Editing Lebensraum (section)

== {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} in practice: the Second World War ==
[[File:Pflichten der polen.jpg|thumb|right|upright=1.3|Poster (in German and Polish): ''Obligations of Polish Workers in Germany'', which included the death penalty for sexual relations with a German.]]

{{Main|Generalplan Ost|Greater Germanic Reich|Heim ins Reich}}

The bio-geo-political nature of Nazi ''[[Weltanschauung]]'' was the core ideological force that instigated Nazi Germany to launch its violent project in pursuit of a [[New Order (Nazism)|new global order]]. This scheme aimed to dissolve the contradictions between the Nazi conceptualizations of "race" and "space" through the creation of a Germanic ''Lebensraum'' and achievement of world domination by the [[Nordic race|Nordic people]]. This combination of [[Biopolitics|biopolitical]] and [[Geopolitics|geo-political]] agenda of the Nazi Reich became the basis for its [[Germanisation|Germanization]] policies, the mission of what it regarded as the "purification of the ''[[Volksgemeinschaft]]''", as well as its state-sponsored [[Genocide|genocidal]] apparatus.<ref>{{harvnb|Giaccaria|Minca|2016|page=37}}</ref>

On 6 October 1939, Hitler told the Reichstag that after the fall of Poland the most important matter was "a new order of ethnographic relations, that is to say, resettlement of nationalities".<ref>[[Peter Longerich]], ''Holocaust: The Nazi Persecution and Murder of the Jews'', p. 150.</ref> On 20 October 1939, Hitler told General [[Wilhelm Keitel]] that the war would be a difficult "racial struggle" and that the [[General Government]] was to "purify the Reich territory from Jews and Polacks, too."<ref>Document 864-PS [translation]", in Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression. Volume III: Documents 001-PS-1406-PS. District of Columbia: GPO, 1947. pp. 619–621.</ref> Likewise, in October 1939, Nazi propaganda instructed Germans to view Poles, Jews, and Gypsies as {{lang|de|Untermenschen}}.<ref>Tomasz Szarota. {{lang|de|"Polen unter deutscher Besatzung, 1939–1941" – Vergleichende Betrachtung}} (in German); p. 43. – {{lang|de|"Es muss auch der letzten Kuhmagd in Deutschland klargemacht werden, dass das Polentum gleichwertig ist mit Untermenschentum. Polen, Juden und Zigeuner stehen auf der gleichen unterwertigen Stufe."}} ''Propaganda Ministry'' (October 24, 1939), Order No. 1306, [in:] {{Cite book |last=Bernd Wegner |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=nRSxAAAAIAAJ&q=%22Kuhmagd+in+Deutschland%22 |title=Zwei Wege nach Moskau: Vom Hitler-Stalin-Pakt bis zum 'Unternehmen Barbarossa' |publisher=Piper Verlag GmbH |year=1991 |isbn=978-3492113465 |location=München/Zürich |author-link=Bernd Wegner}}</ref>

Nazi Germany's pursuit of its bio-geo-political ambitions was carried out through fanatical perpetration of a racist [[war of annihilation]] (''Vernichtungskrieg'') which inflicted industrial-scale [[terrorism]] against entire populations. These policies resulted in the [[genocide]] of numerous ethnic groups in German-occupied territories, including the Jews, Poles, [[Russians]], [[Romani people]], etc. and also contributed to the failure of German war aims.<ref name="The University of Chicago Press">{{harvnb|Giaccaria|Minca|2016|pages=33–36}}</ref> Nazi policies in German-occupied territories were marked by spontaneous adaptation, on-the-fly modifications, and bureaucratic competition, underscoring the impulsive nature of Hitlerism.<ref name="ReferenceA">{{harvnb|Giaccaria|Minca|2016|page=29}}</ref>

In 1941, in a speech to the Eastern Front Battle Group Nord, Himmler said that the war against the Soviet Union was a war of ideologies and races, between [[Nazism]] and [[Jewish Bolshevism]] and between the Germanic (Nordic) peoples and the {{lang|de|Untermenschen}} peoples of the East.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Stein |first=George H. |url=https://archive.org/details/waffensshitlerse00stei_0 |title=The Waffen SS: Hitler's Elite Guard at War, 1939–1945 |publisher=Cornell University Press |year=1966 |pages=[https://archive.org/details/waffensshitlerse00stei_0/page/126 126]–127 |quote=When you, my friends, are fighting in the East, you keep that same fight against the same subhumans, against the same inferior races that once appeared under the name of Huns, and later—1,000 years ago during the time of King Henry and Otto I—the name of the Hungarians, and later under the name of Tatars, and then they came again under the name of Genghis Khan and the Mongols. Today, they are called Russian under the political banner of Bolshevism. ([[Heinrich Himmler]] speaking to SS soldiers, July 13, 1941, Stettin. ''[[:wikiquote:Heinrich Himmler#Quotes|Wikiquote.]]'').}}</ref> Moreover, in one of the secret [[Posen speeches]] to the {{lang|de|SS-Gruppenführer}} at Posen, Himmler said: "the mixed race of the Slavs is based on a sub-race with a few drops of our blood, the blood of a leading race; the Slav is unable to control himself and create order."<ref name="himmler">[http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/pdf/eng/English22.pdf Volume 7. Nazi Germany, 1933–1945 Excerpt from Himmler's Speech to the SS-Gruppenführer at Posen (4 October 1943).] German History in Documents and Images. Retrieved 06 June 2016.</ref> In that vein, Himmler published the pamphlet {{lang|de|Der Untermensch}}, which featured photographs of ideal racial types, Aryans, contrasted with the barbarian races, descended from [[Attila the Hun]] and [[Genghis Khan]], to the massacres committed in the Soviet Union dominated by Jewish Bolshevism.<ref>Koon, Claudia. ''The Nazi Conscience'', p. 260.</ref>

