Again requesting information i would love to hear some of the ways the enslaved workers (i.e. Czechs. Poles etc) sabotaged German military equipment.

A great one I heard was Czechs working on manufacturing tanks used to break the teeth of gears then stick them back on with wood glue.

I've heard of cigarette butts being found in tank engines during overhauls and oil ways being purposely blocked off, which would eventually cause the engine to seize.

There are also instances of nuts and bolts being 'accidentally' omitted during a tanks production.

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Regards
John

"It is always wise to look ahead, but difficult to look further than you can see" - Winston Churchill

IIRC I heard a story where a pilot after flying a mission found a dud 20mm or 30mm cannon shell in his fighter. There was a wadded up piece of paper with a message instead of explosive in it. The shells were being made by slave labor and this was how they fought back.

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For the first time I have seen "History" at close quarters,and I know that its actual process is very different from what is presented to Posterity. - WWI General Max Hoffman.

Thats brilliant!!

Then of course there were the Radom and Browning pistols which had a habit of exploding due to 'production irregularities.'

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There's no honorable way to kill, no gentle way to destroy. There is nothing good in war. Except its ending.

Okay, I'll bite. What did the message say? Boom?

According to Stephen Ambrose, the GIs he talked to mentioned the sheer quantity of dud German artillery shells after German artillery strikes. Slave labor, indeed, is not completely conducive to an effective war machine.

Water-soluble glue for boots, unsewn buttons, stuff like that.

I've heard instances of this, typically it was a message of support.

cheers,

I suppose you get what you pay for with slave-labour. Pay nothing, get nothing.

It reminds me of an exchange in the film "Schindler's List". Oskar Schindler's talking to one of his workers (His accountant, I believe), and the accountant's telling him how the Army and the government is getting suspicious about the stuff that Schindler's been doing. And Schindler replies:

"If this factory produces ONE SHELL that's capable of being fired, I would be a very unhappy man."

...or words to that effect.

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Message of support?

*US GI cracks open dud shell*

"If you can read this, we are cheering you on.

Love,

- Allied POWS".

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Refill with explosive of your choice and return to sender.

Thanks,

Forced-laborers

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WWII-era pen-advertisement
P-51 Mustang fighter-plane.
Parker '51' fountain pen.

"Please refill and return to the nearest Wehrmacht station near you."

No, this isn't a real quote. Just thought it would be humorous.

Great thread! As I'm in a good mood my Positive Rep to all till now, with the caveat that I have already run out of jelly beans for today Thank you all!

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I forget where but I had read that once in Normandy a German 8.8 dud shell broke on a rock near an American camp and it was a message to the senders girlfriend back home that he was alright. I dont remember if it got home though.

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"The perfect Aryan is as tall as Goebbels, as fit as Goering, as blond as Hitler, as handsome as Himmler and has a name such as Rosenberg."
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