The
global success of the institution of the corporation derives from
power and liability being distinct from membership. In the execution
of its operations and distribution of responsibilities, corporate
policy is the final arbiter. IBM was one of the first transnational
corporations to illustrate how corporate structure, at its very
essence, provides for a universe where the money-line (the bottom
line), with the blessings of policy, takes precedence over all
other considerations. The ability to create policy unaffected
by ethos and ethics is the reason behind and cause of coming into
being of the corporation. 
IBM
and the Holocaust is Edwin Black's shocking 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, from the identification and cataloging programs
of the 1930s to the selections of the 1940s.
IBM,
in providing the Nazis -- in their pursuit of the The Final Solution
for the Jews -- punch card technology was forced to issue statements
that they were controlled by the Third Reich during the war. But
Edwin Black, in IBM and the Holocaust, shows that Thomas
Watson, founder of IBM, had more than a hands-on roll in the extermination
plans of Nazi Germany.
Thanks
to IBM, Hitler was able to automate his persecution of the Jews.
To
watch Edwin Black's astonishing video (6 min.)
Click HERE
(medium) or
HERE
(broadband)
Photos by RICHARD
AICHER
