There was a book on IBM and their business with Nazi era Germany. At the time they made 'tabulation machines' a precursor to electronic computers. They were used to collect information on citizens, including if Jewish, to be used in their repression and mass murder.
As an Englishman it is very easy to be ignorant. "Britain stood alone, Churchill, Spitfire, Monty, D-Day Hooray!" However once you scratch the surface it is very muddy. I worked with a lot of Dutch guys over the years (I am at sea in the Dredging industry) and one old Dutch Captain told me that to this day the older generation know which family collaborated, which resisted, who stayed quiet. etc etc. The luxury of not having been occupied, of never having to have to make those choices is a major part in the British mindset being incompatible with the European mindset and more akin to the Americans who have also never been invaded (and unless Canada gets drunk one night and fancies it's chances it probably won't). Long post short: WW2 is complicated. EVERYTHING that happened in the world from 1933 onwards has to be viewed through the telescope of WW2. Great video and well explained.
Britain was invaded in 1066 by a guy from Normandy.. His invasion removed the last British Royal Family from The Throne and we have had invaders ever since. Now we have krauts on the throne still.. Study your History and stop being ignorant
Yeah Britain did not stand alone, they had a lot of help. Lots of American tanks and planes, food and supplies well before the US was officially involved in the war.
No more brother wars. Patton tried to tell us we fought the wrong enemy. And now Weimar conditions are global. But hey, gotta fight for "our greatest ally" and believe any stories they concoct." The winners write the history books" and " to know who rules you, simply find out who you aren't allowed to criticize. "
Even the American soft drink manufacturer Coca-Cola was accused of helping the Germans during that time. Despite the turmoil and the controversy, Germany was able to invent a new soda, Fanta, using the "leftovers of the leftovers" during that time, since the German Coca-Cola bottler ran out of syrup to bottle more Coca-Cola...
Great research. It's never too late to remember history and the fact that multinational corporations are focused on profit over morality regardless of "left or right" rhetoric. Virtue signaling, as war, never changes.
His research left out the main issue, Espionage... That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war... For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers: That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks, Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc., How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism, Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich, Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc... Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over... Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents... While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
@petewood2350 Ford made a huge profit, very little of which cane from Germany. He was a key figure in the enormous industrial growth of the United States. No man contributed more in creating the industrial base of the Arsenal of Democracy than Ford.
American Henty Ford' assembly-line technology actually "built the Nazi War Machine". Post war, Henty Fird was re-embursed gor losses of his German war production assets !!! 😱😲🙀
Don't forget about IBM. Without their computers the Germans could never have implemented their final solution so effectively. After the war IVM sued, and won, royalties for use of that equipment
@@ryanflecke2627don't forget the hole in the wall that they were made to stick a wire into, which bent back and poked them in the eye through another hole, literally just ripped off from Looney Tunes cartoons.
Notice how comments about the actual numbers and the physics behind the heat of enthalpy evaporation and the amount of heat energy contained in the amount of coal coke that was brought in just vanish. Even if enough Coke was available by rail, which it was proven there wasn't, the heat of enthalpy of the amount of moisture in a climbed figures violates laws of physics and thermodynamics.
Ford: "Yes, we did help build vehicles for the Germans, but all those vehicles are fitted with Powershift transmissions so the vehicles didn't work anyway."
There WERE actually dual-clutch designs proposed in the 1930s; they never made it out of the testing state; for reasons that now, with the dubious introduction of the Powershift, are all too apparent.
@@selfdo I have no doubt that's true; from what I recall the German streamliners were hitting 400km/h on the then-new Autobahn back in the 1930's as well.
American industries were nationalized by Germany, and managed by Germans for the duration. Prior to that, the US was neutral, and had no reason to stop manufacturing in Germany. Sweden and Switzerland continued to do business throughout the conflict.
As an American whose mother was a refugee in Germany during / after the war, and whose family tree was drastically trimmed in two world wars, you have really nailed it with this one. As we watch the current state of politics, and the current crop of corporations manouvering for power and distracting the average person with "technology" and "environmental sustainability" ect...... It really is the same old story, over and over....
The *real* distraction is "flooding the zone" with paranoia and outright lies about immigrants, the "woke menace," gays "grooming" our kids, etc., while right-wing *multi-* billionaires(!) buy up the country (and politicians) to run the place by and for themselves
@Zenny_6969 This video sheds little light and contains major problems --primarily perpetuating Marxist nonsense and carefully avoiding important facts.
@@Zenny_6969 Here are some major comments I directed at the producer. A very poor presentation of this topic, simply choosing a few facts like Henry Ford's anti-Semitism and ignoring a whole host of facts that do not paint American companies in the dark picture you want to paint. 1. First of all your central point that war is good for business is nonsense. And you even admit that apparently without knowing it when you point out that many American businesses did not want to shift from normal production to war production. 2. You go on and on about Henry Ford, but not a word about his son Edsel who upon taking control of Ford turned it into an arms-producing dynamo. Not a word for example about Willow Run. 3. You do not mention the Chairman of GM who became the central figure in the Arsenal of Democracy--Bill Knudsen. 4. And you do not mention the countless businessmen like Henry Kaiser who played key roles in winning the War. 5. You do not mention that the NAZIs essentially took over all major corporations in Germany. All corporations had to cooperate with the NAZIs. Any industrialist who did not cooperate lost his company if not his life. I suggest you read about airplane magnate Hugo Junkers. 6. The work on synthetic fuel was all done well before the War, most before Hitler took power. 7. We now know that the NAZIs were the embodiments of evil. But most of their most heinous crimes, occurred after Hitler started the War. And what you are describing occurred before the War. To most Americans, the Concentrations Camps came as a great surprise at the end of the War. Now the behavior of Henry Ford and Ford and GM executives in Germany deserves to be criticized. But this program is a dishonest, thinly veiled hit piece without any attempt at honestly presenting all the facts.
Yup, the Americans 1936 ford truck was the basic ford model the germans used as well, complete with flathead V8... The opel used an older GM designed White six, often mistaken for the chevy stovebolt 6 ... White had been one of the companies aquired by gm in their formation, but was dropped, so, america had no use for the old White 6 tooling, and it wound up in Europe. The British bren gun carrier/ universal carrier also had a ford flathead v8, albeit in the smaller european displacement.
@@HarborLockRoad It is interesting. Hitler was torn between admiring Ford and assembly-line mass production and German fine craftsmanship. He wanted an affordable people's car, but upon seizing power made no effort to convert the German arms industry from craft shops to assembly line production., In fact, he gave the job of running the economy to Goering who made no effort to introduce efficiency in production methods. This would have a major impact on the outcome of the War.
@@HarborLockRoad The British carrier engine was design modified and made at the Dagenham (East London) Ford factory. If you take an American design, modify it for British use and then make it in Britain, does it stay 'American' or become 'British'? Just askin' - and thinking of the very many British wartime designs which somehow became WW2 American by virtue of this odd IP transfer mechanism.
@@HarborLockRoad I've seen a Universal Carrier in the flesh, in the scrap pile of a Hawk missile base. The flathead V8 looks like nothing else. My Father drove one in 1946 in the Danish army.
Such actions actually date back to the time of the Medici banking family. The Medici banking institutions were funding both sides of wars in Europe by the 15th Century.
In some ways maybe your best video so far! I‘m from Germany and I can tell you almost nobody in here knows about this. And if you try to tell them that history sometimes is a little bit more complex than the stuff you learn at school, they simply get angry. But they don‘t want to hear about these facts. Even my history teacher back in the good ol‘ high school days denied it very emotionaly. So thank you very much!
@markusrieder8186 The problem is that this video is very misleading, carefully selecting a few facts to paint an essentially false picture. Do you know about Hugo Junkers?. What do you think would have happened to any corporate executive that refuses NAZI orders?. You may know about Henry Ford. Do you know about Edsel Ford or GM's Bill Knudsen? Any video on this subject without mentioning them is dishonest. When you said that history is complex, you are correct. But this video is hardly complex it simplifies history by only telling one side of the story.
Reminds me of a line from an "X-Files" episode where a character is speculating the US government deliberately invented a "flying saucer" hoax to distract people from the the government's true intentions: "The business of America isn't business - the business of America is war." Probably the series' most truthful statement in its entire run.
