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It is evident that no consistent policy was followed by the Reich and
Farben with reference to the financial arrangements made for the expansion
program. Generally when the expansion was outside of, or exceeded, the
peacetime requirements of Farben, some special financial arrangements were made
to lighten the financial burden on Farben and make the program financially
attractive.
The minutes of the Vorstand of Farben for 25 September 1941
show that Farben expended for new construction for the period from 1932 to 1941
two billion reichsmarks.
The evidence shows that of the many Farben
diverse products, the following were strategically important war materials:
nitrogen (ammonia N), diglycol explosives gunpowder, synthetic gasoline,
tetraethyl-lead, synthetic rubber, magnesium, aluminum, poison gas, sulphuric
acid, chlorine caustic soda and potash, calcium carbide, sodium cyanide,
stabilizers, methanol, other solvents. Farben's records show an enormous
expansion of its production facilities for those materials in the years from
1932 to 1944. In 1932, Farben’s investments for production of those
materials was 4,901,000 reichsmarks; in 1933, it was 12,215,000 reichsmarks
(almost three times as much) ; in 1938, it was 225,238,000 reichsmarks (about
45 times as much) ; and, in 1943, it was 421,500,000 reichsmarks (more than 86
times the 1932 investment).
From a maze of statistical and detailed
information in the record in this case emerges a picture of gigantic
proportions depicting feverish activity by Farben in a warlike atmosphere of
emergency and crisis to rearm Germany in disregard of economic considerations
and in complete sympathy with any demands made upon it by the Nazi regime.
There is nothing in this record to suggest that Farben and these defendants
ever withheld any energy or initiative that was calculated to help Hitler in
plans to build a Germany that would be strong enough militarily to master the
world.
e. Stockpiling of Critical War
Materials. In this summary of cooperation in the rearmament of Germany,
reference has repeatedly been made to the stockpiling of critical war
materials. As early as 1934 Farben began stockpiling war materials in
cooperation with the government’s program of economic preparation for war.
From that time on, Farben pursued and increased its program of stockpiling of
strategic materials. Beginning in 1935, periodic reports of stockpiling of
“iron pyrites” were made by Farben to the authorities [NI-8843, Pros. Ex. 749];
beginning in the summer of 1935, tubes for incendiary bombs were stored at Aken
under the guise of textile shells [NI-4832, Pros. Ex. 744]; from an
inspection report dated 11 September 1935, entitled “Nickel Factory
Oppau,” copy of which went to defendants Krauch, Haefliger, and Gattineau,
plans for “a |
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