Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 1999/08/24
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]In a message dated 08/24/1999 11:43:03 AM Central Daylight Time, msmall@roanoke.infi.net writes: << At 08:48 AM 8/24/1999 EDT, Charlie Trentelman wrote: >Ektachrome, Agfa and so forth are a simpler process stolen from Germany's >Agfa company during World War II (spoils of war) that involves dyes that are >in the film when it is made and activated by the various layers being exposed >to light. It is a simpler process, able to be done in a local lab for less >bux, so the local lab can turn E6 around in two hours. I would object both to the history here and to your characterization of any technological taking as "theft." The US, UK, USSR, and France, and the other Allies, were given carte blanche to take German technology as war booty. It was not "theft": it was a simple taking, precisely in the same way that the German acquisition of the Skoda arms works in 1938 was not theft, but the outflowing of Tiso's cowardice. Marc >> According to Webster's "stealing" is defined as "to take away by force or unjust means." We were lucky enough to be the victor in Europe and "take by force" that which we wanted. We were also lucky to "steal" Von Braun after the acquired considerable rocket technology based on the work Goddard, an American, did in the 20's. If the Americans did not invent the Ektachrome but "stole" them as a result of overcoming Nazi Germany by force, then it is clear that is not American technology. In my view, the US did not steal the A-bomb from Germany merely because Germans provided most of the brains because Hitler ran them off and they came to this country voluntarily. Further, the theories carried in the German minds were no more than theories until the US provided the means by which those theories could be tested and refined. Stole Ektachrome, probably so. Stole the rest, I do not believe so. Therefor; I would conclude the US "stole" the Ektachrome technology from the Germans as Mr. Trentelman stated above.