@@johnking6252 building 2 lake steamboat's in 1890-1920 and later converted to flat-top's ( for WW2 probably because WW1 was over by then and or it took to long to building them ect ) showed that elites USA 🇺🇸 was interested in war and covertly-training even before it was official declared war as the passengers side was a cover for it and a racketeering scam and the banking side was worse 5X normal going/buying rates for a ship or WW1 a 9inch~ wrenches 🔧 and nut's being made for water-dam power plants that didn't exist or only needed 2 at most for repairs
Brown Brothers Harriman, Prescott Bush-chief executive of the Union Banking Corporation, and John J. McCloy chief executive the the Rockefeller owned Chase Bank all financed Hitler's rise to power. Ford Motor manufactured engines for Nazi army trucks and jeeps. Former U.S. banker executive George Herbert Walker was in charge of the building of Auscwhitz. Averal Harriman was in charge of the construction of the railway line to Auscwhitz that carried Jews to this concentration camp. Rockefeller's Standard Oil manufactured and sold to the Nazi air force a compound --tetra lead which was needed for airplane fuel. For more info on this Google 'FROM JFK TO 9/11--EVERYTHING IS A RICH MAN'S TRICK.'
Great video thanks ! My late father was in the British Army REME during WWII, working on Tank recovery. His baby was a British built Scammel tractor unit.
@shaunw9270 What is great about a video lacking all basic historical standards? I might point out that Lend Lease production from companies like Ford and GM played a central role in saving Britain from the NAZIs. 1
Great report. This will sound like a conspiracy theory - but it's not. Ford had - and has - a huge truck plant in Cologne, Germany . It's just north of the city, on the Rhine River. Cologne was about as destroyed as any city in WW-2, with 1,000 plane raids starting in 1942. When the Americans arrived in early 1945, the Ford plant was still producing trucks - and kept going. It was the easiest target to find - but was left untouched while the old city was flattened.
@jim7544 report is about as accurate as your post. Cologne as the first thousand bomber raid. British Bomber Command was using the tactic of area bombing. No one factory was targeted. The target was the entire city. A single factory could not be saved even if the British had wanted to. Now certain factories or other land marks may have survived, but it was not because the Brutish avoided hitting them.
I COULD say this was because the Ford plant was so well defended by Boing Bo-190 fighters of the Luftwaffe ... But I don't. Although Boing with its massive shares in Focke-Wulf did benefit on both sides as well. AFAIK, the Daimler-Benz main facility in Cannstatt was never hit seriously either. Not because they didn't go for it; but because DB had built a decoy facility a few miles away. In case of an alarm, the real thing was hidden underneath an artificial smoke screen - like most if not all critical facilities. Impossible to find at night and veeeeery difficult at daylight. As the gentleman above me said: if they really wanted to hit a factory, they could do so as proven with Philips in Eindhoven. Low level, fast light bombers at daylight. Or the dam busters raid. At night. With 4-engined bombers. Low. Without terrain-following radar. These boys had some balls. Standard Oil traded with IG Farben: fuel additives for high octane fuel in exchange for the licence to produce synthetic rubber. Unlike mentioned in the video, Germany was well leading in terms of synthetic fuel technology but lacked some critical additives. Standard Oil was also RUMORED to have supplied German U-boats with fuel via their Central and South American "activities" in neutral countries as late as 1943. It's not too far fetched to say that without US "investment" and Russian raw materials Germany would have been in a significantly worse position to start a war.
Ive heard old Henry told the American government that if one bomb fell on the ford factories overseas, all domestic war production would cease immediately.
@@kratzikatz1 You should read more than the first sentence ... Boeing had massive shares in F-W. While they delivered the aircraft to bomb Germany (actually Ford produced most of them), they also sold the fighters to the other side, namely the Fw-190. Was it really that hard to understand ?
Ed, I'm fairly sure that the person in the photo shown at 12:22 with the speech bubble, "So 20/80?" is British PM Neville Chamberlain, possibly taken around the 'Peace in Our Time' speech. Just wondering why you've included it.
The Greed of a few Americans helped provide the needed Espionage to win the war for the Allied Powers: That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war... For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers: That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks, Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc., How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism, Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich, Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc... Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over... Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents... While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
Well done! For further reading, I recommend General Smedley Butler's book, "War Is A Racket." It's a convenient, short read. It's also available on audio. 'Runs about one hour.
Classic & should be mandatory reading. But you know as well as I, THAT will never happen. Not in America as it is now/ and how it will end up. Words Mr. Wordsworth. Just Words.
Top shelf video Ed!!! I did a presentation about this exact topic back at high school in the 1990s and it went down like a lead balloon loaded with lard. The other kids in class could not believe that Holden was run by an American company let alone GM and Ford made some 'dodgy deals' with the bad guys in WW2, LOLs i got a major smack down from the teacher as well. i should send them this link so they can revise my report card. Cheers from Melbourne!!!
The main issue was, Espionage: That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war... For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers: That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks, Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc., How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism, Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich, Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc... Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over... Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents... While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
Ah, the beginning of the modern military industrial (and political) complex. Who cares about lives and pacific solution of conflicts when there are billions and billions of dollars to be won. Very interesting topic. Best wishes.
@ajax700 The profit motive is not as appealing a narrative as the socialist story, but only capitalism actually works. The only prosperous countries in this world are countries with core capitalist economies.
You are forgetting about the most important thing that helped the Allied Powers win the war against the Fascists, Espionage: That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war... For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers: That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks, Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc., How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism, Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich, Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc... Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over... Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents... While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
@@dennisweidner288 The Soviet's had a weird form of Capitalism in their Totalitarian Government. Their exploitation of their own workers clearly showed it....
@@davidhollenshead4892 The central mechanism in a capitalist country is the profit mechanism for value discovery. I do not see how Siviet Labor policies were any form of capitalism.
@@dennisweidner288 I wasn't "attacking" capitalism, but mostly USA military industrial (and political) complex. Since you expand the the discussion to things I didn't mean, most *_"core capitalist economies"_* countries also have the worst numbers for depression, anxiety and mental health issues... so? I agree socialist countries were a mess. Best wishes.
"War is a business"... Would that mean that those who take advantage from that situation possibly create the problem that lead to war? in Europe for instance?
@georgesapadbol2776 Nonsense. American corporations had nothing to do with the War, just as they have nothing to do with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Misleading presentations like this leads to ridiculous ideas.
Just like President Truman said, "maybe it's better if neither Germany or Soviets win." He wanted to play both sides until they were both destroyed. Pretty good idea.
Ed I must tell you initially I was very irritated and skeptical about your report. However, I started fact-checking some of your points and found out that you were absolutely correct! Finally thank you for this post, It was very enlightening and accurate.
You'd never heard that America funded Germany before WW2?! Try looking into the gas pipeline and see that it wasn't Pootin. Or you could just wait 50 years then act surprised.
@@joaocosta3374 I have read two of his books. Only they are not all of what I have read. The historical record shows very clearly the enormous role American industry played in destroying NAZI Germany. As for Sutton, he is on much firmer ground when he talks about the Soviets than the NAZIs. The Soviets were actually influenced by the Americans and adopted mass production techniques. One reason they outproduced the NAZIs in areas like tank production, even though they had a smaller industrial base. The Germans for the most part rejected American assembly line and mass production techniques. The American companies went into the Soviet Union knowing about the regime. The American investments in Germany occurred years before the NAZIs took power. Did you expect Ford and GM to dismantle and move their plants out of Germany after 1933? Actually, the American companies that can be criticized most accurately were Hollywood film companies.
Oh yes. And it goes way deeper, with characters involved you never would have thought would do such things. Now all friends and business associates. But that is more for the late 40's and the 50's & 60's. Today is a different arrangement to conduct business. NEVER forget the Bankers who loaned out the currency for all this mayhem. Bullets Bombs & Banks (Gerald Celente). The truth shall set you free. If you've a mind to be in that mood of thought. Most are not. And that's OK too. You cannot change history.
Butler, Smedly: "War is a racket", 1935, 36 p. This treatise was written between the two world wars by a former general. Everyone thinking about joining a service should read it.
@@ralfrufus6573two time MoH Marine Maj.Gen. Smedley Butler ,he helped America colonize, everywhere from the “Boxer” Rebellion, to the Philippines to the creation of the “Banana Republic “ (So. American countries controlled by “Chiqiota Banana “ and her associates) and how businesses used the Military. A Quaker and a Republican who thwarted a coupd’etat Against FDR , when a group of “Industrialists” (some of the same shady caricatures here ) tried to enlist him into leading a group of veterans in an attempt to overthrow the Constitution,and FDR’s administration . He went straight to DoJ and to FDR , who allowed it to pass , confident,knowing that the Constitution was safe and in good hands with men like Gen. Smedley-Butler USMC . A REAL AMERICAN HERO who few people know about.
