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Summary: First Rate Research--Even a Widget has its Evil Side
Review: Who would have anticipated that a speedy card-sorter, the Hollerith machine, would evolve into a tool of one of the most evil schemes of all time? Yet, this patented machine, devised by a little-known man of German descent, made it possible to conduct a census in a short time period, and turned counting into a tool useful on a mass scale. Black's book is a page-burner, containing information that will surprise the reader paragraph by paragraph. In my generation, the "Do Not Spindle, Fold, or Mutilate" written on each IBM punchcard was the introduction to the computer and information age (and often the butt of jokes). A scant 25 to 30 years earlier, similar punch cards became the currency on which the Holocaust was based. A truly groundbreaking piece of research that, fortunately, has already appeared in German translation. In the days where vast amounts of personal information are being reduced to a series of ones and zeros carried electronically and stored digitally, this saga may be the harbinger of horrors much worse than were conceived by the progenitors of the 1000-year Reich. We should pay close attention to the uses of such personal information, lest humans lose complete control of their humanity. Here we find a true fable (that's an oxymoron) with much more to teach than Aesop could have imagined.
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Summary: Important Questions Unraised Before Now
Review: This book is the most important new work on the Nazi era in the last two decades. The book is even more significant for the questions it raises about what the purpose of a corporation is and should be, what role companies and governments should play in directing cutting edge technology, and the danger that misuses of advanced information technology bring to individuals.The core of the story is how a key IBM technology, the Hollerith-based card tabulating machines, became available for the Nazi war and Holocaust efforts. Although the details are murky (and may remain so), it is fairly clear that the use of this technology was sustained during the war years in part by shipments of customized (for each end user) tabulating cards from IBM in neutral countries for everything from blitzkriegs to slave camp scheduling to transportation to the death camps. There was not enough paper capacity to make the cards in Europe (that the Nazi and IBM records show were used), and there is no evidence that Nazis created substitutes for these essential supplies. As Mr. Black warns, "This book will be profoundly uncomfortable to read." I agree. My sleep will not be the same for some time after experiencing this powerful story. Mr. Black makes an even stronger statement. "So if you intend to skim, or rely on selected sections, do not read the book at all." I took him at his word, and did not even read the book quickly. I also arranged to read it in several sittings, so I could think about what I had read in between. I recommend that you do the same. The reason for my recommendation is that your thinking will change very fundamentally through reading the book. Having read dozens of books by fine historians about the Nazi period, and knowing a great deal about the history of data processing, I assumed that there would be little new to the story here. But the title intrigued me. By the fourth time I saw the book, I could no longer resist it. What I found inside the book surprised, shocked, and amazed me. First, many authors claim that it was not clear in the United States that Jews were losing their lives in Europe during the Nazi years until just before the end of the war. This book documents many articles that appeared in the New York Times that certainly seemed to be saying that this systematic killing was going on from very near the time when it began. Anyone who ignored these reports just didn't want to know. Second, the book makes many connections between Thomas Watson, Sr. and Nazi Germany. Many things surprised me about this. One, he was there once or twice a year until just before World War II began. The horrible human abuses were probably observed first hand by him then. Two, he had friends who were victimized by the Nazis. Three, he accepted a very prestigious medal from Hitler in 1937 (which he returned in June 1940). Four, he spoke in favor of making U.S. policy pro-German until just before the United States entered World War II. Five, it appeared that he had a lot more concern about IBM's profits and machines in Europe than about any people there. Third, although I was very familiar with the improvements in industrial and transportation effectiveness in Germany during the Nazi years, I did not realize that IBM's design of Hollerith machines for card tabulation was a breakthrough technology that enabled this progress. Fourth, I had always been amazed that the Nazis had such detailed records of the geneologies of European Jews. What I did not realize was that much of this information was provided by Jewish citizens in government censuses, and was quickly processed into records used by oppressors on Hollerith machines leased from IBM or its subsidiaries. In France, where the use of these machines was subverted by the Resistance, the percentage rate of Jewish deaths was one-third of what occurred in Holland where this technology was well applied. It is hard to avoid the feeling that millions of people died because these machines were available and kept supplied with parts and punch cards for the Nazis. One cannot help but draw the comparison between this historical example and the companies and countries (including, apparently, the United States) that have more recently allowed critical nuclear, rocket, and satellite technology to become available to repressive regimes. It seems that by not asking questions about IBM and the Holocaust, we may be continuing to make many of the same mistakes today. I salute the incredible imagination and back-breaking effort that went into assembling this astonishing set of documents and perspectives. I hope that many people will read the book, that scholars will look for more information to expand our understanding, and that the fundamental questions raised by this book will be debated wherever free people live. Remember: Your freedom is only as good as that of the least free person, who is most vulnerable. "Ask not for whom the bell tolls. It tolls for thee."
