The Website of Carlos Whitlock Porter
ERNST SAUCKEL'S "EXPLOITATION" SPEECH
Translated by Carlos W. Porter
Introduction
Most Nuremberg Trial documents have never been translated into English in
their entirety. Typically, a single paragraph or even sentence is taken out
of context, often mistranslated, to offer "proof" of German crimes. The
rest of the document is ignored; the correctness of the translation is
never questioned.
For example, the following quotations appear in a footnote on p. 948 of
William L. Shirer's Rise and Fall of the Third Reich (page 1128 of the 1960 Pan paperback edition):
"One of his [Sauckel's] first directives laid it down that the foreign
workers were 'to be treated in such a way as to exploit them to the highest
possible extent at the lowest conceivable degree of expenditure.' He
admitted at Nuremberg that of all the millions of foreign workers "not even
200,000 came voluntarily."
Sauckel was, of course, hanged at Nuremberg for his "slave labour
policies".
---
The second quotation comes from an unsigned document (124-R) stating that
factory foremen were sent to prison or a concentration camp for giving their "slave
workers" so much as a box on the ear; the first is a falsified translation
of a single sentence, taken out of context, from a speech (016-PS) in which
Sauckel is explaining the necessity for labour service by both Germans and
foreigners, and is demanding the best possible treatment for his workers,
both German and foreign! The verb "exploit" does not even appear in the
sentence! The verb is to "bring forth".
The original German reads: "Alle diese Menschen müßen so ernährt,
untergebracht und behandelt werden, daß sie bei denkbar sparsamsten
Einsatz die größtmöglichste Leistung hervorbringen."
A better translation would be:
"All these people must be fed, housed, and treated so as to produce the
greatest possible output with the greatest possible economy of
industrial effort".
"Einsatz" includes cost, but is actually much broader: it includes the number
of men at work. In this document, "eingesetzte Menschen", for example,
means "people who have been put to work".
The meaning is to achieve the highest possible production per man with the
lowest possible number of workers, a perfectly ordinary sort of concept in
any undertaking (for example, the basic principle of judo is said to be:
"maximum efficiency, minimum effort").
The full text of the document is as follows (the sentence taken out of
context has been marked in italics, while the context itself is marked in red):
Translation of Document 016-PS, Nuremberg Trial
Draft directive by Ernst Sauckel
[cover letter to Alfred Rosenberg deleted]
The Commissioner for the Four Year Plan
The General Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service.
20.4.42
The Labour Service Programme
On Remembrance Day 1942, the Führer announced to the German people the
most gigantic and most difficult German military achievements in history.
In addition to the heroic and victorious struggle against an enemy
unprecedentedly superior in numbers and materiel, an enemy fighting with
the courage of the most extreme desperation and the most bestial cruelty,
there has been the endurance of a hard winter, without parallel in the
history of the past 140 years, in terms of cold, ice, snows, and storms.
Overcoming the unprecedented hardships caused by such a climate, and by
such extraordinarily bad weather conditions, has turned our soldiers on the
Eastern front, measured against all previous human and military
achievements, of all time -- we may say without exaggeration -- into
Supermen.
These soldiers are now entitled to expect the homeland itself to bring
forth a comparably powerful concentration of the forces of the nation in
order to ensure final, complete, and the earliest possible victory.
All related burdens and other necessary restrictions, even in nourishment,
must be borne with proud determination, precisely in view of the example
set by our soldiers.
Our Greater German Army has shown an excess of heroism, endurance, and
overcoming, on the Eastern front, in Africa, in the air, and on the sea. To
ensure their victory under all circumstances, we must now ensure that they
are supplied with increasingly better and more numerous weapons, material,
and munitions, as the result of an increasingly greater production effort
on the part of the entire German people, that is, of all creative workers,
both intellect and manual, both men and women, and of all German youth.
In this manner, the German homeland will make a decisive contribution to
the destruction of our enemy's every hope of once again staving off total
and final defeat.