People shocked by this retrospective on history don't really get how geopolitics works. Countries don't have friends, they have interests....same with companies. We have corporations in the west deeply invested in Russia. Russia does a bad thing, some pull out, some dont. Russia moved and suddenly, some corporations find themselves on the "wrong" side.
Some people may not like this video from the land of the free. Rugged individualism, look after number one & anyone can make it feeds this narrative. Not team players and unreliable allies.
@@sexyshadowcat7 It is possible to hear a less than flattering fact about your country without getting overly sensitive and crying about whataboutism. Sometimes taking it on the chin and seeing a way of building on it to be better is a more positive way forward. Or just be a salty snowflake, everyone can choose their own way.
@douglasladowski6342 This video is as honest and objective as Mein Kampf. If you cherry pick facts and leave out any fact that challenges your narrative, you can prove anything. This is basically how Goebbels presented issues to the German people.
This is perhaps your most important video!! Over the years, various Hollywood film directors have longed to make a movie on this very topic, but can't get it funded. I wonder why?
Ed, as others have said, this was a very unconformable video to sit through and I'm not even American. Besides thanking you for teaching me about an important topic that I've never heard of before, I also want to commend you for the ending. As a Dutch man I imagine that you feel a lot more strongly about the Second World War than a guy like me living in Canada. The fact you were able to put those emotions aside and stay objective says a lot about your character. Thank you.
I'm a little surprised you didn't mention that Ford Germany wasn't allowed to use the brand name after the war until the late 60s. Else, again an informative video, thanks!
@@jkb2016Taunus was just a model name used by Ford-Werke since 1939. German Ford models of the era were generally named after german regions (Ford Rheinland), mountain ranges (Ford Eifel, Ford Taunus) or cities (Ford Köln), with the Taunus being the then newest one at the start of the war. Once they restarted production in 1948 the name simply stuck. It does get a bit confusing in the late 1950s when the Taunus name branched out into two different models, the smaller 12M/15M and the larger 17M/20M, but these were all generally marketed as Fords. What is true is that Ford was barred by the Nazis from using the Ford logo on their products, which they only started reintroducing in the mid 1960s, at least thats how I understand the history
@@jkb2016 I've been digging through a number of contemporary Ford print advertisements (1950s-60s) and these generally seem to feature the Ford name quite prominently, something along the lines of "Taunus 17M by FORD", so they obviously had no problem with promoting the fact that these were indeed Ford products. Even though the cars themselves never featured any external Ford badging until the mid 60s.
My Great- grandfather was part of the U.S. occupation of Japan after WWll. While sorting through one of the largest military vehicle factories, him and the other G.I.'s were pretty ticked off to see all the General Motors build plates on the production machinery.
American machinery was very common, and the first 5-year plans of the ussr also involved US machinery. Those same models might have also made the barbed wires around the gulags and concentration camps. Even then, pre-war Japan made 25,000 cars a year, so they weren't really up to much on that front.
@markbergthold6181 Good example of how misleading this video is. In fact the NAZI Party took control of EVERY corporation in Germany. Owners were allowed to manage them but only id they complied with NAZI instructions. I suggest you read about what happened to Hugo Junkers and his aircraft company when he refused One of the many facts conveniently left out of this video because it does not comport with the narrative that the producer wants to paint.
I'm surprised you didn't mention the Ford Willow Run plant which turned out more than 6,700 B-24 Liberators, as well as North American Aviation and Allison Engine Company both being divisions of GM, who themselves produced Grumman airplanes for the Navy under license.
It wasn't a war history, it was about American companies in Germany, before and during WW2. Everyone knows what they were doing here in the States. Although, in your defense, I didn't know about GM's involvement in North American Aviation. 😊
Its almost like ideologies are there to make money, and people are disposable... Dont buy into anyone saying you need to fight for this or that. What theyre wanting is for you to work for them .
I would go back to fight and die to protect the ROK. The Republic of Korea is the *greatest success story* of American foreign policy, aid, and became my spiritual home. If one can’t understand this, let’s just say that Koreans are like Texans, only more so! I was born in NY, lived in CA, HI, Japan, MN, and TX, but will be buried in the ROK.
scottlewis6644 I am not sure about good or bad, but he is no historian. He leaves out ALL pertinent details not in conformity with the picture he wants to paint. And what he does present is misleading.
When I worked for Ford in Cologne, the locals said that at the end of the war the only things left standing were the Dom and the Ford plant. They did not think this was by chance.
@@strayling1 The musings of Germans don't really bother me. But I see so much woke misinformation about American history that does bother me. And this video is a good example. Now like any country, there are aspects of American history that should be criticised, but this should be done honestly and this this video is a good example of dishonest history. It is about as objective as Mein Kampf.
Thank you for broaching this topic. Over the year's I have read a small number of articles on this, yet have seen those articles not gain any traction, and most of them just quietly disappear. I think it is important to expose the true nature of war in all its ugliness.
What - and make the students feel bad about themselves, or teach them anything acknowledging this country's baked-in racism? We don't want our kids indoctrinated! (Any other way than what we tell them...) now repeat after me: WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA...
GM's Fisher body division wasted a bunch of time and money developing their p75 eagle fighter, which didn't out perform other fighters in production but supposedly was actually to avoid the strain of having to produce the b29.
In 1920s lots of American company, including Ford, took heavy investment in the industrialization of Soviet Union thanks to the extensive deals they made with the Soviet government under the permission of Stalin. Gaz AA, a humble mid-sized truck, was basically a rebadged Ford AA truck.And Gaz A, a little passenger car manufactured for the Soviet officers and commissars , was just a licensed Ford model A. They didn't care much about whether their business partners were their allies or enemies , as long as they can make a fortune from the deals.
Yup! Ford was everywhere in Europe at that time, had factories in Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod, in Bucharest, Romania, in Greece, in France and in the UK not just Germany.
@mariusallentius4583 I am not sure they made a fortune, but they did make a profit. What you say is true. But the atrocities of the Stalinist regime were not fully understood at the time. How is that different than Tesla, Apple, and other corporations doing business in China today. Actually we know more about China's barbarities today than was known about Stalin at the time.
@@dennisweidner288 Basically, the Soviet regime was some kind of isolated economically and politically by the western countries like the UK and,of course, the USA due to the incompatibly ideological conflict between the communism and the capitalism, even the atrocities done by this regime was rarely known at that period of time.And investment for the industrialization of the USSR coming from America surely laid the foundation for its automobile and later its tank industry, GAZ, ZIL, for example. Then surely international corporation care nothing about their business partners as long as they make a profit from the contracts even they are technically the enemies. It's all about making money and for now no one can make a change.
@@mariusallentius4583 The isolation of the Soviet Union was not all the doing of the West. The Bolsheviks and Stalin pursued a policy of isolation and autarky. Much of what you say is true. As to your claim that international corporations care nothing about their partners. That is often the case, but not always. Look at all the corporations that walked away from multi-billion dollar investments in Russia after Putin invaded Ukraine.
I was going into cold turkey waiting for another video from you. Thanks, Ed and also for tackling something decidedly less fluffy car vids usually are about.
Retired General Smedley Butler was a three time winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor when he wrote “War Us A Racket” detailing the companies and the amounts of money they made off WWI. Congress responded by creating the Nye Commission to investigate which was disbanded in 1939 when we were tooling up for WWII. Eisenhower, in 1961, gave a speech warning us of the military industrial establishment in America, which obviously had no effect at all. War and war machinery are big business. I suppose it’s better to join them rather than fight them through investments. They will never go away.
I always enjoy your channel but this one was able to show the shady and yes even evil practices of all companies. During the Second World War all kinds of companies made money but nobody back then that they would be found out. Ed this was a very good episode.
I had a friend, a WWII veteran who was taken prisoner in the Market Garden debacle. He says he was hauled off after being captured in a brand-new Ford truck.
17:05 Standing behind General Guisan is man with an early Luger holster. Made before they decided to include a magazine pouch, so it was added onto the flap instead of the side.
@@dennisweidner288 Oh, and your spillage under every post is HONEST, is it?! Every single comment you made is wrong, I know because I've lived through it. You are a propagandist. An information terrorist. Probably NAFO pose as well. Get lost from this plane of existence!