With the [[Polish decrees]] (8 March 1940), the Nazis ensured that the racial inferiority of the Poles was legally recognized in the German Reich, and regulated the working and living conditions of Polish laborers ({{lang|de|[[Zivilarbeiter]]}}).<ref>{{cite book |last=Evans |first=Richard J. |title=The Third Reich at War: 1939–1945 |year=2008 |publisher=Penguin Group |location=New York |isbn=978-0-14-311671-4 |page=351}}</ref> The Polish decrees also established that any Pole "who has sexual relations with a German man or woman, or approaches them in any other improper manner, will be punished by death."<ref>{{Cite book |last=Robert Gellately |url=https://archive.org/details/backinghitlercon00gell |title=Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany |date= 2001 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=978-0-19-160452-2 |page=[https://archive.org/details/backinghitlercon00gell/page/155 155] |url-access=registration}}</ref> The {{lang|de|[[Gestapo]]|italic=no}} were vigilant of sexual relations between Germans and Poles, and pursued anyone suspected of race defilement ({{lang|de|[[Rassenschande]]}}); likewise, there were [[proscription]]s of sexual relations between Germans and other ethnic groups brought in from Eastern Europe.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Robert Gellately |title=The Gestapo and German Society: Enforcing Racial Policy, 1933–1945 |publisher=Clarendon Press |year=1990 |isbn=978-0-19-820297-4 |page=224}}</ref>

{{quote box|"Hitler's ideas of ''Lebensraum'', also elaborated in ''[[Mein Kampf]]'', meant that his desire to expand German power and control to the east with the intention of colonising this territory with German settlers would involve the expulsion, enslavement and death of the Slavs who lived there.. If the awful counterfactual of a Nazi victory had come to pass... Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians would surely have shared the fate of the Poles and been eliminated culturally and ethnically as distinct peoples and nations. [[Genocide|Genocidal]] actions against those peoples would have been completed."
| source = — Historian [[Norman Naimark]]<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Kiernan |last2=Lower |last3=Naimark |last4=Straus |first1=Ben |first2=Wendy |first3=Norman |first4=Scott |title=The Cambridge World History of Genocide |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=2023 |isbn=978-1-108-48707-8 |editor-last=Kiernan |editor-first=Ben |volume=3: Genocide in the Contemporary Era, 1914–2020 |location=University Printing House, Cambridge |pages=359, 377 |chapter=15: The Nazis and the Slavs – Poles and Soviet Prisoners of War |doi=10.1017/9781108767118 |editor-last2=Lower |editor-first2=Wendy |editor-last3=Naimark |editor-first3=Norman |editor-last4=Straus |editor-first4=Scott}}</ref>
| align = right
| width = 25em
}}

As official policy, {{lang|de|Reichsführer SS}} [[Heinrich Himmler]] said that no drop of German blood would be lost or left behind to mingle with any alien races;<ref>[[Richard Overy]], ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia'', p. 543 {{ISBN|0-393-02030-4}}</ref> and that the Germanisation of Eastern Europe would be complete when "in the East dwell only men with truly German [and] Germanic blood".<ref>Mark Mazower, ''Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe'', p. 181.</ref> In the secret memorandum ''Reflections on the Treatment of Peoples of Alien Races in the East'' (25 May 1940), Himmler outlined the future of the Eastern European peoples: (i) division of native ethnic groups found in the new living-space; (ii) limited, formal education of four years of elementary school (to teach them only how to write their names and to count to five hundred); and (iii) obedience of the orders of Germans.<ref>Himmler, Heinrich. (25 May 1940). ''Reflections on the Treatment of Peoples of Alien Races in the East''. Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals Under Control Council Law (US Government Printing Office, District of Columbia). pp. 147–150, No. 10. Vol. 13.</ref>

Despite Nazi Germany's official racism, the extermination of Eastern European native populations was not always necessary because the [[racial policy of Nazi Germany]] regarded some Eastern European peoples as being of Aryan-Nordic stock, especially the local leaders.<ref>[https://web.archive.org/web/20040219121503/http://www.dac.neu.edu/holocaust/Hitlers_Plans.htm Hitler's plans for Eastern Europe]</ref> On March 4, 1941, Himmler introduced the [[Deutsche Volksliste|German People's List]] ({{lang|de|Deutsche Volksliste}}), which intended to segregate the inhabitants of German-occupied territories into categories of desirability according to criteria.<ref name="overy">[[Richard Overy]], ''The Dictators: Hitler's Germany, Stalin's Russia'', pp. 543–544 {{ISBN|0-393-02030-4}}</ref> In the same memorandum, Himmler advocated the [[Kidnapping of children for forced Germanization by Nazi Germany|kidnapping of children]] who appeared to be Nordic because it would "remove the danger that this subhuman people ({{lang|de|Untermenschenvolk}}) of the East through such children might acquire a leader class from such people of good blood, which would be dangerous for us because they would be our equals."<ref>Vejas Gabriel Liulevicius. ''The German Myth of the East: 1800 to the Present''. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011, p. 187</ref><ref>Lynn H. Nicholas. ''Cruel World: The Children of Europe in the Nazi Web''. New York: Vintage, 2006, p. 241.</ref> According to Himmler, the destruction of the Soviet Union would have led to the exploitation of millions of peoples as slave labor in the occupied territories and the eventual re-population of the areas with Germans.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Longerich |first1=Peter |title=Heinrich Himmler: A Life |date=2012 |publisher=OUP Oxford |isbn=978-0-19-959232-6 |page=515 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=GBQchepZ-7EC |language=en}}</ref>

