Brabag (Braunkohle Benzin AG) was a German firm, planned in 1933 and operating from 1934 until 1945, that distilled synthetic

aviation fuel Aviation fuels are petroleum-based fuels, or petroleum and synthetic fuel blends, used to power aircraft. They have more stringent requirements than fuels used for ground use, such as heating and road transport, and contain additives to enhan ...

diesel fuel Diesel fuel , also called diesel oil, is any liquid fuel specifically designed for use in a diesel engine, a type of internal combustion engine in which fuel ignition takes place without a spark as a result of compression of the inlet air and ...

gasoline Gasoline (; ) or petrol (; ) (see ) is a transparent, petroleum-derived flammable liquid that is used primarily as a fuel in most spark-ignited internal combustion engines (also known as petrol engines). It consists mostly of organic c ...

lubricant A lubricant (sometimes shortened to lube) is a substance that helps to reduce friction between surfaces in mutual contact, which ultimately reduces the heat generated when the surfaces move. It may also have the function of transmitting forces, t ...

s, and

paraffin wax Paraffin wax (or petroleum wax) is a soft colorless solid derived from petroleum, coal, or oil shale that consists of a mixture of hydrocarbon molecules containing between 20 and 40 carbon atoms. It is solid at room temperature and begins t ...

from

lignite Lignite, often referred to as brown coal, is a soft, brown, combustible, sedimentary rock formed from naturally compressed peat. It has a carbon content around 25–35%, and is considered the lowest rank of coal due to its relatively low heat ...

. It was an industrial

cartel A cartel is a group of independent market participants who collude with each other in order to improve their profits and dominate the market. Cartels are usually associations in the same sphere of business, and thus an alliance of rivals. Mos ...

firm closely supervised by the Nazi regime; while it operated, it produced commodities vital to the German military forces before and during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. After substantial damage from

strategic bombing Strategic bombing is a military strategy used in total war with the goal of defeating the enemy by destroying its morale, its economic ability to produce and transport materiel to the theatres of military operations, or both. It is a systematica ...

, the firm and its remaining assets were dissolved at the end of the war.

History

Brabag, sometimes called 'BRABAG', is a

portmanteau A portmanteau word, or portmanteau (, ) is a blend of wordsacronym An acronym is a word or name formed from the initial components of a longer name or phrase. Acronyms are usually formed from the initial letters of words, as in ''NATO'' (''North Atlantic Treaty Organization''), but sometimes use syllables, as ...

(german: Braunkohlen Benzin AG) denoting the firm's chief inputs and outputs: brown coal (lignite) and gasoline ('benzine'). Upon the ramp-up of the Nazi program of industrial

autarky Autarky is the characteristic of self-sufficiency, usually applied to societies, communities, states, and their economic systems. Autarky as an ideal or method has been embraced by a wide range of political ideologies and movements, especiall ...

that marked the approach of war, Berlin saw that one of its weakest points was the almost complete absence of

crude oil Petroleum, also known as crude oil, or simply oil, is a naturally occurring yellowish-black liquid mixture of mainly hydrocarbons, and is found in geological formations. The name ''petroleum'' covers both naturally occurring unprocessed crude ...

production within German borders; this insight coincided with the emergence in both Hitler's Chancellery and the

General Staff A military staff or general staff (also referred to as army staff, navy staff, or air staff within the individual services) is a group of officers, enlisted and civilian staff who serve the commander of a division or other large military ...

of a belief in a

blitzkrieg Blitzkrieg ( , ; from 'lightning' + 'war') is a word used to describe a surprise attack using a rapid, overwhelming force concentration that may consist of armored and motorized or mechanized infantry formations, together with close air ...

war-fighting strategy that centered on

Panzer This article deals with the tanks (german: panzer) serving in the German Army (''Deutsches Heer'') throughout history, such as the World War I tanks of the Imperial German Army, the interwar and World War II tanks of the Nazi German Wehrma ...

warfare, buttressed by warplanes carrying out tactical air support. This strategy needed synthetic petroleum products. Berlin therefore in October 1934 ordered the German chemical conglomerate

I.G. Farben Interessengemeinschaft Farbenindustrie AG (), commonly known as IG Farben (German for 'IG Dyestuffs'), was a German chemical and pharmaceutical conglomerate. Formed in 1925 from a merger of six chemical companies—BASF, Bayer, Hoechst, Agfa, ...

to join with a cartel of lignite mineowners and other firms to invest 100.0 million

Reichsmark The (; sign: ℛℳ; abbreviation: RM) was the currency of Germany from 1924 until 20 June 1948 in West Germany, where it was replaced with the , and until 23 June 1948 in East Germany, where it was replaced by the East German mark. The Reich ...

s as an initial

tranche In structured finance, a tranche is one of a number of related securities offered as part of the same transaction. In the financial sense of the word, each bond is a different slice of the deal's risk. Transaction documentation (see indenture) ...

of venture capital; these funds were used to set up a new firm, Brabag. The new firm was ordered to distill gasoline and other synthetic petroleum products, of which Germany had very little, from lignite, of which the Germans had an ample supply. Chemists had invented the

Bergius process The Bergius process is a method of production of liquid hydrocarbons for use as synthetic fuel by hydrogenation of high-volatile bituminous coal at high temperature and pressure. It was first developed by Friedrich Bergius in 1913. In 1931 Bergius ...

and the Fischer-Tropsch process to accomplish this goal. Soon plants were built. In 1937, for example, Brabag completed the Brabag II facility in Ruhland-Schwarlheide (the 4th

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

Fischer-Tropsch plant) to produce gasoline and diesel fuel from lignite coal.

Forced labor

As Germany deepened its commitment to World War II, Brabag's plants became vital elements of the war effort. Like other strategic firms under the Nazi regime, Brabag was assigned a significant quota of

forced labor Forced labour, or unfree labour, is any work relation, especially in modern or early modern history, in which people are employed against their will with the threat of destitution, detention, violence including death, or other forms of ex ...

of conscripts from the occupied nations. One estimate counts 13,000

Nazi concentration camp From 1933 to 1945, Nazi Germany operated more than a thousand concentration camps, (officially) or (more commonly). The Nazi concentration camps are distinguished from other types of Nazi camps such as forced-labor camps, as well as con ...

laborers working for Brabag. Brabag plants were a target of the Oil Campaign of World War II. Production of synthetic petroleum products had been severely damaged by the end of the war in 1945.

References

{{Authority control Chemical companies of Germany Chemical companies established in 1934 Defunct companies of Germany IG Farben Oil companies of Germany Synthetic fuel companies Energy companies established in 1934 1934 establishments in Germany Manufacturing companies disestablished in 1945 1945 disestablishments in Germany