Massive use of forced laborers, prisoners of exploited camps: a report commissioned by the German automotive supplier Continental on its past concludes in close collaboration with the Nazi regime.
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At the time, the world's leading manufacturer of rubber materials, the group therefore played a central role in supplying the industry of the Third Reich, “the real backbone of the National Socialist war economy” , concludes historian Paul Erker in his study, quoted in Der Spiegel magazine to be published Thursday. This study was commissioned by Continental to try to shed light on the exact degree of collaboration of the company during this period.
It shows that she used around 10,000 forced laborers in her factories, often political prisoners, and did not hesitate, in addition, to use prisoners from Nazi concentration camps.
Insoles tested by prisoners
The company was a big manufacturer at the time of shoe soles, which the army badly needed for the troops. She had ordered from the Sachsenhausen camp to have shoes tested, the study reveals. The prisoners had to walk 30 to 40 kilometers per day in the Continental soled shoes, circling the central courtyard of the camp, in the middle of which stood a gallows. Inmates who faltered and fell to the ground were executed by SS guards, according to the historian.
The equipment manufacturer's technicians had even ordered that tests be done in the form of forced marches in snow or ice. Some of the detainees had to wear the shoes for a total of 2,200 km, according to the study cited in the Spiegel. The historian's report also mentions what was said by a Continental leader at the time, Hans Odenwald, about the Russian forced laborers employed: "When they are dead, we will take more . "
