Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe
holding company for SS operations
Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe (German: for 'German Economic Enterprises'), abbreviated DWB, was a project launched by Nazi Germany in World War II. Organised and managed by the Allgemeine SS, its aim was to profit from the use of slave labour extracted from the Nazi concentration camp inmates.
Holding company for SS industries
In July 1940, Oswald Pohl (acting on the advice of Walter Salpeter and Hans Hohberg) set up DWB as a holding company for the majority of SS-owned enterprises in order to offset the profits of other SS companies with the losses of German Earth and Stone Works's unsuccessful brickworks at Oranienburg I (Sachsenhausen concentration camp), reducing the taxes due.
DWB was a holding company for more than 25 SS industries. Oswald Pohl, the head of the SS Main Economic and Administrative Office (known by its German initials as WVHA) was also the chief officer of DWB. Georg Lörner, another high WVHA official, was another incorporator. Through stock ownership DWB controlled a wide variety of enterprises, such as stone quarries, brick manufacturing plants, cement mills, pharmaceutical factories, real estate, housing, building materials, book printing and binding, porcelain and ceramics, mineral water and fruit juices, furniture, foodstuffs, and textiles and leather. Some of these businesses and properties had previously been seized or otherwise expropriated from their rightful owners.
The following companies were part of the holding (sorted in groups):
Group Construction materials, Ceramics und Porzellan
Deutsche Erd- und Steinwerke GmbH (DEST)
Ostindustrie GmbH (OSTI)
Pragobau AG
Golleschauer Portland-Zementfabrik AG
Ostdeutsche Baustoffwerke GmbH
Zettlitzer Kaolinwerke AG
Schlackenwerk Linz GmbH
Porzellanmanufaktur Allach
Porzellanfabrik Victoria GmbH
Tonwerke Großes Werder GmbH
Essin GmbH
Porag Porzellan-Radiatorenwerk GmbH
Bohemia Keramische Werke AG
Deutsche Torfverwertung GmbH
Klinker-Zement GmbH
Group Food and Beverages
Deutsche Lebensmittel GmbH
Selchwaren- und Konservenfabrik AG
Salami- und Nahrungsmittelfabrik AG
Freudentaler Getränke GmbH
F. Kunerle oHG
Deutsche Versuchsanstalt für Ernährung und Verpflegung GmbH
Societä Anonima Prodotti Agricoli Vitaminici Apuania
Lesnoplod Orava Sojka a Spol
Mattoni (Mineralwasser)
Apollinaris (Mineralwasser)
Sudetenquell GmbH
Group Paper, Printing and Publishing
Papierfabrik Neudeck AG
SS-Druckschriftenversand GmbH
Forschungsanstalt für das Deutsche Buchwesen GmbH
Lumbeck-Gesellschaft für das deutsche Buchwesen mbH
SS-Vordruck-Verlag GmbH
Völkischer Kunstverlag GmbH
Großdeutscher Bilderdienst GmbH
Friedrich Franz Bauer GmbH
Deutsche Briefkasten-Reklame GmbH
Nordland-Verlag
Group Settlement and Infrastructure
Gesellschaft für technisch-wirtschaftliche Entwicklung mbH (Getewent)
Siedler Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft Zamosc GmbH
Allod Eigenheim- und Kleinsiedlungs GmbH
Erste Gemeinnützige Baugesellschaft für Kleinwohnungen GmbH
Haus- und Grundbesitz GmbH
Gemeinnützige Wohnungs- und Heimstättengesellschaft mbH
Group Textil and Glas
Gesellschaft für Textil- und Lederverwertung mbH (Texled)
Rheinahr-Glasfabrik GmbH
Group Furniture and Interior
Deutsches Sperrholz- und Fournierwerk GmbH
Verkaufsstelle Berliner Möbelwerkstätten eGmbH
Deutsche Ausrüstungswerke GmbH (DAW)
Deutsche Meisterwerkstätten GmbH
Deutsche Heimgestaltung GmbH
Deutsche Edelmöbel GmbH
Groupe other Enterprises
Gesellschaft für Seuchenbekämpfung mbH
Asid GmbH
Deutsche Heilmittel GmbH
Anton Loibl GmbH
Deutsche Schieferöl GmbH (Unternehmen Wüste)
Role in war crimes
After World War II, the surviving chief officers of WVHA were on trial for crimes against humanity in what became known as Pohl trial. Most of them were found guilty. Both Pohl and Georg Lörner were sentenced to death by hanging, although Lörner managed to get his sentence commuted to a prison term. The war crimes tribunal placed particular emphasis on the role the defendants had played in four DWB subsidiaries:
German Earth and Stone Works, known as DEST, which operated five granite quarries, six brick and tile plants, and a stone-cutting plant;
The Klinker-Zement, manufacturing brick and cinder block, fireproof products, ceramics, lime, and chalk.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Deutsche Wirtschaftsbetriebe” as holding company for SS operations. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
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The subject matters to the history & society register because the source frames it as holding company for SS operations. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Chronology, provenance and viewpoint should be read together before a broad social or political interpretation is accepted. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 15, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q5266305. None of the 0 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1940.
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