Nazi Germany's initiation of [[Operation Barbarossa]] was motivated by the [[Nazi racial theories|racial theories]] and bio-political doctrines of the [[NSDAP]], which were fervently [[anti-Slavic]], [[anti-communist]] and [[anti-semitic]]. The Nazi party's doctrine of ''Lebensraum'' was central to its programme of waging a racial war against Russia, a geopolitical agenda advanced by Hitler since the 1920s.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Borejsza |first=Jerzy W. |title=A ridiculous hundred million Slavs: Concerning Adolf Hitler's world-view |publisher=Polskiej Akademii Nauk |year=2017 |isbn=978-83-63352-88-2 |location=Warsaw, Poland |pages=175, 176 |translator-last=French |translator-first=David}}</ref> 

During the final months of the [[World War II|Second World War]], Nazi Germany intensified its [[anti-Semitic]], [[Anti-Slavic sentiment|anti-Slavic]], and anti-communist propaganda. Hitler fanatically reiterated the core ideological tenets of Nazism, such as his goal of expanding German territories eastwards in pursuit of ''Lebensraum''. He continued to advocate the Germanic [[Settler colonialism|settler-colonial]] project in [[Eastern Europe]], including his desire to exterminate a significant portion of the Slavic populations.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Borejsza |first=Jerzy W. |title=A ridiculous hundred million Slavs: Concerning Adolf Hitler's world-view |publisher=Polskiej Akademii Nauk |year=2017 |isbn=978-83-63352-88-2 |location=Warsaw, Poland |pages=168, 175, 176 |translator-last=French |translator-first=David}}</ref> In his letter to German field marshal [[Wilhelm Keitel]] written on 29 April 1945, Hitler stated: <blockquote>“Our goal must still be the capture of living space in the East for the German nation.”<ref>{{Cite book |last=Borejsza |first=Jerzy W. |title=A ridiculous hundred million Slavs: Concerning Adolf Hitler's world-view |publisher=Polskiej Akademii Nauk |year=2017 |isbn=978-83-63352-88-2 |location=Warsaw, Poland |page=168|translator-last=French |translator-first=David}}</ref></blockquote>

===Classification under the laws in the annexed territories===
The [[Volksliste#Himmler's solution|Deutsche Volksliste]] was split into four categories.<ref name="overy" /> Men in the first two categories were required to enlist for compulsory military service.<ref name="overy" /> Membership in the {{lang|de|[[Schutzstaffel]]}} (SS) was reserved for men from Category I only:
{| class = "wikitable plainrowheaders"
|+German People's List (''Deutsche Volksliste'')
! scope="col" | Classification&nbsp;<ref name="overy" />
! scope="col" | Translation
! scope="col" | Heritage
! scope="col" | Definition
|-
! scope="row" | {{lang|de|Volksdeutsche}}
| Ethnically German
| German
| Persons of German descent who had engaged themselves in favour of the Reich before 1939
|-
! scope="row" | {{lang|de|Deutschstämmige}}
| German descent
| German
| Persons of German descent who had remained passive
|-
! scope="row" | {{lang|de|Eingedeutschte}}
| {{nowrap|Voluntarily Germanised}}
| Part-German
| Indigenous persons considered by the Nazis as partly Polonized (mainly [[Silesians]] and [[Kashubians]]); refusal to join this list often led to deportation to a concentration camp
|-
! scope="row" | {{lang|de|Rückgedeutschte}}
| Forcibly Germanised
| Part-German
| Persons of Polish nationality considered "racially valuable", but who resisted Germanisation
|}

Hitler, who was born in the ethnically diverse [[Austrian-Hungarian Empire]], avowed in {{lang|de|Mein Kampf}} (1926) that Germanising Austrian Slavs by language during the [[partitions of Poland|Age of Partitions]] could not have turned them into fully fledged Germans, because no "Negro" nor a "Chinaman" would ever "become German" just because he has learned to speak German. He believed that no visible differences between peoples could be bridged by the use of a common language. Any such attempts would lead to the "bastardization" of the German element, he said.<ref name="Hitler-801–803">{{harvp|Hitler|1939|pp=801–803}}</ref> Likewise, Hitler criticized the previous attempts at Germanisation of the Poles in the [[Prussian Partition]] as an erroneous idea, based on the same false reasoning. The Polish people could not possibly be Germanised by being compelled to speak German because they belonged to a different race, he said; "the result would have been fatal" for the purity of the German nation because the foreigners would "compromise" by their inferiority "the dignity and nobility" of the German nation.<ref name="Hitler-801–803" /> During the war, Hitler remarked in his "[[Hitler's Table Talk|Table Talk]]" that people should only be Germanised if they were to improve the German blood line:

[[File:Die 'großzügigste Umsiedlungsaktion' with Poland superimposed, 1939.jpg|upright=1.3|thumb|[[Nazi Germany]] in 1940 (dark grey) after the [[Invasion of Poland|conquest of Poland]] together [[Soviet invasion of Poland|with the USSR]], showing pockets of German colonists resettled into the [[Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany|annexed territories of Poland]] from the Soviet "sphere of influence" during the {{lang|de|[[Heim ins Reich]]}} action. A red outline of pre-war Poland is superimposed here over the original Nazi propaganda poster; the original German print made no mention of Poland.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Lynn H. Nicholas |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=PeUKT6d9khIC |title=Cruel World: The Children of Europe in the Nazi Web |publisher=Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group |year=2011 |isbn=978-0307793829 |page=194 |author-link=Lynn H. Nicholas |via=Google Books}}</ref>]]

{{Blockquote|There is one cardinal principle. This question of the Germanisation of certain peoples must not be examined in the light of abstract ideas and theory. We must examine each particular case. The only problem is to make sure whether the offspring of any race will mingle well with the German population and will improve it, or whether, on the contrary (as is the case when Jew blood is mixed with German blood), negative results will arise. Unless one is completely convinced that the foreigners whom one proposes to introduce into the German community will have a beneficial effect, well, I think it's better to abstain, however strong the sentimental reasons may be which urge such a course on us. There are plenty of Jews with blue eyes and blond hair, and not a few of them have the appearance which strikingly supports the idea of the Germanisation of their kind. It has, however, been indisputably established that, in the case of Jews, if the physical characteristics of the race are sometimes absent for a generation or two, they will inevitably reappear in the next generation.<ref>Hitler's Table Talk, p. 475</ref>}}
[[File:P_20221107_205156_vHDR_Auto_(1).jpg|thumb|Borders of [[Greater Germanic Reich]] envisaged in the [[Nazi Propaganda|Nazi-era propaganda]] map "''Das Grossdeutschland in der Zukunft''" (1943). The map depicts occupied Eastern Europe as a [[Settler colonialism|settler-colonial]] territory of Nazi Germany.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Kartenskizze eines zukünftigen Europa unter deutscher Herrschaft |trans-title=Sketch map of a future Europe under German rule |url=https://www.dhm.de/lemo/bestand/objekt/d2a24325 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170614003327/https://www.dhm.de/lemo/bestand/objekt/d2a24325 |archive-date=14 June 2017 |website=Deutsches Historisches Museum}}</ref>]]
Informed by the [[blood and soil]] beliefs of ethnic identity—a philosophic basis of {{lang|de|Lebensraum}}—Nazi policy required destroying the [[USSR]] for the lands of Russia to become the [[granary]] of Germany. The Germanisation of Russia required the destruction of its cities, in an effort to vanquish [[Russianness]], [[Communism]], and [[Jewish Bolshevism]].<ref>[[Karel C. Berkhoff]], ''Harvest of Despair: Life and Death in Ukraine Under Nazi Rule'' pp. 35–36 {{ISBN|0-674-01313-1}}</ref> To that effect, Hitler ordered the [[Siege of Leningrad]] (September 1941 – January 1944), to raze the city and destroy the native Russian population.<ref>[[Edwin P. Hoyt]], ''Hitler's War'' p. 187 {{ISBN|0-07-030622-2}}</ref> Geopolitically, the establishment of German {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} in the east of Europe would thwart [[blockade]]s, like those that occurred during the First World War, which starved the people of Germany.<ref>Richard Bessel, ''Nazism and War'', p. 60 {{ISBN|0-679-64094-0}}</ref> Moreover, using Eastern Europe to feed Germany also was intended to exterminate millions of Slavs, by slave labour and starvation.<ref name="harvest45" /> When deprived of producers, a workforce, and customers, native industry would cease and disappear from the Germanised region, which then became agricultural land for settlers from Nazi Germany.<ref name="harvest45">Karel C. Berkhoff, ''Harvest of Despair: Life and Death in Ukraine Under Nazi Rule'' p. 45 {{ISBN|0-674-01313-1}}</ref>

The Germanised lands of Eastern Europe would be settled by the {{lang|de|[[Wehrbauer]]}}, a soldier–peasant who was to maintain a fortified line of defence, which would prevent any non–German civilisation from arising to threaten the [[Greater Germanic Reich]].<ref>Robert Cecil, ''The Myth of the Master Race: Alfred Rosenberg and Nazi Ideology'' p. 190 {{ISBN|0-396-06577-5}}</ref> At a conference in 1941, Hitler stated:

{{Blockquote|text="There is only one task: Germanization through the introduction of Germans [to the area] and to treat the original inhabitants like [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Indians]]. … I intend to stay this course with ice-cold determination. I feel myself to be the executor of the will of history. What people think of me at present is all of no consequence. Never have I heard a German who has bread to eat express concern that the ground where the grain was grown had to be conquered by the sword. We eat Canadian wheat and never think of the Indians."<ref>Minutes of Hitler Conference, 17 October 1941 reproduced in Czesław Madajczyk, ed., Generalny Plan Wschodni: Zbiór dokumentów (Warszawa: Glówna Komisja Badania Zbrodni Hitlerowskich w Polsce, 1990)</ref>}}

Plans for the Germanisation of western Europe were less severe, as the Nazis needed the [[collaborationism|collaboration]] of the local political and business establishments, especially that of local industry and their skilled workers. Moreover, Nazi racial policies considered the populations of western Europe more racially acceptable to Aryan standards of racial purity. In practice, the number and assortment of [[Racial policy of Nazi Germany#Germanization between 1939 and 1945|Nazi racial categories]] indicated that "East is bad and West is acceptable"; thus, a person's "race" was a matter of life or death in countries under [[Nazi occupation]].<ref>Lynn H. Nicholas, ''Cruel World: The Children of Europe in the Nazi Web'' p. 263 {{ISBN|0-679-77663-X}}</ref>

