German airline Lufthansa is one of many big-name brands that collaborated with the Nazis during the Holocaust. As the airline celebrates its 100th anniversary, why does its Nazi past continue to fly under the radar? Lufthansa Airlines, the flag carrier of Germany, takes great pride in its aviation heritage spanning almost a century. Images from the 1920s and 1930s — including Junkers Ju 52 aircraft used by the Luftwaffe — feature prominently in Lufthansa’s marketing, alluding to the “pioneering spirit” of the brand and its place in aviation history. But the story of Lufthansa’s role in the Third Reich war machine, one that includes the large-scale use of forced labor, remains largely under the radar. In fact, Lufthansa is just one of many companies that collaborated with the Nazi regime, big-name brands and business dynasties that continue to “hide in plain sight,” according to journalist David de Jong. (…) Deutsche Luft Hansa — from 1933 styled as Lufthansa — was founded in 1926 when only a small elite could afford to fly. By the early 1930s, it was struggling to survive. The Nazis “saved Lufthansa,” according to German historian Lutz Budrass, an expert in German aviation history. In 1933, Hermann Goering appointed Lufthansa director Erhard Milch to state secretary of what would become the Reich Aviation Ministry. Under the Treaty of Versailles, which ended World War I, it was forbidden for Germany to have an air force. But with only minor restrictions on civil aviation, Budrass said that Lufthansa became a front for National Socialist rearmament. After 1941, Lufthansa had a prominent role in aircraft repair workshops behind the front lines and, unlike other companies, was able to directly procure forced laborers, including many children who were kidnapped from Nazi occupied territories across Europe. When World War II ended, the Allies declared the airline part of the German air force and liquidated the company in 1951. Deutsche Lufthansa, today the world’s fourth largest airline by revenue, was founded as the Aktiengesellschaft für Luftverkehrsbedarf (shortened to Luftag) in 1953, acquiring the rights to the Lufthansa name and the famous crane logo in 1954. But it wasn’t just the same name and logo: Many of the same men returned to its management board, including Kurt Weigelt, who led the economic department of the NSDAP Office of Colonial Policy. After the war, he was placed on a list of wanted war criminals and was eventually sentenced to two years in prison and a fine. But by 1953, he was the chairman of Lufthansa’s supervisory board and in retirement, became its only ever honorary board member. At the end of the 1990s, Lufthansa hired Budrass to research its use of forced labor during the Nazi period. The study was completed in 2001 but Lufthansa did not publish it until 2016, and then only as a supplement at the back of a glossy illustrated history of the company. In response, Budrass published his own 700-page book — against Lufthansa’s wishes: 2016’s “The Eagle and the Crane: The History of Lufthansa 1926-1955” (“Adler und Kranich: Die Lufthansa und ihre Geschichte 1926-1955”). In a statement to DW, Lufthansa asserted that it is not the legal successor of the company founded in 1926, writing that “the legal foundation of today’s Lufthansa was laid in 1953.” Lufthansa acknowledged that the National Socialist era is part of its history and said it would be “using its 100th anniversary as an opportunity to critically reexamine its responsibility during the Nazi era and to further investigate it based on historical research.”
via dw: Lufthansa and the role of big business in the Holocaust
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