Context: Before the US joined the war, IBM had a business deal with the Nazi regime to supply their machines. Their tabulation machines were used for everything from census and logistics to concentration camp administration. IBMs punch card systems along with numbers tattooed on prisoners were used to track their relocations, labour schedules and executions.

IBM claims that they lost control of their German division after the US entered the war but some historians claim that they still continued to profit from their partnership knowingly and despite the fact.

  • PugJesus@piefed.socialMEnglish
    3·
    8 days ago

    The way I’ve come to terms with it is this: if it hadn’t been for the IBM computers in use, we wouldn’t have the records that we do. We wouldn’t have had the same level of hard proof at Nuremberg. IBM didn’t commit the atrocities. But in a sense, they created accountability.

    That’s… not really a justification.

    Fuck, man, we have reams of video evidence just because Ike said “Someone will try to deny this” when he saw the camps and had to have fucking thousands of emaciated and tortured bodies buried. I don’t think a handful of extra records is really relevant.