Extent of German military and civilian losses

[rob]

Some revisionist authors are claiming that German civilian losses were massive, something like 15-20 million deaths, including military and post war losses. This would include victims of ethnic cleansing in Pomerania, Silesia, East Prussia, deaths from post war starvation and disease, deaths in battle, deaths from air raids, deaths in pow camps. I believe that Germany clearly suffered huge losses in people, but 20 million? that sounds excessive. I'd like to see census figures from 1940 to 1950. that would be revealing.

[tonyh]

Who?
I've never seen anyone claim this.

Tony

[Roberto]

Some revisionist authors are claiming that German civilian losses were massive, something like 15-20 million deaths, including military and post war losses.

Whoever those fellows are, they seem to be so full of it that I wouldn't call them revisionists but "Revisionists" instead.

Military losses, according to the most recent and detailed estimate (Rüdiger Overmans, Deutsche Militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg) were about 5.3 million, including deaths in captivity.

Civilian deaths due to bombing, according to a study published in 1962 by the West German Bundesminister für Vertriebene, Flüchtlinge und Kriegsgeschädigte, amounted to 410,000 local residents and 128,000 refugees from the eastern territories, a total of 538,000 dead.

The Federal Statistics Bureau (Statistisches Bundesamt) in 1958 estimated the total number of German residents of the former eastern territories and Eastern Europe who perished during either the flight from the Red Army or the postwar expulsion at ca. two million. This estimate is probably too high and has been recently challenged by historians and by a detailed study prepared by the Danube Svabian Cultural Foundation in Munich (the Danube Svabians were the ethnic Germans of Yugoslavia), which halved the estimates of the Federal Statistics Bureau for their region. However, until a better comprehensive estimate covering all affected countries and regions is available, the estimate of the Federal Statistics Bureau is what historians must work with.

This means that the maximum number of German victims of World War II and its aftermath, including the ethnic Germans residing in Eastern European countries before the war, is somewhere close to eight million.

[rob]

Canadian James Braque in his book Cruelties and Mercies writes about millions of postwar German deaths due to starvation, disease and ethnic cleansing. I haven't read it, just heard about it. Braque is famous (notorious) for his book Other Losses, wherein he claims about one million deaths of German POWs after the war in American and French run POW camps.
In Cruelties and Mercies I don't remember the exact numbers he claims died but combined with war deaths, the figure reached somewhere around 15 million. Another article, definetely by a Revisionist, had similar claims.

[johnny_bi]

15-20 millions ? ... From a french history manual I grabed the figure of 5 milions deaths ...
15-20 millions only russians could claim such huge number of casualties... This could have been a disaster for Germany ... If I think "demographically" this would have mean a depopulation of Germany ... and it would have been almost impossible to support such huge loss of population keeping acout of german further economical development ...



BI

[weiwensg]

15-20 million would be like 25% of the German population. Now how do they derive those figures, or is it without any basis at all?

[Caldric]

These numbers pretty much make James Braque look like a liar and anti-historian. This not to say that Ike did not order near starvation food rations for German POW's, which some of the American General's refused to follow. Only a few of the camps used the rations ordered.

These are from most Historians that have studied the deaths. If 1 million German POWs died in Allied hands (western Allies) then almost as many died in allied captivity then on the battlefields, which is myth, and so is Braque's work. Urlanis seems to have done some serious work in the area, and he includes most deaths, including execution, battlefield, bombing, suicide, and non-battle deaths due to illness.

