I consider it entirely impossible that the population of former Soviet nationality could be accorded a greated measure of consideration than our German people on whom I have been forced to place very drastic measures. Should it no longer be possible to enforce the compulsion to work in the East, nor to draft labor, then the German war economy and agriculture will likewise be able no longer to fulfill their tasks in full measure.
"I myself am of the opinion that under no circumstances should the commanders of our armies give credence to the Bolshevist propaganda of atrocities and defamation. After all, it is to the interest of the generals themselves that replacements for the troops be made in opportune time.
"I take permission to point out that -- without wishing to discredit their best will -- it is impossible to put German women entirely inexperienced in work -- into the place of hundreds of thousands of excellent workers who now have to go to the front as soldiers. It must be possible for me to replace them with people from the Eastern territories.
"I myself report to you that all the members of foreign nations who are working with us are being satisfactorily treated according to human standards; tnat they are being treated correctly and fairly; they are being fed, housed, yes, even clothed. Because of my own experience in the service of foreign nations I am even bold enough to claim that never before have foreign workers been so decently treated anywhere in the world as is being done by the German people during this the hardest of all wars.
"I therefore ask you, my Fuehrer, to cancel orders which prevent the enrolment of foreign male and female workers and to kindly advise me whether my concept of the assignment as laid down herein still is correct.
"I ask your permission to report to you in person on several important points of the labor recruitment early next week, possibly on Tuesday.
"In lasting gratitude, loyalty and obedience, Fritz Sauckel."
Which proves that until March, 1943, he was the commander in charge of foreign labor and that it was Sauckel and he alone who demanded it because he was of the opinion that foreign people had to do and produce the same as the German people.
It is further important that he didn't declare that to the Fuehrer only, but also to the Defendant Speer and the Defendant Milch, which the Defendant Speer later on will attest, that never were foreign workers treated so fairly by any other people. In other works, he lied to the men who were to work with him.
I now turn to No. R-124, the Fuehrer minutes of September 14. This will be Exhibit No. 4, page No. 10 in this document book. I am reading figures 16 and 18 of the minutes.
"Fuehrer conference of 11/12 September 1943, from Page 7 of the original. Detleffson: 16) The Fuehrer brings up the subject of the Luftwaffe production and the discussions with Messerschmitt and he asks for my personal intervention with the Reich Marshal and Field Marshal Milch to cut down appreciably the construction of airplane types."
This is important because later the defendant will show that he encountered difficulties in the construction of fighters because the Fuehrer wanted to have bombers, while Milch wanted to have fighters for defensive protection of Germany.
18) The Fuehrer is displeased that the long range flight of Messerschmitt planes has not yet been taken by the Luftwaffe -
THE COURT: Dr. Bergold, you did not read 17.
DR. BERGOLD: No. I am omitting it because it is unimportant, just the connection between the two sections I gave in copying it.
"The Fuehrer is displeased that the long range flight of Messerschmitt planes has not yet been taken by the Luftwaffe. Messerschmitt is said to have been unable to obtain the support of aviation for it."
This again shows another attitude on the part of the Fuehrer. I am then omitting several exhibits, because I must prepare them. The next one is 124, minutes of the 11th meeting of Central Planning of 22 July 1942. It will be Exhibit No. 5, Page 15 of the English Document Book.
THE PRESIDENT: The interpreter said "June."
DR. BERGOLD: IT is July, the seventh month.
"Safeguarding of Food Supplies:
"A net increase of one million foreign workers is anticipated. This figure has not been reached during the past months. Even if more than one million workers are brought here during the months to come, the limit of one million will never be exceeded due to continued losses. Food for this number of workers is guaranteed."
This proves obligations were fulfilled.
The next exhibit is on the following page. Here we have minutes of the 22nd meeting of Central Planning. It is dated November 2, 1942. It will be Exhibit Number 6. It is Page 16 of the English Document.
"Extract from the Stenographic Record of the 22nd Conference of the "Central Planning" concerning Assignment of Labor, Monday, 2 November 1942, 1200 o'clock in the Reich Ministry for Aviation.
"MILCH: In my opinion agriculture has to be provided with its changeover. If, theoretically, agriculture had been given 100,000 more men, there would be 100,000 fairly well-fed men, while those we get now, particularly the prisoners of war, are not exactly fit for work. If agriculture will get them in time, they will again be able to feed those people well. However, it will not be very happy about it."
