"A tremendous, timely work. Neglected for more than 50 years, the sordid records
disclosing IBM's collaboration with the Nazi regime have now been exhumed by
Edwin Black." —Robert Wolfe, former chief National Archives expert for
captured German records and Nuremberg documentation

"Leaves no room for deniability." —Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman,
Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations

"Edwin Black's groundbreaking book, IBM and the Holocaust, made a great impression
on me. It documents, for the first time, that an American company, IBM, bears a
good deal of the moral responsibility for the preparation of the persecution of the
Nazi victims. IBM and the Holocaust confirms the belief that the Holocaust was not
only a cruel, unprecedented crime, but also an enormous bureaucratic undertaking.
—Franclszek Piper, historian, Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum


I see that there is a second, expanded edition published in 2012 (1st ed. was 2002), so I assume there were even more discoveries beyond those that made it into the first edition:
IBM & the Holocaust
 
I have no doubt that Hermann Hollerich's technology was used during the Hitler era. Putting inventive technology to evil use though isn't the fault of the inventor or their business.

We know that Saddam's poison gas, deployed against the Kurds and marsh Arabs, owed a lot to the Institut Pasteur in Paris, but should they be held culpable for ostensibly medical research being turned to an evil purpose?
 
tuco said:
Siemens makes a vacuum cleaner called zyklon ( as in zyklon B ) in Germany, I know zyklon means cyclone in german but seems a bit insensitive to me.
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The main Siemens factory in Dresden was destroyed in the allied bombing raid in February 1945. The rail hub was also destroyed and the Hellerberg concentration camp put out of commission. Which certainly saved some Jewish lives. Something that those who swallowed the Nazi propaganda and criticise the allied bombing conveniently forget.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
Putting inventive technology to evil use though isn't the fault of the inventor or their business.
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Fair enough. Except when a company goes out of its way to conceal its actions, and to actively support a terrible operation like this, then they are very much at fault. I confess I haven't read the source material, but Indrid's exhaustive list of comments seems to make it clear that this is not simply the Nazis using standard equipment like typewriters. The company was actively involved.
Indrid Drood said:
"Black's book is most interesting when he is dealing with Watson's stubborn and unsuccessful
determination to continue in control of IBM's German operation without
appearing to be doing so. He was able to cut off direct relations between IBM in the
U.S. and the Germans while continuing to deal with them indirectly. He was a master
of subterfuge and made a fine art of being in a position to deny collaboration with
the Nazis while operating through subsidiaries who were responsive to his every wish.
. . . And he never forbade them to supply IBM machines that were used in sending
people to camps, which they did." —Gordon A. Craig, New York Review of Books
Click to expand...
 
Krepostnoi said:
Fair enough. Except when a company goes out of its way to conceal its actions, and to actively support a terrible operation like this, then they are very much at fault. I confess I haven't read the source material, but Indrid's exhaustive list of comments seems to make it clear that this is not simply the Nazis using standard equipment like typewriters. The company was actively involved.
Click to expand...

After redundancy three years ago, I had an interview with IBM at their Hursley campus, near Winchester.
(They offered me the job btw, but I was offered a better one the very next day and plumped for that instead).
Following my interview, they gave me a tour of the famous IBM museum. This had a wealth of fascinating early hardware, and I'm certain I recall some fragile and yellowed Hollerich punch-cards in a display case. These didn't appear to be in any way hushed up or concealed.
I can understand any corporation not exactly wanting to broadcast any historical links they may have had to Hitler era Germany though. It's hardly something you'd want to be proud of. Bit like Volkswagen playing down its Nazi origins, but I certainly don't blame VW owners for furthering Hitler's legacy.
There are times you can make too much of historical correlations (unless you want to sell books to conspiracists!).
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
After redundancy three years ago, I had an interview with IBM at their Hursley campus, near Winchester.
(They offered me the job btw, but I was offered a better one the very next day and plumped for that instead).
Following my interview, they gave me a tour of the famous IBM museum. This had a wealth of fascinating early hardware, and I'm certain I recall some fragile and yellowed Hollerich punch-cards in a display case. These didn't appear to be in any way hushed up or concealed.
I can understand any corporation not exactly wanting to broadcast any historical links they may have had to Hitler era Germany though. It's hardly something you'd want to be proud of. Bit like Volkswagen playing down its Nazi origins, but I certainly don't blame VW owners for furthering Hitler's legacy.
There are times you can make too much of historical correlations (unless you want to sell books to conspiracists!).
Click to expand...
I don't quite know what to make of your reply; it's as though we are reading different texts. The way I read Indrid's post is that IBM, or at any rate at least one of its senior executives, was actively supporting the Nazis to implement their "final solution" in the full knowledge of what that entailed, whilst at the same time concealing this support from general knowledge. It's not just a correlation, it was active collaboration.
 
Krepostnoi said:
I don't quite know what to make of your reply; it's as though we are reading different texts. The way I read Indrid's post is that IBM, or at any rate at least one of its senior executives, was actively supporting the Nazis to implement their "final solution" in the full knowledge of what that entailed, whilst at the same time concealing this support from general knowledge. It's not just a correlation, it was active collaboration.
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But this is where we're straying into conspiracy territory. IBM claims they released all their corporate records from the period for independent evaluation. Furthermore, the 2001 and 2015 lawsuits by concentration camp survivors against IBM were dismissed.
I know we all like a big conspiracy, but until conclusive evidence that can stand up in court is forthcoming, let's not play the role of judge and jury ourselves.
 
