Citation de Sodapop_Curtis
The companies, in turn, were in charge of technical supervision during work, and paid for the construction and maintenance of the compound, which had to conform to strict SS standards. Firms also paid daily rates for prisoner labor, revised in October 1942. In Germany, the daily price for each qualified male prisoner now stood at six Reichsmark, and four Reichsmark for an unskilled one. In occupied eastern Europe, including Auschwitz, the daily rate was reduced to four and three Reichsmark respectively, presumably because less output was expected from the even more ravaged prisoners. There was no such distinction between skilled and unskilled labor in the case of female prisoners, who were regarded as less able workers ; instead, there was a flat rate similar to the one for unskilled men. Contrary to the claims of some historians, the SS benefited from most payments only in a roundabout way. Since the prisoners were regarded as the property of the state, most of the income from their labor — perhaps around two hundred million Reichsmark in 1943, rising to around four to five hundred million the following year —
officially went into the coffers of the Reich (though this helped to finance the state-sponsored KL system).
If there was little immediate financial gain for the Camp SS, why did it lease inmates to the war industry ? For a start, the SS remained subject to outside influence, and as the demand for labor grew, so did the pressure (above all from Speer) to surrender prisoners for war production. But the SS also expected advantages from its collaboration with industry. In addition to tangible benefits, such as the preferential allocation of weapons for SS troops, Himmler, who never quite abandoned his dream of an SS arms complex, hoped that working with industry would enhance the expertise of his own managers. And then there was power and prestige. With labor becoming an increasingly precious resource, the SS could present the KL as vital cogs in the Nazi war economy ; the larger the SS army of forced workers, the greater its potential influence. This was one reason, no doubt, behind the strenuous efforts by Pohl and his WVHA managers in 1942–43 to extend the overall number of prisoners in the concentration camps, as well as their output.
But even the most high-profile projects launched with SS involvement made little difference to the progress of the war. Despite the investment of hundreds of millions of Reichsmark and the abuse of tens of thousands of slave laborers, the huge IG Farben complex under construction in Auschwitz was never completed and failed to produce any synthetic rubber or fuel. Similarly, few projects of the Geilenberg Staff went past the initial stage. The first factories of project “Desert,” provisionally operational from early spring 1945, turned out an oily sludge that was useless for the remaining German tanks. And Dora never became the high-tech underground factory of Himmler’s dreams, either. The number of the much vaunted V2s manufactured, around six thousand by spring 1945, remained well behind schedule. And although the rockets killed thousands of civilians abroad and proved a potent propaganda tool inside Germany, their strategic impact was negligible. The uniqueness of the weapon lay elsewhere, as the historian Michael J. Neufeld has pointed out : “More people died producing it than died from being hit by it.” This verdict sums up the SS involvement in the war economy as a whole. Its main output was not fuel or planes or guns, but the misery and death of its prisoners.
officially went into the coffers of the Reich (though this helped to finance the state-sponsored KL system).
If there was little immediate financial gain for the Camp SS, why did it lease inmates to the war industry ? For a start, the SS remained subject to outside influence, and as the demand for labor grew, so did the pressure (above all from Speer) to surrender prisoners for war production. But the SS also expected advantages from its collaboration with industry. In addition to tangible benefits, such as the preferential allocation of weapons for SS troops, Himmler, who never quite abandoned his dream of an SS arms complex, hoped that working with industry would enhance the expertise of his own managers. And then there was power and prestige. With labor becoming an increasingly precious resource, the SS could present the KL as vital cogs in the Nazi war economy ; the larger the SS army of forced workers, the greater its potential influence. This was one reason, no doubt, behind the strenuous efforts by Pohl and his WVHA managers in 1942–43 to extend the overall number of prisoners in the concentration camps, as well as their output.
But even the most high-profile projects launched with SS involvement made little difference to the progress of the war. Despite the investment of hundreds of millions of Reichsmark and the abuse of tens of thousands of slave laborers, the huge IG Farben complex under construction in Auschwitz was never completed and failed to produce any synthetic rubber or fuel. Similarly, few projects of the Geilenberg Staff went past the initial stage. The first factories of project “Desert,” provisionally operational from early spring 1945, turned out an oily sludge that was useless for the remaining German tanks. And Dora never became the high-tech underground factory of Himmler’s dreams, either. The number of the much vaunted V2s manufactured, around six thousand by spring 1945, remained well behind schedule. And although the rockets killed thousands of civilians abroad and proved a potent propaganda tool inside Germany, their strategic impact was negligible. The uniqueness of the weapon lay elsewhere, as the historian Michael J. Neufeld has pointed out : “More people died producing it than died from being hit by it.” This verdict sums up the SS involvement in the war economy as a whole. Its main output was not fuel or planes or guns, but the misery and death of its prisoners.