The racist ideology of {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} also comprised the [[North German]] racial stock of the northern-European peoples of [[Scandinavia]] (Denmark, Norway, Sweden); and the continental-European peoples of Alsace and Lorraine, Belgium and northern France;{{citation needed|date=June 2020}} whilst the United Kingdom would either be annexed or be made a [[puppet state]].<ref name="Gerhard-2005">[[Gerhard L. Weinberg]], ''Visions of Victory: The Hopes of Eight World War II Leaders'' p. 11 {{ISBN|0-521-85254-4}}</ref> Moreover, the poor military performance of the Italian armed forces forced [[Fascist Italian|Fascist Italy]]'s withdrawal from the war in 1943, which then made northern Italy a territory to be [[annexation|annexed]] to the Greater Germanic Reich.<ref name="Gerhard-2005" />

;Collaborationism
[[File:Vlassof.Himmler.jpg|thumb|right|Himmler and the Soviet defector general [[Andrey Vlasov]], the leader of the Russian collaborationist movement]]

For political expediency, the Nazis continually modified their racist politics towards non–Germanic peoples—and so continually redefined the ideological meaning of {{lang|de|Lebensraum}}—in order to collaborate with other peoples, in service of the Reich's foreign policy. Early in his career as leader of the Nazis, Adolf Hitler said he would accept friendly relations with the USSR, on condition that the Soviet government re-establish the disadvantageous borders of European Russia, which were demarcated in the [[Treaty of Brest-Litovsk (Russia–Central Powers)|Treaty of Brest-Litovsk]] (1918). This made possible the restoration of Russo–German diplomatic relations.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31">Peter D. Stachura. ''The Shaping of the Nazi State''. p. 31.</ref>

In 1921–22, Hitler said that German {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} might be achieved with a smaller USSR, created by sponsoring anti-communist Russians in deposing the Communist government of the [[Bolshevism|Bolsheviks]]; however, by the end of 1922, Hitler changed his opinion when there arose the possibility of an Anglo–German geopolitical alliance to destroy the USSR.<ref name="Peter D. Stachura P. 31" /> However, following the invasion of the USSR in [[Operation Barbarossa]] (1941), the strategic stance of the Nazi régime towards a smaller, independent Russia was affected by political pressure from the [[German Army (Wehrmacht)|German Army]], who asked Hitler to endorse the creation of the anti–Communist [[Russian Liberation Army]] (ROA) and its integration into the [[Wehrmacht]] operations in Russia. The ROA was an organization of [[defectors]], led by General [[Andrey Vlasov]], who meant to depose the régime of [[Joseph Stalin]] and the [[Communist Party of the Soviet Union|Russian Communist Party]].<ref>Geoffrey A. Hosking. ''Rulers and Victims: The Russians in the Soviet Union''. Harvard University Press, 2006 p. 213.</ref>

Initially, Hitler rejected the idea of collaborating with the peoples in the East.<ref>[[Michael Burleigh]], ''The Third Reich: A New History'', pp, 544, 551</ref> However, Nazis such as Joseph Goebbels and Alfred Rosenberg were in favor of collaboration against Bolshevism and offering some independence to the peoples of the East.<ref>Ulrich Herbert, ''Hitler's Foreign Workers: Enforced Foreign Labor in Germany Under the Third Reich'', pp. 260–261</ref><ref>Robert Edwin Herzstein, ''The war that Hitler won: Goebbels and the Nazi media campaign'', p. 364</ref> In 1940, Himmler opened up membership for people he regarded as being of "related stock", which resulted in a number of right-wing Scandinavians [[Waffen-SS foreign volunteers and conscripts|signing up to fight in the Waffen-SS]]. When the Germans invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, further volunteers from France, Spain, Belgium, the Netherlands, Czechoslovakia, and Croatia signed up to fight for the Nazi cause.<ref name="Waffen-SS1">{{Cite AV media |url=http://www.worldmediarights.com/index.php?hidAction=episode&eid=50 |title=The Waffen-SS |series=Gladiators of World War II |access-date=26 April 2015 |website=worldmediarights.com}}</ref> After 1942, when the war turned decisively against Nazi Germany, further recruits from the occupied territories signed up to fight for the Nazis.<ref name="Waffen-SS1" /> Hitler was worried about the foreign legions on the Eastern Front; he remarked that "One mustn't forget that, unless he is convinced of his racial membership of the Germanic {{lang|de|Reich}}, the foreign legionary is bound to feel that he's betraying his country."<ref>Trevor-Roper, Gerhard L. Weinberg, ''Hitler's Table Talk 1941–1944: Secret Conversations'', p. 305</ref>

After further losses of manpower, the Nazis tried to persuade the [[forced labour under German rule during World War II|forced foreign laborers in the Reich]] to fight against Bolshevism. [[Martin Bormann]] issued a memorandum on 5 May 1943:
{{Blockquote| It impossible to win someone over to a new idea while insulting his inner sense of worth at the same time. One cannot expect the highest level of performance from people who are called beasts, barbarians, and subhuman. Instead, positive qualities such as the will to fight Bolshevism, the desire to safeguard one's own existence and that of one's country, commitment and willingness to work are to be encouraged and promoted. Moreover, everything must be done to encourage the necessary cooperation of the European peoples in the fight against Bolshevism.<ref>{{Cite web |title=Martin Bormann's Circular of May 5, 1943, which included a Memorandum on the General Principles Governing the Treatment of Foreign Laborers Employed in the Reich (dated April 15, 1943) |url=http://germanhistorydocs.ghi-dc.org/docpage.cfm?docpage_id=2943}}</ref>}}