The purpose of the gigantic new labour service is to make use of all the
hugely rich resources which the army, fighting under the leadership of
Adolf Hitler, has achieved and consolidated to such a overwhelmingly rich
extent, in order to strengthen the Army and feed the homeland. The raw
materials and fertility of the conquered territories, and their manpower
resources, must be perfectly and conscientiously utilized for the benefit
of Germany and our allies through the labour service.
Despite the fact that most able-bodied German people have already put their
strength to work for the war economy in a manner worthy of the highest
recognition, considerable additional reserves must still be found and made
available under all circumstances.
The decisive measure to implement this is the uniformly regulated and
controlled labour service of the nation at war.
To achieve this goal, the following principles must be stated and carried
out.
A. All important manufacturing programmes running at the present time must
under no circumstances be disrupted, but rather must be further increased.
B. All orders of the Führer, the Reichsmarschall of the Greater German
Reich, and the Minister for Munitions and Armaments must be obeyed as
quickly as possible. The labour resources required for this purpose must be
released and made available in Germany itself and in the occupied
territories .
C. Equally urgent is the task of ensuring seed and harvest for the German
farmers and all European areas under German control with the aim of
achieving the highest yield. The agricultural workers required must be made
available as quickly as possible.
D. A supply programme for the most indispensable commodities must be
ensured for the German people.
Implementation of these principles for the labour service requires:
1. the cooperation of all forces of the Party, the economy, and the state
under uniform leadership;
2. the best will of the German people;
3. the most extensive measures to ensure that all workers in service, men
and women, place their highest trust in the justice of their treatment in
terms of their personal fate and remuneration, as well as the best possible
care for their health and housing in wartime;
4. the fastest and best possible solution to the question of service by
women and youth.
If the objective set by the Führer is to be achieved, it can only be made
possible through the simultaneous and earliest possible implementation of
many different measures, all aiming at the same objective. Since, however,
none of these measures may disrupt the others -- rather, they must
complement each other in a sensible way -- it is absolutely necessary for
all the agencies participating in this decisive task, in any manner -- in
the Reich, its territories and municipalities, in the Party, state, and
economy -- to proceed according to uniform guidelines.
Thus, the labour service of the nation will make an extraordinary
contribution to the earliest possible victorious conclusion of the war. It
will also require the final effort of the German people in the homeland. It
is for these German people -- for their maintenance, their freedom, their
happiness, and for the betterment of their nourishment and the maintenance
of their lives -- that this war is being fought.
Basic principles:
I. In the districts, the task of the NSDAP district leaders will consist of
propaganda, in the enlightenment of the German people, with regards to the
necessity for the labour service, and for the implementation of major steps
providing for the youth and women set to work, while taking care of the
conditions in camps and lodgings.
They must also ensure the closest and most comradely cooperation of all
participating institutions.
II. The principal duty of the General Plenipotentiary -- in fact, the sole
precondition for the success of his task -- is to ensure the unreserved
cooperation and harmony of all superior agencies -- especially the agencies
of the Army, whose scope of responsibility extends to the present
assignment.
III. The agreement of all reich Leaders of the Party, its organizations,
particularly, the cooperation of the German Labour Front and the
installations of the economy, is equally indispensable.
IV. The General Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service will therefore --
using the smallest possible personal staff of fellow workers of his choice
-- make exclusive use of the available Party, state and economic agencies,
and guarantee the quickest success of their measures through the good will
and cooperation of all.
V. The General Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service has therefore set all
district leaders of the Greater German Reich to work as his
plenipotentiaries in the German districts of the NSDAP with the approval of
the Führer and in harmony with the Reichsmarschall of the Greater German
Reich and the leadership of the Party Chancellery.
VI. The Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service will make use of the
responsible agencies of the Party in their districts. The leaders of the
highest offices of the state and economy responsible for their districts
will consult and instruct the district leaders with regards to all
important questions of the labour service.
