Auschwitz

Haber s legacy, like his life, was a mix of high-minded science and nationalism gone tragically amiss. To obliterate Haber s achievements, the Nazis credited others with his nitrogen-fixation process and his chemical warfare work. Most horrifically, the Nazis used the pesticide Zyklon B—an offshoot of work begun in Haber s institute and supported by him—in concentration camp gas chambers. Among Haber s relatives, members of his stepsister s family lost their lives to Zyklon B cyanide at Auschwitz. 

A winter outbreak of typhus had been stopped for the first time in history. DDT also halted a flea-borne plague epidemic in West Africa a dengue fever epidemic on Saipan in the West Pacific and a typhus epidemic during the U.S. occupation of Japan in late 1945. When the Allies liberated German concentration and labor camps, their lice-laden inmates were dusted with DDT before they were evacuated. Typhus had been a major cause of death in the camps. The commander of Auschwitz, where three million... 

Harry Fiss. The Interpreter. New York Times Magazine. May 2, 1999, p. 96. Source for typhus in Auschwitz. 

In my compartment there was a man, a working man, and he told with loud voice to the other men and wives in the compartment that in Auschwitz concentration camp people — people were burned in a crematorium (he said not the word "crematorium") and in large numbers. And then the whole air in Auschwitz was filled with the smell of death. I was very deeply impressed and I sprang up and said he should not say such lies. 

Q. You say, then, that in the beginning of 1942 you heard of Auschwitz concentration camp, about the burnings and cruelties going on there, and you learned that from an open discussion on the train... 

Q. In the summer of 1943 you visited Auschwitz again. Did it occur to you that you should investigate it then ... 

A. I asked in Auschwitz a responsible man, the chief engineer Heidebroek. 

Q. Is this your statement, Dr. Struss "After I spoke to Heidebroek I was convinced that the situation at the Auschwitz concentration camp was as bad as they had told me, but I was hoping that it was not true" Is that a fair statement ... 

Altogether, there wasn t much more evidence than Bernstein had turned up two years before. There had been thousands of forced laborers working in the Farben plants yet here there wasn t a single statement from any of them to pin responsibility for their plight on any Farben director. Also puzzling was the absence of direct evidence about the Farben buna plant at the Auschwitz concentration camp. The "album of dedication" which Major Tilley had found at Geheimrat Schmitz s house had disappeared. Two weeks before, Drew Pearson, at my request, had advertised over the radio for its return. His appeal had got no response. I exclaimed "Farben must have kept some records at the Auschwitz site."... 

If these statements are acceptable," I commented to Sprecher, "they prove, too, that Dr. Ambros should have received the notoriety that Hitler himself got for the most infamous industrial project in history, the camp at Auschwitz. But Von Schnitzler himself— "... 

That s right. Thousands of people were there on the site at Auschwitz, but we can t make a house-to-house canvass all over Europe to find out who our witnesses were. We ve got to find those records. As for the rest of the Baron s testimony, it puts the linger on Schmitz alone."... 

I didn t know exactly what he meant. Everybody had his baby. With him it was Auschwitz, with Belle it was aggressive war. 

Of course it is. But I still say you should argue Auschwitz then they will see what kind of men they are trying, and they ll understand all the rest of it. We should have started with Auschwitz on... 

All I m saying is that we can use a simpler method of proof from now on, one that would reflect back on the proof that s already in. It s hard to take the rearmament up the line. It s not so hard with some of the things that happened at Auschwitz. For example, Farben built its buna-rubber plant near Auschwitz and put the engineer Duerrfeld in charge. And then we show that Duerrfeld s boss, Ambros, knew that concentration-camp inmates were being used at the plant, and he reported this to Ter Meer and the other members of the technical committee. But these technical-committee members were also members of the board. In this way we can show not only what kind of men these defendants are, but also begin to show responsibility all the way up to the top."... 

Your simple method is fine," 1 said. "But where is your simple proof We may find that the judges are no more inclined to believe all the horror that happened at Auschwitz than many officials in Washington who heard about it during the war. A human mind can only take so much."... 

Good. You agree then that Auschwitz is the way upstairs "... 

We should have stopped in Pilsen," Minskoff said. "In Pilsen, they still call this place Farben. When Farben took over here, they impressed about 1100 people from Pilsen. Six hundred of them wound up at Auschwitz. Of course we re in Bohemia now, but this is the parent factory of the first two chemical outfits Farben grabbed in the Sudetenland — isn t that right "... 

Q. What impression did you have of what went on there, at Auschwitz ... 

One of the Farben drugs, Methylene Blue, had been developed in the hope of curing people who had typhus. Dr. Mertens department at Leverkusen had sent several hundred doses of this unproved drug to faraway Auschwitz. There the shipment was received by a young doctor named Vetter who had lately worked for Mertens. Vetter had chosen healthy concentration camp inmates and injected the typhus disease, which struck the veins like a bolt of fire. When the disease had reached its delirious stage, he had injected the drug. Vetter had sent a full report to Dr. Mertens. 