This document shows that Milch took care and saw that the people who worked were properly fed. If they worked in agriculture, they would be better fed than the other people in Germany. Consequently, everybody in Germany went out to the country because they could get better food.
The next document will be R-124; minutes of a conference on 12 February 1943. This will be Exhibit Number 7.
THE PRESIDENT: What is the date of the meeting?
DR. BERGOLD: It is the 32nd Conference. It is Page 16 of the English Document Book. It is Exhibit Number 7.
"Extract from the Stenographic Record of the 32nd Conference of the "Central Planning" of the Four-Year Plan."
I will turn now to the last paragraph of the original document.
"MILCH: Everybody sticks to his old methods until he is literally beaten away from them. However, one must not only beat, one must give advice too. They must be good experts who will tell people: You will do that this way or that; it is not necessary that you use just this sum. Who does such a thing will never give in and say I can do with less. Mining has been partly beaten into iron by saying we cannot give you anything but iron on account of the shortage of lumber."
This document shows that the Defendant liked to use strong language. It refers merely to the allocation. He speaks of "beating" figuratively. The High Tribunal will remember at one time he spoke of whips being used to force certain people to use suggested methods. That is not what he meant.
The next document is again R-124. These are the minutes of the 33rd Conference, 16 February 1943. This will be Exhibit Number 8. It is on Page 17 of the English Document Book.
"Extract from the Shorthand Report of the 33rd Conference of Central Planning, 16 February 1943. Page 16 of the original.
"SPEER: We are in complete agreement. You will not receive any list from us for this action, but the whole armament industry including the anticipated deliveries will be devoted to this action. The administration too must be served at the same time. But the authorities including Army, Air and Navy, shall not get a single person from the action. This must be adhered to. You know what the Reich Minister, Dr. Lammers, said: That he must therefore have some new women typists at the Reich Chancellery at once. That makes no sense.
"MILCH: Where France is concerned, there exists in France an industry which makes aircraft motors and parts, all complete. We have transferred there all the things which can be made there without endangering secrecy in any way. These are training aircraft, transport aircraft, etc. However, since we want to make the most of the production in other ways, we have moved away part of it to a large extent. As a whole, these things must be kept secret from the French, but in every entity subject to secrecy, there are only a few parts which are really secret.
The bulk consists of other parts. These have also gone there to a great extent, just as we engaged aircraft builders in France to a great extent. We now currently have work waiting in France for several thousand aircraft builders. At the moment the industry working for us there needs, according to its claims, some 20m000 men, who are asked of us, in order to be able to keep to the program. The production is still far behind that which was agreed upon with you in the program. Whereas we in Germany fully carry out our program, only 30 per cent of it is carried out in France. In fact it has only begun to function in the last weeks and months after we have been more active there. In principle, we have excluded the State from this whole cooperation with industry and set the German firms to work with the French firms.
"Sponsor firms have been appointed so as to make the affair operate. This system is not yet fully completed but has been favorably initiated everywhere and indeed brings quite other returns in some extent. The reproach is always made to us that nearly all Europe is at our disposal. The production we draw from France, with the exception of motor cars, is minute as regards the Army. The whole French production potential is not yet fully exploited by us or only to a quite small proportion.
"If it were necessary for us to produce in France, because in Germany the capacity, space, machine tools, etc., which are not convenient for removal are lacking, if the accommodation of the people were not so difficult, etc., we would, in fact, be reduced to the point of taking everything to Germany and have the work done here. But this would entail too great a decrease in the production in our own country, not to mention the reluctance of the people. We came to an agreement yesterday. I am very thankful that this matter is now, thanks to yourself, Gauleiter Sauckel, together with Gen. v. d. Heyde and Colonel Brueckner, to be settled on the spot. It is difficult to induce Frenchmen to come over here. An official agency alone cannot either appreciate or realize this, only a sponsoring firm can realize it. I therefore suggest that sponsor firms be called upon to cooperate, precisely because in France the sub-contract system is very widespread.