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Summary: A Sober, Courageous Look at IBM's Sordid WW II Past
Review: To what end should profit be more important than morality? This is the main question readers should ask after reading Edwin Black's thoughtful, thorough look at IBM's economic history with Nazi Germany before - and especially, during - World War II. Although Black is not the most lyrical of writers, he does make a very persuasive case for IBM's primary role in mechanizing Hitler's Holocaust agains the Jews, Gypsies and other racial, religious and sexual minorities in Nazi-occupied Europe. One important unanswered question from World War II has been the extent of IBM's involvement in Nazi genocide; judging from Black's evidence that involvement was substantial, to say the least. Indeed, it is Black's premise that IBM's counting machines made it possible for Germany to perfect the crime of genocide as a mere matter of industrial mechanization. Black shows how IBM's Hollerith counting machines were used to identify, round up, and then deport hundreds of thousands of Jews from Poland to Holland into the Nazi regime's nightmarish network of labor and death camps. Black's book is also a fascinating look into corporate politics. One wonders how much IBM's New York office knew of its German affiliate's activities. Without gaining access to IBM's archives, Black shows that IBM was aware and choose not to know, concerning itself only with the profits earned by Dehomag, its German affiliate, throughout Nazi-occupied Europe.
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Summary: An interesting reading, although not a history book
Review: The author sustains a thesis: IBM, which according to the author was the most powerful American corporation during the time in which the action is set, stipulated an unwritten "strategic alliance" with Hitler's Nazi Germany. The book starts with a panoramic and synthetic view of IBM's history starting from the invention of an automatic tabulating machine by Mr. Hollerith, an engineer working for the U.S. census Bureau. Then the narration focus on the IBM German subsidiary Dehomag and on its business relationship with its most important customer: the German state. The facts, about co-operation between Dehomag and the Nazi Government, are reported from the population census ordered in 1933 to the end of the third Reich in 1945. There is then a last part about how the Allied Force and in particular the American Army disposed of special units in charge of the recovery of the Hollerith Machines during the liberation of German occupied territories. While writing about Dehomag history, the author also writes about the history of the persecution, ghettizazion and extermination of European Jews. There are many facts reported and some parts of the research are very well done but, in my opinion, this book cannot be regarded as a History research written by a scholar for the following reasons: 1) A strong position against IBM is sustained since the beginning of the book. For instance, the author reports that Hollerith invented and used an electrical device to keep rats of his yard. 2) Facts are presented in order to prove the author's thesis. It is like attending a trial with no lawyer present, but only the representative of the people. 3) Rudimental Hollerith machines are presented as powerful modern computers. No details are reported about how they worked and why could they be so helpful for the Nazi in organising the mass deportation. The author keeps saying that the SS knew the names of the Jews. However, as he reports they knew the names because they filled paper forms with the information about religion and tracked the so-called "racial Jews" going through the church records of conversions to the Christian religion. I think they had the names because they frantically looked for them. How Hollerith machines helped to speed the process, in my opinion, is not well explained. 4) Many times, it seems to read two different books: one about IBM financial operation and business history and the other about Holocaust with few or no connections about the two plots. Besides these partial presentation of facts I think this book is worthy to be read because it underlines how interests of an international company might be significantly different from the interests of its country of origin. It also shows very clearly many problems generated by World War II to IBM which had, as any other international company, to defend its own business through a deep reorganisation.