War indeed is a business. Even today, after nearly two years of the Russo-Ukrainian War going on and many many countries around the world pledging their support to Ukraine, numerous investigations still find out that Russia keeps importing western-made tech and multi-purpose microchips as they did before the war if not in even bigger numbers. Anyways, great work as always, Ed. Appreciate the effort and research you put in every video! 👍
That war started 10 years ago, not 2. Are you not aware that the pipeline was blown up by Ukraine? Do you actually believe the mainstream media and American military?
A nice look into the situation. I remeber talking with people regarding this history & being ignored. Plus NG also tested half tracks in Canada in the forestry industry, In the mid 30s.
To quote Dr Pangloss in Bernstein’s operetta “Candide”: Though war may seem a bloody curse It is a blessing in reverse when cannon roar both rich and poor by danger are united! (Till every wrong is righted!)
The other thing we have to keep in mind is that during the war, while companies were not specifically under pressure from Germany, they were pressured and in some cases ORDERED by the goverment to shift production from domestic product (cars for the American people) to war production efforts, so in effect, were participating in the war, but that their hands were tied in some cases, so that claim is partially true I believe (at least when it came to GM itself and the American side of things... this is not to say that they necessarily were in thesame "boat" so to speak for the GM owned companies overseas, although some were possibly also shifted from car production to war time production as well under their respective countries, to which the US government may or may not have had full say in what went on).
Good morning, This was very interesting and a nice surprise to wake up to. I knew about all of this except the investigation in 99, I also didn't know that Dodge made planes or that Holden was a coach builder before it was a car company.
Chrysler was a major contractor for aircraft, aircraft engines (Curtiss-Wright), tanks, tank engines, various weapons, heavy trucks. They continued with military production until the 1970's.
To quote 2 times medal of honor recipient Smedley Butler, war, is a racket, Al Capone was an amature that ran 3 districs, as part of the USMC I made it safe for american business to operate on 3 continents!
If I remember correctly " Trading with the Enemy" was a good book about Big Business on both side dealing with each other during the war. Pretty scarey. The Nazis needed Trucks desperately for the Army and so snatched up all rolling stock they could find. that is why they had so many different makes and types of trucks in their inventory. They could not manufacture enough trucks. Good video.
Hitler's mustache was not distinct. It was a regular mustache, with the ends cut off as ordered by the German Army to fit gas masks. Hundreds of thousands of German veterans had mustaches like it. War didn't break out, it happened because of German invasions, supported by their ally the Soviet Union.
@@posticusmaximus1739 may be Edward will do that on the 75th episode of The Automotive History Series. P.S. When will Edward do *What If Cars* on Mitsubishi or Packard? I'd like to see the latter on what cars would Packard make if they didn't went the way of the dodo.
IBM has some very sketchy relationships with the political party helmed by a certain Austrian painter.
"Übersicht mit Hollerith Lochkarten".
- Deutsche Hollerith-Maschinen Gesellschaft
It's odd how these companies were never held responsible
There was a book on IBM and their business with Nazi era Germany. At the time they made 'tabulation machines' a precursor to electronic computers. They were used to collect information on citizens, including if Jewish, to be used in their repression and mass murder.
@@theforcedmemeit's not odd. It's planned.
Just like the gas pipeline that was pretended to be blown up by someone else.
Apple too
As an Englishman it is very easy to be ignorant.
"Britain stood alone, Churchill, Spitfire, Monty, D-Day Hooray!"
However once you scratch the surface it is very muddy.
I worked with a lot of Dutch guys over the years (I am at sea in the Dredging industry) and one old Dutch Captain told me that to this day the older generation know which family collaborated, which resisted, who stayed quiet. etc etc.
The luxury of not having been occupied, of never having to have to make those choices is a major part in the British mindset being incompatible with the European mindset and more akin to the Americans who have also never been invaded (and unless Canada gets drunk one night and fancies it's chances it probably won't).
Long post short:
WW2 is complicated. EVERYTHING that happened in the world from 1933 onwards has to be viewed through the telescope of WW2.
Great video and well explained.
@peterdixon7975 I agree with everything you said until the last sentence. If you think this is a great video, your standards are very low.
Britain was invaded in 1066 by a guy from Normandy.. His invasion removed the last British Royal Family from The Throne and we have had invaders ever since. Now we have krauts on the throne still.. Study your History and stop being ignorant
@@dennisweidner288Not Quite Wrong
Yeah Britain did not stand alone, they had a lot of help. Lots of American tanks and planes, food and supplies well before the US was officially involved in the war.
@@ComfortsSpecter I suggest you read about Edsel Ford (Ford Motor) and William Knudsen (GM) and the facts about the Arsenal of Democracy.
"War is a racket."
"Is that you Chesty?"
The modern conception of the corporation is a racket.
Listen to Smedley... He told us all.
No more brother wars. Patton tried to tell us we fought the wrong enemy. And now Weimar conditions are global. But hey, gotta fight for "our greatest ally" and believe any stories they concoct." The winners write the history books" and " to know who rules you, simply find out who you aren't allowed to criticize. "
@@quintessenceSL Capitalism as a whole is a racket
Even the American soft drink manufacturer Coca-Cola was accused of helping the Germans during that time.
Despite the turmoil and the controversy, Germany was able to invent a new soda, Fanta, using the "leftovers of the leftovers" during that time, since the German Coca-Cola bottler ran out of syrup to bottle more Coca-Cola...
Coca-Cola has an, um, interesting history.
@@JoJoJoker As does Hugo Boss and Adidas.
@@jh565bb on a far smaller scale. Look into their water theft practices.
@@JoJoJokerdon’t forget Volkswagen!
It is a crime that Fanta, a Nazi soda, is sold here in the United States.
Great research. It's never too late to remember history and the fact that multinational corporations are focused on profit over morality regardless of "left or right" rhetoric. Virtue signaling, as war, never changes.
@gpalmerify This is a far removed from good history as Mein Kampf.
His research left out the main issue, Espionage...
That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war...
For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers:
That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks,
Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc.,
How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism,
Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich,
Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc...
Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over...
Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents...
While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
Henery Ford "we made a great profit and a few people died".
"Some of you may die, but that's a sacrifice i'm willing to make"
Please provide a reference that proves Ford actually said that. Ford was a pacifist, so I doubt he ever said any such thing.
@petewood2350 Ford made a huge profit, very little of which cane from Germany. He was a key figure in the enormous industrial growth of the United States. No man contributed more in creating the industrial base of the Arsenal of Democracy than Ford.
@@dennisweidner288Who wrote this, Henry Ford?
American Henty Ford' assembly-line technology actually "built the Nazi War Machine".
Post war, Henty Fird was re-embursed gor losses of his German war production assets !!!
😱😲🙀
The LA Noire music is perfect for this. Fascinating video as usual Ed!
Don't forget about IBM. Without their computers the Germans could never have implemented their final solution so effectively. After the war IVM sued, and won, royalties for use of that equipment
Don't forget about Mercedes, built the ovens used in the death camps
@@posticusmaximus1739that is actually bullshit
Who built the masturbation machines? How about the "roller coasters of death?😂
@@ryanflecke2627don't forget the hole in the wall that they were made to stick a wire into, which bent back and poked them in the eye through another hole, literally just ripped off from Looney Tunes cartoons.
Notice how comments about the actual numbers and the physics behind the heat of enthalpy evaporation and the amount of heat energy contained in the amount of coal coke that was brought in just vanish. Even if enough Coke was available by rail, which it was proven there wasn't, the heat of enthalpy of the amount of moisture in a climbed figures violates laws of physics and thermodynamics.
Ford: "Yes, we did help build vehicles for the Germans, but all those vehicles are fitted with Powershift transmissions so the vehicles didn't work anyway."
Excellent ! Very funny.
There WERE actually dual-clutch designs proposed in the 1930s; they never made it out of the testing state; for reasons that now, with the dubious introduction of the Powershift, are all too apparent.
@@selfdo I have no doubt that's true; from what I recall the German streamliners were hitting 400km/h on the then-new Autobahn back in the 1930's as well.
American industries were nationalized by Germany, and managed by Germans for the duration. Prior to that, the US was neutral, and had no reason to stop manufacturing in Germany. Sweden and Switzerland continued to do business throughout the conflict.
@@herschelmayo2727exactly.
As an American whose mother was a refugee in Germany during / after the war, and whose family tree was drastically trimmed in two world wars, you have really nailed it with this one.
