In an interview, historian David de Jong, whose grandfather, a Dutch stocking manufacturer, was himself expropriated under National Socialism, discusses how Nazi profits became German economic power.
der Freitag: Mr. de Jong, which companies and families became wealthy during the Nazi era? David de Jong: Of course, there are many – not just those I describe in my book. We're talking about thousands of businesses and entrepreneurial families. However, my focus was on the families and companies that are still very successful today. These include the Quandt family at BMW, Porsche-Piëch, the von Finck banking family, the Oetker family, and the family of steel and arms producer Friedrich Flick. Later, in connection with Klaus-Michael Kühne, the Kühne family of Kühne + Nagel was added, especially his father and uncle.
When companies that particularly benefited from the Nazi era are publicly discussed in Germany, names like IG Farben or ThyssenKrupp often come up. Why do they play no role in your book? Three criteria were decisive for my selection. First, the families and companies should still exist today. Second, they should continue to play a significant role in the global economy. Third, I was particularly interested in the power of individuals and families. The Krupp dynasty ended in the early 1980s with the death of the last heir. ThyssenKrupp is still a huge conglomerate, but the families no longer exercise control there. IG Farben also had no single family behind it. I therefore focused on families where a few shareholders still exert considerable influence – for example, Stefan Quandt and Susanne Klatten at BMW.
The wealth of the Porsche-Piëch family originated under National Socialism.
Many of these companies were already very wealthy before Hitler's seizure of power. Is there a company that only became successful through the Nazi era? Yes, this is especially clear with the Porsche-Piëch clan. In January 1933, at the time of the Nazi takeover, Porsche was almost bankrupt. Subsequently, the family forced the Jewish co-founder Adolf Rosenberger out of the company. Around the same time, Porsche received the contract to develop the Volkswagen. This laid the foundation for the family's later fortune. The family profited massively during the Nazi regime; that is where the basis of their wealth originated.
How was Adolf Rosenberger forced out of the company? Are details known? Adolf Rosenberger was forced in July 1935 to sell his ten percent stake at a nominal value of 3,000 Reichsmarks. The nominal value at that time was significantly below the actual market value. Porsche had by then already received the contract to develop the Volkswagen. From a business that was almost bankrupt in 1933, it had become a profitable and lucrative company by 1935. The irony is that in the Volkswagen plant in Fallersleben – today's Wolfsburg – very few Volkswagens were produced during the war. Instead, tens of thousands of forced and slave laborers had to produce weapons there.
What was the concrete involvement of these companies in Nazi crimes? At the beginning, after the seizure of power, there was massive rearmament. Although it violated the Treaty of Versailles, it was not yet comparable to the later crimes. Then came very quickly the "Aryanization," i.e., the expropriation of Jewish entrepreneurial families or shareholders. During World War II, this development continued in the territories occupied by Germany. There, companies and assets were also expropriated and looted. Added to this was the exploitation of an estimated twelve to twenty million men, women, and children as forced or slave laborers in German factories and mines.
Aryanization was made possible by authorities and professional groups that gave the expropriations an appearance of legality.
To what extent were the expropriations of Jewish entrepreneurs controlled by the state? Between 1933 and 1937, Jewish entrepreneurs were increasingly pressured to sell their companies at low prices. Many wanted to emigrate, but this desire naturally arose under massive coercion. The Nazi authorities controlled these processes. There were also numerous middlemen: lawyers, auditors, and trustees. Often, public perception focuses on the big industrialists who profited from "Aryanization." But it was also made possible by authorities and professional groups that gave the expropriations an appearance of legality.
Is anything known about compensation later paid to former Jewish shareholders? In the post-war period, families like Quandt and Flick tried to keep the stolen wealth as much as possible. Their lawyers conducted negotiations with survivors or with the heirs of murdered families and former shareholders. Often, they tried to delay legal proceedings as long as possible.
In February 1933, shortly after Hitler's appointment as Chancellor, a meeting took place between Hitler, Göring, and leading industrialists. What was agreed there? Most of the big industrialists had never met Hitler personally before. Officially, they were invited to talk about his economic policy. In reality, Hitler, Göring, and the NSDAP were primarily interested in party donations for the upcoming election campaign. The political promise was very clear. Göring essentially stated that the election of March 5, 1933, would be the last election in Germany for a long time. It was thus clearly announced that German democracy was to be ended. Many of the industrialists present subsequently donated.
Big industrialists donated a total of about three million Reichsmarks to the NSDAP.
Do we know how much was paid? A total of about three million Reichsmarks was collected. The NSDAP was in a catastrophic financial situation at the time and was more than twelve million Reichsmarks in debt.