Rather than IBM one should really focus on US investment bank, Brown BrothersHarriman and the activities of Prescott Bush.

Key director Prescott Bush, was also a director of Union Banking Co which represented Fritz Thyssen's interests in the USA.

They raised a lot of money from the USA for the Nazi war machine.

Prescott Bush was of course the father of George HW Bush and the grandfather of George W Bush.

Thus the Bush family fortune was made.
 
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blessmycottonsocks said:
Furthermore, the 2001 and 2015 lawsuits by concentration camp survivors against IBM were dismissed.
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Not quite. The 2001 lawsuit was dropped -

In February 2001, an ATCA claim was filed in U.S. federal court against IBM for allegedly providing the punch card technology that facilitated the Holocaust, and for covering up Dehomag's activities. But in April 2001, that same lawsuit was dropped.

Lawyers said they feared proceeding with the suit would slow down payments from a special German Holocaust fund created to compensate forced laborers and others who had suffered due to the Nazi persecution. German companies had asked for a release from further legal actions before contributing to the fund.

The 2004 case was dismissed on a technicality (statute of limitations).

The 2015 case was about human rights abuses in South Africa during apartheid and only referred to WW2. That one, I think, got dismissed.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
After redundancy three years ago, I had an interview with IBM at their Hursley campus, near Winchester.
(They offered me the job btw, but I was offered a better one the very next day and plumped for that instead).
Following my interview, they gave me a tour of the famous IBM museum. This had a wealth of fascinating early hardware, and I'm certain I recall some fragile and yellowed Hollerich punch-cards in a display case. These didn't appear to be in any way hushed up or concealed.
I can understand any corporation not exactly wanting to broadcast any historical links they may have had to Hitler era Germany though. It's hardly something you'd want to be proud of. Bit like Volkswagen playing down its Nazi origins, but I certainly don't blame VW owners for furthering Hitler's legacy.
There are times you can make too much of historical correlations (unless you want to sell books to conspiracists!).
Click to expand...
Ferdinand Porsche was tried for war crimes at nuremberg after WW 2 ( but he had been designing tanks as well ! )
 
tuco said:
Ferdinand Porsche was tried for war crimes at nuremberg after WW 2 ( but he had been designing tanks as well ! )
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And Werner Von Braun was never tried, because the Americans wanted to exploit his knowledge of rocket science. I suspect he was more boffin than Nazi though.
The Wiki page has a long list of big-name companies with links to The Holocaust.

Something to reflect on when you're driving your BMW or sipping your Nestlé cocoa!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
 
tuco said:
Ferdinand Porsche was tried for war crimes at nuremberg after WW 2 ( but he had been designing tanks as well ! )
Click to expand...

I feel like a bit of a meanie correcting minor details in this thread. He was never tried at Nuremberg but the French authorities imprisoned him for a while.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
And Werner Von Braun was never tried, because the Americans wanted to exploit his knowledge of rocket science. I suspect he was more boffin than Nazi though.
The Wiki page has a long list of big-name companies with links to The Holocaust.

Something to reflect on when you're driving your BMW or sipping your Nestlé cocoa!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
Click to expand...
There were many collected by the allies in operations paperclip and backfire who were never tried, some really nasty pieces of work got off scott free, I find this very hypocritical . "( sometimes ) I feel guilty for being a member of the human race" ( Jack Kerouac ).
 
Tribble said:
I feel like a bit of a meanie correcting minor details in this thread. He was never tried at Nuremberg but the French authorities imprisoned him for a while.
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Cheers Tribble , I should have checked before posting !
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
And Werner Von Braun was never tried, because the Americans wanted to exploit his knowledge of rocket science. I suspect he was more boffin than Nazi though.
The Wiki page has a long list of big-name companies with links to The Holocaust.

Something to reflect on when you're driving your BMW or sipping your Nestlé cocoa!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
Click to expand...

Sulzer and Barclays bank were a bit surprising. I knew about most of the others. And I do try to avoid them, Nestle for multiple reasons.
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
And Werner Von Braun was never tried, because the Americans wanted to exploit his knowledge of rocket science. I suspect he was more boffin than Nazi though.
The Wiki page has a long list of big-name companies with links to The Holocaust.

Something to reflect on when you're driving your BMW or sipping your Nestlé cocoa!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_companies_involved_in_the_Holocaust
Click to expand...
Hugo Boss's involvement in the Nazi party couldn't have been more enthusiastic if he tried .. I've never liked their aftershave anyway.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hugo_Boss
 
I guess this thread raises the question that, should companies like Volkswagen, BMW, Nestlé, Siemens, Hugo Boss and all the others in the hall of shame be cursed and shunned forever?
Are we, as consumers, being complicit in whitewashing their tarnished legacies by buying their products?
 
blessmycottonsocks said:
I guess this thread raises the question that, should companies like Volkswagen, BMW, Nestlé, Siemens, Hugo Boss and all the others in the hall of shame be cursed and shunned forever?
Are we, as consumers, being complicit in whitewashing their tarnished legacies by buying their products?
Click to expand...
Yes and yes!
 
..
IBM leased these machines for high fees and became the
sole source of the billions of punch cards Hitler needed. ..

I understood that IBM has always been the sole supplier of cards for their machines. That is how the money kept coming in.
 
Mythopoeika said:
Yes and yes!
Click to expand...

Not at all.

It's just part of history. We move on.

How any American companies would need to be blackballed if every one of them who participated in the Hiroshima and Nagasaki (Building the planes, the bombs the support etc) destruction and in the incineration of hundreds of thousands of civilians. ?
 
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