of Angelos Anastasopoulos
Today they are some of the most successful and richest companies on the planet. However, they largely owe their development to Adolf Hitler's Nazis. They cooperated with them and became giants thanks to the development of National Socialism, only unlike the leader of Nazi Germany they lived even after the Second World War and completed the plan of conquering the world. Let's look at some of these companies.
Allianz: Today, it is the only company that does not deny that it cooperated. The chairman of the multinational, Henning Schulte-Noel, notes: “We recognize our moral obligation and do not turn our backs on history. We want to erase honestly and without evasion the pain of Holocaust survivors and their families." Allianz had then refused to insure Jews, confiscated the money entrusted to it, but ten years later it paid the compensations in full.
Audi: Back when the company was still called Horch/Auto Union and the R8 didn't even exist in people's imaginations, the factory in Zwickau exclusively manufactured engines for German tanks.
bayer: Bayer is one of the world's leading pharmaceutical companies, famous for the invention of aspirin. And another invention of hers was from heroin, a drug (yes, it was pioneered as such) that gave whoever took it "heroic powers". But even worse than that (or even equal) is the fact that the pharmaceutical giant collaborated with the Nazis in making Zyklon B gas, which was used in the extermination chambers of millions of prisoners.
Fanta: When the American Coca-Cola Company refused its German branch to send Coca-Cola's secret syrup, since the two states were at war, it was decided to create a new one, Fantastisch, or Fanta for short. After the Allies prevailed, Coca-Cola pardoned the Germans and adopted the recipe, giving it a… tropical air so that its history would be forgotten.
Hugo Boss: We have to admit that the Nazis had beautiful uniforms. There is a simple reason: the Hitler Youth, SS and Assault Battalions were personally clothed by Hugo Bosch, a member of the Nazi party since 1928. Eight years after he founded his company, he signed a highly lucrative contract with Hitler. During World War II, Bosch used prisoners from concentration camps in France and Poland in his factory.
IBM: Of the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust, nearly half were Polish nationals. IBM played an important role in the... success of the German pogrom on the Polish front, which created an innovative database for the time (intercepting bank and school records) exclusively for the occasion, with the help of which 95% of the Jews were identified of the country and almost 80% was exterminated.
Opel: As much as Opel denies it, it was the creator of the first gas chamber. This is the Blitz truck, which instead of sending out the exhaust gases, channeled them into the closed carriage, where dozens of people were piled.
Puma: An ardent supporter and close friend of Hitler, Rudi Dassler was particularly cruel and used thousands of enslaved Jews, communists and homosexuals, who sent him the SS, to test his shoes on "endurance tracks". One of the reasons why he parted ways with his brother, Andy (creator of Adidas), was because he considered him to be an apparent Nazi.
Siemens: Wernher von Siemens' grandson, Hermann, was among the businessmen who bribed people (a known tactic of the company in question) to help Hitler become chancellor. He later built factories next to the Auschwitz and Buchenwald camps. And Hitler himself described the Siemens company as a model for the German people.
Volkswagen: When one thinks of the scarab or the Volkswagen van, the mind probably goes to Woodstock, to love, to the hippie movement... And yet, it shouldn't. Ferdinand Porsche, head of Volkswagen and Porche, met Hitler in 1934 to discuss creating the people's car. Hitler asked Porsche to design a car with a curved line, "like a beetle". And so the Volkswagen Beetle was born. It wasn't just created for the Nazis. Hitler was the man who christened it. And of course four out of five workers at the Porsche factory were prisoners of war.
Source: Journal of the Editors
