DISCLAIMER
This is not a Shell website. You Can Be Sure Shell does not endorse or approve of this site, or its content. Royal Dutch Shell Plc threatened to take legal action in the event of publication. All bluster and bluff thus far. There are no subscription charges nor do we solicit or accept donations. It is a non-commercial entirely free to use website drawing attention to Shell’s toxic Nazi history. The Shell logo image with the white text used on this website, as per the above example, is in the public domain because its copyright has expired and its author is anonymous. It can be found on WIKIMEDIA COMMONS. Link to Shell’s own website: shell.com
NAZI HISTORY OF ROYAL DUTCH SHELL
Royal Dutch Shell conspired directly with Hitler, financed the Nazi Party, was anti-Semitic and sold out its own Dutch Jewish employees to the Nazis. Shell had a close relationship with the Nazis during and after the reign of Sir Henri Deterding, an ardent Nazi, and the founder and decades-long leader of the Royal Dutch Shell Group. His burial ceremony, which had all the trappings of a state funeral, was held at his private estate in Mecklenburg, Germany. The spectacle (photographs below) included a funeral procession led by a horse-drawn funeral hearse with senior Nazis officials and senior Royal Dutch Shell directors in attendance, Nazi salutes at the graveside, swastika banners on display and wreaths and personal tributes from Adolf Hitler and Reichsmarschall, Hermann Goring. Deterding was an honoured associate and supporter of Hitler and a personal friend of Goring.
Deterding was the guest of Hitler during a four-day summit meeting at Berchtesgaden. Sir Henri and Hitler both had ambitions on Russian oil fields. Only an honoured personal guest would be rewarded with a private four-day meeting at Hitler’s mountain top retreat.
MORE INFORMATION
Shell appeased and collaborated with the Nazis. The oil giant instructed its employees in the Netherlands to complete a form giving particulars about their descent, which for some, amounted to a self-declared death warrant. Shell used slave labour and was a close business partner in Germany of I.G. Farben, the notorious Nazi run chemical giant that also used slave labour and supplied the Zyklon-B gas used during the Holocaust to exterminate millions of people, including children. Shell continued the partnership with the Nazis in the years after the retirement of Sir Henri and even after his death. It was money generated on Shell forecourts around the world, profiteering from cartel oil prices, that funded the Nazi party and saved it from financial collapse. Evidence about Shell’s Nazi connections can be found in extracts from “A History of Royal Dutch Shell” Volumes 1 and 2 authored by historians paid by Shell, who had unrestricted access to Shell archives. There are 67 pages in total, so takes some time to download.
Photograph (full size here) shows a Swastika flag flying at the head office of Royal Dutch Petroleum, 30 Carel van Bylandtlaan, The Hague, during the Nazi occupation of the in World War II (From Image Database Hague Municipal)
Sir Henri Deterding (photograph above and oil painting below), the founder of the Royal Dutch Shell Group – known as “The Most Powerful Man in the World” – who became an ardent Nazi and financial supporter of Hitler and the Nazi party on behalf of his beloved company, Shell.
The caption says: “Oil painting of Sir Henri Deterding, controversial leader of Royal Dutch Shell”.OVER 500 EXTERNAL PUBLICATIONS CITING OUR SHELL WEBSITES
See our link list of over 500 articles by the FT, Wall Street Journal, Reuters, Bloomberg, Forbes, Dow Jones Newswires, New York Times, CNBC etc, plus UK House of Commons Select Committee Hansard records, information on U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission website etc. all containing references to our Shell focussed websites, or our website founders Alfred and John Donovan. Includes TV documentary features in English and German, newspaper and magazine articles, radio interviews, newsletters etc. Plus academic papers, Stratfor intelligence reports and UK, U.S. and Australian state/parliamentary publications, also citing our Shell websites. Click on this link to see the entire list, all in date order with a link to an index of over 100 books also containing references to our websites and/or our activities.
