viewtopic.php?f=6&t=13435Category 3 included: Persons of German descent, who became connected with the Polish nation in the course of the years, but have on account of their attitude, the prerequisites to become full-fledged members of the German national community. To this group belong also persons of non-German descent who live in a people's mixed marriage with an ethnic German ill which the influence of the German spouse has prevailed. Persons of Masurian, Slonzak, or upper Silesian descent who are to be recognized as ethnic Germans, usually belong to this group 3.
Albert Forster who was the Gauleiter and Reichsstatthalter of Danzig-West Prussia accepted any Pole who considered himself/herself to have 'German blood' to sign the list.
Ben Mosher published a short journal (nine pages) which presents very well the contradictions of the Germanisation policies that happened during the Third Reich:
‘Germanization’ in Occupied Poland: Disunity, Inconsistency, and Contradiction within the Nazi AdministrationOn October 8, 1939, Adolf Hitler issued the Annexation Decree, officially commencing what would become a 6-year Nazi occupation of Polish territory. Hitler’s goal was not only to re-establish German rule over the areas of Poland that belonged to Germany prior to WWI, but also to reorder the region, and its people, based upon the tenets of Nazi racial theory.
To enact Hitler’s grand vision for Poland, the Nazis pursued a program of Germanization in the annexed territories. This involved completely reforming Polish existence in a way that met the economic, political, cultural, racial, and ethnic requirements of a truly German empire. As such, one would expect a cohesive and consistent Germanization policy that systematically met the goals of “the Fuehrer".
However, this was not the case. Germanization policies in Poland varied greatly, and disunity, improvisation, and inconsistency between Nazi districts characterized the majority of their practical application. To understand why this was the case, it is important to analyze Hitler’s laissez-faire brand of administrative rule, the autonomous competition that was cultivated amongst Nazi officials, and the ambiguities associated with the ‘racial status’ of the Polish population. Ultimately, the fragmented nature of the Nazi Germanization program stems from Hitler’s non-interventionist brand of leadership, which afforded his district officials with the administrative autonomy to enact his vision as they saw fit.
Following the annexation of Poland, the Nazis immediately began partitioning the country into Reichsgaus (territorial districts). Each district was governed by a Nazi administrative official, or Gauleiter (district leader). The three largest districts in Poland were: Danzig-West Prussia in the North West, which was headed by Albert Forster, the Wartheland in West-central Poland, which was headed by Arthur Greiser, and the so-called General Government in the South, which was led by Hans Frank.
On October 12, 1939, the Nazis issued a decree automatically revoking all Polish national citizenship, rendering the population affectively stateless. This paved the way for the imposition of the Germanization program, whereby the Nazis embarked on the complete destruction of Polish life and culture, which was to be replaced by an ethnically German national community. With the entire Polish population stripped of its citizenship, rights, and statehood, the Nazi administration could begin to pick and choose which Poles could be Germanized and which ones had to be removed or eliminated.
Heinrich Himmler, given authority by Hitler to colonize the East, oversaw the Germanization program in Poland. Under him, Arthur Greiser and Albert Forster spearheaded Germanization in their respective districts. Both Greiser and Forster independently implemented policies that brought about the ethnic cleansing of both Poles and Jews. Although both men perpetrated horrific crimes upon the population, Greiser was especially brutal in his efforts to Germanize the Wartheland and was by far the most radical of the Eastern Gauleiters. He was a staunch believer in Nazi racial theory, and embarked on a program of rigid discrimination against Poles and Jews in an attempt to construct a racially pure “model Gau of the Great German Reich”. He evicted and relocated some 700,000 ethnic Poles to the “racial dumping ground” in the South, brought in over 500,000 German nationals to populate the Wartheland, ghettoized and enslaved 183,000 Jews in Lodz, and segregated Poles from all German spheres of activity, reducing them to a life of forced labor.
