Impact of War on Nazi Economic Policies Flashcards
Relatively speaking how prepared was Germany?
More prepared than Britain and France but nit as self-sufficient as Hitler had hoped ; there was 6 weeks worth of supplies of ammunition but they had wanted 4 months of it
How did the war affect Nazi economic policies?
They had been geared for war before 1939 and thus war did not affect it - eventually changed the way in which the war economy was run
Could they handle war production well?
No because several different organisations were involved in organising war production - office of the 4 year plan, economics ministry, army, navy and Air Force
Goering was head of the Air Force as well as the 4 year plan so he favoured the Air Force and people who actually knew about the latest technology were ignored while Nazis who knew much less were given power
What happened in 1940?
Fritz Todt was made minster of armaments and munitions with the task of organising industry to full production ; but he needed centralised control which none of the other departments would accept he had this level of control (especially not Goering who carried on allocating more resources to the Air Force)
Hitler’s role?
Passed a memorandum asking for efficient to be improved but he still did not force the adoption of Todt’s reorganisation and centralisation plans
What was the new system?
Todt’s replacement, Speer, convinced Hitler that the armaments minister needed to be in full charge ; Hitler’s 1942 decree set up the central planning board to distribute raw materials and to organise transportation
How did this new system work?
A variety of committees for each type of armament with specialists and engineers ; they closed many smaller factories and focused on production into a few larger ones and factory machinery was standardised to make construction easier
Factories adapted to maximise efficiency ; production became more mechanised as thousands of workers were enlisted into the army and replaced by foreign workers
This resulted in spectacular rates of production in necessities such as torchlights
Adapting to the war
Different products were needed at different times
First year was mainly planes, tanks and armoured vehicles for Blitzkrieg
Then h boars and longer range planes for battle for Britain
Tanks and armoured vehicles again for Operation Barbarossa
Military spending increase
1936 - 10.8 millions
1943 - 112 millions of marks
Overstretched economy
In 1945 the economy was severely overstretched and war production had been badly affected by
Allied bombing - wiped out towns, mines, factories , transport links
Loss of land that had provided raw materials (upper Silesia)
Damage to electricity, gas and water
Sabotage of foreign workers
Food production had also been affected by the loss of farm workers to the Front and the bombing of transport links ; people were starving
Black market had taken ofer as it did during and just after WW1
As the army fell back/deserted , economy ground to a halt and Hitler ended up trying to resort to his Scorched Earth Policy