John Donovan, the website owner
A head-cut image of Alfred Donovan (now deceased) appears courtesy of The Wall Street Journal.
Tag Archives: Waffen SS
CONTENT
SUMMARY OF FEATURED CONTENT FROM THE EBOOK “SIR HENRI DETERDING AND THE NAZI HISTORY OF ROYAL DUTCH SHELL”
CHAPTER 1: The best historians Shell could buy
CHAPTER 2: News story in February 2015: Shell ship named after a Nazi SS Officer
CHAPTER 3: Royal Dutch Shell and the Nazis
CHAPTER 4: Media coverage of Sir Henri Deterding’s death
CHAPTER 5: The Nazi Funeral of Royal Dutch Shell leader Sir Henri Deterding
CHAPTER 6: Great friend of the Germans
CHAPTER 7: “You Can Be Sure of Shell….”
CHAPTER 8: Royal Dutch Shell Anti-Semitism
CHAPTER 9: Deterding’s support for Nazi Stormtroopers
CHAPTER 10: Shell support for the Nazis continued after the retirement of Sir Henri as leader
CHAPTER 11: Shell collaborated in the Nazi annexation of Austria and occupation of Czechoslovakia
CHAPTER 12: Shell’s notorious business partner: IG Farben
CHAPTER 13: Royal Dutch Shell and Nazi slave labor
CHAPTER 14: Control of Royal Dutch Shell companies in Nazi-occupied Europe
CHAPTER 15: Nazi connections relating to Shell
CHAPTER 16: Shell historians attempt to distance Deterding from Hitler
CHAPTER 17: Why does it still matter?
CHAPTER 18: Time for a rare public apology from Shell?
CHAPTER 19: INDEX OF KEY DATES
CHAPTER 20: Shell cloak and dagger activities
CHAPTER 21: Wikipedia: The sanitization of Shell’s history
Chapter 22: Author’s unique connection with Shell
CHAPTER 23: Index of Shell leadership financial support for the Nazis
RELATED ARTICLES
Deterding’s massive funding for Hitlers Winterhilfswerk (added 2 Aug 2019)
Shell’s effort to help maintain Hitler’s foreign markets thereby aiding the Nazi Government in its direct war against Britain: added October 2021
Royal Dutch Shell Corporate Collaboration with the Nazis: added Oct 2021
Henry van der Waerden, the Shell executive who defied Deterding and his Nazi ambitions
Shell’s toxic Nazi history catching up with the energy giant
CHAPTER 1: The best historians Shell could buy
By John Donovan
Shell commissioned a group of eminent “independent” historians (above) mostly Dutch, to author a history of Royal Dutch Shell to mark the Group’s centenary in 2007. The introduction in Volume 1 pledged independent research and “a proper and even-handed assessment of Deterding.” Something went amiss because the “history,” as published in regard to his dealings with Hitler, is simply untrue.
On 24 May 2015, a light-hearted story in the Prufrock column of The Sunday Times posed the question: “ARE corporate histories the new harbingers of doom?” It cited the release of corporate histories of two multinational banks that proved embarrassing to the banks due to unforeseen developments.
Wiesenthal Centre to Royal Dutch Shell CEO: ‘Disassociate Your Company from Glorification of a Nazi War Criminal’
By John Donovan
I recently became aware of a letter (see below) which a director of the Simon Wiesenthal Centre sent to Royal Dutch Shell CEO Ben van Beurden on 5 February 2015. The communication stemmed from my campaigning activities that ended with Allseas renaming the worlds largest ship. It had been named in honour of a Waffen SS officer, Pieter Schelte Heerema (right). I will shortly be supplying the Simon Wiesenthal Centre with a trove of evidence about Shell’s Nazi history including its close partnership in Nazi Germany with IG Farben, the chemical giant which manufactured the gas used to exterminate several million Jewish people in the Holocaust. Dutch Directors of the Royal Dutch Shell Group including Sir Henri Deterding helped finance Hitler and the Nazi Party.