During World War ii many companies worked for the Third Reich and used slave labor
as it was cheap and the Nazi Party determined who worked where.
American companies Ford and General Motors had extended their businesses all over the world into
a dozen nations and those businesses operated serving both the Allies and the Axis powers.
What were American companies doing working with Hitler and his war machine? How deeply involved
were Ford and the General Motors in Germany's production of war materiel using slave labor?
How did these companies operate producing war material to both the United States its allies
and Nazi Germany? if German companies were punished after the war what about Ford and General Motors?
Hello I'm Colin Heaton former soldier Marine Corps scout sniper history professor historian and
book author and we'll answer these questions and other issues on this segment of Forgotten History.
These post-war punishment and financial penalties have been applied to all the
major German companies such as Volkswagen I.G. Farben BASF Krupp BMW Daimler Benz
the aircraft manufacturers, Siemens and Bosch just to name a few. All of them were on the financial
hook for using slave labor. European industrialists such as Professor Willie Messerschmitt Professor
Ferdinand Porsche as examples were all charged with war crimes for using slave labor
not what they really had a choice in doing but the American companies did. Both Ford and GM had
established their companies in Germany and other nations with GM buying Opel in 1931.
After the war both were subsequently charged with aiding and abetting the holocaust
in essence playing both sides of the war for profit. In Germany General Motors and Ford were
critical in building and maintaining Germany's war machine. Heinrich Himmler ensured that the
Gestapo maintained security at all of the Ford and GM operations as well as German companies for
maximum effectiveness and security. In July 1938 following the German annexation of Austria Henry
Ford accepted the Grand Cross of the German Eagle. This was the highest medal that Nazi Germany could
bestow upon a foreigner and Hitler admired Ford's antisemitic outlook and kept an autographed photo
of Ford which he prized. However, Ford was not alone in receiving accolades as a month later the senior
executive for General Motors in Germany James Mooney also received a medal for his distinguished
service to the Reich. The major portions of their profit was the use of slave labor by the Third
Reich primarily under Reich armaments minister Albert Speer who was in charge of war production.
Ironically one of Henry Ford's stipulations for hiring workers were "no negroes or Jews"; it is the
height of irony that tens of thousands of jews built Ford products for Hitler. GMs plants in
Germany along with the other firms built thousands of jet propulsion systems and vehicle engines as
well as trucks under their brand name Opel started by Franz von Opel which they owned under license.
Ironically during the war GM's American plant simultaneously produced aircraft
engines for the American aviation industry. researcher Bradford Snell stated that quote
"General Motors was far more important to the Nazi war machine than Switzerland
as their banks profited from the deposits of stolen wealth. However, GM like Ford was critical a
critical part of the German war effort and of the 350,000 trucks used by the German Army as of 1942
one third were made by Ford the other third made by GM. In late January of 1942 the Dearborn
headquarters was informed that Ford's operations in France had the highest production level of
all other manufacturers and as summed up by the U.S. Treasury report that they were still
relying upon the French government to preserve the interests of American stockholders. This was
divulged during the war due to secret meetings held in Lisbon Portugal between Robert Schmidt
and Ford executives. Ford's Cologne manufacturing center used slave laborers from 1941 and 1945
mostly from Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union but also, many forced workers from France and Italy.
One large part of this collective Ford and GM operation were the concentration camps primarily
auschwitz the largest camp where arrivals were selected either for labor the gas chamber or in
some cases medical experiments but there was also another category one necessary for the war effort.
According to SS Lieutenant General Karl Wolff quote, "Rudolf HOess the commandant of Auschwitz
had criteria for selection of prisoners those prisoners with any skills such as metalworking
construction any form of engineering electricians mechanics medical training anything that would aid
the war effort were to be sent for labor under Speer," end quote. The Auschwitz records fell into
Soviet hands after they liberated the camp in January of 1945. These files are detailed and
supposedly contain the names of a hundred thousand forced workers located in the Moscow archives.
Ford did admit under oath that its German subsidiary Ford Werke AG used slave labor in the
Cologne plant and was aware of it. Documents show that the parent companies followed a conscious
strategy of continuing to do business with the Nazi regime rather than divest themselves of their
German assets. Less than three weeks after the Nazi occupation of Czechoslovakia in March 1939
General Motors chairman Alfred P. Sloan defended the strategy as sound business practice
given the fact that the company's German operations were quote highly profitable.