In 1944, as the German army continually lost battles and territory to the [[Red Army]], the leaders of Nazi Germany, especially {{lang|de|Reichsfuhrer-SS}} Heinrich Himmler, recognized the political, ideological, and military value of the collaborationist ROA in fighting Bolshevism.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Andreyev |first=Catherine |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ORYvFXeW8OAC |title=Vlasov and the Russian Liberation Movement: Soviet Reality and Emigré Theories |publisher=Cambridge University Press |year=1989 |isbn=978-0521389600 |location=1st paperback edition. Cambridge, England |pages=53, 61}}</ref> Secretly, Himmler in his Posen speeches remarked: "I wouldn't have had any objections, if we had hired Mr. Vlasov and every other Slavic subject wearing a Russian general's uniform, to make propaganda against the Russians. I wouldn't have any objections at all. Wonderful."<ref name="himmler" />

===Implementation===
{{Further|Generalplan Ost|Expulsion of Poles by Nazi Germany (1939–1944)|Ural Mountains in Nazi planning|Wehrbauer}}
[[File:Bundesarchiv R 49 Bild-0128, Gelsendorf, Aussiedlung von Polen.jpg|thumb|300px|The Nazi establishment of German {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} required the expulsion of the Poles from Poland, such as their expulsion from the {{lang|de|[[Reichsgau Wartheland]]}} in 1939.]]
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 183-J09397, Lodz, Millionster Umsiedler im Wartheland.jpg|thumb|300px|Germanisation of Poland: {{lang|de|SS Obergruppenführer}} [[Arthur Greiser]] welcomes the millionth Eastern European {{lang|de|[[Volksdeutsche]]r}} to be resettled in annexed Polish territories, March 1944.]]

Nazi policies in German-occupied territories were marked by spontaneous adaptation, on-the-fly modifications, and bureaucratic competition, underscoring the impulsive nature of Hitlerism.<ref name="ReferenceA"/> Nazi Germany's pursuit of its bio-geo-political ambitions was carried out through fanatical perpetration of a racist [[war of annihilation]] (''Vernichtungskrieg'') which inflicted industrial-scale [[terrorism]] against entire populations. These policies resulted in the [[genocide]] of numerous ethnic groups in German-occupied territories, including the Jews, Poles, [[Russians]], [[Romani people]], etc. and also contributed to the failure of German war aims.<ref name="The University of Chicago Press"/>

The [[Invasion of Poland|Polish Campaign]] was Nazi Germany's first implementation of {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} policy, beginning with the [[Occupation of Poland (1939-1945)|Occupation of Poland (1939–1945)]]. In October 1939, Heinrich Himmler became the [[Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood]], tasked with returning all ethnic Germans ({{lang|de|[[Volksdeutsche]]}}) to the {{lang|de|Reich}}, preventing harmful foreign influences upon the German people, and creating new settlement areas (especially for returning {{lang|de|Volksdeutsche}}).<ref>Peter Longerich, ''Heinrich Himmler: A Life'', p. 528.</ref>

From mid–1940, the [[ethnic cleansing]] (forcible removal) of Poles from the {{lang|de|[[Reichsgau Wartheland]]}} initially occurred across the border, to the [[General Government]] (a colonial political entity ostensibly autonomous of the Reich); then, after the invasion of the USSR, the displaced Polish populations were jailed in {{lang|de|[[Polenlager]]}} (Pole-storage camps) in [[Silesia]] and sent to villages designated as [[ghetto]]es. In four years of Germanisation (1940–44), the Nazis forcibly removed some 50,000 ethnic Poles from the Polish territories annexed to the Greater German {{lang|de|Reich}}, notably some 18,000–20,000 ethnic Poles from Żywiec County, in Polish Silesia, effected in [[Action Saybusch]].<ref>{{Cite web |last=Anna Machcewicz |date=16 February 2010 |title=Mama wzięła ino chleb |url=http://tygodnik.onet.pl/1,41565,druk.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120318131952/http://tygodnik.onet.pl/1%2C41565%2Cdruk.html |archive-date=18 March 2012 |access-date=5 May 2012 |website=Historia |publisher=[[Tygodnik Powszechny]]}}</ref><ref>{{Cite web |last=Mirosław Sikora |date=20 September 2011 |title=Saybusch Aktion – jak Hitler budował raj dla swoich chłopów |url=http://www.fronda.pl/news/czytaj/tytul/saybusch_aktion_-_jak_hitler_budowal_raj_dla_swoich_chlopow_15558 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111106143810/http://www.fronda.pl/news/czytaj/tytul/saybusch_aktion_-_jak_hitler_budowal_raj_dla_swoich_chlopow_15558 |archive-date=6 November 2011 |access-date=May 5, 2012 |website=OBEP [[Institute of National Remembrance]], Katowice |publisher=Redakcja Fronda.pl |language=pl}}</ref>

