Auschwitz-Birkenau: Extermination and Slave Labor Combined

Auschwitz began in 1940 as a concentration camp for Polish political prisoners, before the complex was expanded from 1942 onward with the construction of Auschwitz II-Birkenau as a dedicated mass extermination center, and further developed with Auschwitz III-Monowitz as a slave-labor camp tied to the IG Farben chemical industry. Auschwitz thus combined, uniquely among the Nazi camps, the functions of immediate extermination and forced-labor exploitation within a single sprawling complex.