The following will be especially important for this purpose:
- the President of the Agricultural Labour Office;
- the Labour Trustees;
- the State Agricultural Leaders;
- the District Economic Advisers;
- the District Leader of the German Labour Front;
- the Leaders of the District Women's Organizations;
- the Regional Leaders of the Hitler Youth;
- the superior representatives of the Interior and General Administration
or Office for the Agricultural Economy.
(If the region of an Agricultural Labour Office consists of several
districts, and if there is no Agricultural Labour Office in the district
capital, then the President of the Agricultural Labour Office must make his
closest and hardest-working employees available to the district leaders
involved, so as to ensure constant instruction of the district leaders on
all measures relating to the labour service in that district.)
VII. The principal and most important task of the district leaders of the
NSDAP, in their capacity as plenipotentiaries in their districts, is,
therefore, to ensure the best possible harmony of all the agencies in their
district, in participation in the labour service. The strictest care must
be taken, however, to ensure that the superior officers of the party or
agencies of the NSDAP, as well as its organizations, branches, and related
associations, neither take over functions for which only the authorities of
the state, the Army, or institutions of the economy are responsible or may
assume responsibility; nor may they arbitrarily interfere in the course of
agency matters for which they are not responsible, according to the best
will of the Führer.
But if we succeed, with the assistance of the Party in all districts,
areas, and municipalities, in convincing all German workers, both the
workers of the intellect and the workers of the hand, of the great
significance of the labour service in deciding the war; if we succeed in
caring for and in strengthening all German men, women, and youth, doing
their duty in the labour service under extraordinarily difficult
conditions, in the best possible way, with regards to their physical and
spiritual powers of endurance; if we furthermore succeed, with the
cooperation of the Party, in utilizing the service of prisoners of war and
civilian workers, both men and women, of foreign blood, but without harm to
our people -- yes, even to the greatest benefit of the war effort and the
food industry, then the most difficult part of the task of the labour
service will have been solved.
The task and its solution
(In accordance with the requirements of secrecy, the following contains no
statements in terms of figures. I nevertheless ask you to believe that this
is the greatest labour problem of all times, especially in terms of
numbers.)
A. The task:
I. The war situation has necessitated the call-up of new soldiers into all
sections of the Army in huge numbers.
This means:
a) taking workers out of all commercial enterprises, above all, great
numbers of technical workers from armaments factories which are of the
utmost importance to the war effort;
b) taking workers out of the military food industry, although they are
indispensable precisely at the present time;
2. The military situation, however, also requires the implementation of
armaments programmes which have been hugely expanded and improved by the
Führer in comparison to the previous situation.
3. The commodities most necessary to the German people must also continue
to be produced in the necessary quantities.
4. German housewives, particularly, agricultural housewives, must,
especially as mothers, suffer no harm to their health as a result of the
war; they must therefore be relieved, insofar as possible, in whatever way.
B. The solution:
1. All technical workers called up for military service from industries
important to the war effort must be assigned immediately and absolutely so
as to avoid interruptions or drops in the production of equipment of
importance to the war effort.
All labour service authorities are therefore responsible for taking account
of these conditions in every case.
The most suitable manpower must therefore be taken out of reserve, from
industries which have been shut down and are less important to the war
effort, as well as from agricultural industries which have also been shut
down, and be allocated to industries where the manpower has been called up
for military service, eight weeks before they are drafted, so that every
conscripted technical worker can instruct and teach his replacement.
Similarly, all other workers released through closure actions and not being
utilized in service as replacements for technical workers, must be made
available to the armaments industries without delay, especially for work on
the night shift.
2. Male and female workers who have, for example, been released through
destruction or damage of their companies by enemy air raids, must be
equally quickly retransferred and set to work in the armaments industry.
3. The challenges in armaments and food now require, however, the
importation of foreign manpower as an urgent necessity, in addition to the
total utilization of all German manpower.
I have therefore immediately tripled the transport programme which I found
in taking over my job.