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Summary: Utterly spectacular tale of IBM evil
Review: This is the first book I've read on the Holocaust and I'm glad I selected it. The ruthless greed -detailed by footnote after footnote- of IBM is a cold and shocking juxtaposition to even more grotesque actions taken by the Germans. There is no way a person can read this book and not be awed by its power and authority. Nothing, not one claim, is made in this book without substantiation. IBM didn't just supply the equipment needed to process the holocaust, they were right there in their expensive suits asking, "So do you want the punch card to read filthy Jew or skanky Jew?" Personally, I hope this book leads to an endless string of fabulously expensive law suits for this gigantic company which so clearly does not deserve to exist. I don't care how long ago the holocaust happened in "MTV years" it wasn't that long ago in spreadsheet years and IBM should be held accountable for their evil. And to those who clearly have not read this book and say, "You can't blame corporations for what the Germans did..." I say, read the book and then see if you still feel that way.
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Summary: Gripping, Chilling Documentation IBM Complicity
Review: I am astonished that Holocaust research has advanced so far and no one has yet detailed or even mentioned the involvement of IBM in organizing the Holocaust--from identification to extermination, 1933 to 1945. Not until IBM and the Holocaust. Author Edwin Black has produced a powerful, gripping, chilling and magnificently documented volume. The correspondance of IBM officials juxtaposed against NYT headlines offers a horrid insight into their mindsets as they were designing applications to further oppress the Jews and help Hitler conquer Europe. The author's website is filled with worldwide praise for this work, and yet it stands alone. I can find no other follow-up volumes to this excellent book. ... I cannot recommend enough this important achievement. --This text refers to the Paperback edition
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Summary: Makes me UNproud to be former IBM employee
Review: The book is very well written and the author obviously did his homework. I think it is a bit wordy and describes events and conversations contributing little to the overall story.
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Summary: Not the WHOLE Truth,
Review: The bottom line here is simple. After reading this book, I will never purchase or have any part of an IBM product. This book is not the best I have ever read. The author tends to lose the readers in the details of IBM's involvement with the Third Reich. This book could have been 100 pages shorter and still have been just as effective. The lengthy explanations about the number of manufacturing facilities and the number of punch cards produced and where they were sent were boring. However, the existence of these explanations is used as evidence in an attempt to prove without a doubt that IBM, an American company, knowingly contributed the machinery and manpower that organized and mobilized Germany's blitzkrieg. Other than the lengthy asides, there was one thing that really bugged me about this book. The author is the son of Polish survivors of the Holocaust and the first critic on the back flap to heap praise upon the book is from the American Jewish Historical Society. The facts about the atrocities of the Holocaust are cut and dry, Germany killed 6 million Jews. But, the fact that the author is the son of concentration camp survivors makes me think that it would be difficult to write an objective account of IBM's relations with Germany. There is plenty of evidence to support Black's claim, but I am not positive we are getting the whole story. I liked this book very much, and I would recommend reading it. However, I would tell anyone who is going to read this to keep in mind that there are 2 sides to every story. I am not ready to call for the end of IBM, but I am finished supporting their products.
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Summary: IBM Should Come Clean
Review: Edwin Black's book has unveiled a whole new understanding of the Holocaust era. I was alternately driven to rage, tears and appreciation as I read his book. If Edwin Black's masterpiece has given us this much without IBM's cooperation, imagine how much more the world could learn if IBM came clean and opened all its files as the author urges.
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Summary: IBM and the Holocaust
Review: This book is one of the most interesting factual books I have ever read. It is worth the read, but not for the assumptions made in it, to say that IBM can be held as a responsible party for the mass executions is not a fair accusation. However, it has raised many questions in my mind, about the involvment of IBM in Nazi Germany. I'm sure this is raising some questions at IBM also. It seems unthinkable that corporate America could have been invovled in this genocide, but Edwin Black brings it to life. He has brought the Holocaust closer to home than any historian or history book ever has or ever will.
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