IBM and the Holocaust

IBM and the Holocaust: The Strategic Alliance Between Nazi Germany and America's Most Powerful Corporation, Expanded Edition, by Edwin Black, Dialog Press, 2012. 

German Subsidiary

IBM had a German subsidiary in the years leading up to World War II. At that time, IBM was not an electronic computer company, but rather a manufacturer of mechanical machines for processing Hollerith paper cards. IBM manufactured various types of Hollerith machines: punchers, sorters, proofers, verifiers, tabulators, alphabetizers, multipliers, and printers. 

Leading up to and during the Second World War, a German national, Willy Heidenger, managed the IBM German subsidiary, Dehomag. IBM provided its German subsidiary with supplies, such as Hollerith cards, and technical assistance.

Concealment

IBM concealed the fact that it owned Dehomag 100%, and tried to make it appear to be an independent German company. However, even during World War II, IBM continued to closely manage its German subsidiary. In fact, Thomas Watson micromanaged Dehomag until the summer of 1940. IBM also had subsidiaries in Denmark, Belgium, Holland, Switzerland. 

A Medal for Thomas Watson

In 1937 at the International Chamber of Commerce Congress in Berlin, the president of IBM, Thomas Watson, received a medal, the Merit Cross of the German Eagle with Star, from Adolph Hitler. Watson did not criticize Nazi Germany. Eventually, when America entered the war, Watson was forced to return the medal Hitler gave him. But IBM did not divest itself of the German subsidiary. 

Reich Statistical Office

The Reich Statistical Office managed the Hollerith machines and cards. IBM Hollerith machines contributed to the general war effort, tracking railroad timetables and shipping, horses, mules, census, slave labor brigades, German troop movements, and coal shipments. 

Keeping Track of the Jews

The Nazis also used the IBM machines to identify the Jews of Germany, Austria, Poland. Nazis used them to track the bloodlines of Jews, so they could identify not only practicing Jews, but also racial Jews, going back to great grandparents. The Reich Committee for the Protection of German Blood identified which Germans were practicing Jews or who had Jewish ancestors. When tracing Jewish family trees, the Nazis identified even 1/8 and 1/16 Jews, not just observant Jews. Jews were deprived of their German citizenship.