As we watch the current state of politics, and the current crop of corporations manouvering for power and distracting the average person with "technology" and "environmental sustainability" ect...... It really is the same old story, over and over....
The *real* distraction is "flooding the zone" with paranoia and outright lies about immigrants, the "woke menace," gays "grooming" our kids, etc., while right-wing *multi-* billionaires(!) buy up the country (and politicians) to run the place by and for themselves
You can be sure someone is going to make a lot of money out of us. They always do.
Sorry for your family, we still feel those losing in our hearts
@timmcooper294 Misleading history nails nothing.
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
..good one, Ed....as an American, this is something not commonly known here......thanks for shedding light on a dark subject....
@Zenny_6969 This video sheds little light and contains major problems --primarily perpetuating Marxist nonsense and carefully avoiding important facts.
...important facts like what@@dennisweidner288?...please school myself and Ed where this is wrong.....
@@dennisweidner288 ....what "important facts"....do go on......
@@Zenny_6969
Here are some major comments I directed at the producer.
A very poor presentation of this topic, simply choosing a few facts like Henry Ford's anti-Semitism and ignoring a whole host of facts that do not paint American companies in the dark picture you want to paint.
1. First of all your central point that war is good for business is nonsense. And you even admit that apparently without knowing it when you point out that many American businesses did not want to shift from normal production to war production.
2. You go on and on about Henry Ford, but not a word about his son Edsel who upon taking control of Ford turned it into an arms-producing dynamo. Not a word for example about Willow Run.
3. You do not mention the Chairman of GM who became the central figure in the Arsenal of Democracy--Bill Knudsen.
4. And you do not mention the countless businessmen like Henry Kaiser who played key roles in winning the War.
5. You do not mention that the NAZIs essentially took over all major corporations in Germany. All corporations had to cooperate with the NAZIs. Any industrialist who did not cooperate lost his company if not his life. I suggest you read about airplane magnate Hugo Junkers.
6. The work on synthetic fuel was all done well before the War, most before Hitler took power.
7. We now know that the NAZIs were the embodiments of evil. But most of their most heinous crimes, occurred after Hitler started the War. And what you are describing occurred before the War. To most Americans, the Concentrations Camps came as a great surprise at the end of the War.
Now the behavior of Henry Ford and Ford and GM executives in Germany deserves to be criticized. But this program is a dishonest, thinly veiled hit piece without any attempt at honestly presenting all the facts.
@@dennisweidner288 ...I think you are looking for a 10 hour documentary series....
The Opel Blitz truck was actually a slightly modified American GMC T-15 heavy duty truck from 1936.
@Foxonian The date 1936 is important. That was 3 years before the War and before the NAZIs had begun any mass killing.
Yup, the Americans 1936 ford truck was the basic ford model the germans used as well, complete with flathead V8... The opel used an older GM designed White six, often mistaken for the chevy stovebolt 6 ... White had been one of the companies aquired by gm in their formation, but was dropped, so, america had no use for the old White 6 tooling, and it wound up in Europe. The British bren gun carrier/ universal carrier also had a ford flathead v8, albeit in the smaller european displacement.
@@HarborLockRoad It is interesting. Hitler was torn between admiring Ford and assembly-line mass production and German fine craftsmanship. He wanted an affordable people's car, but upon seizing power made no effort to convert the German arms industry from craft shops to assembly line production., In fact, he gave the job of running the economy to Goering who made no effort to introduce efficiency in production methods. This would have a major impact on the outcome of the War.
@@HarborLockRoad The British carrier engine was design modified and made at the Dagenham (East London) Ford factory. If you take an American design, modify it for British use and then make it in Britain, does it stay 'American' or become 'British'? Just askin' - and thinking of the very many British wartime designs which somehow became WW2 American by virtue of this odd IP transfer mechanism.
@@HarborLockRoad I've seen a Universal Carrier in the flesh, in the scrap pile of a Hawk missile base. The flathead V8 looks like nothing else. My Father drove one in 1946 in the Danish army.
This is not just 'car' history, this is just History full stop. and i must say i really enjoyed this.
@MEYH3M You may have enjoyed this, but it is not history full stop. It is biased and misleading with a few facts sprinkled in.
Such actions actually date back to the time of the Medici banking family. The Medici banking institutions were funding both sides of wars in Europe by the 15th Century.
In some ways maybe your best video so far!
I‘m from Germany and I can tell you almost nobody in here knows about this. And if you try to tell them that history sometimes is a little bit more complex than the stuff you learn at school, they simply get angry. But they don‘t want to hear about these facts.
Even my history teacher back in the good ol‘ high school days denied it very emotionaly.
So thank you very much!
Homer Simpson: But what happened from 1939 to 1945?
German Tour Guide: NAHSSINK HAPPENED BETVEEN NINETEEN SURTY NEIN UND NINETEEN FAWTY FIFE!!!!
The USA is invaded daily - with covert regime approval.
I feel like most Germans don't know Holocaust history very well and will only get worse as the AfD rises
@markusrieder8186 The problem is that this video is very misleading, carefully selecting a few facts to paint an essentially false picture. Do you know about Hugo Junkers?. What do you think would have happened to any corporate executive that refuses NAZI orders?. You may know about Henry Ford. Do you know about Edsel Ford or GM's Bill Knudsen? Any video on this subject without mentioning them is dishonest. When you said that history is complex, you are correct. But this video is hardly complex it simplifies history by only telling one side of the story.
We just don’t care
Reminds me of a line from an "X-Files" episode where a character is speculating the US government deliberately invented a "flying saucer" hoax to distract people from the the government's true intentions: "The business of America isn't business - the business of America is war." Probably the series' most truthful statement in its entire run.
They did. It's documented.Wiki Paul Bennewitz.
War is business, a very lucrative business . Just saying. 👍
@@johnking6252 building 2 lake steamboat's in 1890-1920 and later converted to flat-top's ( for WW2 probably because WW1 was over by then and or it took to long to building them ect ) showed that elites USA 🇺🇸 was interested in war and covertly-training even before it was official declared war as the passengers side was a cover for it and a racketeering scam and the banking side was worse 5X normal going/buying rates for a ship or WW1 a 9inch~ wrenches 🔧 and nut's being made for water-dam power plants that didn't exist or only needed 2 at most for repairs
Brown Brothers Harriman, Prescott Bush-chief executive of the Union Banking Corporation, and John J. McCloy chief executive the the Rockefeller owned Chase Bank all financed Hitler's rise to power. Ford Motor manufactured engines for Nazi army trucks and jeeps. Former U.S. banker executive George Herbert Walker was in charge of the building of Auscwhitz. Averal Harriman was in charge of the construction of the railway line to Auscwhitz that carried Jews to this concentration camp. Rockefeller's Standard Oil manufactured and sold to the Nazi air force a compound --tetra lead which was needed for airplane fuel. For more info on this Google 'FROM JFK TO 9/11--EVERYTHING IS A RICH MAN'S TRICK.'
Ford was a private business.
Great video thanks ! My late father was in the British Army REME during WWII, working on Tank recovery. His baby was a British built Scammel tractor unit.
I love those big old Scammels 👍
@shaunw9270 What is great about a video lacking all basic historical standards? I might point out that Lend Lease production from companies like Ford and GM played a central role in saving Britain from the NAZIs.
1
Now 'that was a truck'.
Great report. This will sound like a conspiracy theory - but it's not. Ford had - and has - a huge truck plant in Cologne, Germany . It's just north of the city, on the Rhine River. Cologne was about as destroyed as any city in WW-2, with 1,000 plane raids starting in 1942. When the Americans arrived in early 1945, the Ford plant was still producing trucks - and kept going. It was the easiest target to find - but was left untouched while the old city was flattened.
@jim7544 report is about as accurate as your post. Cologne as the first thousand bomber raid. British Bomber Command was using the tactic of area bombing. No one factory was targeted. The target was the entire city. A single factory could not be saved even if the British had wanted to. Now certain factories or other land marks may have survived, but it was not because the Brutish avoided hitting them.
I COULD say this was because the Ford plant was so well defended by Boing Bo-190 fighters of the Luftwaffe ... But I don't. Although Boing with its massive shares in Focke-Wulf did benefit on both sides as well.
AFAIK, the Daimler-Benz main facility in Cannstatt was never hit seriously either. Not because they didn't go for it; but because DB had built a decoy facility a few miles away. In case of an alarm, the real thing was hidden underneath an artificial smoke screen - like most if not all critical facilities. Impossible to find at night and veeeeery difficult at daylight.
