Page "Organisation Todt" Paragraph 2

* The period from 1938, when the OT proper was founded, until February 1942, when Todt died in a plane crash.

During this period ( 1940 ) Todt was named Minister for Armaments and Munitions ( Reichminister für Bewaffnung und Munition ) and the projects of the OT became almost exclusively military.

The huge increase in the demand for labour created by the various military and paramilitary projects was met by a series of expansions of the laws on compulsory service, which ultimately obligated all Germans to arbitrarily determined ( i. e., effectively unlimited ) compulsory labour for the state: Zwangsarbeit.

From 1938 – 40, over 1. 75 million Germans were conscripted into labour service.

From 1940 – 42, Organization Todt began its reliance on Gastarbeitnehmer ( guest workers ), Militärinternierte ( military internees ), Zivilarbeiter ( civilian workers ), Ostarbeiter ( Eastern workers ) and Hilfswillige (" volunteer ") POW workers.