The main bulk of that transport was brought forward in time to the months
of May/June, so that the introduction of foreign workers from the occupied
territories will still be effective for increased production under all
circumstances with regards to coming Army operations, as well as for
agricultural work in the sector of the German food economy.
All prisoners of war who are already in Germany, in either the Western or
Eastern territories, must also be imported for German armaments and
agriculture without exception, insofar as this has not yet occurred; their
production must be brought to the highest conceivable levels.
It must be emphasized that huge numbers of foreign workers must
nevertheless still be brought into the Reich. The largest reservoir for
this purpose is the occupied territories in the East.
It is therefore indispensable that full use be made of the existing human
reserves available in the conquered territories. If we do not succeed in
winning over the required manpower on a voluntary basis, then steps must be
immediately taken to go over to levies or compulsory manpower call-ups.
In addition to already available prisoners of war who are still in the
occupied territories, it is also particularly necessary to mobilize male
and female civilian and technical workers from the Soviet territories for
the German labour service, from the age of 15 upwards.
According to the available possibilities, on the other hand, a quarter of
the total requirements in terms of foreign workers can be imported from the
occupied European territories to the west of Germany.
The importation of manpower from sympathetic or even neutral countries will
only satisfy a fraction of the total needs. These workers will be
principally technical and special workers.
4. To provide German housewives with a perceptible amelioration of their
burdens, particularly for mothers with many children, as well as German
agricultural wives, who are already overburdened with responsibilities, and
to avoid further endangering their health, the Führer has also ordered me
to bring approximately 4 to 500,000 selected healthy, strong girls into the
Reich from the occupied territories.
5. It is also planned to ensure early service by German youth, in the order
of school years, together with men and women teachers, on the basis of an
agreement with the reich Youth Leaders and the responsible superior Reich
authorities. The necessary orders and implementation instructions have
already been issued.
6. Labour service by German women is of very great importance.
After learning the basic view of the Führer and that of the Reichsmarschalls
of the Greater German Reich, and having very conscientiously reviewed this
very difficult problem in great detail on the basis of my own most
meticulous investigations and reports, I must basically dispense with
compulsory service for German women and girls by the State for the German
war and food economy.
Even though I myself first believed -- and with me, quite the greater
proportion of the leaders in the Party and women's organizations on certain
grounds -- that it would be necessary to introduce compulsory service for
women, I must now, however, and so should all responsible men and women of
the Party, state, and economy, give way, with the greatest respect as well
as the deepest gratitude, before the wisdom of our Führer Adolf Hitler,
whose greatest concern is for the health of German women and girls, and, at
the same time, for the present and future mothers of our people.
I need not recall here all the reasons that have been decisive in making my
decision. I ask you, however, to believe me, as an old and fanatical
National Socialist district leader, when I say that, precisely in the last
analysis, the decision could not have been otherwise.
We all completely agreed that this decision apparently, however, entails a
very great injustice and hardship with regards to the millions of women who
are <already> working under very difficult conditions in war service in the
armaments and food economy every day, but we also agree upon this: that one
does not improve an evil by generalizing it to the utmost consequence, and
conjuring it up onto everybody.
The only way to eliminate the present hardships and injustices is to win
the war; then we will able to take all German women and girls out of all
professions which we then consider to be unfeminine and harmful to the
health of our women, dangerous to the birth rate of our people, harmful to
family life, and to the life of our people.
It must be further considered that it makes, in fact, a huge difference
whether a woman or a girl has already been accustomed to a certain job in a
factory or in agriculture from an early age, and whether she has already
endured this work or not.
In addition to physical harm, however, German women and girls must
therefore also continue to be protected from harm to their emotional life
and spirit under all circumstances, according to the will of the Führer.
This condition of the Führer could hardly be fulfilled through mass
compulsion and mass service. German women cannot be compared to German
soldiers in this regard without further consideration. There are inborn
differences between men and women which are determined by race and by
nature.
We could not take responsibility before the innumerable men of our people,
doing duty at the front as brave soldiers, and particularly before the
fallen, for the damage to the entire life of our people which threatens to
arise here in the context of women's service.