"Behind the factory which actually organized the thing, there are other factories which belong to the semi-finished goods and preparatory industry. This industry, however, can be supervised by our sponsor industries. We should have to assign to our people the task of investigating the individual firms and find out which people are working for our program. All others we annex ourselves. When we have got hold of them and annex them in German industry, that is, only those people who are really necessary to us, it will be possible to utilize them in the right way. The proportion of specialist workers there is higher than in this country. We have indeed drained a certain number of them into our factories last year because they were the easiest to get. The Frenchmen must work with more specialists than the Russian and the Russian must have still more specialists than the American In America they can place any simpleton before any machine. He will put it right in a flash. Only the installation requires a specialist. The man need only have arms; a head is a superfluous luxury. In France the system is quite different. The Frenchman has adapted himself to it and has always indeed had unemployment. A labor organization as we conceive does not exist. With the same number of Frenchmen and all other installations, facilities, etc., being the same, one will only obtain, as compared with German personnel half at the most or only one-third of the production, even if the personnel have all good will and zeal. It is a matter of system. This system we cannot simply alter, neither can the sponsor firms, but we must try in this way to obtain from them to a certain extent the additional resources which we need for our industry and armament. By proceeding thus, we can put things right. I believe the sponsor firms have an obvious interest in this. If industry has too many specialist workers there working for us, let us draw upon them ourselves, because we are suffering a great shortage of them.
"This resource should be left to our firms after this extensive drain on specialist workers has been suffered. We want to raise our armament. Now to another point. I have today ordered in my jurisdiction that an extensive action should take place; today, when we are counting upon obtaining a great number of women in virtue of the obligatory service whose age limit we hope to see extended to 55.
The British have extended obligatory service to the age of 65. The additional ten years are a trifle exaggerated. Women are not able to go the machines immediately and perform heavy work. The few days that are necessary for them to instruct the personnel are immaterial. We can still spare that much time if it were not that I would convey to the population an impress to the following effect: Now that we have reported for work, it is months before we are called up.
"I have ordered, within my jurisdiction, that the woman should as much as possible be employed in offices where men are now to be found, for instances, in the wages offices, etc. In these, women and elderly men can be easily trained, as they will be able to do without further difficulty. In this way, men in the commercial offices, etc., should be released for the accountancy offices and similar offices. This involves, in the case of industry, 20,000 individuals and there are other branches besides. It amounts to quite a considerable number consisting solely of people who, in view of the war economy, are unfortunately necessary now. These men must now be placed at our machines insofar as they are not drafted, that is to say, they are not soldiers. These people are more likely to be able to render good service at the machines or in the factories than the women now assigned, insofar as women are disposed to go to the machines. Of course, there will be women who have done such work before and who are willing to turn to this work, but who have not reported for work so far because they have not found it necessary to work for a living on account of the dole. Where the assistance of women is concerned, I should suggest, that, in the process of the action, only those women be assigned for whome work at the machine is not involved if a man is thereby released.
"TIMM: The danger lies in this that the draftees were partly to be released without replacement having actually been forthcoming.
"FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: That is quite another matter. When female auxiliaries of the Signal Corps are assigned, it is not additionally, but only in the proportion that soldiers are released thereby. There are indeed several 100,000 men in the signal corps of the army and air force. In our department, 250 to 300,000 have been such. Whether there are many now, I do not know.
They are all young men fit for combat. I have always campaigned against this and said: One ought to assign women preferably so as to release soldiers. If that is done now, it will really release a large number, it does not matter whether for the workshop or of the front.
"Of course there is a front somewhere in the East too. This front will be maintained for a certain time. The only useful thing the Russians will inherit from the territories evacuated by us will be the people. It might be better in principle to withdraw the population as far as 100 km behind the front. The whole civilian population will move back to 100 kilometers behind the front. Nobody will now be assigned to ditchdigging.
"TIMM: We tried to withdraw the population of Kharkow. 90,000 to 120,000 people were required by the fortress commandant of Kharkow for trench work so that in some cases we had to organize whole convoys.
"WEGER: Successful blowing-up operations were even carried out.
"FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: But that is done by the engineer corps. There is definitely no more hope that more prisoners of war will come from the East.
SAUCKEL: The prisoners taken are used there.
