"… 12 years in prison with confiscation." And the hall exploded with an alarming rumble!
Nobody pleaded guilty. The last of the 27 condemned in the case of accomplices of the Third Reich was released in 1952. Alfried Krupp came out even earlier, in 1951. The third most important defendant, the owner of the industrial empire Friedrich Flick, was released in 1950.
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After the end of the great Nuremberg trials, which ended with the condemnation of the top leadership of the Reich, the smaller Nuremberg trials of other accomplices of the regime began. The largest number of military tribunals took place in the American zone of occupation, where, in the course of 12 trials, the actions of representatives of all spheres of German society were consistently evaluated. Nazi doctors-executioners were convicted (7 death sentences). Then the trial of the judges took place. In April 1947, it was time for big business representatives to respond.
Flick's trial (April to December 1947).
IS Farben trial (from August 1947 to July 1948).
The Krupp trial (December 1947 to July 1948).
For those who are not yet aware of what these names and surnames represented. Flick and Krupp - heavy industry, metallurgy, the main manufacturers of weapons for the Third Reich. Interessen-Gemeinschaft (Community of Interest) "Farben" is a legendary cartel, the largest scientific center of its era, an association of six German chemical companies. Angels and evil geniuses, those who invented the method of obtaining synthetic oil and gas for mass murder "Cyclone-B".
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The fact that most of the accused had a NSDAP membership card, direct cooperation with the fascist regime, the fulfillment of military orders of the Wehrmacht and other obvious things were not accepted as charges.
All the questions of the tribunal were related to the actions of business representatives in the occupied territories. The actions were no good. If modern tycoons are forced to somehow reckon with legislation, labor standards and the payment of wages to employees, imagine how, in conditions of absolute omnipotence, the fascist oligarchy and top managers who took ownership of hundreds of enterprises in the occupied territories were “blown off the roof”.
The criminal cases included, as they say now, raider seizures, criminal seizure of property and the use of forced labor by millions of concentration camp prisoners.
The German "der ordnung" (order) turned out to be a hell of a hell. No independence for "auxiliary peoples", no illusion of rights and freedoms. The only requirement is submission to the German masters. For non-fulfillment of plans - repression to the fullest extent of wartime. For marriage, sand in bearings and other signs of sabotage, the Germans could spend the entire work shift.
Otherwise, everything was fine, everyone was happy with everything, “drank Bavarian beer” and “drove Mercedes”.
Despite the differences in the methods of “privatization” and organizational issues, which had their own characteristics for each of the occupied territories, the general scheme looked obvious. After the end of hostilities and the surrender of the country, the entire industrial infrastructure came under the control of the German military administration. A large “division” began, during which what was not part of the state concern “Hermann Goering” was distributed between private structures. The rigidity of the approaches increased from west to east.
The key difference in the situation with the Soviet Union was that it did not give up and continued to fight against fascism. The incessant hostilities, along with the severe destruction of infrastructure in the occupied territories of the USSR, made the "investment climate" extremely unattractive for German "partners". Only a limited number of mining companies operated on the territory of our country, along with the banal looting of the remaining infrastructure. The peaceful idyll was complemented by the endless hijacking of "Ostarbeiters" to work in Germany.
Having familiarized yourself with the content of the cases of the fascist industrialists, you are probably ready to make an unequivocal verdict: to find the defendants guilty on all charges and to sentence the moral monsters to the death penalty. The least they deserve.
Historians rightly believe that it was hardly worthwhile to carry out separate processes for them. The scale and severity of the crimes committed made Flick and Krupp worthy to sit on the same bench with other defendants of the Great Nuremberg Tribunal. But.
Justice in historical science is an unknown concept. Especially when it comes to such prominent figures who had close ties with the political and business elite of all Western states.
Raven crow …
Friedrich Flick was sentenced to 7 years in prison, of which he spent only three years in captivity.
After his early release, Flick immediately revived his empire, and by 1960 he reappeared at the top of the list of the richest people in Germany. Flick never admitted his guilt and refused to pay any compensation to prisoners of war and concentration camp prisoners, whose forced labor was used in his factories throughout the war.
The Soviet Union expressed indignation at the unacceptable leniency of sentences and regularly put forward demands for the extradition of war criminals. Of course, all this was only a means of ideological struggle. As for the Soviet zone, there were no large-scale trials of fascist criminals in it.
First, there was no one to judge. Aware of the irreconcilable fury of the Soviet side, key figures in German politics and big business chose to flee to the West in advance and surrender to the allies. Secondly, the USSR had no time to deal with formalities, it was necessary to rebuild the country and settle issues of reparations. The scoundrels who accidentally came to hand were immediately sent into the loop by the decision of the military tribunal.