As the gentleman above me said: if they really wanted to hit a factory, they could do so as proven with Philips in Eindhoven. Low level, fast light bombers at daylight. Or the dam busters raid. At night. With 4-engined bombers. Low. Without terrain-following radar. These boys had some balls.
Standard Oil traded with IG Farben: fuel additives for high octane fuel in exchange for the licence to produce synthetic rubber. Unlike mentioned in the video, Germany was well leading in terms of synthetic fuel technology but lacked some critical additives.
Standard Oil was also RUMORED to have supplied German U-boats with fuel via their Central and South American "activities" in neutral countries as late as 1943.
It's not too far fetched to say that without US "investment" and Russian raw materials Germany would have been in a significantly worse position to start a war.
Ive heard old Henry told the American government that if one bomb fell on the ford factories overseas, all domestic war production would cease immediately.
@@ottovonbismarck2443what is a boing Bo 190?
@@kratzikatz1 You should read more than the first sentence ... Boeing had massive shares in F-W. While they delivered the aircraft to bomb Germany (actually Ford produced most of them), they also sold the fighters to the other side, namely the Fw-190. Was it really that hard to understand ?
Ed, I'm fairly sure that the person in the photo shown at 12:22 with the speech bubble, "So 20/80?" is British PM Neville Chamberlain, possibly taken around the 'Peace in Our Time' speech. Just wondering why you've included it.
It's all money. And the winners dictate their convenient history of events as they see fit. War never change$.
Great video, thank you.
Nonsence. Any business executive defying NAZI orders lost his company and likely his life. Read about HugoJunkers.
The Greed of a few Americans helped provide the needed Espionage to win the war for the Allied Powers:
That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war...
For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers:
That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks,
Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc.,
How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism,
Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich,
Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc...
Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over...
Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents...
While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
Modern-day example. Ukraine
I care not what side you are on, that is just the truth. Red team/ Blue team.
Well done! For further reading, I recommend General Smedley Butler's book, "War Is A Racket." It's a convenient, short read. It's also available on audio. 'Runs about one hour.
Thank you for the suggested readings. I just went out and bought it on thrift books , and i'm looking forward to reading it.
Thanks I got it and read it.
Not only that it was autographed!
Classic & should be mandatory reading. But you know as well as I, THAT will never happen.
Not in America as it is now/ and how it will end up.
Words Mr. Wordsworth. Just Words.
Top shelf video Ed!!! I did a presentation about this exact topic back at high school in the 1990s and it went down like a lead balloon loaded with lard. The other kids in class could not believe that Holden was run by an American company let alone GM and Ford made some 'dodgy deals' with the bad guys in WW2, LOLs i got a major smack down from the teacher as well. i should send them this link so they can revise my report card. Cheers from Melbourne!!!
The main issue was, Espionage:
That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war...
For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers:
That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks,
Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc.,
How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism,
Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich,
Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc...
Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over...
Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents...
While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
Ah, the beginning of the modern military industrial (and political) complex.
Who cares about lives and pacific solution of conflicts when there are billions and billions of dollars to be won.
Very interesting topic.
Best wishes.
@ajax700 The profit motive is not as appealing a narrative as the socialist story, but only capitalism actually works. The only prosperous countries in this world are countries with core capitalist economies.
You are forgetting about the most important thing that helped the Allied Powers win the war against the Fascists, Espionage:
That regardless of what people like Henry Ford personally thought & did, there were Americans taking note of Nazi Germany's assets & shortcomings. And those accountants, secretaries & other staff were providing OSS with information that helped win the war...
For example, Knowing the following helped the Allied Powers:
That Nazi Germany had insufficient capasity to make tires for their Opel Trucks,
Where the Synthetic Fuel Plants were, recent photos of them, etc.,
How much labor was wasted in German Manufacturing due to Perfectionism,
Which Germans & Austrians to turn against the Third Reich,
Who to target for Assassination and who not to, as Overconfident Examples of Dunning Kruger Effect like Adolf Hitler would help win the war for the Allied Powers, etc. etc...
Regardless of the actions of a Sociopathic Capitalist CEO who only cares about money, there was a wealth of information to be gained from those who worked under them. Many of these people cared about principles that matter more than personal wealth. And their information helped decide which targets to bomb and which were not worth losing Air Craft & Air Crews over...
Which is to say that Corporate Espionage was similar to dealing with the Enemy's Spies. As some of them could be turned into double agents...
While I personally wish we could leave Western Capitalism in the dust bin like other flawed forms of government. I can't ignore the wealth of information that was gained about the Fascists in order to defeat them...
@@dennisweidner288 The Soviet's had a weird form of Capitalism in their Totalitarian Government. Their exploitation of their own workers clearly showed it....
@@davidhollenshead4892 The central mechanism in a capitalist country is the profit mechanism for value discovery. I do not see how Siviet Labor policies were any form of capitalism.
@@dennisweidner288 I wasn't "attacking" capitalism, but mostly USA military industrial (and political) complex.
Since you expand the the discussion to things I didn't mean,
most *_"core capitalist economies"_* countries also have the worst numbers for depression, anxiety and mental health issues... so?
I agree socialist countries were a mess.
Best wishes.
"War is a business"... Would that mean that those who take advantage from that situation possibly create the problem that lead to war? in Europe for instance?
You referring to that Nordstream/gas reliance & Ukraine war?
@georgesapadbol2776 Nonsense. American corporations had nothing to do with the War, just as they have nothing to do with the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Misleading presentations like this leads to ridiculous ideas.
A business that dates back at least to the time of the Medici banking family.
@@Sacto1654 A little different. Armies in Italy at the time were primarily mercenaries.
can you imagine that you can simply destroy these plans simply by not invadining neghbour country and by not starting war
Just like President Truman said, "maybe it's better if neither Germany or Soviets win." He wanted to play both sides until they were both destroyed. Pretty good idea.
Ed I must tell you initially I was very irritated and skeptical about your report. However, I started fact-checking some of your points and found out that you were absolutely correct! Finally thank you for this post, It was very enlightening and accurate.
You'd never heard that America funded Germany before WW2?! Try looking into the gas pipeline and see that it wasn't Pootin. Or you could just wait 50 years then act surprised.
@markmmcaulay Some of what he says is true, most is misleading and he leaves out most pertinent facts.
@@joaocosta3374 I have read two of his books. Only they are not all of what I have read. The historical record shows very clearly the enormous role American industry played in destroying NAZI Germany.
As for Sutton, he is on much firmer ground when he talks about the Soviets than the NAZIs. The Soviets were actually influenced by the Americans and adopted mass production techniques. One reason they outproduced the NAZIs in areas like tank production, even though they had a smaller industrial base. The Germans for the most part rejected American assembly line and mass production techniques. The American companies went into the Soviet Union knowing about the regime. The American investments in Germany occurred years before the NAZIs took power. Did you expect Ford and GM to dismantle and move their plants out of Germany after 1933? Actually, the American companies that can be criticized most accurately were Hollywood film companies.
Oh yes. And it goes way deeper, with characters involved you never would have thought would do such things. Now all friends and business associates. But that is more for the late 40's and the 50's & 60's. Today is a different arrangement to conduct business. NEVER forget the Bankers who loaned out the currency for all this mayhem. Bullets Bombs & Banks (Gerald Celente).
The truth shall set you free. If you've a mind to be in that mood of thought. Most are not.
And that's OK too. You cannot change history.
You say "war is a business." I prefer Gen. Smedley Butler's thesis, "war is a racket."
I'm thinking "racket" in that sense might not be familiar to someone for whom English is a second language.
@@caulkins69Count me in. What is the meaning of "War Is A Racket"?
Butler, Smedly: "War is a racket", 1935, 36 p.
This treatise was written between the two world wars by a former general. Everyone thinking about joining a service should read it.
@@ralfrufus6573two time MoH Marine Maj.Gen. Smedley Butler ,he helped America colonize, everywhere from the “Boxer” Rebellion, to the Philippines to the creation of the “Banana Republic “ (So. American countries controlled by “Chiqiota Banana “ and her associates) and how businesses used the Military. A Quaker and a Republican who thwarted a coupd’etat Against FDR , when a group of “Industrialists” (some of the same shady caricatures here ) tried to enlist him into leading a group of veterans in an attempt to overthrow the Constitution,and FDR’s administration . He went straight to DoJ and to FDR , who allowed it to pass , confident,knowing that the Constitution was safe and in good hands with men like Gen. Smedley-Butler USMC . A REAL AMERICAN HERO who few people know about.
