 |
| [con...] ditions therein with regard to production orders and
manpower. They were directed to supervise the allocation of labor and the
proper consumption of raw materials on quota, plant maintenance, coal, et
cetera, in the plants of which they were in charge. Thus it appears that the
plant leaders were given little opportunity to exercise initiative in matters
pertaining to production. They were all well informed of and knew that
compulsory foreign workers, prisoners of war, and concentration-camp inmates
were being employed in the Farben plants and they acquiesced in this practice
under the pressure of conditions as they then existed in the Reich. We are not
convinced from the proof that any of these defendants exercised initiative in
obtaining forced labor under such circumstances as would deprive them of the
defense of necessity. Ambros made a report at a meeting of the TEA on 21 April
1941 in which he specifically mentioned that concentration-camp inmates were
being utilized in construction work at the buna plant Auschwitz, but the extent
of his disclosures is not revealed by the evidence. It is not established that
the members of the TEA were informed of or that they knew of the initiative
being exercised by the defendants Ambros, Buetefisch, and Duerrfeld in
obtaining workers for the Auschwitz project, or that the availability of such
labor was one of the determining factors in the location of the Auschwitz site.
The affiant Struss, Director of the Office of the Technical Committee
testified: |
| |
“The members of the TEA
certainly knew that IG employed concentration-camp inmates and forced laborers.
That was common knowledge in Germany but the TEA never discussed these things.
TEA approved credits for barracks for 160,000 foreign workers for
IG.” |
| |
| The members of the TEA, with the exception of the chairman ter Meer,
were plant leaders. Under the decentralized system of the Farben enterprise
each leader was primarily responsible for his own plant and was generally
uninformed as to the details of operations at other plants and projects.
Membership in the TEA does not import knowledge of these details. As plant
leader, each was subject to the orders and supervision of the Reich authorities
with respect to the operation of his own plant. He was not required to assume
that governmental orders and decrees were being exceeded or that other members
were taking criminal initiative in the field of employment. There is a dearth
of evidence regarding information made available to the members of the TEA,
other than Ambros, about conditions at Auschwitz. We cannot assume that the
general membership of the committee knew of the initiative displayed by Ambros
in planning for or obtaining the use of concentration-camp workers or forced
laborers on the construction project. On this state of the record we are not
prepared to |
213755—53—76
1193 |
. 
