Reichsbahn
The Deutsche Reichsbahn was the state-owned railroad company during the Weimar Republic and the “Third Reich”, incorporated in phases into the Reich Ministry of Transport. The Reichsbahn was very important for the transfer of troops and material during the invasion of Austria and Czechoslovakia, as well as during most of the campaigns of World War II. Their various departments were therefore generally considered to be particularly important to the war effort, and were given priority in the allocation of raw materials and labor. The Reichsbahn was one of the largest “employers” of forced laborers. In the summer of 1944, nearly 300,000 foreign civilian workers and prisoners of war made up about 28 percent of the total workforce of approximately 1.1 million employees. The Reichsbahn authority was involved in the most serious crimes: in addition to the wars of aggression and the exploitation of forced laborers, it was also involved in the deportation of forced laborers into the Reich territory and in the deportation of Jews, Sinti and Romani to the extermination camps.