I have had the honor of calling your attention to the existence of the black market in Belgium, its organization by the occupation troops, and their final decision to suppress this black market. One may, with respect to this, conclude, as has already been indicated in the course of the general observations, that in spite of their claims it was not in order to avoid inflation in Belgium that the German authorities led a campaign against the black market.
The day the Germans decided to suppress the black market, they loudly proclaimed their anxiety to spare the Belgian economy and the Belgian population the very serious consequences of the threatening inflation. In reality, the German authorities intervened against the black market in order to prevent its ever-growing extension from reaching the point where it would absorb all the available merchandise and completely strangle the official market. In a word, the survival of the official market with its lower prices was finally much more profitable for the army of occupation.
I now come, gentlemen, to Page 46 of my presentation, to the third Chapter—purchases which were regular in appearance; which had only one aim, namely the subjugation of Belgian productive power.
Carrying out their program of domination of the countries of Western Europe as it had been established since before 1939, the Germans, from the moment they entered Belgium in May 1940, took all the measures which seemed to them appropriate to assure the subjugation of Belgian production.
No sector of Belgian economy was to be spared. If the pillage seems more noticeable in the economic sphere, that is only because of the very marked industrial character of Belgian economy. Agriculture and transport were not to escape the German hold, and I propose to discuss first the levies in kind in industry.
Belgian industry was the first to be attacked. Thus, the military commander in Belgium, in agreement with the various offices of the Reich for raw materials and with the Office of the Four Year Plan and the Ministry of Economics, drew up a program the purpose of which was to convert almost the whole of Belgian production to the bellicose ends of the Reich. Already on the 13th of September 1940 he was able to make known to the higher authorities a series of plans for iron, coal, textiles, and copper. I submit Exhibit Number RF-162 (Document Number ECH-2) in support of this statement.
Also a report by Lieutenant Colonel, Dr. Hedler, entitled “Change in Economic Direction,” states that from 14 September 1940 the Army Ordnance Branch sent to its subordinate formations the following instructions, to be found in the document book under Exhibit Number RF-163 (Document Number ECH-84). I read the last paragraph of Page 41 of the German text:
“I attach the greatest importance to the proposition that the factories in the occupied western territories, Holland, Belgium, and France, be utilized as much as possible to ease the strain on the German armament production and to increase the war potential. Enterprises located in Denmark are also to be employed to an increasing extent for subcontracts. In doing so the operational directives of the regulation of the Reich Marshal as well as the regulations concerning the economy of raw materials in the occupied territories are to be strictly observed.”
All these arrangements quickly enabled the Germans to control and to direct Belgium’s whole production and distribution for the German war effort.
The decree of 27 May 1940, VOBEL Number 2, submitted as Document Number RF-164, established commodity control offices whose task was—and I quote from the third paragraph:
“. . . to issue, in compliance with Army Group directives, general regulations or individual orders to enterprises which are producing, dealing with, or using controlled commodities, in order to regulate production and ensure just distribution and rational utilization while keeping to the place of work, as far as possible.”
Article 4 of the same text indicated in detail the powers of these commodity control offices, and in particular they were given the right:
“To force enterprises to sell their products to specified purchasers; to forbid or require the utilization of certain raw materials; to subject to their approval every sale or purchase of commodities.”
To conceal more effectively their real objective, the Germans gave these commodity control offices independence and the status of a corporation. Thus, there were set up 11 commodity control offices which embraced the whole economy except coal, the direction of which was left under the Belgian Office of Coal. Exhibit Number RF-165 (Document Number ECH-3), gives proof of this.
The execution of the regulations was ensured by a series of texts promulgated by the Belgian authorities in Brussels. They issued in particular a decree dated 3 September 1940, by virtue of which Belgian organizations took over again the offices which the Germans gave up.
These offices were to experience various vicissitudes. Although originating from the Belgian Ministry of Economics, they were closely controlled by the German military command. In this way, the seizure of Belgian production was completed by the appointment of “Commissioners of Enterprises,” under the ordinance of 29 April 1941, submitted as Document Number RF-166. Article 2 of this text defines the powers of the commissioners:
“The duty of the Commissioner is to set or keep in motion the enterprise under his charge, to ensure the systematic fulfillment of orders, and to take all measures which increase the output.”
The decline of the commodity control offices began with an ordinance dated 6 August 1942, establishing the principle providing for the prohibition of manufacturing certain products or for ordering the use of certain raw materials. This ordinance is to be found in the document book under Document Number RF-167. Supervision of the commodity control offices was soon organized by the appointment to each of them of a German Commissioner, selected by the competent Reichsstelle.
From the last months of 1943 on, the “Rüstungsobmann” Office of the Armament and War Production Ministry (Speer), acquired the habit of passing its orders direct, without having recourse to the channel of the commodity control offices.
Even before this date measures had been taken to prevent any initiative that was not in accord with the German war aims. Further and even before the above ordinance of 6 August 1942, the ordinance of 30 March 1942 should be mentioned, which made the establishment or extension of commercial enterprises subject to previous authorization by the military commissioner.
In the report of the military administration in Belgium that has already been cited, the chief of the administrative staff, Reeder, specifies in Exhibit Number RF-169 (Document Number ECH-335) that for the period of January to March 1943 alone, out of 2,000 iron works, 400 were closed down for working irrationally or being useless to the war aims. The closing of these factories seems to have been caused less by the concern for a rational production than by the cunning desire to obtain cheaply valuable tools and machines.
In this connection, it is appropriate to point to the establishment of a Machine Pool Office. The above quoted report of the military administration in Belgium, in the 11th section, Pages 56 and following, is particularly significant in this respect. Here is an extract from the German text, the last lines of the last paragraph of Page 56, in the French translation, the last lines . . .
THE PRESIDENT (Lord Justice Sir Geoffrey Lawrence): That passage you read about the Defendant Raeder, was that from Document 169 or 170?
M. DELPECH: Mr. President, I spoke yesterday of the chief of the administration section, Reeder. He was section chief in Brussels. He has no connection with the defendant here.
THE PRESIDENT: I see, very well.
M. DELPECH: Exhibit Number RF-171 (Document Number