All the many millions of women, however, who are truly and conscientiously
doing worthwhile work within the German planned economy and especially now
in the war, deserve the best care and security conceivable. They deserve
the greatest thanks of our nation, just as much as our soldiers and
workers. They must be treated in the best manner possible by the Labour
Offices and authorities; the most generous possible account must be taken
of their economic and health requirements. Both the Führer and the
Reichsmarschall of the Greater German Reich place the greatest value on this.
It would be totally wrong to use threats, or inflict penalties on women, or
even take them to court, for example, for staying home from work prior to
maternity leave because of physical complaints related to pregnancy; this
has, unfortunately, already occurred. Nevertheless, it will and must be
possible to maintain the indispensable working discipline.
7. A last, but not inconsiderable reserve consists of increasing the
possible individual industrial production per German worker. It will be the
principal task of the Party and the German Labour Front to attain such
increases in production. There is no doubt that the German worker, both
skilled and unskilled, wherever he may be employed, can nevertheless do his
best, even under the most difficult conditions of our today's food
situation.
This will be an expression of the overwhelming gratitude of German workers
in the homeland with regards to the soldiers at the front, who have endured
the most fearful suffering, hardships, and deprivation during this hard
winter, and nevertheless remained victorious over the enemy.
In this regard, the cooperation of Party, state, and economy remains
reserved, therefore, to take care that the industrial health services, and
understanding cooperation on the part of the social security services and
doctors of industrial medicine, allow us to lower the sick rate by 1%. This
was possible in the district of Thüringen. For the whole Reich, such a
general improvement in the sick rate would mean 200,000 new workers.
Severe measures must obviously be taken against loafing vermin, since
loafers cannot be permitted to shirk their duties in this fateful fight for
our people at the cost of the decent and hardworking.
Under point B. 1-7, I have attempted to describe the exterior solution of
the task of the German labour service under the present war situation.
It is obvious that the possibilities indicated in these points must all be
entirely exhausted. The abandonment of general compulsory service for all
women and girls in no way means, however, that I have at all abandoned my
intention to make able-bodied women and girls available for suitable
service, wherever they can be used to the benefit our war economy, without
violating the basic principles of the Führer. This will be carried out in
the closest cooperation with the agencies of the Party, the state, the
army, and the economy, involved for this purpose.
The labour service programme established in point 1-7 means quite the most
gigantic labour service ever implemented by any people, and even in
history.
Adolf Hitler has, however, revealed to us, through the concept of National
Socialism, that numbers are not the decisive factor in the life of a
people. In addition to the huge numbers of people set to work, there is the
productive capacity. This productive capacity is, in turn, dependent, not
just on the calories which I make available to them in the form of food,
but also upon the inner attitude, the will, as well as the life of the mind
and the emotions of the people who have been set to work.
In addition to the huge organizational problems which must be solved in the
labour service in this war, there are also, therefore, the questions of
food, housing, education, propaganda, and social care.
Social care for German workers men and women
There must be no doubt in the mind of any German person and National
Socialist that the working German person, when he is correctly led, and
given political and ideological guidance, in his conscientiousness at work,
in his readiness to take the greatest efforts on himself, in his ability
and his performance, towers high over all the other workers on earth.
The district leaders of Adolf Hitler in the districts of the NSDAP
entrusted to them, must therefore guarantee that -- with the help of all
the installations and organizations of the Party in the now decisive stage
of the war -- they will give the German working people the best political
and ideological guidance which has ever existed in the history of human
labour and in times of war.
As the Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service, I am certain that all steps
will be taken in this regard by the Party, both outside and inside of
industry, through the utilization of all means of propaganda and education,
through waves of collections, and through industrial appeals, to maintain
the proper attitude and morale of the German worker, in keeping with the
dignity of the homeland with regards to the front, in this hour which is to
decide our fate, and which is also the sole precondition for meeting this
huge challenge and winning the war.
