Customer Reviews

IBM's Shadow Force

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Read this book and learn why the Iron Curtain fell!

This book is about what happened in the engineering application of science and technology during the Cold War. It is not a nod to the senior managers who came and went. With few exceptions, they are never mentioned.

This book is no cheerleader's song book. When a harsh appraisal is called for, it is given... as in the discussion of the FAA's Advanced Automation System problems of the 1990's which are still not solved.

As a 27-year veteran of IBM's Federal Systems Division, I found the Shadow Force a pleasant walk down memory lane.

For those who want a glimpse of how it once was, this is a must read.

According to the inside flap of the book the author spent 17 years - 1955-1972 - with IBM's Federal Operations and claims to report "the untold story of Federal Systems - the Secretive Giant that Safeguarded America as IBM's Shadow Force".

In 2008, 36 years later he is providing 11 chapters of information with very low value: fragmented product descriptions, a bibliography of books about IBM which is incomplete because very important books are missing (e.g. Emerson Pugh), almost unreadable figures and charts, chapter 9 "What's Real Time" consists of a reprint authored by P.F. Olsen and R.J. Orange (unknown people).

Robinson quotes the "Father of IBM" Thomas J. Watson Sr. who "reportedly referred to FSD as IBM's 'contribution to America's defenses'", whereas the Federal Systems Division (FSD) was founded in 1959 three years after Thomas Watson died in 1956. He also refers to Thomas J. Watson as "General Manager of the National Cash Register Company" whereas Watson was the General Sales Manager of NCR, the GM was John H. Patterson; he describes a situation when Watson was a very young salesman and not the General Sales Manager - see Belden & Belden "The Lengthening Shadow".

Robinson argues: "thus, the question will always remain: Was selling the Federal Systems Company a good idea? While it provided an immediate influx of cash, what were its long-term costs to today's IBM?" page 87), continuing "This more than proves the point that selling FSD was a mistake" (page 88): He does not provide any facts and figures to prove his opinion.

He mentions "Wehrner von Braun" instead of "Wernher von Braun". Robinson claims that FSD "produced enormous dividends for both the company and the government" (page 122) without providing any figures about revenue, cost, expense and profit of this division. He does not provide any information about the FSD top management, the organizational set-up, the management system, etc. etc.

The last chapter - 11 - consists of nothing else then 74 pages of technical specifications of FSD Hardware without providing any information about the time and duration of installation, contract value etc.

Robinson opens each chapter with a proverb, many of them signed "Anonymous" where the reader gets the impression that it is Robinson's own "wisdom", like "The transfer of know-how and experience in common cause is a noble endeavor", "Performance is the Best Strategy" etc.

I worked for several years on a project that only got about 2 inches of text in this whole book.

Either the author wasn't much aware of this project ( it was known as Safeguard, an antiballistic missile system that was developed in Whippany, NJ) or he didn't feel it was important enough to mention it.

If nothing else, it gave me a better appreciation of why a toilet seat costs at least $7 to the military--you have to have someplace to hide the costs of these projects from the general public. It's just too bad that those state-of-the-art machines ended up in a New Jersey dump when the project ended/lost funding.

I knew of the FSD from reading several other books about IBM. None of them went into much detail. I thought this would go into more detail. It was a fast read. When I got done it felt more like I had read an inventory list of systems.

I was hoping for a style more like the books Emerson W. Pugh was involved in.

It is impressive to see what technology IBM had their fingers in.

IBM is best known as a computer hardware company, and they have had a strong relation with the federal government for decades. "IBM's Shadow Force: The Untold Story of Federal Systems The Secretive Giant That Safeguarded America" takes an eye to this relationship and how it has protected the nation through the information age and the era around it. From putting a man on the moon to internet security, it's a scholarly look at how far technology has come in the past years. "IBM's Shadow Force" is a must for those who love technology and its history.