Q. Was it not at some conference between Dr. Mertens and yourself that it was reported to you that Vetter was a camp doctor at Auschwitz and was trying out B-1034 (Methylene Blue) on concentration-camp inmates ... 

It s better than that Bear in mind that they sent the 50 doses, not to Auschwitz in Poland, but to the Buchenwald concentration camp in the center of Germany, where there was no epidemic."... 

Hoerlein had hated the Nazis—there was no doubt of that. Many of the Nazis hated I.G. Farbenindustrie. He had fought hard and lost. He was not a real Nazi, and he had not begun as a "cold" scientist he had faced the problem and then put behind him for good the decision that explained why none of the letters from Auschwitz spoke a word of "patients" — only of products to be tested. "The ban against animal experiments was imposed anyway," he d testified in the beginning. "And now it was a question of whether it would be possible to carry out scientific research."... 

Q. Now, Dr. ter Meer, the trial brief states that the defendants, in regard to Auschwitz, closed their eyes to facts. 

A. Tn July, Major Tilley did ask me whether I knew anything about that, I do not believe that during the conversation he spoke about pharmaceutical experiments in the Auschwitz camp. 

A. I was in Auschwitz twice. The first trip undoubtedly served to acquaint me with the site. This visit was made in October 1941, hardly six months after the work was begun in a terrain that had previously served agricultural purposes. We arrived in Auschwitz after lunch. We ate on the way. In a house between the city and the plant there was a temporary construction office. Subsequently, we walked over the terrain. I still remember it very well. 

The second time he went to Auschwitz, in November 1942, he observed a little more. Many buildings had been raised well above the ground. Again he saw the inmates on the construction site. 

That was not the last time he saw Auschwitz. Auschwitz was the third important buna factory. It had been carefully financed. So had the first two buna plants, which were buiit by 1936. At Crans-berg Prison, Schmitz had pointed out "I was concerned about the financing, and therefore we (I and Dr. ter Meer) insisted on getting favorable amortization rates and on making sure that the new investments did not bring us to financial ruin. In regard to the buna plant at Huels, capital of roughly one hundred million had to be provided, of which Farben took 74 per cent and the State 26 per cent." In the second buna plant the Reich also had a financial interest. 

But one couldn t look back to 1936 and say that Ter Meer, skeptically studying the influence of buna on Farben s fortunes and on the economy as a whole, could foresee that full employment sometimes brings greater evils than unemployment. Auschwitz existed then only as a "buna plant to the east." The name "Auschwitz" did not yet exist, except as the German translation for a little Polish town in Upper Silesia. Not until 1937 did full employment and "buna autarchy" begin to move eastward, driven by more than the danger of financial failure. In that year, said Ter Meer, "political reasons" dictated an abnormal expansion of most of Farben s plants, with the biggest emphasis on buna rubber. 

One day in the spring of 1937, Dr. ter Meer and Dr. Ambros began the search for another buna site that was to take them, four years later, to Auschwitz. The prosecution contended that the "possible war" turned their feet toward the East. Only one buna plant was in the Rhine Valley, which offered everything they needed water power, calcium deposits, economy of operation. In and beside the Rhine River were water and rail transportation to take the finished rubber to its nearby destinations. 

On the outskirts, a concentration camp had just been built. The camp was called "Auschwitz" (the German translation). The town itself was still "Oswiecem" when Ambros drove around it. 

A buna factory needed a lot of water, even in winter. They planned to cut a canal to connect the Vistula to the Oder a few miles away. Oswiecem was on a level plain, and all the waters of all the rivers around could be harnessed without flooding. Oswiecem fell on a line between Krakow and Vienna, and the old short stretches of railways could be joined to ship the buna back to the Reich. Said Ter Meer "There were really so many of our industrial prerequisites that one has to admit that this location, Auschwitz, was ideal industrially."... 

Ambros was very exact. A few weeks later, he reported twice to a group of buna colleagues at Ludwigshafen that plans were being made to build a second concentration camp at Auschwitz "The inhabitants of the town of Auschwitz itself are 2000 Germans, 4000 Jews, 7000 Poles. The availability of inmates of the camp would be advantageous."... 

Three thousand people were in Camp I. Then the second camp swelled the prison population to 14,000 — Dr. ter Meer was never to share his lunch with them. During the first two years of construction, reports came to his office of daily trainloads of "workers" coming to Auschwitz. Then Camp III and Camp IV were built, both nearer the buna factory than the other two camps. Then at last, in 1943, Ter Meer made a third visit to Auschwitz. Returning to Frankfurt, he had himself transferred to Italy, where he became plenipotentiary for the Italian chemical industries. Ambros appeals followed him "More workers are needed." "Herr Doctor Ambros is asking for assistance at Auschwitz."... 

A. Methanol is a product which was planned at Auschwitz. I don t know what year any more. To what extent it is suitable for the burning of corpses is hard to answer. But in my opinion, it is most unsuitable, because methanol bums at a low temperature and is not suitable for burning difficult combustible materials. 

The cheap source of raw materials decided our Sparte on Auschwitz," he said. "I knew nothing about the employment of inmates until a month after the site had finally been decided upon. Then an order came from Goering approving Farben s employment of the inmates."... 

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