Forster, on the other hand, embarked upon a comparatively moderate Germanization program. Instead of rigidly racially discriminating against the Poles, Forster instituted Germanization lists, which forced ethnic Poles to abandon their cultural heritage and accept German citizenship. Furthermore, he deported far fewer Poles from his Reichsgau and was quite tentative towards the resettlement of German nationals in his district. Forster certainly did engage in atrocious acts of murder and slavery, especially against Polish Jews, but on the whole his specific Germanization initiative was much more assimilative in nature than what was experienced in the Wartheland. The contrast between Greiser and Forster highlights the numerous different, even contradictory, forms that Germanization took during the Nazi occupation. To understand why this is the case, one must take a deeper look into the internal structure of the Nazi administration and its impact on the reality of Germanization in Poland.
As a leader, Hitler despised all forms of administrative bureaucracy. He often described the German political administration as over organized and felt that an overabundance of rules set down by the judiciary and ministerial bureaucracy imposed a severe hindrance to individual agency and the adaptability of Nazi policy. He once stated, “The Wehrmacht provides the highest distinction for one who –acting against orders- salvages a situation by means of his own insight determination". This adequately captures the nature of Hitler’s unique brand of authoritarianism. Instead of passing down strict orders and regulations to his subordinates, Hitler would often delegate authority to multiple Nazi officials and provide them with only broad or ambiguous orders from which to work. Hitler provided his general vision for the Third Reich, but kept himself substantially removed from the day-to-day functions of the Nazi regime.
Germanization in Poland was no different. Each Gauleiter was given the authority to enact their own Germanization policy, and received only the most basic guidelines from Hitler. Hitler even reportedly stated, “every Reichsgau should have its own face according to the personality of its leader and the particular problems of the population”. Since each Gauleiter was given the freedom to form and reform his district as he saw fit, the given policies between districts varied just as much as the personalities of their leaders. Therefore, Germanization policy was also able to manifest itself in many different ways, since consistency was not even the expectation Hitler himself. That is why Arthur Greiser was able to embark upon a radical program of genocide and mass deportation, while Forster was able to undertake a program focused mainly on Polish assimilation. Moreover, when it came to the Germanization of the Polish districts and the authority of the Gauleiters, Hitler specifically stated that “no questions would be asked regarding their methods”. In November, 1942, Greiser sent a letter to Himmler pertaining to the Jewish situation in the Wartheland in which he had this to say about Hitler’s involvement: “I personally don’t think, that we have to consult the Fuehrer again in this matter, all the more since he told me at the last interview concerning the Jews, that I should act according to my own judgment”. This perfectly captures both the non-interventionist approach Hitler took towards bureaucratic administration, and the high level of autonomy that was afforded to his district officials. It also helps explain why Germanization policy in Poland varied so greatly, and why inconsistencies between separate Reichsgaus were common.
A side effect of Hitler’s characteristic detachment from actual policy making, and his over-delegating of authority, was fierce competition between Nazi officials to win Hitler’s favor. The competition between Forster and Greiser in the enactment of the Germanization order was particularly divisive. Hitler told his Gauleiters that in ten years each of their territorial districts should be fully Germanized. This instigated a “competition in brutality” between Forster and Greiser over who could report in the shortest time that the racial struggle had been won and full Germanization achieved. As such, both men initiated Germanization policies that were radically different from one another in order to distinguish themselves in the eyes of Hitler, and ultimately win the Germanization race.
Greiser took the radical route, which he believed would best elicit the jubilant approval of the Fuehrer. With the support of Himmler, he began removing the ethnic Polish population from his district in an effort to clear the territory, and thus make way for incoming German settlers. However, this was a slow and arduous process, and Greiser himself, realizing that the exploitation of Polish slave labor was a valuable asset, was reluctant to expel all of the Poles from his district. Forster, on the other hand, was successfully Germanizing large segments of the Polish population by forcing German citizenship upon them. On paper, it seemed as though he was winning the race to Germanize his Reichsgau. When Greiser and Himmler complained to Hitler about Forster’s lack of adherence to the tenets of Nazi racial theory, Hitler, in characteristic fashion, told them to resolve the problem amongst themselves. Hitler’s detachment from administrative duties, and the resulting autonomy that was afforded to his Gauleiters, instigated a high level of contention between Forster and Greiser. That contention, in turn, caused the two Nazi officials to pursue vastly different Germanization policies in an attempt to outdo one another.
