Let's suppose this pisses off a group of GI's and they decide to investigate. And they realize that if you overstate the case, you lose credibility. In fact, if you overstate by one-tenth of one percent, people feel they've been worked and played and kick at the whole thing.Ford and GM Scrutinized for Alleged Nazi Collaboration
Washington Post , Michael Dobbs, Nov. 30, 1998.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/daily/nov98/nazicars30.htm
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When American GIs invaded Europe in June 1944, they did so in jeeps, trucks and tanks manufactured by the Big Three motor companies in one of the largest crash militarization programs ever undertaken. It came as an unpleasant surprise to discover that the enemy was also driving trucks manufactured by Ford and Opel -- a 100 percent GM-owned subsidiary -- and flying Opel-built warplanes. (Chrysler's role in the German rearmament effort was much less significant.)
When the U.S. Army liberated the Ford plants in Cologne and Berlin, they found destitute foreign workers confined behind barbed wire and company documents extolling the "genius of the Fuehrer," according to reports filed by soldiers at the scene. A U.S. Army report by investigator Henry Schneider dated Sept. 5, 1945, accused the German branch of Ford of serving as "an arsenal of Nazism, at least for military vehicles" with the "consent" of the parent company in Dearborn.
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So, when they get out of the service, these veterans engage in very skillful activism. As they learn more, they state 80% of the case. As they learn still more, 90%. They make sure there is evidence behind their public statements.
And U.S. Army investigator Henry Schneider may have overstated, or he may not have. The veterans realize it's a good statement to play off of, even as they engage in their own parallel investigation in a very systematic and more cautious fashion.