Sued by Holocaust survivors for aiding the Nazis by using slave workers in forced-labour camps, American company General Motors helped provide the machinery to carry out Germany's devastating and innovative war tactic: blitzkrieg ("lightning war"). "Blitz" trucks were manufactured in GM's German factory and supplied to the Wehrmacht ahead of the brutal invasions of nations including Poland, France and the USSR. Interestingly, the Nazi Minister of Armaments and War Production, Albert Speer, also gave special praise to the rubber supplied by GM - claiming it aided and abetted the Wehrmacht's lightning-war policy. The outbreak of war in 1939 also saw GM plants produce military aircraft and trucks - something US intelligence reports label as "the backbone of the German Army transportation system". So little did GM care about Hitler's policies that once Germany invaded Czechoslovakia in 1939, the company's chairman Alfred Sloan declared: "The Nazis' behaviour should not be considered the business of the management of General Motors." Profit before people - it's almost always the case, isn't it?
NUFC editor for WhatCulture.com/NUFC. History graduate (University of Edinburgh) and NCTJ-trained journalist. I love sports, hopelessly following Newcastle United and Newcastle Falcons. My pastimes include watching and attending sports matches religiously, reading spy books and sampling ales.
