From: Tim May <tcmay@got.net>
Date: Thu, 8 May 1997 00:47:36 +0800
To: cypherpunks@cyberpass.net
Subject: Banking Secrecy and Nazi Gold
Message-ID: <v03007800af9667d20ad6@[207.167.93.63]>
MIME-Version: 1.0
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I try to deconstruct events, to determine what the real issues are.

Take the case of the ongoing flap over Switzerland and claims that Swiss
banks hid gold, jewels, and other forms of money for high-ranking Nazis.
Adding to the flap--actually, making it a newsworthy event--is the
allegation, probably true, that some of the gold was taken from Jews and
others sent to extermination camps.

(A further claim, not related to the Nazi claim directly, is that the bank
accounts of those who perished in the war were not made available to heirs,
that in some cases the banks even liquidated the accounts and used the
money for (unspecified) purposes. I know little about this particular
claim, and won't discuss it further.)

OK, so it's clear to all right-thinking persons what should be done:
Switzerland should return the money to the heirs of those killed by the
Nazis.

Ah, but it's not so clear to me. I guess I'm not a right-thinking person.

First, it is not a matter of "Switzerland" having done something, it is a
matter of several major banks and dozens (I presume) of lesser banks. It is
Credit Suisse, Union Bank, etc. who presumably took in deposits, with
numbered accounts (perfectly legal by Swiss law at the time), not the
"state of Switzerland."

Second, how could the _provenance_ of the deposits be determined by, say
Credit Suisse? How could Hans the Banker taking a deposit from Fritz the
Depositer somehow know that the money Fritz was depositing was from money
seized from Jews? For all Hans knew, especially in 1939-43, before any real
knowleedge of the extermination of Jews became available (and such
knowledge was still rare, as any examination of the newspapers of the day
will show), the money was from German families seeking to protect their own
assets, or was even money siphoned from the German war effort, and so on.

Third, the notion that "Switzerland must do something!" is pernicious and
inimical to banking secrecy and basic privacy issues. A drumbeat is
building which will serve to undermine banking secrecy around the world.

(Now what happened to the Jews in Europe was horrible, depicable, etc. It
was an example of the power of the total state to order the liquidation of
some religious or ethnic faction. But the horror of the liquidation of
millions of Jews, or millions of Chinese, or millions of Tutsis/Hutus,
etc., must not be an excuse for expanding the power of states still
further. That circular logic will ultimately kill even more in factions out
of favor.)

This issue relates to Chaumian anonymous cash, of course. One can imagine
various scenarios by which crypto anarchy is used to transfer funds, etc.
Left as an exercise for the imaginative.

As the "Nazi Gold" story continues to build, expect "Swiss bankers" to be
added to the list of the "Horsemen." (Swiss bankers always have been viewed
with some suspicion--and admiration. Usually related to their "sheltering"
of funds from dictators and mobsters. And their has long been the hint of
complicity with the Reich in some areas. But now the move is on to
associate Swiss banks with the Holocaust more explicitly.)

I suspect the U.S. pressure on Swiss banks has a political dimension
related to forcing a New World Order on international banking. The U.S.
wants banking secrecy subject to U.S. control (so that banks like Castle
Bank, Nugan Hand Bank, Banco Ambrosiano, BCCI, and the Bank of America can
continue to be used for U.S. interests, and only U.S. interests).

The Jews killed by the German state in the war are dead and gone. Most of
their money is irretrievably gone. The clamor to break banking secrecy and
"force" the banks to disclose all records is part of a larger political
game.

--Tim May


There's something wrong when I'm a felon under an increasing number of laws.
---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:---------:----
Timothy C. May              | Crypto Anarchy: encryption, digital money,
tcmay@got.net  408-728-0152 | anonymous networks, digital pseudonyms, zero
W.A.S.T.E.: Corralitos, CA  | knowledge, reputations, information markets,
Higher Power: 2^1398269     | black markets, collapse of governments.
"National borders aren't even speed bumps on the information superhighway."