@@chipschannel9494 a known communist sympathizer, who took place in numerous false flag operations.......he's a reliable source.
People shocked by this retrospective on history don't really get how geopolitics works. Countries don't have friends, they have interests....same with companies. We have corporations in the west deeply invested in Russia. Russia does a bad thing, some pull out, some dont. Russia moved and suddenly, some corporations find themselves on the "wrong" side.
Some people may not like this video from the land of the free. Rugged individualism, look after number one & anyone can make it feeds this narrative. Not team players and unreliable allies.
@@sexyshadowcat7 It is possible to hear a less than flattering fact about your country without getting overly sensitive and crying about whataboutism. Sometimes taking it on the chin and seeing a way of building on it to be better is a more positive way forward. Or just be a salty snowflake, everyone can choose their own way.
@@sexyshadowcat7which one is the not numbered one? The Cold War or the Seven Year War?
im from this garbage country and i love this video, i didn't expect this from ed, ive been watching him for a while now
@@J.Gainez This'garbage country' saved Western civilization. And American corporations like Ford and GM was at the center of it.
@mickk7489 I do not like it because it is a very dishonest presentation.
Ed, wonderful job of topic presentation.
@douglasladowski6342 This video is as honest and objective as Mein Kampf. If you cherry pick facts and leave out any fact that challenges your narrative, you can prove anything. This is basically how Goebbels presented issues to the German people.
This is perhaps your most important video!! Over the years, various Hollywood film directors have longed to make a movie on this very topic, but can't get it funded. I wonder why?
Bold thumbnail choice
Ed, as others have said, this was a very unconformable video to sit through and I'm not even American. Besides thanking you for teaching me about an important topic that I've never heard of before, I also want to commend you for the ending. As a Dutch man I imagine that you feel a lot more strongly about the Second World War than a guy like me living in Canada. The fact you were able to put those emotions aside and stay objective says a lot about your character. Thank you.
@MapletreePaper This video is about as objective as Main Kamf.
It's called "Mein Kampf"
If you feel the need to envoke it for comparison with this video, at least spell it right.@@dennisweidner288
I'm a little surprised you didn't mention that Ford Germany wasn't allowed to use the brand name after the war until the late 60s. Else, again an informative video, thanks!
There were most certainly Ford cards under the name Ford built in Germany in the 50's. Look up Ford Taunus P1 for example.
@@heiner71They had to use Taunus instead of Ford
@@jkb2016Taunus was just a model name used by Ford-Werke since 1939. German Ford models of the era were generally named after german regions (Ford Rheinland), mountain ranges (Ford Eifel, Ford Taunus) or cities (Ford Köln), with the Taunus being the then newest one at the start of the war. Once they restarted production in 1948 the name simply stuck. It does get a bit confusing in the late 1950s when the Taunus name branched out into two different models, the smaller 12M/15M and the larger 17M/20M, but these were all generally marketed as Fords. What is true is that Ford was barred by the Nazis from using the Ford logo on their products, which they only started reintroducing in the mid 1960s, at least thats how I understand the history
@@mrspandel5737 German Wikipedia article tells otherwise
@@jkb2016 I've been digging through a number of contemporary Ford print advertisements (1950s-60s) and these generally seem to feature the Ford name quite prominently, something along the lines of "Taunus 17M by FORD", so they obviously had no problem with promoting the fact that these were indeed Ford products.
Even though the cars themselves never featured any external Ford badging until the mid 60s.
My Great- grandfather was part of the U.S. occupation of Japan after WWll. While sorting through one of the largest military vehicle factories, him and the other G.I.'s were pretty ticked off to see all the General Motors build plates on the production machinery.
Could they have possibly, just maybe, have bought thst machinery before Pearl Harbor you think?
@@chickenfishhybrid44- of course they did, but what's your point?
The sailors in the Pacfic during WWII often called the naval shells being fired “Part of the NY El (Elevated) is coming back at us!”
American machinery was very common, and the first 5-year plans of the ussr also involved US machinery. Those same models might have also made the barbed wires around the gulags and concentration camps. Even then, pre-war Japan made 25,000 cars a year, so they weren't really up to much on that front.
No hard feelings guys.
Just business. You know.
You always hear about the lend lease to the Soviets but never about those ford engines used in nazi tanks....
Which tanks from germany used ford engines? I know some use Tatra engines but ford ????
@@startingbark0356And, that's why you never hear about them! 😅
@@jimurrata6785 bruh 😂
German lobby at work
None of their tanks were powered by ford engines
As a car & history enthusiast, good episode. 👌 Could've had more details but afterall this is a car channel 😝
Thanks, Ed, for researching & sharing this. I had never thought about this, presuming that operations “over there” had been seized.
@markbergthold6181 Good example of how misleading this video is. In fact the NAZI Party took control of EVERY corporation in Germany. Owners were allowed to manage them but only id they complied with NAZI instructions. I suggest you read about what happened to Hugo Junkers and his aircraft company when he refused One of the many facts conveniently left out of this video because it does not comport with the narrative that the producer wants to paint.
War is business. And holy smokes it's lucrative
For those who survive*
USA agrees wholeheartedly
"War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength."
Always need a war when the economy is in the dumps to resolve it . Depression era was solved by WWII. Ever noticer that !
@SomeoneAbstruse Utter nonsense. If war is so lucrative, why did the Government have to order GM, Ford, and Chrysler to stop producing cars?
Outstanding video Ed!
I'm surprised you didn't mention the Ford Willow Run plant which turned out more than 6,700 B-24 Liberators, as well as North American Aviation and Allison Engine Company both being divisions of GM, who themselves produced Grumman airplanes for the Navy under license.
It wasn't a war history, it was about American companies in Germany, before and during WW2. Everyone knows what they were doing here in the States. Although, in your defense, I didn't know about GM's involvement in North American Aviation. 😊
@@ramblerdave1339you’re being a liar. Once the war started, hell even before, assistance to Germany was halted.
Its almost like ideologies are there to make money, and people are disposable... Dont buy into anyone saying you need to fight for this or that. What theyre wanting is for you to work for them .
I would go back to fight and die to protect the ROK. The Republic of Korea is the *greatest success story* of American foreign policy, aid, and became my spiritual home. If one can’t understand this, let’s just say that Koreans are like Texans, only more so!
I was born in NY, lived in CA, HI, Japan, MN, and TX, but will be buried in the ROK.
Edward, you are a good and smart man.
scottlewis6644 I am not sure about good or bad, but he is no historian. He leaves out ALL pertinent details not in conformity with the picture he wants to paint. And what he does present is misleading.
When I worked for Ford in Cologne, the locals said that at the end of the war the only things left standing were the Dom and the Ford plant. They did not think this was by chance.
@strayling1 Then they did not know much about World War II. I suggest you read about the accuracy of World War II bombing.
@@dennisweidner288 Factory gossip and tall tales for foreigners of course. Lighten up, Francis.
@@strayling1 The musings of Germans don't really bother me. But I see so much woke misinformation about American history that does bother me. And this video is a good example. Now like any country, there are aspects of American history that should be criticised, but this should be done honestly and this this video is a good example of dishonest history. It is about as objective as Mein Kampf.
@@strayling1 Then why did you write the post if it's "gossip and tall tales"?
@@Ozark_Bule What can I say, I'm easily amused. And a bit surprised that anyone would take such an outrageous claim seriously - I certainly didn't.
Thank you for broaching this topic. Over the year's I have read a small number of articles on this, yet have seen those articles not gain any traction, and most of them just quietly disappear. I think it is important to expose the true nature of war in all its ugliness.
Damn good video. It should be shown in history class in school. This may be your best work yet.
What - and make the students feel bad about themselves, or teach them anything acknowledging this country's baked-in racism? We don't want our kids indoctrinated! (Any other way than what we tell them...) now repeat after me: WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA. WE ARE ALL HAPPY. WE LOVE AMERICA...
@johnasbury4997 Given what is being taught in history classes nowadays this video lacking all historical standards would fit right in.
GM's Fisher body division wasted a bunch of time and money developing their p75 eagle fighter, which didn't out perform other fighters in production but supposedly was actually to avoid the strain of having to produce the b29.
In 1920s lots of American company, including Ford, took heavy investment in the industrialization of Soviet Union thanks to the extensive deals they made with the Soviet government under the permission of Stalin. Gaz AA, a humble mid-sized truck, was basically a rebadged Ford AA truck.And Gaz A, a little passenger car manufactured for the Soviet officers and commissars , was just a licensed Ford model A. They didn't care much about whether their business partners were their allies or enemies , as long as they can make a fortune from the deals.
