Death Is My Trade

Franz Lang, born in 1900, fails to be deployed to the front during World War I and instead volunteers at a military hospital. There he encounters Captain Günther, who emphasizes a code of duty and obedience that will shape Lang's worldview. This early exposure to authority sets the pattern for his lifelong subservience, even under brutal orders.

In 1917 Lang serves at the front under Captain Günther. While manning a machine gun, he witnesses the deaths of two comrades. When a deserter tries to flee, Lang shoots him to honor his fallen group leader's wish to hold the position. He is severely wounded but drags the machine gun behind the front line, where Günther finds him and promotes him to non-commissioned officer as the sole survivor.

After the war, Lang's rigid sense of duty bleeds into civil life, causing friction. In 1919 a comrade helps him get a job in a machine factory, but a clash with an elderly colleague leads to dismissal with shop stewards siding against him. The episode underscores his intolerance for slower pace and his unwavering approach to work.

Lang seeks nationalist circles and joins the Freikorps Roßbach, taking part in actions against leftist uprisings in the Ruhr and other locales. In a group of arrested insurgents he defends a former wartime comrade, but his commander reframes the prisoners as communists and orders obedience to be absolute. When his former comrade tries to flee, Lang shoots him.

After the Freikorps, Lang works as a construction laborer and feels crushed by the physical strain and his inability to fulfill duties. He contemplates suicide, but a fellow worker senses his despair, warns him to stay loyal to Germany, and leaves him a copy of a nationalist newspaper that sparks his turn toward Nazism.

In 1922 Lang visits a Sturmlokal (SA meeting) where the Obersturmführer informs him he has been accepted into the SA, receiving a preliminary ID card. He cannot afford an SA uniform, so the leader provides him the uniform of a locally shot SA member. He commits to the NSDAP/SA cause.

As a member of the NSDAP and SA, Lang is stationed with fellow riders to protect landowners' holdings. A former Freikorps treasurer appears in town and Lang uncovers what he believes are Communist Party membership links. The gathering of fellow soldiers abducts and beats the man, and Lang shoots him. In 1924 he is sentenced to ten years in prison.

Lang serves nearly five years in prison before an amnesty frees him in 1928. While incarcerated he reads Mein Kampf and becomes a fanatic Nazi.

The NSDAP helps him find employment on Baron Jeseritz's land, where he manages a neglected farm. He marries Else, chosen to fit Aryan standards, and at a party meets Heinrich Himmler, who notes his reliability. Himmler orders him to organize a cavalry unit that will become part of the SS.

As the National Socialists gain power, Lang accepts an administrative post at Dachau concentration camp and becomes an Unterscharführer with the SS riders. He views the move as loyalty to the party and homeland.

In Dachau Lang is trained to be a future camp commander and is promoted over the years to SS-Sturmbannführer as he solidifies his role within the regime. His rising rank reflects increasing trust from the regime and his effectiveness in administration.

During World War II Himmler summons Lang to discuss the plan to annihilate the Jews and the camps. Lang takes over Auschwitz in Poland, with Adolf Eichmann informing him about camp capacities. He implements Zyklon B gasings as a 'hygienic' and effective solution, earning a promotion to SS-Obersturmbannführer after a visit by Himmler.

During a meal with the head of the Chelmno camp, Lang's wife Else challenges his actions, and he defends himself by saying it is his duty. He even concedes he would kill their children if ordered, insisting that personal responsibility is overridden by obedience to superiors.

At the war's end Lang hides on a farm in the American occupation zone, is found by American soldiers, and imprisoned for interrogation. When asked if the extermination of Jews was right, he replies that it is irrelevant what he believes because he merely obeyed.

Lang is extradited to Poland, sentenced to death, and hanged in Auschwitz for his crimes.