Death March

A death march is a forced march of prisoners of war or other captives or deportees with the intent to kill, brutalize, weaken and/or demoralize as many of the captives as possible along the way. It is distinguished in this way from simple prisoner transport via foot march. Death marches usually feature harsh physical labor and abuse, neglect of prisoner injury and illness, deliberate starvation and dehydration, humiliation and torture, and execution of those unable to keep up the marching pace. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Death_march

Which led to the concept of the "death march project"

• In Project Management, a death march is a project where the members feel it is destined to fail, or requires a stretch of UnSustainable overwork (OverTime). The general feel of the project reflects that of an actual death march because the members of the project are forced to continue the project by their superiors against their better judgment.
• Ed Yourdon book http://yourdon.com/publications/