1947 CIA Report - Auto-Union Factories Nationalized

Central Intelligence Group
Country: Germany (Russian Zone) / Poland
Date: 3 November 1947
Subject: Production at the “Sachsiche Aufbauwerke”; I.G. Farben Branch to be Established in Landsberg/Warthe; Requisitioning of Freight Engines
Pages: 2
Origin: [redacted]
Supplement: SO-8242
Introduction redacted


1. All factories of the former Auto-Union which have not been dismantled are now owned by the State of Saxony and known as the “Sachsiche Aufbauwerke”. Among these factories is the Werk Horch in Zwickau, where eighteen hundred men are employed at the manufacture of three and one-half ton trucks (Horch model) for the Russian army and the repair of large number of other Russian army vehicles. Until recently, the Audi-Werke in Zwickau, another branch plant of the Auto-Union, served as the main source of supply of spare parts for German vehicles belonging to the Russian army. A few weeks ago, however, an SMA order was received for the production of parts for DKW (midget German passenger cars), and the directors of the plant were notified that present plans provide for the assumption of all DKW production for the Russians by the Audi-Werke.

2. Ownership of the Wanderer-Werke AG in Chemnitz is to be transferred to the state of Saxony. The factory now employs thirteen hundred men in the production of motorcycles for reparations; these motorcycles are delivered to the branch office of Deruta in Chemnitz, which handles their further disposition. Payment of up to eighty per cent of the value of the goods delivered is made up by the Saxon State Bank (Sachsiche Landesbank) immediately upon presentation of duplicates of the delivery certificates. The final accounting is arranged by the Saxon state government.

3. According to statements made by a Russian engineer to the business directors of the Filmfabrik Agfa in Wolden (Kreis Bitterfeld) on 27 August 1947, a new enterprise of the Soviet AG Fotoplaska, to which the Filmfabrik Agfa belongs, is under construction in Landsberg/Warthe (W08) in the area under Polish administration. Two of the special casting machines (Giessmaschinen) owned by the Filmfabrik Agfa are to be dismantled immediately and shipped to this new film factory. Specialists from the Filmfabrik Agfa must accompany the machines to supervise their mounting. There is a possibility that a few compressors may also be dismantled; if this cannot be prevented, the entire Filmfabrik Agfa may be obliged to close down.

4. During August a transportation conference was called in Sassnitz by the Russian directorate of transportation; all railway directorates of the Russian zone were required to send representatives. The Russian railway commander present announced that two hundred and forty additional locomotives were to be supplied to Russia from the zone within the next few weeks. A special preference for tender locomotives, models 01 and 03, was expressed. Fulfillment of this order will sizeably diminish present stocks, since only three thousand eight hundred of the seven thousand locomotives at the disposal of the Russian zone were in operating order at the end of August.

CIA Report 1947 Automobile Production: https://dkwautounionproject.blogspot.com/2024/07/1947-cia-report-on-state-of-vehicle.html

CIA Report 1953 VEB Eisenach: https://dkwautounionproject.blogspot.com/2024/07/1953-cia-report-on-automobile.html

CIA Report 1952 Automobile Production: https://dkwautounionproject.blogspot.com/2024/07/1953-cia-report-on-automobile_13.html