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Science, Technology, and Reparations: Exploitation and Plunder in Postwar Germany
Most people know something about Werner von Braun and the German rocket scientists and engineers whom the Americans brought to the United States after the Second World War. What virtually no one seems to know is that the plan under which they were brought - Project Paperclip - was but one aspect of a much more comprehensive and systematic program of 'intellectual reparations'. This program began in late 1944 with the limited aim of exploiting German scientific and technical know-how in order to shorten the war with Japan. As Allied armies swept across Western Germany, teams of dozens of American experts - drawn from government agencies, industrial and trade associations, and the universities - visited hundreds of targeted german research institutions, technical schools, and industrial firms. They interviewed personnel, examined processes and products, took photographs and samples, and demanded drawings, plans, blueprints, research reports, and documents of all kinds. But the limited, war-related aims they began with quickly yielded to the tempting opportunities for industrial and tempting opportunities for industrial and technological plunder in virtually every area of German expertise, including wind tunnels, tape recorders, synthetic fuels and rubber, color film, textiles, machine tools, heavy equipment, ceramics, optical glass, dyes, and electron microscopes. Ostensibly, the information gathered was to be made, in Secretary of State George C. Marshall's words, 'available to the rest of the world'. In practice, however, much of it was transferred by the scientific consultants and document-screeners directly to their own firms and for their own purposes. This story has never before been told, and the author's meticulous but highly readable account is based on over ten years of research in German and American public and private archives, many of them previously unused. One of the most striking revelations in the book is the vast scale of the 'intellectual reparations' program. At the Moscow meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers in 1947, V. M. M olotov, the Soviet Union's Minister of Foreign Affairs, charged that the United States and Great Britain had taken over c10 billion in reparations from germany in the form of patents and other technical knowledge. Secretary of State marshall angrily denied the charge, but no precise evaluation was ever issued by the US government. On the basis of his research, the author concludes that the $10 billion figure dismissed by State Department functionaries as 'fantastic' is probably not far from the mark. General Lucius D. Clay, the American Military Government, eventually succeeded in having the program shut down in the interests of German economic recovery, but he failed in his efforts to have an evaluation made in monetary terms to establish a credit to Germany's reparations account. nevertheless, the popular American belief that the United States took no reparations from Germany needs to be drastically modified. The exploitation program had a negative effect on the early resumption of postwar German research and economic recovery. I n the long run, however, the American exploitation program furthered an extensive network of American-German scientific, business, and industrial collaboration, and it contributed to the American climate of opinion that insured West germany's participation in the Marshall Plan. Throughout the book, the author has used case studies to illustrate the program - its nature, extent, and impact upon the Germans and Americans.<
- GenresHistory
280 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1990
About the author
John Gimbel
10 books2 followersFor the author of works on graph theory, see John Gordon Gimbel (University of Alaska, Fairbanks)
John Gimbel (1922-1992) was a historian and professor at Humboldt State University in California. He was twice the receiver of the outstanding professor award 1965/66 and 1967/68. Outstanding history majors can earn a scholarship in his name through the John Gimbel Research Trust Award. His life's work, dedicated to World War II, is in preservation at Stanford University.
Sources:
Social Security Death Index
Outstanding Professor
John Gimbel Research Trust Award
The John Gimbel Papers
John Gimbel (1922-1992) was a historian and professor at Humboldt State University in California. He was twice the receiver of the outstanding professor award 1965/66 and 1967/68. Outstanding history majors can earn a scholarship in his name through the John Gimbel Research Trust Award. His life's work, dedicated to World War II, is in preservation at Stanford University.
Sources:
Social Security Death Index
Outstanding Professor
John Gimbel Research Trust Award
The John Gimbel Papers
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
August 23, 2019
Ever suspect a physical copy of a book is near impossible to find or extremely expensive because provides clear evidence that cherished and protected narratives are simply lies and propaganda? This book falls into that category for me. Chock-full of cited information, this book paints a picture of inestimable value stolen from German companies (usually falling into the hands of private business, although such efforts were funded by American taxpayers) that never found its way into reparations calculations. When one juxtaposes disappearing reparations with still continuing reparations to magically appearing and multiplying victims, one wonders how true justice and satisfaction can ever be reached.
"In this fashion, the firms' representatives concluded, German industry was being deprived of its most valuable intellectual capital (”das wertvollste geistige Kapital”); and this was being done without control of any kind (”vollig unkontrolliert”), thus without credit to Germany’s reparations account."
"The subjects of the reports offered for sale by the OTS touched virtually every aspect of German industry and technology: acetylene chemistry, synthetic fuels and rubber, synthetic lubricating oils, synthetic fibers and textile manufacturing, ceramics, diesel motors, optics and glass, wind tunnels, heavy presses, infrared, tape recorders and metalized plastic tapes, cold extrusion of steel, electron microscopes, electric condensers, a butter-making machine, fruit juices, a machine to wrap chocolates, a process to preserve soybean oil, white carbon black, cellulose products and wood sugars, dental supplies, synthetic mica flakes, synthetic sapphires for watch, clock, and instrument bearings, color film and color-film processing, quartz clocks, pharmaceuticals, insecticides, synthetic blood plasma, artificial leather, plastics, colors and dyes, soaps and detergents, woodworking machinery, slide fasteners, sewing needles, cheese-making equipment, potentiometers and other precise measuring instruments, milk cans, manure Spreaders, motorcycles, and cameras and photographic equipment, among other things."