The Nazi invasion of Poland consisted of atrocities committed against Polish men, women, and children. The German population's psychological acceptance of the atrocities was achieved with [[Nazi propaganda]] (print, radio, cinema), a key factor behind the manufactured consent that justified German brutality towards civilians; by continually manipulating the national psychology, the Nazis convinced the German people to believe that Slavs and Jews were ''Untermenschen''.<ref>Richard J. Evans, The Third Reich at War, p.&nbsp;102</ref> For example, leaders of the [[Hitler Youth]] were issued pamphlets (such as ''On the German People and its Territory'') meant to influence the rank-and-file Hitler Youth about the necessity of Nazi racist practices in obtaining {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} for the German people.<ref>{{Cite web |year=1937 |title=On the German People and its Territory |url=http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/hjhandbuch.htm |publisher=Vom deutschen Volk und seinem Lebensraum, Handbuch für die Schulung in der HJ |language=de}}</ref> Likewise, in the {{lang|de|Reich}} proper, schoolchildren were given propaganda pamphlets (such as ''You and Your People'') explaining the importance of {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} for the future of Germany and the German people.<ref>{{Cite web |year=1940 |editor-last=Fritz Bennecke |title=You and Your People (''Volk'') |url=http://research.calvin.edu/german-propaganda-archive/du.htm |website=Vom deutschen Volk und seinem Lebensraum, Handbuch für die Schulung in der HJ |publisher=Franz Eher, 1937 |language=de |location=Munich}}</ref>

On 21 June 1941, Himmler commissioned the drafting of ''[[Generalplan Ost]]'' (GPO), which was to be the blue-print of German expansionist and extermination policies in Eastern Europe. The draft, which was based on the proposals of Nazi agronomist [[Konrad Meyer]], were forwarded to Hitler for approval. On 16 July 1941, Hitler appointed [[Alfred Rosenberg]] as [[Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories|Reich Minister for Occupied Eastern Territories]], giving him directives to monitor [[Schutzstaffel|SS]] activities. GPO was approved by Hitler's orders in May 1942 and became the official occupation program of [[Nazi Germany]] in July 1942. The program launched the [[genocide]] of millions of Slavs, Jews, [[Romani people]], etc. through various methods like mass-killings, forced starvations, [[Extermination through labour|extermination through slave labour]], etc. [[Ethnic cleansing]] was initiated to [[Forcibly displaced|forcibly displace]] remaining non-Germanic inhabitants eastwards. Under the objectives of ''Generalplan Ost'', the evacuated territories were to be colonized by over 10 million German settlers and establish the blueprint for a [[Greater Germanic Reich]]. [[Germanisation|Germanization]] campaigns were extolled in [[Nazi Propaganda|Nazi propaganda]] as the modern adaptation of what it portrayed as "[[civilizing mission]]s" of the [[Teutonic Order]].{{sfn|Evans|2008|p=173}}{{sfn|Longerich|2012|pp=527–530, 577–580}}

===East–West frontier===
Concerning the geographic extent of the Greater Germanic {{lang|de|Reich}}, Adolf Hitler rejected the [[Ural Mountains]] as an adequate eastern border for Germany, arguing that such mid-sized mountains would not suffice as the boundary between the "European and Asiatic worlds", and that only a living wall of racially pure Aryans would suffice as a border. He also advocated that permanent war in the East would "preserve the vitality of the race":

{{Blockquote|The real frontier is the one that separates the Germanic world from the Slav world. It is our duty to place it where we want it to be. If anyone asks where we obtain the right to extend the Germanic space to the east, we reply that, for a nation, its awareness of what it represents carries this right with it. It is success that justifies everything. The reply to such questions can only be of an empirical nature. It is inconceivable that a higher people should painfully exist on a soil too narrow for it, while amorphous masses, which contribute nothing to civilization, occupy infinite tracts of a soil that is one of the richest in the world&nbsp;...

We must create conditions for our people that favour its multiplication, and we must, at the same time, build a dike against the Russian flood&nbsp;... Since there is no natural protection against such a flood, we must meet it with a living wall. A permanent war on the eastern front will help form a sound race of men, and will prevent us from relapsing into the softness of a Europe thrown back upon itself. It should be possible for us to control this region to the east with two hundred and fifty thousand men, plus a cadre of good administrators&nbsp;...

This space in Russia must always be dominated by Germans.<ref>Rich, Norman (1974). ''Hitler's War Aims: the Establishment of the New Order'', pp. 327–329.</ref>}}

In 1941, the Reich decided that within two decades, by the year 1961, Poland would have been emptied of Poles and re-populated with ethnic-German colonists from [[Bukovina]], [[Eastern Galicia]], and [[Volhynia]].<ref>[[Volker R. Berghahn]] "Germans and Poles 1871–1945" in ''Germany and Eastern Europe: Cultural Identities and Cultural Differences'', Rodopi 1999.</ref> The ruthless Germanisation that Hitler enacted for {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} was attested in the reports of {{lang|de|[[Wehrbauer]]}} (soldier–peasant) colonists assigned to ethnically-cleansed Poland—of finding half-eaten meals on the table and unmade beds in the houses given them by the Nazis.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Nicholas |first1=Lynn H. |author-link=Lynn H. Nicholas |title=Cruel World: The Children of Europe in the Nazi Web |date=2006 |publisher=Vintage Books |location=New York |isbn=0-679-77663-X |pages=213–214}}</ref> [[Baltic Germans]] from Estonia and Latvia were evaluated for racial purity; those classified to the highest category, {{lang|de|Ost-Falle}}, were resettled in the Eastern Wall.<ref>{{harvnb|Nicholas|2006|p=213}}</ref>

