Foreign workers labor service in wartime Germany (1939 -- 1945) | Los Angeles Museum of the Holocaust

Foreign workers labor system in Germany,

Classifications

A class system was created amongst Fremdarbeiter ("foreign workers") brought to Germany to work for the Reich. The system was based on layers of increasingly less privileged workers, starting with well paid workers from Germany's allies or neutral countries to forced laborers from conquered Untermenschen ("sub-humans") populations.

Arbeitsbuch Für Ausländer (Workbook for Foreigner) identity document issued to a Polish Forced Laborer in 1942 by the Germans together with a letter "P" patch that Poles were required to wear to distinguish them from the German population.

Young Polish girl wearing Letter "P" patch.

Gastarbeitnehmer ("guest workers") – Workers from Germanic and Scandinavian countries, France, Italy, other German allies (Romania, Bulgaria, Hungary), and friendly neutrals (e.g. Spain and Switzerland). This was a very small group, only about 1% of foreign workers in Germany came from countries that were neutral or allied to Germany.

Zwangsarbeiter (forced workers) – Forced laborers from countries not allied with Germany. This class of workers was broken down into the following designations:

Militärinternierte ("military internees") – Prisoners of war. Geneva Conventions allowed captor nations to force non-officer prisoners of war to work within certain restrictions. For example, almost all Polish non-officer prisoners of war (c. 300,000) were forced to work in Nazi Germany. In 1944, there were almost 2 million prisoners of war employed as forced laborers in Germany. Compared to other foreign workers, the prisoners of war were relatively well-off, especially if they came from western countries that were still at war like United States or Britain, as the minimum standards of their treatment were mandated by the Geneva Conventions (Soviet prisoners of war, however, were treated with utter brutality as Nazis did not consider them subject to protection under the Geneva Conventions, which had not been ratified nor implemented by the Soviet Union). Their working conditions and well-being were subject to supervision by the International Red Cross and, in cases of mistreatment, retaliation against German prisoners held in US and Britain (and likewise performing forced labor) was almost certain. However, the treatment of these workers varied greatly depending on their country of origin, the period, and the specific workplace.

Zivilarbeiter ("civilian workers") – ethnic Poles from the General Government. They were regulated by strict Polish decrees: they received much lower wages and could not use conveniences such as public transport, or visit many public spaces and businesses (for example they could not attend German-church services, swimming pools, or restaurants); they had to work longer hours and were assigned smaller food rations; they were subject to a curfew. Poles were routinely denied holidays and had to work seven days a week; they could not enter marriage between themselves without a permit; they could not possess money or objects of value: bicycles, cameras, or even lighters. They were required to wear a sign: the "Polish P", on their clothing. In 1939 there were about 300,000 Polish Zivilarbeiter in Germany. By 1944, their number skyrocketed to about 1.7 million, or 2.8 million by different accounts (approximately 10% of occupied Poland's prisoner workforce). In 1944, there were about 7.6 m foreign so-called civilian workers employed in Germany in total, including POWs from Generalgouvernement and the expanded USSR, with and a similar number of workers in this category from other countries.

Ostarbeiter ("Eastern workers") – Former Soviet civil workers, primarily from Ukraine. They were marked with a sign OST ("East"), had to live in camps that were fenced with barbed wire and under guard, and were particularly exposed to the arbitrariness of the Gestapo and the industrial plant guards. Estimates put the number of OST Arbeiters between 3 million and 5.5 million.

In general, foreign laborers from Western Europe had similar gross earnings and were subject to similar taxation as German workers. In contrast, the central and eastern European forced laborers received at most about one-half the gross earnings paid to German workers and much fewer social benefits. Forced laborers who were prisoners of Labour or concentration camps received little if any wage and benefits. The deficiency in net earnings of central and eastern European forced laborers (versus forced laborers from western countries) is illustrated by the wage savings forced laborers were able to transfer to their families at home or abroad (see table).

The Nazis issued a ban on sexual relations between Germans and foreign workers. Repeated efforts were made to propagate Volkstum ("racial consciousness"), to prevent such relations. Pamphlets, for instance, instructed all German women to avoid physical contact with all foreign workers brought to Germany as a danger to their blood. Women who disobeyed were imprisoned. Even fraternization with the workers was regarded as dangerous, and targeted with pamphlet campaigns in 1940–1942. The soldiers in the Wehrmacht and SS officers were exempt from any such restrictions. It is estimated that at least 34,140 Eastern European women apprehended in Łapankas (military kidnapping raids), were forced to serve them as "sex slaves" in German military brothels and camp brothels during the Third Reich. In Warsaw alone, there were five such establishments set up under military guard in September 1942, with over 20 rooms each.