It will be my constant concern to see that the labour service authorities,
as well as all industrial leaders, support the Party, and particularly the
German Labour Front, which has a decisive and great task, in every way.
Even when workers, men and women, are set to work in armament factories in
their own localities, and can sleep and eat in their own homes and sleep
with their family, they must be cared for in the most meticulous way. I
will mention only: ensuring the coal and potato supply, and considering the
approach routes to and from work.
Lack of spring vegetables and other hardships of wartime, which get on
people's nerves and harm our people's health, must thereby be equalized, so
that all decent people and women may therefore derive all the more strength
from realizing the National Socialist principles of the racial community,
of social justice, and the necessity for common sacrifices, and faith and
trust in the Führer.
The challenge will be, however, much more difficult when it involves caring
for those millions of workers, both men and women, rendering services which
they are not accustomed to, far from their own homes. This is a necessity
of war.
Such service can neither be restricted, nor can the related hardships be
eliminated.
Everything must be done for these racial comrades, both men and women, to
make their lives more enjoyable and their work easier, insofar as possible.
All these German people must be supported so as to be housed in decently
furnished quarters under equally decent conditions insofar as possible, to
permit them to enjoy comradeship in their leisure time, through the Party
and through the Labour Front, and to receive their coupons and so on, at
the correct time.
In this regard in particular, the "Politeness" Action of Reichsleiter Dr.
Goebbels must be binding on all labour offices and all economic and food
offices to the highest degree.
Wherever German working people, whether men or women, are housed in camps,
these camps must represent perfect examples of German cleanliness, order,
and health care.
German industries and the German economy must spare no sacrifice to make
life tolerable for all those racial comrades, both men and women, who are
housed in camps far from their own homes and families, on the basis of
compulsory service. Just as in the German Army, the German soldier, in his
company, considers perfect order with regards to both his outer needs and
his character as a German soldier to be a matter of course, in a manner
which raises him above the soldiers of all other peoples in his military
qualities, this must also be possible for the working German people, in a
manner suitably adapted to the labour service.
Care for working German people in the armaments industries, in the war
economy and the camps, must therefore be fundamentally guaranteed by
German labour front to the most perfect degree.
The more widespread utilization of women and girls outside their localities
and away from their families must basically proceed according to the model
of the women's labour service with regards to housing and care.
Prisoners of war and foreign workers
The utilization without exception of all prisoners of war, as well as the
importation of huge numbers of new foreign civilian workers, both men and
women, has become an indisputable necessity in meeting the challenges of
the labour service in this war.
--
THE FOLLOWING SENTENCE WAS TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT AT NUREMBERG TO PROVE GERMAN INHUMANITY AND CRUELTY
All these people must be fed, housed, and treated so as to produce the
greatest possible output with the greatest possible economy of
industrial effort.
WHILE THE FOLLOWING PARAGRAPHS WERE SIMPLY IGNORED
For the Germans, it always has been a matter of course to treat a defeated
enemy -- even when he has been our cruellest and most irreconcilable enemy
-- without any cruelty or cheap trickery, to treat him correctly and
humanely, especially when we expect useful production from him.
As long as the German armaments industry did not urgently require it, the
importation of both Soviet prisoners of war, as well as civilian workers,
both men and women, from the Soviet territories, was to be dispensed with
under all circumstances. But that is no longer possible now. The manpower
of these peoples must be utilized to the greatest extent.
I have therefore, as my first step, regulated the nourishment, housing, and
treatment of these foreign working people with the responsible superior
authorities of the Reich, and with the approval of the Führer and the
Reichsmarschall of the Greater German Reich, so that optimal labour
production may be demanded from them, and can also be obtained from them.
Please remember, in so doing, that even a machine can only produce what I
make available to it with in terms of fuel, lubricant, and maintenance. How
many more requirements must be taken into consideration with a human being,
even if he is of a primitive type and race, compared to a machine.