We return to the Nuremberg trials of German industrialists.
Senior Krupp was released from the tribunal for health reasons. Back in 1941, old man Gustav finally lost his mind and was forced to transfer control to his son, Alfried Krupp.
The son received his legal 12 years with confiscation. By the decision of the tribunal, Krupp was forced to sell all of his enterprises, and the proceeds from the sale were paid in the form of compensation to the victims. However, the execution of the harsh sentence was interrupted by an unexpected circumstance: not a single buyer was found for the dilapidated workshops and deserted enterprises.
In early 1951, at the personal request of the High Commissioner of the American Occupation Zone, Alfried Krupp was released ahead of schedule and returned to managing his factories.
Today, at the beginning of the XXI century, the Krupp empire continues its history in the form of the largest industrial concern in Europe “TyssenKrupp AG”.
The most terrifying of all was the IS Farben chemical cartel. The American military tribunal concluded that without his activities, World War II would have been impossible. Heinrich Butefisch (the governor of IS Farben) and Heinrich Gateneu (the official representative of IS Farben, at the same time was an SS officer) financed Hitler's rise to power with the expectation of government support for synthetic fuel factories. Subsequently, to expand scientific projects, the Nazis created an experimental base for the Farben company - the Auschwitz concentration camp.
On April 14, 1941, in Ludwigshafan, Otto Armbrust, IG Farben representative in charge of the Auschwitz project, told his colleagues: “Our new friendship with the SS is a blessing. We have taken all the necessary measures to integrate concentration camps for the benefit of our enterprise."
IS Farben's pharmaceutical departments used concentration camp victims as test subjects in deadly human experiments.
“These IG Farben criminals, not Nazi fanatics, are the main war criminals. If their crimes are not brought to light, and they themselves are not punished, they will pose a much greater threat to the future world than Hitler if he remained alive. And if their guilt is not made public, they will do even more harm to future generations."
(From the speech of the official US prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials.)
At the trial in the case of IG Farben, the company's “top managers” were tried. The main criminals did not repent of anything and were able to avoid serious punishment. Having received the minimum terms, they again returned to managing a big business.
However, the ominous shadow of Nazism fell on the names of those who had nothing to do with savage experiments, financial machinations and chemical warfare agents.
Arthur von Weinberg, Karl Bosch (his discovery now feeds a third of the world's population) and other genius scientists of the 1920s. Their names were known to contemporaries like the current Elon Musk.
Many of the founders of Farben, due to their advanced age, did not see the beginning of the war. And the relations of the scientists themselves with the Nazis remained, to put it mildly, cool. For example, Weinberg, for obvious reasons, died in the Theresienstadt ghetto concentration camp.
Despite this, the names of the founders of IS Farben, along with the desecrated name of their company, were shamed and erased from the pages of history. Together with the little-known names of company leaders who held important positions in the era of fascism.
Fellowship of Interest was liquidated by a tribunal, and it became shameful to speak the name IG Farben in a society of decent people.
Organizationally, the Community immediately split into six of its original components (and a number of smaller entities). You probably know some of these names: BASF, Bayer, AGFA. These companies' turnover is currently 20 times that of the sinister IG Farben.
Formally, the elimination of IS Farben took a little longer than the tribunal participants had expected. For 70 years, an annual meeting of members of the IG Farben community has been held in Frankfurt am Main. The descendants of war criminals are still trying to resolve financial and legal issues that arose during the division of the company. Traditionally, the vile event is accompanied by speeches by anti-fascists and members of Holocaust memory organizations.
Epilogue
Not feeling a bit of sympathy for the fascist henchmen and scoundrels who drowned half the world in blood, I note that the wording “oligarch” does not accurately correspond to the industrialists of the Third Reich. Flick, Krupp and IG Farben did not plunder the bowels of their own country, and their super profits were due to the high degree of product processing.
With the change in political course, the accumulated industrial potential became the main hope for the future of the country. As a result, already in the early 1950s. industrial production in the war-torn Germany exceeded the pre-war level.
Evil geniuses were, without exaggeration, progressors for all mankind, and the whole world used their inventions.
As for ethical issues, this is a known situation, and there is nothing to discuss there. For 300% of the profit the capitalist will sell the rope on which he will be hanged (K. Marx). In my opinion, the meaning of the story with Krupp and IG Farben is as follows: a situation in which big business gets uncontrolled power should not be allowed.
Author: Alexey Dolganov