Can one say who acted out of opportunism and who out of ideological conviction? You cannot generalize. Quandt and Flick were primarily opportunists. The von Finck, Porsche-Piëch, and Oetker families were more ideologically driven. With Kühne, it was probably a mixture of opportunism and ideology. Quandt and Flick, the two biggest profiteers, acted in my assessment primarily opportunistically.
There were even satellite camps of concentration camps built right next to the factories of these entrepreneurs. Large companies like BMW and IG Farben, but also the companies of Günther Quandt and Friedrich Flick, as well as Siemens, Krupp, and Daimler-Benz, collaborated with the SS. Satellite camps were set up near their factories, sometimes with direct links to specific concentration camps. Examples are IG Farben and Auschwitz, or BMW and Dachau. The companies essentially "borrowed" concentration camp prisoners from the SS. They paid a fixed daily rate – for example, four Reichsmarks per forced laborer. The people were exploited under terrible conditions. Many died or were murdered.
Why were the Nuremberg Trials not comprehensively extended to industry and entrepreneurs? That is an important question. The Americans did not want to put capitalism itself on trial. The Cold War began, and a conflict between political and economic systems developed. In competition with the Soviet Union, the USA did not want to fundamentally delegitimize capitalism.
The Americans did not want to put capitalism itself on trial.
Did economic interests also play a role, because Germany was needed as a strong counterweight to communism? Yes, West Germany was to become a buffer against the Soviet Union. In the subsequent Nuremberg trials, there were proceedings against Friedrich Flick and his managers, against those responsible for the Krupp concern, and against board members of IG Farben. But these were only three of a total of eleven subsequent trials. None of the companies were expropriated by the Western Allies. No one had to give up their wealth, not even part of it.
The Western Allies later handed over hundreds of thousands of suspected war criminals to West German authorities. That happened at the national level. The original war against National Socialism had already been politically overshadowed by the Cold War. Now West Germany was to be responsible for prosecuting its own perpetrators. However, there was little incentive among West German authorities to punish compatriots for crimes in which large parts of society had been involved or whose ideology they had shared.
So-called denazification. Denazification is largely a myth. It did not take place in the claimed form. Power and wealth from the "Third Reich" continued to have an effect in West Germany. In the years between 1945 and the founding of the Federal Republic, the Allies could still have had some oversight over denazification procedures. Nevertheless, men like Günther Quandt or August von Finck were only classified as followers. That is hardly understandable.
Companies did not assume explicit moral or legal responsibility for the crimes in their factories.
With the establishment of the Foundation "Remembrance, Responsibility and Future" and an agreement negotiated in 1999 between the US government and the Schröder government, German companies made compensation payments to forced laborers. At the same time, however, the companies did not assume explicit moral or legal responsibility for the crimes in their factories. The agreement contained a clause stating that the payments should not be understood as an admission of guilt or recognition of legal responsibility.
Compensating people for something without taking responsibility sounds like cognitive dissonance. That hits the nail on the head. The payments were made primarily because of pressure from the USA. In the 1990s, in the wake of globalization, survivors – including people from the former Soviet Union and Shoah survivors in the USA – threatened class-action lawsuits against major German companies like VW, Allianz, Siemens, BMW, and Deutsche Bank. Some lawsuits were actually filed. For the companies, their global reputation, their stock prices, and above all the value of their brands were at stake. They had to protect their brands, their companies, and their access to global markets.
There are still families like Quandt who had their history researched very professionally and thoroughly. There is a great discrepancy between a scientifically sound study on the one hand and public communication on the other. Companies and families continue to maintain institutions like the BMW Foundation Herbert Quandt, the Herbert Quandt Media Prize, the Friedrich Flick Sponsorship Foundation, or the Ferry Porsche Foundation, without transparently informing about the crimes of these men. At the same time, they essentially say: We have had our history researched.
What would an honest reckoning look like? A real reckoning would have to make clear to a global audience and to consumers: This person was a successful entrepreneur, but at the same time deeply entangled in the Nazi system and its crimes. So, for example, not just that Herbert Quandt was an important economic leader, but also that he founded and helped build a satellite concentration camp in Poland at the end of 1944. Or that he operated battery factories in Berlin where he exploited thousands of female concentration camp prisoners. Or that he bought businesses looted from Jews in France. Yes, that he even exploited prisoners of war on his own estate in Silesia. These connections are still not presented clearly and transparently enough. The BMW-Quandt family argues that his success as an entrepreneur is more important than his crimes. But both belong to historical truth. You cannot honor one and ignore the other.