DR. BERGOLD: Just a minute, I am short one page from my old document book. From one of the pages I am in the wrong place, and I shall read the one page which was supposed to be right. Consequently that is the reason why you lost the context before. It was my mistake. I am sorry. Now I'll have to cover it. Before that it said on the one page--two pages before that one I just read in the same number of the same document, and the same interlineation. That is on page 18 of the Document Book. I will read:
"With the same number of Frenchmen and all other installations, facilities, etc. being the same, one will only obtain, as compared with German personnel, half at the most or only one-third of the production, even if the personnel have all good will and zeal. It is a matter of system. This system we can not simply alter, neither can the sponsor firms, but we must try in this way to obtain from them to a certain extent the additional resources which we need for our industry and armament. By proceeding thus, we can put things right. I believe the sponsor firms have an obvious interest in this. If industry has too many specialist workers there working for us, lot us draw upon them ourselves because we are suffering a great shortage of them. This resource should be left to our firms after this extensive drain on specialist workers has been suffered. We want to raise our armament. Now to another point.
I have today ordered in my jurisdiction that an extensive action should take place; today, when we are counting upon obtaining a great number of women in virtue of the obligatory service whose age limit we hope to see extended to 55. The British have extended obligatory service to the age of 65. The additional 10 years are a trifle exaggerated. Women are not able to go to the machines immediately and perform heavy work. The few days that are necessary for them to instruct the personnel are immaterial. We can still spare that much time if it were not that it would convey to the population an impression to the following effect: Now that we have reported for work, it is months before we are called up. I have ordered, within my jurisdiction, that the women should as much as possible be employed in offices where men are now to be found, for instance in the wages offices, etc. In these, women and elderly men can be easily trained, as they will be able to do without further difficulty.
In this way, men in the commercial offices, etc. should be released for the accountancy offices and similar offices. This involves, in the case of industry, over 20,000 individuals, and there are other branches besides. It amounts to quite a considerable number consisting solely of people who, in view of the war economy, are unfortunately necessary now. These men must now be placed in our machines insofar as they are not drafted, that is, to say, not soldiers. These people are more likely to be able to render good service at the machines, or in the factories than the women now assigned, insofar as women are disposed to go to the machines. Of course, there will be women who have done such work before, and who are now willing to turn to this work, but who have not reported for work so far because they have not found it necessary to work for a living on account of the dole. Where the assignment of women is concerned, I should suggest that, in the process of the action, only these women be assigned for whom work at the machine is not involved, if a man is thereby released."
Now I can make a jump to the page I had read once before. Yes, and I shall then skip one page and continue, "We have made the request--," that is on page 20 in the Document Book:
"We have made the request that there should be a certain percentage of Russians with us in the anti-aircraft artillery. 50,000 altogether are expected. 30,000 are already there as gunners. It is a funny thing that Russians must operate the guns. The other 20,000 are still missing. I received a letter from the Supreme Command of the Army yesterday saying: we can no longer turn over a single one, we have too few ourselves. So this thing will not turn out so successfully for us.
SPEER: It would be advisable to make the draft of women somewhat cleaner in the press.
FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: That would primarily have to be placed in the foreground. In this respect the question is whether I will receive the accounts from our industry in time. The matter is bound to be settled some time. There will be no deception. People who want to deceive, also deceive now, whether they have this personnel or not, whether their accounts are up to date or not. The other people are decent. The mass has not engaged in deception. Whether we are a little backward in checking prices will not be very important. The most important thing is to work. He know what is produced abroad, having now received their figures. The Russian actually makes 2000 aircraft a month in the way of front-line craft. This figure is far higher than ours. This must not be forgotten. We must get to the assembly line and produce quite other figures."
This document is to show that Field Marshal Milch was very much endeavoring to leave the French workers in France with their own firms, and to transfer actually only their orders, which the International Military Tribunal has counted as exonerating circumstances in the case of Speer, as that was productive work; so far as Milch is concerned we want to point out that he did the very same thing for the aircraft industry, and this is the basis upon which he endorsed a reasonable arrangement. It also shows that the man always had in mind the reasonable economical thing. Finally the document proves that individual remarks which in themselves were of no significance, flowers of speech which did not lead to any result, as for instance, in the getting of continuances, which is shown by the last words of Speer and of Milch in the marginal note. I will also show that the word used was not at all what it was implied to be, but that it was Goering, and that because he had difficulties with Goering the minutes were changed. In turn again I show this passage was taken out from the document because at that time serious difficulties arose between him and Goering.
