Soon, other editors learned that eminent credentials were no guarantee of a factual review of IBM’s role in the Holocaust. One of the most reliable magazines of Israeli and Jewish affairs ran a review by a highly respected Holocaust author, again filled with ad hominem references. This review was filled with numerous errors and distortions, and concluded with this statement: “This strange type of pre-publication ‘peer review,’ in which the readers are chosen by Black, raises more than a few questions about the book’s reliability. Having spoken to several of them after they had read the book, I found that they all overlapped on one point: that Black took an interesting subject and built it up beyond proportion, probably in order to tell a better story.” The reviewer’s many false statements and errors were detailed to the magazine’s editor. Upon questioning, the historian confirmed to the astonished magazine editor that none of my pre-publication reviewers were actually contacted. The review was immediately pulled from the magazine’s website. My letter of correction was published shortly thereafter and the publication sent me an official letter of thanks.
The best-read history journal in England abruptly cancelled a review submitted by one of Britain’s most distinguished Holocaust historians. That reviewer had asserted this bizarre technologic statement: “The Hollerith cards were inflexible, obviously subject to frequent human error, easily torn, and had to be programmed on a time-consuming one-by-one basis. It is not surprising that the Nazis did not use them on a regular basis in carrying out the Holocaust.” Punch cards were printed by the millions, not programmed one by one.
At this writing, a prestigious Ivy League history journal has promised to intensely scrutinize before publishing a review by an eminent historian of Reich business until numerous complaints of errors can be resolved. Those complaints came to light when the challenged review was faxed to a historical institute just before my speaking engagement there—months before scheduled publication. A historian in New England is working on a joint letter with me retracting and correcting his mistaken review in a scholarly journal, which he admits unfortunately relied upon the business weekly’s review condemned by the ADL as a “distortion of history” and “morally bankrupt.” The New England reviewer, like several others, blindly repeated statements about the SS Race and Settlement Office, not knowing what the agency was. Many other publications have recanted, corrected, or cancelled error-filled reviews that engage in Hollerith denial.
Although I was astonished by the statements of a few historians, my friends in academia simply chuckled. They had seen it many times before. Still, others involved in the study of Holocaust history did not find these misstatements humorous. “Most dismaying to me was the reaction of some of the Holocaust scholars I had come especially to respect,” says Wolfe, arguably one of the world’s most accomplished Holocaust scholars. He adds, “Some refused to read the book, others indulged in ad hominem attacks on its author. They are defensive because they were scooped…. I have always assumed that the essence of scholarship is… cogent interpretation of the best available sources. Perhaps it is embarrassing that most Holocaust experts (with the notable exception of the late Sybil Milton) missed the role of punch-cards in enabling the Third Reich… to engage in war crimes such as operating concentration camps where extermination through labor was conducted. Some of the most telling records of the amoral and profitable involvement of IBM with Nazi Germany were in my custody for a third of a century, but it took Edwin Black to draw their significance to my attention.”
Ironically, while readying my Afterword, I issued a worldwide call for any corrections of “fact or fact context” that could be incorporated in the next edition. I asked for any documentation to be attached. The notice was repeatedly posted at the most visible Holocaust sites on the Internet, circulated to several dozen university history departments, and I even personally phoned likely critics soliciting corrections. None came. That said, one pre-publication reader did remind me to correct a few minor errors discovered just before publication of the hardcover involving the number and type of questions on nineteenth-century American census forms. We also corrected numerous typos. Other than that, the main chapters of the paperback are virtually identical to those of the hardcover.
Fortunately, the few isolated instances of Hollerith denial were marginalized by most reputable historians and the public. People continued to demand accountability. Numerous lawsuits were filed or threatened against IBM by Jews in America, Poland, and France, and by Gypsies throughout Europe, seeking to open IBM’s archives. Ironically, some of these lawsuits were deemed to threaten the final financial reparations agreed to by Germany. Eventually, rather than endure months and years of additional delay due to any IBM litigation, U.S. and German government officials as well as organizational leaders pressured the plaintiffs’ lawyers to desist. The U.S. State Department itself issued a statement announcing one lawsuit dismissal, asserting, “The primary remedy sought by the plaintiffs in the IBM case was the opening of IBM’s archives in relation to the World War II period. The United States strongly supports the opening of all archives, public and private, relating to the Holocaust era in order to facilitate further research and encourage greater understanding of the Holocaust and its historical context.” Unfortunately, other than the two partial transfers, none of the other archives has yet been opened. Nor did the carefully worded State Department statement indicate when those IBM archives might be opened.
To date, IBM has never acknowledged or explained its twelve-year involvement with the Hitler regime. Nor has it apologized for its role in the Holocaust or the German war machine. Nor has it opened its numerous archives. I firmly believe that the people of IBM today are good people, many of them are friends. But IBM has received terrible advice from its public relations people. IBM should take a lesson from its Nazi customers—acknowledge and reveal its activities and move on. Instead, it seems, that IBM is hoping the matter will simply go away.
But, the Holocaust will never go away. An entire community of young researchers is now combing the archives of Europe, Latin America, and the United States. Long after I have moved on to other book projects, new revelations about IBM’s role in the Holocaust will continue to emerge. As I said previously, I have only scratched the surface. The deeper the world digs, the darker and more documented the picture becomes.
NOTES
I: NUMBERED PEOPLE
1. “Recollection of Hanna Levy-Hass” in Eberhard Kolb, Bergen-Belsen: From “Detention Camp” to Concentration Camp, 1943-45, trans. Gregory Claeys and Christine Lattke (Gottingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1985), p. 66; see Encyclopaedia Judaica, s.v. “Bergen-Belsen,” p. 611; Kolb, pp. 29, 41, 94, 98, as well as the photos; General Glyn-Hughes, Cite in Le grand livre des temoins, FNDIRP, Ramsey, 1995, p. 291; also see photos, The Nizkor Project, www.nizkor.org; Judith Jaegermann, “Memories of My Childhood in the Holocaust,” Oral History in A History of Jews in Hamburg, Hamburg University, www.rrz.uni-hamburg.