"Still other Commerce Department officials bubbled over with enthusiasm. One of them wrote: 'This accumulation of information [the two-year accumulation of FIAT, BIOS, C108, and Publication Board reports] not only represents the greatest transfer of mass intelligence ever made from one country to another, but it also represents one of the most valuable acquisitions ever made by this country.' 40 Another wrote that 'qualified technical men familiar with the mass of information being gathered say it will be 10 years before anyone can estimate its value fully. But on the basis of a few reports from a few industries which have already taken advantage of the material that has been published, German technology will save billions of dollars for American industry in the next decades and should advance our own research by several years.'"
"In this fashion, the firms' representatives concluded, German industry was being deprived of its most valuable intellectual capital (”das wertvollste geistige Kapital”); and this was being done without control of any kind (”vollig unkontrolliert”), thus without credit to Germany’s reparations account."
"The subjects of the reports offered for sale by the OTS touched virtually every aspect of German industry and technology: acetylene chemistry, synthetic fuels and rubber, synthetic lubricating oils, synthetic fibers and textile manufacturing, ceramics, diesel motors, optics and glass, wind tunnels, heavy presses, infrared, tape recorders and metalized plastic tapes, cold extrusion of steel, electron microscopes, electric condensers, a butter-making machine, fruit juices, a machine to wrap chocolates, a process to preserve soybean oil, white carbon black, cellulose products and wood sugars, dental supplies, synthetic mica flakes, synthetic sapphires for watch, clock, and instrument bearings, color film and color-film processing, quartz clocks, pharmaceuticals, insecticides, synthetic blood plasma, artificial leather, plastics, colors and dyes, soaps and detergents, woodworking machinery, slide fasteners, sewing needles, cheese-making equipment, potentiometers and other precise measuring instruments, milk cans, manure Spreaders, motorcycles, and cameras and photographic equipment, among other things."
"Still other Commerce Department officials bubbled over with enthusiasm. One of them wrote: 'This accumulation of information [the two-year accumulation of FIAT, BIOS, C108, and Publication Board reports] not only represents the greatest transfer of mass intelligence ever made from one country to another, but it also represents one of the most valuable acquisitions ever made by this country.' 40 Another wrote that 'qualified technical men familiar with the mass of information being gathered say it will be 10 years before anyone can estimate its value fully. But on the basis of a few reports from a few industries which have already taken advantage of the material that has been published, German technology will save billions of dollars for American industry in the next decades and should advance our own research by several years.'"
August 9, 2016
It took some time and effort to find out who John Gimbel is, and I want to know, because this is the only complete academic work on the subject, and because it's wonderful. I want to know who you are, John. I think Gimbel and Tom Bower are the only two major credible sources on this topic, besides the Technology Transfer Out of Germany After 1945 and American Policy and the Reconstruction of West Germany, 1945 1955 essays. Even Gimbel recommends Bower for his alternative, investigative journalist arguments.
This is the bio I have created:
John Gimbel (1922-1992) was a historian and professor at Humboldt State University in California. He was twice the receiver of the outstanding professor award 1965/66 and 1967/68. Outstanding history majors can earn a scholarship in his name through the John Gimbel Research Trust Award. His life's work, dedicated to World War II, is in preservation at Stanford University, of where this book is published.
Cheers to you, John. Without your work, I could not have spent the last 48+ hours writing a paper on an often overlooked topic.
Sources:
Social Security Death Index
Outstanding Professor
John Gimbel Research Trust Award
The John Gimbel Papers
This is the bio I have created:
John Gimbel (1922-1992) was a historian and professor at Humboldt State University in California. He was twice the receiver of the outstanding professor award 1965/66 and 1967/68. Outstanding history majors can earn a scholarship in his name through the John Gimbel Research Trust Award. His life's work, dedicated to World War II, is in preservation at Stanford University, of where this book is published.
Cheers to you, John. Without your work, I could not have spent the last 48+ hours writing a paper on an often overlooked topic.
Sources:
Social Security Death Index
Outstanding Professor
John Gimbel Research Trust Award
The John Gimbel Papers
May 6, 2019
This book gives a good summary and the big picture regarding US involvement in exploiting German property after World War II. It takes in Operation Paperclip, FIAT and other similar programs. It is purely academic and not biased or sensational about the subject (which is a controversial subject to begin with).
The other good thing is that it is only 186 pages of text so it covers the subject in a succinct way.
The other good thing is that it is only 186 pages of text so it covers the subject in a succinct way.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews