How the Ford Motor Company Became an Arsenal of Nazism

158 Pages·2014·0.87 MB·English

by  Daniel Warsh

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Honors Program in History (Senior Honors
Department of History
Theses)
May 2008
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Daniel Warsh
University of Pennsylvania, [email protected]
Follow this and additional works at: https://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors
Warsh, Daniel, "The Silent Partner: How the Ford Motor Company Became an Arsenal of Nazism" (2008).
Honors Program in History (Senior Honors Theses). 17.
https://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/17
A Senior Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Honors in History.
Faculty Advisor: Walter Licht
This paper is posted at ScholarlyCommons. https://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/17
For more information, please contact [email protected].
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Corporate responsibility is a popular buzzword in the news today, but the concept itself is hardly novel. In
response to a barrage of public criticism, the Ford Motor Company commissioned and published a study
of its own activities immediately before and during WWII. The study explores the multifaceted and
complicated relationship between the American parent company in Dearborn and the German subsidiary
in Cologne. The report's findings, however, are largely inconclusive and in some cases, dangerously
misleading. This thesis will seek to establish how, with the consent of Dearborn, the German Ford
company became an arsenal for Hitler's march on Europe. This thesis will clarify these murky
relationships, and picking up where the Ford internal investigation left off, place them within a framework
of corporate accountability and complicity. Ford's development as a transnational entity provides a
perfect subject of study to embark on such a project. Many of the major themes of post-World War I
Europe – economic stagnation, nationalism, coping with the aftermath of a devastating conflict, and
eventually, the rise of authoritarian states – are all present in Ford's German story, and their
consequences not only resonate within the fields of American, European, and business history but also
that of corporate responsibility. The lessons are still relevant today.
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Ford, Nazi, Hitler, Wehrmacht, Edsel, Research Findings About Ford-Werke Under the Nazi Regime
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A Senior Thesis Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for Honors in History.
Faculty Advisor: Walter Licht
This thesis or dissertation is available at ScholarlyCommons: https://repository.upenn.edu/hist_honors/17
University of Pennsylvania

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A senior thesis submitted in partial fulfillment
of the requirements for Honors in History

by

Daniel Warsh

Philadelphia, PA
March 24, 2008

Faculty Advisor: Walter Licht
Honors Director: Michael Zuckerman
For my family
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Acknowledgements....................................................................................................iv

Abstract......................................................................................................................v

Introduction................................................................................................................1

Chapter 1: International Expansion:
Nationalist Germany and Ford-Werke AG (1925-1933)...........................................12

Chapter 2: Enter Hitler and the Nazis: Implications for the
German Auto Industry and Ford-Werke AG (1933-1936)........................................42

Chapter 3: Aiding and Abetting:
How Dearborn and Cologne supplied the Nazi War Effort (1936-1939)..................72

Chapter 4: Strict Neutrality Has Its Costs (and Benefits)..........................................102

Conclusion.................................................................................................................134

Bibliography..............................................................................................................148
iv
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I would like to thank the following individuals for all of their help in making this thesis a reality.
Their guidance, encouragement, and patience throughout the past year and a half has been much
appreciated and contributed to this meaningful and enjoyable endeavor.
First, I would like to thank my mother, father, brother, and grandmother, who have always
supported me in every venture I have undertaken. My parents set an example for me in teaching
me to speak out whenever I witness injustice. My grandmother's experience of fleeing Germany
in 1938 gives this story a personal dimension for me. She has inspired me to push myself to my
fullest because so many others never lived to have that chance.
The close reading and useful commentary on my thesis drafts by Dr. Walter Licht, my thesis
advisor, was greatly appreciated. His ability to probe beneath the text is a true gift, and his
opinions strengthened this study. I will always be thankful for his wisdom, knowledge, and deep
concern for me, along with his insistence that I never forget Ford in the historical context. It has
been an honor to work with Dr. Licht and I am grateful for his willingness to take on my project.
He helped me organize this information into a coherent and structured argument, leaving an
indelible mark on this thesis.
Dr. Michael Zuckerman, my Honors director and second reader, encouraged me from our very
first class meeting to reconsider how I thought about history. Under his tutelage, my
fundamental understanding of historical reality was re-shaped. He instilled in me a real desire to
question the past and not take it at its face value. My thesis has engaged the past on this level
and has been the most formative experience of my academic career. Without Dr. Zuckerman’s
encouragement to break the traditional definitions and boundaries of history, I never would have
attempted such a venture.
I would like to thank each and every member of my Honors section. They are truly some of the
smartest and most talented individuals at the University of Pennsylvania and I am privileged to
have had the opportunity to work with each one of them. Their input on my thesis throughout
this process kept me focused and challenged me intellectually. Our camaraderie is one of the
best memories I have of my time here at Penn.
The comments of Professor Daniel Raff of the Wharton School and Professor Jonathan Steinberg
of the History Department in the early stages of this project kept me moving in the right
direction. Their abilities to point me to relevant literature and resources was invaluable.
I would also like to recognize my high school history teacher, Mrs. Karen Lessenberry, for
sharing with me her passion for United States history. Through her teaching, I was inspired to
pursue my undergraduate studies in history.
Finally, I am grateful for the History Department's generosity with regard to my research funding
which helped relieve the financial burden of completing this thesis.
v
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Corporate responsibility is a popular buzzword in the news today, but the concept itself is
hardly novel. In response to a barrage of public criticism, the Ford Motor Company
commissioned and published a study of its own activities immediately before and during WWII.
The study explores the multifaceted and complicated relationship between the American parent
company in Dearborn and the German subsidiary in Cologne. The report’s findings, however,
are largely inconclusive and in some cases, dangerously misleading. This thesis will seek to
establish how, with the consent of Dearborn, the German Ford company became an arsenal for
Hitler’s march on Europe. This thesis will clarify these murky relationships, and picking up
where the Ford internal investigation left off, place them within a framework of corporate
accountability and complicity. Ford’s development as a transnational entity provides a perfect
subject of study to embark on such a project. Many of the major themes of post-World War I
Europe – economic stagnation, nationalism, coping with the aftermath of a devastating conflict,
and eventually, the rise of authoritarian states – are all present in Ford’s German story, and their
consequences not only resonate within the fields of American, European, and business history
but also that of corporate responsibility. The lessons are still relevant today.
TTTTAAAABBBBLLLLEEEE OOOOFFFF CCCCOOOONNNNTTTTEEEENNNNTTTTSSSS