I now turn to page 124, Page 54 of the original, 2nd paragraph. Extract of Shorthand report of the 39th Meeting of the Central Planning Board on the subject Food Situation and Armament Industry held on Friday 23 April 1943, 9:30 AM, Exhibit No. 9, and at page 20a of the English Document Book. I read, "Extract of Shorthand Report of the 38th meeting of the Central Planning Board on the subject Food Situation and Armament Industry held on Friday 23 April 1943, 9:30 AM in the Festival Barack near the zoo, Jebenstrasse, second paragraph, page 54, reading: page 20b of the Document Book:
"MILCH: I am convinced that there are more Russian prisoners of war. At that time 4,000,000 were captured. A large part of them died, however, the number of those who are still living is higher than we are told now. We reckon here with hundred thousand Russian prisoners of wan in the agriculture. Altogether, we have 300,000 of them in the Reich. During the first World War, I had 200 Italian prisoners of war with me. These prisoners were to be turned over however, we kept ours by reporting them dead in order to keep them. And these people also wanted to stay, in spite of the fact that we told them that they would be reported dead even to their families. We dragged these prisoners around with us till the end of the war. This proves that the assertions that have been made regarding the number of employed Russians arc wrong.
KEHRL: If the food supplies of the labor brought in from abroad are taken from the German rations then, while we think that we are very rich for having these people, the German rations are in reality reduced, and the decrease in the working capacity of our own workers does more harm than the good done my the new people. This proves that they were not starved but were fed at the expense of the German people.
SPEER: But from the figures of this incoming labor we have to deduct those who leave the country because of expired foreign agreements, and the others which we lose because of cases of death or illness. On the whole the increase of labor in our total professional war economy is not at all so very important.
This again proves that the agreements were made voluntarily, because they were terminated and the workers had to return home.
"(interpolation: The more labor we fetch from the East, the more this total figure will increase.)
BACKE: But there is a limit, too, in the number of men we can absorb. At that time we were told that one million was to be taken into the country, from the East. Now we have already got several millions.
MILCH: You can not count that way. Before all these measures in the second year of the war, the Air Force had 1.8 million men and today it has less than two million. The whole air armament which is a considerable part of the total war armament, that is, in the course of the war, or in the last 2½ years of the war, has not even increased by 10 percent. In reality the total increase in this field amounts to about 125,000 to 150,000 men. We are always looking for those people. That is our main problem."
This man told of this agreement, the fact all were voluntary, because they were issued in accordance with that and they are no longer valid. The figures were raised more as pertains to the reference of Backe, "But there is a limit, too, in the number of men we can absorb. At that time we were told that one million workers be taken into the country from the East. Now we have already got severed millions."
If the Court please, this is supposed to show the demands were so gigantic that the aircraft production was started early: because one of the most important things was obtained, and people were not drafted at random.
I now pass to our page 124, a document in the Speer minutes of the 50th Conference of the Central Planning meeting held 22 November 1943. This will be Exhibit No. 10, and at page 21 of the English Document Book. "Extract of the Shorthand Record of the Central Planning concerning Energy on 22 November 1943", page 63 of the original:
"KEHRL: I would appreciate our discussing the boiler-wagon question first. Here I have a request to the Field Marshal. We have asked the Luftwaffe to deliver boiler-wagons to us. They gave us 1000 wagons last year. They now have given us 600 wagons. We had requested 2000. Now it is practically thus that everything we could not transport resulted in the total 532-a loss for the effective fuel-supply.
During the month of November 23 we had, considering what we could have had, a deficit of approximately 100 to 120,000 tons -- really a disastrous loss. Could you not, Field Marshal, take an appropriate decision"?
It continues at --
FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: An enormous amount of barrels are being made.
SPEER: The number of 250,000 will diminish in the future because of lack of tin material.
FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: During the winter no barrel will be returned. They will disappear in the stoves.
BIESE: As long as the war will last in the East, the largest amount of the new production of barrels will go to the front.
FIELD MARSHAL MILCH: I see that also in our place. We manufacture smaller barrels, and use an enormous amount. One should say to the soldiers: "If you do not return the barrels, you shall not get any fuel any more."
I went to show by this that, while we was opposed to the number, he did not reply in that there were so many meetings, and so much was talked about -- there were so many proposals, that he did not do anything about it. I want also to show how much he was ready at first, to make statements, in his proposal that the soldiers were not to be given any more barrels; if they did not give back any barrels, they they were not to get the fuel any more. Nobody could reduce the consumption, but it showed that he made utterances which nobody seriously because in war time nobody can refuse the troops fuel which they need. But it was simply the nature of this man, to make exaggerated statements without meaning them seriously.