This administrative inconsistency was also, in part, generated and perpetuated by the conceptual ambiguity surrounding the ‘racial status’ of the ethnic Pole. There was a consistent lack of unity within the Nazi ranks over what to do with the Poles, and whether they were, or were not, fit for Germanization. To clarify the situation, Himmler imposed a 4-point ethnic classification list, which sought to determine how various members of the Polish population should be dealt with. Those with full German blood should be made immediate national citizens; those with German blood but unfamiliar with German culture should be re-educated and made citizens; those with partial German blood should be reacquired by the nation through Germanization and eventual citizenship; and those with non-German blood should be removed, segregated, or eliminated. Contrary to its desired purpose, this classification list only further muddied the waters, and raised questions regarding how one ought to determine into which category a Polish person should be placed.
Despite the confusion, no legal regulations were ever implemented regarding the ‘racial status’ of the Polish population. Furthermore, the Gauleiters insisted on their administrative autonomy, and frequently rejected recommendations from the Reich Ministry of the Interior in Berlin on the Polish question. Thus, local authorities were given a mandate to treat the Poles as they saw fit, usually through internal case-by-case guidelines. Racially categorizing the Polish population remained an ambiguous task, and the responsibility ultimately fell to the discretion of each Reichsgau administration. Some Gauleiters, like Forster, took the more liberal view that in cases of doubt regarding racial heritage the reclamation of German blood should take priority. This re-enforced the sentiment that “no German blood should be lost” during the Germanization efforts, lest the initiative lose sight of its original purpose. As a result, a higher percentage of Poles were considered eligible for Germanization in districts that employed a more liberal approach to German reclamation. By contrast, some Reichsgaus, like Greiser’s for example, initiated a much more rigid policy towards Polish racial categorization. Strict racial examinations were imposed upon large segments of the population, and as a result many more Poles were considered unfit for Germanization. The consequence of this persistent racial ambiguity was that the “concepts and conditions fordeciding Germanization remained unsolved, vague, and fluid right up to the end of the Third Reich”.
Hitler’s ultimate plan was to annihilate all remnants of Polish society, thereby creating the necessary conditions to re-build the region as a ‘pure’ German nation. Therefore, Germanizing Polish territory and its people –at least those who were deemed racially acceptable took top priority. However, what Germanization truly meant, what form it should take, and especially who should and should not be Germanized, was never clearly established. As a result, each Reichsgau administration pursued unique and often contradictory Germanization policies with varying degrees of intensity. Hitler’s anti-bureaucratic approach afforded high levels of autonomy to individual Gauleiters, which prevented the construction of a unified Germanization model. It also cultivated fierce competition between district officials –namely, Greiser and Forster- who fought for Hitler’s approval by distinguishing themselves from one another with personalized policy strategies. Finally, the ambiguous ‘racial status’ of the Polish population created an atmosphere of uncertainty regarding their eligibility for Germanization, which resulted in a range of policy guidelines that were both inconsistent and arbitrarily implemented. Hitler’s brand of detached leadership led to a significant degree of administrative disunity within the Nazi hierarchy. As a consequence, the Germanization program in Poland was plagued with an internal ambiguity and inconsistency that persisted throughout the entirety of the Nazi occupation.
Mark Mazower in his book Hitler's Empire: Nazi Rule in Occupied Europe wrote about Albert Forster's approach to Germanising Poles:
He thought Himmler's emphasis on rigorous racial selection a lot of nonsense, and saw a virtue in avoiding the protracted upheaval deportation and resettlement. From 1941, he was inclined to admit any former Polish citizen on to the List who spoke German reasonably well - soon even that condition was relaxed - and had done nothing politically to cross the authorities.
In fact, Forster was not simply allowing Poles to become Germans, he was actually forcing them to. 'During the process of Germanizing Poles on the basis of the Ethnic Register,' recalled an official after the war, 'there were many cases where whole villages or towns were compulsorily entired in the register according to fixed quotas laid down by Forster. For example, a local branch leader or mayor was instructed to enter right per cent of his village although it was at least eighty per cent Polish'. Nearly two-thirds of the former Polish population of Forster's Gau was brought, by one means or another, on to the DVL.