Germany All (undifferentiated):

Compton's: 3.75M
Wallechinsky: 4M
Britannica: 4.28M
Messenger: 5M
HarperCollins: 5.15M
Ellis: 5.55M
Keegan: 5.593M
Eckhardt: 6.221M
Urlanis: 6.5M
Encarta: 7.3M
Kinder: 7.8M
MEDIAN: 5.5M

Military:

HarperCollins: 2,850,000
Ellis: 3,250,000
Compton's: 3,250,000
Info. Please: 3,250,000 (all causes)
Britannica: 3,500,000 (incl. 1M missing. Not incl.: 250,000 dead of natural causes, suicide and execution)
Small & Singer: 3,500,000
Encarta: 3,500,000
Keegan: 4,000,000
Kinder: 4,000,000
Urlanis: 4,500,000
Eckhardt: 4,750,000
MEDIAN: 3.5M


Civilian:

Compton's: 500,000
Britannica: 780,000
Wallechinsky: 780,000
Davies: 780,000
Eckhardt: 1,471,000
Keegan: 1,593,000
Urlanis: 2,000,000
HarperCollins: 2,300,000
Ellis: 2,050,000 (by Allies), 300,000 (by Germans)
Kinder: 3,800,000
Encarta: 3,800,000
MEDIAN: 1.6M

http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/ww2stats.htm

[thorwald77]

Third Reich War Dead Lets do the Math

(1)-Overmans lists a total of 5.255 million military dead.
(4.457.000 Reich Germans & Danzig, 261,000 Austrians and 537,000 Ethnic Germans)
Excludes 63 ,000 Western European volunteers

Source Rűdiger Overmans. Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Oldenbourg 2000

(2-) 1.1 million German civilian dead during the Soviet invasion and expulsions.
(690,000 Reich Germans and 410,000 Ethnic Germans)

Source Rűdiger Overmans. Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg. Oldenbourg 2000


(3-) 270,000 Germans dead in USSR due to forced labor
(160,000 Reich Germans and 110,000 Ethnic Germans)


Source: Gerhard Reichling. Die deutschen Vertriebenen in Zahlen, Bonn 1995

(4-) 500-600,000 German civilian deaths due to famine after the war, mostly in the Soviet Zone.

This can be computed by comparing the actual deaths reported by the West & East German government's and the pre war death rate

(5-) 400,000 Dead in Allied air raids in Germany and Austria.

Source: US Strategic Bombing Survey


(6-) 500,000 Killed by the Nazis as political prisoners, Jews , homosexuals or for being disabled.

Assumes 200,000 political prisoners, 150,000 Jews and 150,000 others

A Recap of Third Reich War Dead
5,260,000 Military
1,100,000 Expellee deaths
270,000 Dead in USSR due to forced labor
600,000 Famine dead 1945-47
400,000 Killed in air raids
500,000 Victims of the Nazis
8,160,000 Total Dead

6.7 million Reich Germans, 360,000 Austrians and 1.1 million ethnic Germans in East Europe.

This does not include 310,000 Soviet Germans who also perished in the war.
Source: Gerhard Reichling. Die deutschen Vertriebenen in Zahlen, Bonn 1995


.For those who doubt these statistics, I refer them to Peter Marschalck’s Bevolkerungsgeschichte Deutschlands which lists a total of 6.9 million war dead and missing for the German Reich in 1937 borders. This may be on the high side, the actual total is closer to 6.7 million because 1.3 million Germans stayed in Poland not 1.1 million as was originally thought.
Austrian military losses were 260,000. One must add 100,000 civilian deaths in Austria.
The 1.1 million ethnic German dead (530,000 military & 550,000 Expellee & Forced Labor deaths)
An important point of this long numerical exercise is that the Overmans total of 5.3 million military war dead makes demographic sense. His numbers fit neatly into the German demographic puzzle.

One must not forget that Krivosheev lists 215,000 Vlasovite dead and Overmans 63,000 volunteers in west Europe reported dead. These losses in the German Armed Forces are not included in the total of 8.2 million listed above.

[Penn44]

Third Reich War Dead Lets do the Math

A Recap of Third Reich War Dead
5,260,000 Military
1,100,000 Expellee deaths
270,000 Dead in USSR due to forced labor
600,000 Famine dead 1945-47
400,000 Killed in air raids
500,000 Victims of the Nazis
8,160,000 Total Dead

6.7 million Reich Germans, 360,000 Austrians and 1.1 million ethnic Germans in East Europe.
.

Why not mention the figures of historians who disagree with the figures you provided:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographi ... ern_Europe

Whatever the total number of German civilian deaths the death figures are undoubtly high and certainly illustriates the high cost of German nationalism. Should make them think twice before starting another war.

