But from the early 1930s, IG’s annual investment rose at an almost uncontrollable rate, from as little as 10–12 million Reichsmarks per annum at the trough of the recession to 500 million Reichsmarks per annum in the early 1940s. This extraordinary growth was driven not by coercion but by a financial environment of unprecedented generosity. As Schnitzler admitted: ‘A high percentage of our turnover . . . was more or less guaranteed by the Wehrmacht. Agreements of the most different kinds were being