{| class="wikitable" width="100%" style=text-align:right
|+ Area and population data in 1939 of [[Administrative divisions of Nazi Germany|Nazi German Gaue]] that included annexed territories of Poland: Estimates of 1947<ref>The
Western Review, Supp. Number for Abroad, July and August, 1947 p. 49.</ref> as cited by Stanisław Waszak, ''Demographic Picture of the German Occupation'' (1970)<ref>Czesław Madajczyk. Polityka III Rzeszy w okupowanej Polsce pp. 234–286 vol. 1, Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, Warszawa, 1970</ref>
! Gau
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Total population
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Poles
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Germans
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Jews
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Ukrainians
! scope=col style="width: 12%;" | Others
|-
| {{align|left|{{lang|de|[[Wartheland]]}}}}
| 4,933,600
| 4,220,200
| 324,600
| 384,500
| {{align|right|–}}
| 4,300
|-
| {{align|left|[[Upper Silesia]]}}
| 2,632,630
| 2,404,670
| 98,204
| 124,877
| 1,202
| 3,677
|-
| {{align|left|[[Danzig-West Prussia]]}}
| 1,571,215
| 1,393,717
| 158,377
| 14,458
| 1,648
| 3,020
|-
| {{align|left|[[East Prussia]]}}
| 1,001,560
| 886,061
| 18,400
| 79,098
| 8,099
| 9,902
|-
| {{align|left|Total}}
| 10,139,005
| 8,904,648
| 599,576
| 602,953
| 10,949
| 20,899
|}

Moreover, the Germanisation of Russia which began with [[Operation Barbarossa]] (June–September 1941) meant to conquer and colonise [[European Russia]] as the granary of Germany.<ref>Madajczyk, Czesław. {{lang|de|"Die Besatzungssysteme der Achsenmächte. Versuch einer komparatistischen Analyse"}} in {{lang|la|Studia Historiae Oeconomicae}} vol. 14 (1980): pp. 105–122, quoted in [[Gerd R. Ueberschär]] and [[Rolf-Dieter Müller]], ''[[Hitler's War in the East 1941−1945|Hitler's War in the East, 1941–1945: A Critical Assessment]]'' Berghahn Books, 2008 (review ed.). {{ISBN|1-84545-501-0}}.</ref> For those Slavic lands, the Nazi theorist and ideologue [[Alfred Rosenberg]] proposed administrative organisation by the {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat]]e}}—countries consolidated into colonial realms ruled by a commissar:

{| class="wikitable"
|-
! {{lang|de|Reichskommisariat}} name
! Area included
|-
| {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat Ostland|Ostland]]}}
| The [[Baltic States]], [[Belarus]], and western Russia
|-
| {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat Ukraine|Ukraine]]}}
| [[Ukraine]] (minus [[East Galicia]] and the [[Romania in World War II|Romanian]]-controlled [[Transnistria Governorate]]), extended eastwards to the [[Volga river|River Volga]]
|-
| {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat Moskowien|Moskowien]]}}
| The Moscow metropolis and [[European Russia]], exclusive of [[Karelia]] and the [[Kola peninsula]], which the Nazis promised to Finland in 1941
|-
| {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat Kaukasien|Kaukasien]]}}
| The [[Caucasus]]
|}

In 1943, in the secret [[Posen speeches]], Heinrich Himmler spoke of the [[Ural Mountains]] as the eastern border of the Greater Germanic Reich.<ref name="himmler" /> He asserted that the Germanic race would gradually expand to that eastern border, so that, in several generations' time, the German {{lang|de|Herrenvolk}}, as the leading people of Europe, would be ready to "resume the battles of destiny against Asia", which were "sure to break out again"; and that the defeat of Europe would mean "the destruction of the creative power of the Earth".<ref name="himmler" /> Nonetheless, the Ural Mountains were a secondary objective of the secret {{lang|de|[[Generalplan Ost]]}} (Master Plan East) for the colonisation of Eastern Europe.<ref>Madajczyk, Czeslaw (1962). [http://www.worldfuturefund.org/wffmaster/Reading/GPO/gpoarticle.HTM ''General Plan East: Hitler's Master Plan For Expansion'']. Polish Western Affairs, Vol. III, No. 2.</ref>

The never-established ''[[Reichskommissariat Turkestan]]'' would have been the closest territory to Imperial Japan's north-westernmost extents of its own [[Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere]], as a "[[Ural Mountains in Nazi planning#"Living wall"|living wall]]" said to be defending the easternmost {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} lands. It also would have elevated higher-social-class Chinese and nearly all Japanese-ethnicity populations as "[[Nazism and race#Honorary Aryans|honorary Aryans]]", partly to Hitler's own stated respect in ''Mein Kampf'' towards those specific East Asian ethnicities.

The early stages of {{lang|de|Lebensraum im Osten}} ({{lang|de|Lebensraum}} in the East) featured the ethnic cleansing of Russians and other Slavs (Galicians, Karelians, Ukrainians, et al.) from their lands, and the consolidation of their countries into the {{lang|de|Reichskommissariat}} administration that extended to the Ural Mountains, the geographic frontier of Europe and Asia. To manage the ethnic, racial, and political populations of the USSR, the German Army promptly organized [[collaborationism|collaborationist]], anti-Communist, puppet governments in the {{lang|de|[[Reichskomissariat Ostland]]}} (1941–45) and the {{lang|de|[[Reichskommissariat Ukraine]]}} (1941–44). Nonetheless, despite the initial strategic successes of Operation Barbarossa, the Red Army's counterattack victories against the German Army at the [[Battle of Stalingrad]] (August 1942 – February 1943) and at the [[Battle of Kursk]] (July–August 1943) in Russia, plus the Allied [[Operation Husky]] (July–August 1943) in Sicily, thwarted the full implementation of Nazi {{lang|de|Lebensraum}} in Eastern Europe.