Acknowledgements....................................................................................................iv

Abstract......................................................................................................................v

Introduction................................................................................................................1

Chapter 1: International Expansion:
Nationalist Germany and Ford-Werke AG (1925-1933)...........................................12

Chapter 2: Enter Hitler and the Nazis: Implications for the
German Auto Industry and Ford-Werke AG (1933-1936)........................................43

Chapter 3: Aiding and Abetting:
How Dearborn and Cologne supplied the Nazi War Effort (1936-1939)..................71

Chapter 4: Strict Neutrality Has Its Costs (and Benefits)..........................................103

Conclusion.................................................................................................................134

Bibliography..............................................................................................................148
1
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Historical accountability and apology mark our current age. Nations all over the world
are taking steps to acknowledge the wrongs of the past and, when possible, act to correct them.
South Africa has actively improved race relations and strengthened democracy following the
ending of apartheid. To retroactively cope with the human rights abuses, Truth and
Reconciliation commissions have been established to investigate claims of brutality under
apartheid, while granting amnesty to perpetrators willing to admit they had erred. In South
America, Argentina and Chile have both instituted special truth-seeking commissions to
investigate tens of thousands of deaths and “disappearances” under brutal 1960s and 1970s
dictators. Just last year, Japan grudgingly apologized for its treatment of civilians who lived in
occupied areas during the Japanese conquests of Asia during World War II, and for forcing
thousands of women into prostitution for Japanese soldiers. In our own country, former
members of the confederacy, Virginia, Maryland, North Carolina, and Alabama have issued
official apologies for the horrors of slavery. Even New Jersey has passed a legislative resolution
apologizing for its connections to the Atlantic slave trade, and it remains the only Northern state
to actually accept responsibility for participating in slave trafficking.
This trend has expanded from the geopolitical sphere into the corporate world as well.
With varying degrees of acceptance, many firms have admitted wrongdoing for their past
behaviors. In 2005, Wachovia Bank publicly accepted blame for promoting and profiting from
slavery, as one of the banks it acquired had earned revenues from the slave trade. Financial giant
J.P. Morgan did the same, and went even further by creating a special scholarship fund for
African-Americans from Louisiana, where one of its subsidiary firms owned slaves. In a similar
vein, some firms that did business with the Nazis have publicly pledged to contribute to a
2
humanitarian fund designed to provide monetary compensation to individuals who worked as
forced laborers producing goods for the regime. These firms include Opel, owned by General
Motors, and Ford-Werke AG, the German subsidiary of Ford Motor Company.
Ford Motor Company enters the picture under this lens in 1998, when the British
Broadcasting Corporation produced a documentary about the activities of Ford Motor Company’s
German subsidiary in the years immediately prior to, as well as during, World War II. Shortly
thereafter, the Washington Post published an article that levied accusations against Ford and its
subsidiary on the basis of their relationship to and support of the Nazi regime, the use of slave
labor during the war, and the financial gains achieved by the company as a result of its wartime
activities. Around the same time, a class-action lawsuit was implemented against Ford by a former
forced laborer at the Cologne facility. She demanded compensation on behalf of herself and the
thousands of others who had been compelled to work under horrible conditions.
Ford executives agreed that damage control was desperately needed. Ford, after all, had
prided itself on its service to the nation as the “arsenal of democracy,” and the company had
worked hard to improve relations with the Jewish community which the company had alienated
in the past. These damning indictments that the entire Ford board of directors had approved of
doing business with the Nazis had serious implications for the company, both in terms of real
sales and in the courtroom. Ford wanted to guarantee that, should the class-action suit go to trial,
there would not be any unpleasant surprises. Thus, Ford chose to commission research not out of
a human interest but a financial one. Indeed, this was the worst kind of publicity for the
company, which had struggled for decades to overcome the anti-Semitism of its founder, Henry
Ford. It was still very easy for Ford executives to look back on the times when Henry Ford
publicly made his outlandish anti-Semitic claims in the United States. Following Ford’s