The purpose for both companies not closing down was to protect their investments.
Ford and GM decided not to shut down their German factories after the war had been declared as they
still expected their profits from manufacturing claiming they had no right to close down. GM also
had its issues as part of its operations with the development of synthetic fuels which became even
more critical as Germany's access to petroleum slowly crumbled. When the us army liberated the
Ford plants in Cologne and Berlin they discovered the slave laborers and began taking statements.
A U.S. Army report dated September 5th 1945 accused the German branch of Ford of "serving as an arsenal
of Nazism at least for military vehicles with the consent of the parent company in Dearborn Michigan."
Incredibly after the war both GM and Ford demanded reparations from the U.S. Government
for wartime damages sustained by their German facilities as a result of Allied bombing.
In 1967 the Foreign Claims Settlement Commission of the U.S. Congress made
a compensatory award and Ford received a little less than one million dollars
primarily as a result of damages sustained by its military truck factory at Cologne.
Yet at no point during these proceedings was the use of the slave labor force even brought up.
On march 4th 1998 a first of its kind the lawsuit was filed against Ford Motor
Company and subsequently General Motors also found themselves in trouble after Switzerland's largest
banks agreed in August of 1997 to make a 1.25 billion dollar settlement to holocaust survivors
which they had resisted for decades. A precedent was established. Holocaust survivors could be
compensated for pain suffering and loss of material wealth and assets.
The success of Nazi victims and obtaining financial reparations from Swiss banks
which had profited from Nazi wartime deposits shook the financial world. Regarding Ford the
lawsuit claimed that Ford's German plant became an eager aggressive and successful bidder for
forced laborers and that senior Ford executives in Dearborn Michigan were well aware of the fact.
Ford's lawyers argued that the parent company lost control of German operations when the war
broke out and those assets were seized as enemy property but Ford still took the money later.
Ford corrected its initial claim that it did not profit in any way from force to labor but
only after documents surfaced that after the war. Ford received dividends from its German subsidiary
worth approximately sixty thousand dollars for the years 1940 to 1943. Similar arguments applied to
General Motors which was paid 32 million dollars by the U.S. Government for damages sustained
to its German plants even though they made war material for Germany. The treasury department had
investigated Ford in 1942 for possible illegal contracts and contacts with a subsidiary in
occupied France which produced German trucks under their Opel brand using slave labor
along with GM. The investigation ended without charges being filed possibly due to the heavy
U.S. government influence and the fact that Ford was making so much money for the American war
effort along with General Motors. Ford even called the former U.S. Secretary of State
Warren Christopher as a witness to testify that former administrations had upheld the
concept that governments and not courts should decide war reparations. Ford also argued that
the statute of limitations on the victims' claims had expired without providing any legal precedent
but if that were so how could Nazi war criminals still be hunted without any such exploration or
legal restrictions? Making this point was New York University law Professor Bert Neuborne who
represented the slave laborers and their families when he stated quote, "Time can never shield a war
criminal either criminally or civilly," end quote. Famed Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal agreed and said,
the perpetrators of these crimes whether extermination or slave labor have no legal relief
and therefore cannot expect any compassionate forgiveness," end quote. To Ford's credit according
to Simon Reich who compiled Ford's World War II documents he totally disagreed with any comparison
with General Motors. Reich stated quote, "Ford decided to take a very public open and transparent
route. Any serious researcher can go into the Henry Ford Archive and see the documents in paper form
and have them copied; compare and contrast to this with the fact that General Motors conducted a very
private study and had the original hard copy documentation upon which the study was made
and has never been made available and today cannot be copied without General Motors legal
department's permission," end quote. Unlike General Motors to their credit Ford agreed to a 5 billion
dollar settlement and in 2001 added 2 million dollars to compensate victims of slave labor.
It also set aside 4 million dollars for research on human rights and slave labor.
So the connections between American companies and the Third Reich is more transparent than
most believed. We hope you enjoyed this segment of Forgotten History. Please click like and subscribe
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