page_title: Erhard Milch
section_title: World War II
hierarchical_section_title: Erhard Milch / World War II
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. A. Speer, E. Milch, W. Messerschmitt ADN-Zentralbild/Archiv II. Weltkrieg, Inspektion eines Rüstungsbetriebes im Mai 1944 durch den Reichsminister für Rüstung und Kriegsproduktion Prof. Albert Speer (links) und Generalfeldmarschall Erhard Milch (Mitte), rechts Prof. [Willy] Messerschmitt Abgebildete Personen: Messerschmitt, Willy Ing.: Flugzeugbauer, Firmengründer, Wehrwirtschaftsführer, Bundesrepublik Deutschland GND 118581376 Milch, Erhard: Generalfeldmarschall, Ritterkreuz (RK), Luftwaffe, Deutschland (GND 118582402) Speer, Albert Prof. Dr.: Reichsminister für Rüstung und Kriegsproduktion, Architekt, Deutschland (GND 118615998)
context_page_description: Erhard Milch was a German Field Marshal who oversaw the development of the Luftwaffe as part of the re-armament of Nazi Germany following World War I. During World War II, he was in charge of aircraft production. He was convicted of war crimes during the Milch Trial held before the U.S. military court in 1947 and sentenced to life imprisonment; he was released in 1954.
context_section_description: At the outbreak of World War II Milch, now with the rank of general, commanded Luftflotte 5 during the Operation Weserübung in Norway. Following the defeat of France, Milch was promoted to Generalfeldmarschall (field marshal) during the 1940 Field Marshal Ceremony and given the title Air Inspector General. As such, Milch was in charge of aircraft production. Milch cancelled production of the ineffective and dangerous Me 210 and He 177 and put them back in development. Under his direction, aircraft production focused on mass production of the tested and tried models. Production level doubled in the summer of 1943 in comparison with the winter of 1941–1942. Tooze comments: "For the first time, the German aircraft industry was able to achieve substantial economies of scale. The resources pumped into the Luftwaffe in 1940–41 were now concentrated in mass assembly." To achieve this level of mass production, the Armaments Ministries and the industry cooperated with the SS to procure labour from the concentration camps. Due to Milch's connections with the SS, the Luftwaffe had an advantage in obtaining slave labour. In order to increase the quantity, Milch also made some sacrifices in quality, notable in the case of the Bf 109. When the US Air Force began to directly challenge the fighter forces of the Luftwaffe, the cost of Milch's decisions was shown. Especially, the handling of the Bf 109 G was so bad that it became, in the words of Tooze, "little more than death traps".
  The frequent, and often conflicting, changes in operational requirements led to numerous changes in aircraft specification and designs so that manufacturers like Messerschmitt were unable to focus outright on a few aircraft types and, most importantly, production output.  The Germans failed to put their production on a war footing, continued to run factories only eight hours a day, and failed to include women in the workforce. German World War II aircraft production output did not rise as steeply as Allied output, especially Soviet production, which exceeded Germany's in 1942 and 1943.
  On 10 August 1943, Milch finally addressed Germany's lack of a truly "four-engined" heavy bomber to carry out raids against Great Britain.  He endorsed Arado Flugzeugwerke to be the subcontractor for the Heinkel He 177B separately engined heavy bomber design.  Only three flyable prototypes were completed by early 1944. From March 1944, Milch, together with Albert Speer, oversaw the activities of the Jägerstab ("Fighter Staff"), a governmental task force whose aim was to increase the production of fighter aircraft, in part by moving the production facilities underground. In cooperation with the SS, the task force played a key role in the exploitation of slave labour for the benefit of the German aircraft industry and the Luftwaffe.
  In 1944 Milch sided with Joseph Goebbels, the propaganda minister and Heinrich Himmler, the Reichsführer-SS, in attempting to convince Adolf Hitler to remove Göring from command of the Luftwaffe. When Hitler refused, Göring retaliated by forcing Milch out of his position. For the rest of the war, he worked under Albert Speer.
  Following Hitler’s suicide, Milch attempted to flee Germany but was apprehended by Allied forces on the Baltic coast on 4 May 1945. On surrendering, he presented his baton to British Brigadier Derek Mills-Roberts, who was so disgusted and angered by the atrocities he had seen committed when liberating the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp that he brutally broke the baton over Milch's head with several blows and repeatedly beat Milch with a champagne bottle. This incident left Milch with several contusions and a fractured skull.
caption: Milch (centre) with Minister of Armaments Albert Speer (left) and aircraft designer Willy Messerschmitt (right)
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