Penn44

.

[phylo_roadking]

This entry from Wiki covers the losses themselves.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties

and has stood up to scrutiny in a couple of threads on various forums since it appeared.

And I should note that although Other Losses got piloried it did bring out defenders on Bacque's behalf; and Crimes and Mercies didn't get half the hostility his earlier work did.

Its also worth taking a look at this thread on Feldgrau; it approaches the subject more from the point of view on intentions, but still has a great bearing on this.

http://www.feldgrau.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=25203

[thorwald77]

The higher end estimates that are cited in the Wikipedia article are based on
the 1958 West German government report. The research by Reichling has shown that the 1958 report underestimated the number of Germans who survived in eastern Europe. The 1958 report lists 2.197 million Germans remaining in eastern Europe, Reichling in 1985 has shown the number to be 2,770 million., which decreases losses by 573,000. Reichling's study was supported by the German government.

Overmans has pointed out that the number of military dead in the the region of expulsions was 1,444,000. The 1958 report gave a figure of 1,088,000. 356,000 deaths were reclassified from civilian to military by Overmans.

The research by Reichling and Overmans has brought down the numner of expellee/deportation deaths from 2.2 million to 1.4 million.

Overmans wrote an article in 1994 that pointed out that only about 500,000 of the expellee deaths can be certified, the balance of the deaths is based on demographic estimates.

Based on the recent research in Germany we can now say that civilian deaths in the expulsions and deportations was about 1.4 million. The 1958 estimate of 2.2 million expellee dead is dated and should not be accepted as fact.

I am familiar with the Wikipedia article that you refer to, it gives the readers lists of statistics that are not backed up with solid analysis. One gets the impression that a number of editors each had a chance to post their set of figures. I would treat that particular Wikipedia article with extreme caution.
For example they cite Reichling's data but fail to point that he includes 310,000 deaths of Soviet Germans who were not covered in the 1958 report.

[phylo_roadking]

it gives the readers lists of statistics that are not backed up with solid analysis

The great majority of the military losses broken down in it come from Overmans, according to the footnotes.

The important thing is that while compiling all the various sources may give us "floating" totals that vary by some hundreds of thousands....the upwardly-revised 15-20 million isn't right. That's an exaggeration beyond all the totals.

[thorwald77]

This entry from Wiki covers the losses themselves.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties

and has stood up to scrutiny in a couple of threads on various forums since it appeared.

And I should note that although Other Losses got piloried it did bring out defenders on Bacque's behalf; and Crimes and Mercies didn't get half the hostility his earlier work did.

Its also worth taking a look at this thread on Feldgrau; it approaches the subject more from the point of view on intentions, but still has a great bearing on this.

http://www.feldgrau.net/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=25203

The Canadian author Bacque claims that 5.7 million Germans starved to death after WW2. His
figures are false. He claims that there were 4 million German refugees in the 1946 census
population, in fact there were 10 million. He then alleges that 5.7 million starved from
1946-50. The actual figure is about 500-600,000 excess deaths during 1945-47. This
can be computed by comparing the actual deaths reported by the West German government
and the pre war death rate. The scary thing about this is that the Bacque book had wide
circulation in Germany and his lies are accepted as fact by many of his readers.

[phylo_roadking]

and Crimes and Mercies didn't get half the hostility his earlier work did.

Given this and "His figures are false", can you point us at this in print or on the Net? The various attacks on "Other Losses" are well-known, I presume it should be as easy to find similar material on "Crimes and Mercies"?

[thorwald77]

Bacque claims there were 4 million refugees in Germany counted in the Oct 1946 Census. This is not true. The actual number is 10 million. He then compares the 4 million to the 12 million refugees in the sept 1950 census and concludes that 6 million starved to death. The 4 million figure he uses is the Jan 1946 count of ration cards issued by the allies. Between Jan 1946 and Oct 1946 6 million refugees entered Germany, Bacque ignores this fact. His book is based on this falsehood.