I could not take responsibility before the German people for the
importation of huge numbers of such people into Germany if, instead of
bringing forth highly necessary and useful production, they one day become
the heaviest burden or even become hazardous to the health of the German
people, due to failings in nourishment, housing, and treatment.
The most meticulous principles of German cleanliness, order, and hygiene
must therefore apply in the Russian camps as well.
Only in this way will it be possible, without all false sentimentality, to
ensure the highest benefits from this service as well, in terms of
armaments for the fighting front and for the military food economy.
The necessary instructions for the nourishment, housing, and treatment of
people from the East have already been issued to the responsible
authorities of the police, war economy, and agricultural offices; in
addition, I am now requesting the districts of the NSDAP to support me to
the utmost in this matter, to avoid everything which may result in harm to
the German people from this service.
Members of racially related peoples and [German-] allied and friendly
nations working in Germany should be treated and cared for with particular
care.
We must avoid everything which could make the stay and the work of foreign
men and women doing service in Germany more difficult, or even cause
unnecessary suffering, under the restrictions caused by the conditions and
hardships of war. We are greatly dependent upon their good will and their
manpower.
It is therefore in keeping with the laws of reason to make their stay and
their work in Germany as tolerable as possible, without compromising
ourselves.
This must, for example, be realized by making concessions to them with
regards to their national or racial habits in food, housing, use of their
leisure afternoons, etc., insofar as conditions permit, taking the
situation of our own people into account.
It is entirely possible that, if the authorities of the labour service, the
general and interior administration, Party, and labour front, cooperate
closely in the service of foreign men and women workers, with complete
understanding and in close cooperation, in addition to the huge benefits
which this mass service of millions of prisoners of war and foreign
civilian workers may bring forth for the German war effort and the
agricultural economy, just as great an advantage may accrue to the
propaganda of the National Socialist Greater German Reich and its prestige
in the world.
Contrariwise, if the cooperation of all forces is not ensured, and if these
problems are not eliminated by all authorities in the most meticulous
detail, the greatest harm may result for our war economy.
I therefore ask you, in conclusion, to pay exact attention to the following
principles:
1. all technical matters or procedures relating to the administration of
the labour service are the exclusive responsibility and competence of the
General Plenipotentiary for the Labour Service, the agricultural offices,
and labour offices.
2) all matters and tasks of propaganda, education, observation of political
effects, and care, are the responsibility of:
a) outside of industry: the Party;
b) inside commercial industry: the German Labour Front, the agricultural
industries, the Office for Agricultural Policy.
3. The supply of food coupons, clothing ration cards, financial
equalization and support, are the exclusive competence of the authorities
or institutions responsible for the economy.
I ask the district leaders of the NSDAP, as my plenipotentiaries, to ensure
harmonious methods of procedure, the best conceivable mutual agreement, and
the most complete mutual information.
4) Meeting the challenges of military production is so important to the war
effort that no consideration may be given even to the most important local
or regional interests, or the most prominent challenges of the peace.
Anyone who violates this must take the responsibility upon himself if
German soldiers, in the struggle to decide the fate of the life of our
people should lack weapons or munitions, synthetic gasoline or rubber,
vehicles or airplanes.
I would, therefore, most sincerely as well as most emphatically like to
make it a duty for all German men and women wishing to cooperate decisively
in the labour service, to take the most heartfelt account of all these
necessities, decisions, and measures, according to the old National
Socialist principle:
Nothing for ourselves, everything for the Führer and his work, that is,
for the future of our people!
Fritz Sauckel
Note: Under the 4th Hague Convention, the Germans were entitled to utilize
lower-ranking prisoners of war and resistance members for their labour, and
to conscript civilian labour "for the needs of the army of occupation";
what the latter actually means in practice is somewhat unclear. In view of
the scope of Allied war crimes and atrocities, it seems frivolous to argue
the matter. De minimis non curat lex.
For more lies by William L. Shirer, click here
MADE IN RUSSIA - THE HOLOCO$T
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