I now come to the minutes, on page 124, meeting cf the 53rd Conference of the Central Planning. This is a long document, it is thirty-five pages long and before the recess I will say we will not finish.
However, I should like to read it in one stretch, so that the Tribunal might have an idea what was being discussed in one such meeting in the Central Planning Board, that one does not simply deal with the slave labor program but that it 533-a involves certain possible remarks at random.
I would suggest now a recess so I may at this time be able to read it altogether after the recess.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal plans to recess at 12:20 today in any event, and to resume the session at 2:30 P.M. If it will conform with your convenience we may recess now and resume at 2:30 this afternoon.
DR. BERGOLD: Yes, very much so. Thank you.
THE MARSHAL: This Tribunal will recess until 2:30 this afternoon.
(thereupon noon recess was taken to 1430 hours.)
(The hearing reconvened at 1430 hours, 27 January 1947.)
BY DR. BERGOLD (Continued):
May it please the Tribunal, before I continue with the reading of my document, I should like to return to Exhibit No. 4, and ask you please to turn to it once more. This is number eighteen. After this meeting I discovered that the Chief of the Luftwaffe was to build so-called American bombers, which were to be built by Messerschmitt to bomb American cities, and in this case you can see what difficulty was encountered here by me. All of these documents I have been presenting to you, I have not been able to talk over with my client. I had to leave these documents at the Information Center, and then, according to my own judgment, I had to scrutinize these documents alone, without being able to turn to my client. I had to copy them, and it was only after they had been copied that the defendant could see them. You can readily see what sort of difficulty confronted me under such circumstances. The very first thing a defense lawyer should do is to show such documents to his client; that of course, I am not able to do. I simply want to point that out to you. Had I been able to take these documents from the Information Center, then I could have talked it over with my client immediately. However, I had to copy them, have them mimeographed, and only then could I talk them over with my client. That is merely an example of what I have to contend with.
I will continue now with our page 124, the Minutes of the 53rd Conference, on 16 February, 1944. This will be Exhibit No. 11, This is a very extensive document. It is document of a meeting concerning labor employment. It is a meeting concerning labor employment on the basis of which in the year 1944 the allocation of labor requirements in the amount of four and a half million workers was published; and this document was shown to you by the Prosecution with the defendant's personal initials on it. You will see from this that the question of foreign workers occupies only a relatively small part of the total statements of this 53rd meeting, and that people always asked themselves whether these workers were really available or whether they were being deceived by Sauckel.
Permit me to begin now, extract from the Minutes of the 53rd Conference, on the 16th of February, 1944.
Page 1 of the original:
DR. JANICKE/C
535 A
MILCH: Good day, gentlemen. We of the Central Planning, in conjunction with the GBA, should like to discuss in this circle of these most in need of manpower, the question how the personnel needs can be met in this year or in the next quarter. We are very thankful to the GBA for his work in this field and that he has given us the chance of talking it over among ourselves. I am particularly grateful for his preparation of the statistics which all you gentlemen have received and which Sauckel had managed to refuse at that time. That's the reason for our gratefulness.
So far as this material is concerned let me draw your attention to a few points.
First, page 1: New Employment and Separations. In the four quarters here described, namely from the last quarter of 1942 to the third quarter of 1943, we had a demand for about 30 million workers, which was designated as requirement. This figure corresponds to the total number of all employed in Germany and, looking at it absolutely, we see that our needs represent something impossible. If, however, we examine it more closely we observe that the balance, that is, what was received in one quarter, was always carried forward for the next quarter. It is interesting that altogether 9,780,000 requests were made. Over against this stands a decrease through discharges, according to the compulsory labor registration statistics, of 6,800,000; so there accordingly remains a surplus of new employment of circa 3,000,000. But several things must still be deducted from this number; those that have died, total invalids, and various others. It would be interesting if later you, President Kehrl, would speak about this matter briefly.
The second page shows the allocations of labor forces made by the Labor Offices from 1 October 1942 until 1 October 1943. From it one sees that agriculture was well taken care of with 1,800,000, and, after armaments and war production, received the largest allocation of the total of 9,700,000.
It is remarkable that domestic services received the very large increase of 810,000.
Page three, which shows the total balance of labor forces, makes clear that before the war we had a total number of 38,500,000 persons employed whereas we now have 36,000,000, that is about 2,600,000 less. This matter is also important for the Ministry of Agriculture in their consideration of the question how these workers are fed.