Yup! Ford was everywhere in Europe at that time, had factories in Moscow and Nizhny Novgorod, in Bucharest, Romania, in Greece, in France and in the UK not just Germany.
@mariusallentius4583 I am not sure they made a fortune, but they did make a profit. What you say is true. But the atrocities of the Stalinist regime were not fully understood at the time. How is that different than Tesla, Apple, and other corporations doing business in China today. Actually we know more about China's barbarities today than was known about Stalin at the time.
@@dennisweidner288 Basically, the Soviet regime was some kind of isolated economically and politically by the western countries like the UK and,of course, the USA due to the incompatibly ideological conflict between the communism and the capitalism, even the atrocities done by this regime was rarely known at that period of time.And investment for the industrialization of the USSR coming from America surely laid the foundation for its automobile and later its tank industry, GAZ, ZIL, for example. Then surely international corporation care nothing about their business partners as long as they make a profit from the contracts even they are technically the enemies. It's all about making money and for now no one can make a change.
@@royale7620 So they just focused on making money. They are cold-blooded businessmen, not the good Samaritan.
@@mariusallentius4583 The isolation of the Soviet Union was not all the doing of the West. The Bolsheviks and Stalin pursued a policy of isolation and autarky. Much of what you say is true. As to your claim that international corporations care nothing about their partners. That is often the case, but not always. Look at all the corporations that walked away from multi-billion dollar investments in Russia after Putin invaded Ukraine.
I was going into cold turkey waiting for another video from you. Thanks, Ed and also for tackling something decidedly less fluffy car vids usually are about.
One of your best so far Ed.
Ed, I have never heard this before and I'm 68. Thanks for another excellent report.
Ferengi rule of acquisition # 34 - “War is good for business” Ferengi rule of acquisition # 35 “ Peace is good for business”
Please never change! I always look forward to your videos!!
Incredible! Rought times need rough ads
Nice one, Ed, and very timely. Thanks so much.
NO WAR!
Good video! War is shit
This is one of your best videos released! Congratulations! 👏
I love this channel, thanks man, great content
Retired General Smedley Butler was a three time winner of the Congressional Medal of Honor when he wrote “War Us A Racket” detailing the companies and the amounts of money they made off WWI. Congress responded by creating the Nye Commission to investigate which was disbanded in 1939 when we were tooling up for WWII. Eisenhower, in 1961, gave a speech warning us of the military industrial establishment in America, which obviously had no effect at all. War and war machinery are big business. I suppose it’s better to join them rather than fight them through investments. They will never go away.
I always enjoy your channel but this one was able to show the shady and yes even evil practices of all companies. During the Second World War all kinds of companies made money but nobody back then that they would be found out. Ed this was a very good episode.
Fantastic video, thanks so much for providing this great content!
I had a friend, a WWII veteran who was taken prisoner in the Market Garden debacle. He says he was hauled off after being captured in a brand-new Ford truck.
17:05
Standing behind General Guisan is man with an early Luger holster. Made before they decided to include a magazine pouch, so it was added onto the flap instead of the side.
Fantastic work Ed, I appreciate you bringing this important information to us in an entertaining manner. Well done. Thank you.
@crustyoldoffroader7436 It may be entertaining. It is not honesty history.
@@dennisweidner288 Oh, and your spillage under every post is HONEST, is it?! Every single comment you made is wrong, I know because I've lived through it. You are a propagandist. An information terrorist. Probably NAFO pose as well. Get lost from this plane of existence!
Want to thank you for this, not only a great video, but every bit is a thing needing to be said.
Another great video, Ed!
1938 Opel Blitz, my childhood playground, as it stood parked for good behind the barn.
War indeed is a business. Even today, after nearly two years of the Russo-Ukrainian War going on and many many countries around the world pledging their support to Ukraine, numerous investigations still find out that Russia keeps importing western-made tech and multi-purpose microchips as they did before the war if not in even bigger numbers.
Anyways, great work as always, Ed. Appreciate the effort and research you put in every video! 👍
That war started 10 years ago, not 2.
Are you not aware that the pipeline was blown up by Ukraine?
Do you actually believe the mainstream media and American military?
Good on you for tackling this subject.
I'm pretty sure that there is a lot of business going on at present, and the potential for even more business in the not too distant future...
A nice look into the situation. I remeber talking with people regarding this history & being ignored. Plus NG also tested half tracks in Canada in the forestry industry, In the mid 30s.
To quote Dr Pangloss in Bernstein’s operetta “Candide”:
Though war may seem a bloody curse
It is a blessing in reverse
when cannon roar
both rich and poor
by danger are united!
(Till every wrong is righted!)
Lenin was impressed by Henry Ford’s production system. Ford had a plant in Moscow by 1923.
Wow! Amazing video!
Good one, very well made as always. Thanks Ed !
Thank You Ed! It's more important than ever that people realize this!
First, congratulations on putting out your 60th episode, Ed! And this was another wonderful one on a somewhat uncomfortable topic.
Good vid; tough subject.
The other thing we have to keep in mind is that during the war, while companies were not specifically under pressure from Germany, they were pressured and in some cases ORDERED by the goverment to shift production from domestic product (cars for the American people) to war production efforts, so in effect, were participating in the war, but that their hands were tied in some cases, so that claim is partially true I believe (at least when it came to GM itself and the American side of things... this is not to say that they necessarily were in thesame "boat" so to speak for the GM owned companies overseas, although some were possibly also shifted from car production to war time production as well under their respective countries, to which the US government may or may not have had full say in what went on).
Good morning, This was very interesting and a nice surprise to wake up to. I knew about all of this except the investigation in 99, I also didn't know that Dodge made planes or that Holden was a coach builder before it was a car company.
Chrysler was a major contractor for aircraft, aircraft engines (Curtiss-Wright), tanks, tank engines, various weapons, heavy trucks. They continued with military production until the 1970's.
@@leonb2637 Thanks Leon, that's really cool, very interesting. I had no idea Chrysler worked with Curtiss-Wright.
The wartime production of Chrysler makes some interesting reading.
@@fubarmodelyard1392 Yes it does.
Bold video, Ed. Bravo.
YEAH! Another E.A.R. video!!!
Both World Wars were empires vs empires. There were no good guys among them, just the ones that served your side.
To quote 2 times medal of honor recipient Smedley Butler, war, is a racket, Al Capone was an amature that ran 3 districs, as part of the USMC I made it safe for american business to operate on 3 continents!
If I remember correctly " Trading with the Enemy" was a good book about Big Business on both side dealing with each other during the war. Pretty scarey. The Nazis needed Trucks desperately for the Army and so snatched up all rolling stock they could find. that is why they had so many different makes and types of trucks in their inventory. They could not manufacture enough trucks. Good video.
Hitler's mustache was not distinct. It was a regular mustache, with the ends cut off as ordered by the German Army to fit gas masks. Hundreds of thousands of German veterans had mustaches like it. War didn't break out, it happened because of German invasions, supported by their ally the Soviet Union.
I miss when companies played both sides in war instead of starting them
Yet another quality video thank you.
I like history and cars; this is an excellent video!!!
5:52 what is that "dual engine"?
Huh?! I was expecting The SUV Episode for the 60th episode of The Automotive History Series.
Yeah, I'm tired of hearing about Germany. SUVs PLZ!
@@posticusmaximus1739 may be Edward will do that on the 75th episode of The Automotive History Series.
P.S.
When will Edward do *What If Cars* on Mitsubishi or Packard?
I'd like to see the latter on what cars would Packard make if they didn't went the way of the dodo.
As an American. I'm disturbed to find out these facts about these American car manufacturers. Thank you Ed for sharing this
Look up the name Prescott Bush !
I still like this channel more and more each day!!
You went deep
This video added a new layer to your channel. Very well done, especially for a dutch guy who could easily be biased (and who could blame you)
Some of dark moment of Henry Ford
For decades Jewish persons in the USA and elsewhere wouldn't buy Ford products due to HF's Antisemitism and war production in the Nazi era.
Henry Ford was a great man with noble opinions.
Don't forget Fordlândia.
Extremely interesting video. A+++, Ed!
Very spicy thumbnail
The United States Army Air Force left Ford Cologne alone. The Royal Air Force had no problem bombing it.
War never changes