NAZI LABOUR SERVICE

Evening Star, Issue 23834, 14 March 1941, Page 2

NAZI LABOUR SERVICE

REPAIRS WRECKAGE OF CORNIEST Behind the grey-clad German army there is another army clad in a dull earth brown, which is as important as the army in grey, for it has prepared the way for the march of the grey army into other countries. This army behind the lines is the Labour Service, the “ arbeitsdienst” (writes the Berne correspondent of the ‘ Christian Science Monitor’). When the Czech crisis was past the labour brigades were put back on peace time work. Then came the war and the German attack in the west. As the army proper moved forward, it was closely followed by the brown army of tho Labour Service, which—in immediate contact with the movements of the front line—re-established broken communications, built bridges, repaired roads, strung telephone wires, and gave the main troops every possible assistance. With tho end of the campaign in France began the preparation for the attack on England. Here the chief task was preparing “ airplane eyries ” in which the warplanes could hide after their raids on England. Travelling through Northern France, Belgium, Holland, North Germany, and Norway, one is not able to discern these hideouts unless a plane happens to be landing or departing.

CLOAKED BY PEACEFUL MEADOWS. The landscape offers only its usual aspect ot fields, forests, or lakes. Hut in this harmless looking landscape there may bo hidden an “ airplane nest,” with underground gasoline tanks, workshops, airdromes, barracks, and munition stores. What looks like a peaceful meadow is perhaps a runway leading to an underground “ air city.” One may suddenly see a German airplane swoop down, land on a meadow, and disappear into a passageway leading underground, while from behind the green hedges or from the midst of an apple orchard the anti-aircraft guns suddenly appear to fire at the pursuing enemy. This artistic work of military landscape' gardening has all been done by the “ arbeitsdienst,” which now has nine years of experience behind it and a veteran personnel. During the rapid advance in the west as well as during the preparation period for the attack on England largescale construction work had to be done in the occupied territory. In Holland, a country of canals, the chief work of the “ arbeitsdienst ” was the construction of bridges, which had been destroyed by the retreating armies. Usually a temporary bridge was rapidly built for immediate use until the main bridge could be constructed. In Liege, Belgium, the Trade Bridge was reconstructed. In Belgium, to keep the Allies from cutting off communication with the rear, detour roads had to be built, sometimes several miles long. Repair work on railways—such as restoring the electric signal system, replacing tracks, and rebuilding machine shops and roundhouses—had to be done. BRIDGES BUILT SPEEDILY. In Northern France many bridges were built in record time in order to give passage to the rapidly advancing troops. One bridge GOlt long and 25ft wide was finished by a troop of 35 ■workers in 45 hours. Often shell holes had to be filled, wreckage removed, military obstacles dynamited and carried away, and the road levelled out again. On the Rhine-Marne Canal, the Rhine-Rhone Canal, the East Canal, and the Saar Coal Canal hundreds of blasted bridges had to be removed, 23 bridges were permanently rebuilt, and 25 were temporarily rebuilt. Some 175 sluice-gates were repaired and 85 completely rebuilt. Like a section of the army, the Labour Service is thoroughly organised with many various departments—service, personnel, projects, economy, hygiene, instruction, court, and Press departments. The administration is divided into 38 districts for the men’s and 13 districts for the girls’ Labour Service. There are countless leaders in the Labour Service for the direction of the field work, the training of the youth, and administration work. These leaders are the “ elite corps of Labour.” They come for the most part from the working class, where hand labour is best understood. Though not always the brightest lads, these leaders are fit for their task, for they have a rough adaptability to all sorts of working conditions. PRESTIGE FOR WORK LEADERS. Since it requires no prestige of family. Labour Service leadership is a good outlet for rough-hewn leadership talent in the younger generation of the working class, among whom a Labour Service leader has as much prestige as a lieutenant in tho middle classes or a general in the ruling classes. What schooling is needed is obtained free of charge, interspersed with periods of practical experience in the special Labour Service schools which have been formed. Special engineering knowledge is obtained by those with special talent in regular engineering schools. The labour barracks are simple, wooden structures, usually four in number, lodging 16 men each. Each man has his own cot and blankets and washing dish, with a few hooks for his clothes and a shelf for small personal effects. There is also a building for tho kitchen and a combined dining and common room, as well as an office for the administrators and leaders. Each man gets 2 Reichsmarks a day, however, from which his food and laundry is paid, leaving him .25 marks or about 6 cents in pockeGmouey. GIRLS HELP FAMILIES. The labour service for girls—though it Is a younger organisation founded in 1937—is also of great use in time of war. The peace-time activities include helping mothers with large families, especially those who are ill or poor. The girls do not fear work in the barn and in the field, and can drive a team of horses. There are, however, special tasks which have come as a result of the war. Some of the girls’ youth hostels are now used as hospitals and homes for wounded soldiers, whom the labour service girls serve as nurses and as cooks. The girl labour battalions have much to do in connection with the great Go-vernment-owned migrations of German minorities from the small Baltic countries, from Russian Poland, from Bessarabia ami Bukovina back to the German Empire. Those migrants have to be helped to settle on farms in the eastern frontier on land conquered in the Polisli war or won from the sea or swamps by the younger men’s ‘‘ arbeitsdienst.” FARM EQUIPMENT REPAIRED. Most of tho women migrants have to be helped, and made to feel at home

FARM EQUIPMENT REPAIRED. Most of tho women migrants have to be helped, and made to feel at home

in Germany. There • are. all sorts of tasks in the new farmhouses from cleaning up after the destructive march of German and Polish soldiers to repairing farm equipment which has been broken and recultivating fields which have lain unused. There is also a great deal to be done for the families who are moving back into the evacuated zones along the Siegfried Line and in Alsace and Lorraine. Houses which have 'been long deserted or used as military outposts or barracks are full of dust and dirt and badly in need of repair. Labour Service girls help in this work and also organise units of the Labour Service among the native population. The life of the “ arbeitsdienst ” for young men and girls is hard and bare of higher intellectual’ pleasures; it is, however, not without its rewards in physical strength, robust health, comradeship, and a new attitude toward physical labour. Above all it gets work done and helps win victories.