Thread by @karolcummins

Although there were sanctions and restrictions against working with Germany during World War II, especially when America entered the war in 1941, there were some American companies that profited off both sides of World War II.
Backdoor #Deals #Bribes

cia.gov/library/center…

🐙GE assisted the German SIGINT & was of intel value to Dulles during the war.

At the start of WWII GE was a German co that produced electrical equip’t known as Allgemeine Elektricitäts-Gesellschaft AG (AEG). They engaged in corp espionage for Germany.

nsa.gov/Portals/70/doc…

“Overall, the Germans were successful in establishing a secret radio communications network from their control station in Argentina, as well as a courier system involving the use of Spanish merchant vessels for the shipment of paper-form intelligence.”

nsa.gov/Portals/70/doc…

“Albrecht Engels (Alfredo) was another German spy, and the owner of the General Electric Company in Krefeld. Engels was originally recruited by the Abwehr, the German military's intelligence agency.”

nsa.gov/Portals/70/doc…

This meant that, in addition to collecting economy-related information, the agents would collect information about shipping, war production, military movements in the United States, and political and military affairs in Brazil.

nsa.gov/Portals/70/doc…

🐙Koch

“The father of the billionaires Charles G. and David H. Koch helped construct a major oil refinery in Nazi Germany that was personally approved by Adolf Hitler, according to a new history of the Kochs and other wealthy families.”

nytimes.com/2016/01/12/us/…

🐙Mellon

The book, “Dark Money,” by Jane Mayer, traces the rise of the modern conservative movement through the activism and money of a handful of rich donors: among them Richard Mellon Scaife, an heir to the Mellon banking fortune.

Mellon #OSS #Donovan

nytimes.com/2016/01/12/us/…

And Harry and Lynde Bradley, brothers who became wealthy in part from military contracts but poured millions into anti-government philanthropy.

nytimes.com/2016/01/12/us/…

“More than 50 years ago Fred C. Koch, father of the controversial billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, warned in an alarmist pamphlet that he wrote and distributed to more than 2.5 million people that “socialism is the precursor to communism””

america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/…

“More than half a century ago, Fred Koch wrote in his manifesto, “Democracy cannot exist if the government owns all property. A communist take-over in a socialist country would be no trick at all.””

america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/…

🐙Mellon

Mellon controlled interests such as Alcoa & formed several cartel agreements with IG Farben. #Backdoordeals Harding Adm.

📌Mellon supported several pro-fascist groups in the 1930s & was part of the fascist plot against FDR.

books.google.com/books?id=vh7sx…

📌Critics on the right worried that Roosevelt was a Communist, a socialist or the tool of a Jewish conspiracy.

📌Critics on the left complained his policies didn't go far enough.

🔑Sound familiar? Same arguments 90 years later.

npr.org/2012/02/12/145…

📌Some of Roosevelt's (FDR) opponents didn't stop at talk.

📌Though it's barely remembered today, there was a genuine conspiracy to overthrow the president. #Mellon

npr.org/2012/02/12/145…

📌The Roaring 20s & Roots of American Fascism

@threadreaderapp unroll please and thank you. #Dulles #OSS & #GermanCompanies