Editing Racial policy of Nazi Germany (section)

==Turks and Turkics==

=== Turks ===
In 1935, a half-Turkish half-German man named "Johannes Ruppert" was forced to leave the [[Hitler Youth]], due to the belief that as the son of a Turkish man he was not a full Aryan as required by the [[Reich Citizenship Law]].<ref name=":02">{{Cite book |last=Herf |first=Jeffrey |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1npq5k |title=Nazi Propaganda for the Arab World |date=2009 |publisher=Yale University Press |isbn=978-0-300-14579-3 |pages=17–18, 151–152|jstor=j.ctt1npq5k }}</ref> Ruppert sought assistance from the Turkish Embassy in [[Berlin]] to clarify how “the Aryan question” affected his case. The Turkish Embassy brought the matter to the attention of the German Foreign Ministry. In a note of December 20, 1935, a Foreign Ministry official wrote that "opening up the Aryan question in relation to Turkey is extraordinarily undesirable as well as dangerous for our relations with Turkey".<ref name=":02" /> However, in January 1936, Foreign Ministry wrote a memo to the [[Nazi Party Office of Racial Policy]], writing that it was "essential that determination of whether the Turks are Aryan be decided as soon as possible", so that the Foreign Ministry could give "a satisfactory answer" to the Turkish Embassy's repeated questions about the issue, since there had been individual cases, that is, others in addition to Ruppert, in which "German citizens with Turkish mixed-blood had run into difficulties with the state and the [Nazi] Party due to their origins".<ref name=":02" /> The classification of Turks as "non-Aryans", in keeping with [[Nazi racial theories]], led to foreign policy complications, because the Nazis considered the Turkish government as a potential ally. Consequently, the racial theories had to be "modified" to some degree in accordance with foreign policy requirements.<ref>{{Cite book |last1=Nicosia |first1=Francis R. |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ykQtDwAAQBAJ&pg=PA68 |title=Nazism, the Holocaust, and the Middle East: Arab and Turkish Responses |last2=Ergene |first2=Boğaç A. |date=2018 |publisher=Berghahn Books |isbn=978-1-78533-785-7 |page=68 |language=en}}</ref> On April 30, 1936, Nazi Office for Racial Policy released a circular which stated that the Turks were "Europeans" while explaining that Turkish citizens of [[History of the Jews in Turkey|Jewish background]] would still be considered Jews and Turks of "colored origin" would be considered non-European.<ref>A 1378/36 (June 19, 1936), Political Archives of German Foreign Office. The circular: Ankara 539, doc. 82–35.B 8/4 (April 30, 1936), Political Archives of German Foreign Office.</ref><ref name=":02" /> Some Turkish and international newspapers, such as the Swiss ''[[Le Temps]]'' and the Turkish ''Republique'', reported at the time that the Turks had been recognized as an "Aryan nation" and that they were exempt from the [[Nuremberg Laws|Nuremberg laws]].<ref name=":12">Motadel, David (2014) ''Iran and the Aryan myth.'' In: Ansari, Ali, (ed.) Perceptions of Iran: history, myths and nationalism from medieval Persia to the Islamic Republic. International library of Iranian studies (37). I.B. Tauris, London, p. 134. {{ISBN|9781848858305}}</ref><ref name=":22">{{Cite book |last=Motadel |first=David |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0D1rBQAAQBAJ |title=Islam and Nazi Germany's War |date=2014 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-74495-0 |page=57 |language=en}}</ref> Turkish newspaper ''[[Akşam]]'' published an article with the headline "The Turks are Aryans!".<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ihrig |first=Stefan |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=F_Q9BQAAQBAJ |title=Atatürk in the Nazi Imagination |date=2014 |publisher=Harvard University Press |isbn=978-0-674-36837-8 |page=128 |language=en}}</ref> Such reports were picked up by other international newspapers, as well as by some modern scholarship, however the claim that the Turks had been recognized as an "Aryan nation" and that they were exempt from the [[Nuremberg Laws|Nuremberg laws]] was a hoax.<ref name=":12" /><ref name=":22" /> Nazi officials themselves disputed these reports by publishing a press release which stated that they were unfounded.<ref name=":22" /> The Nazis classified some Turks as "European" and not as "Aryans" and the decision had no practical consequences.<ref name=":12" /> In addition, this decision was designed to appease Turkey from a foreign policy standpoint, although, from a racial standpoint, Nazi officials did not believe that the Turks were neither European nor Aryan.<ref name=":02" />

In May 1942, a writer in the official journal of the Nazi Office for Racial Policy, ''[[Neues Volk]]'', replied to a father's question caused by his daughter's relationship with a Turkish man, about whether racial differences between Germans and Turks meant that a marriage should not take place.<ref name=":02" /><ref name=":4">{{cite web |author=Jeffrey Herf |year=2008 |title=Nazi Germany and the Arab and Muslim World: Old and New Scholarship |url=https://www.bu.edu/historic/conference08/Herf.pdf |access-date=1 June 2023 |website=Boston University}}</ref> The reply read:<ref name=":02" />

{{Blockquote|text=A marriage or similar connection between your daughter with a Turk is out of
the question. A Near Eastern blood element [Bluteinschlag] predominates among the Turks, among whom, alongside Oriental and Western racial components, mongoloid racial elements also enter. The Near Eastern and Oriental races are alien [artfremde] races. The same is true of the mongoloid [Mongolide] races. Moreover, in such cases, even when such racial considerations are not present, marriages of German young women with foreigners are not desirable. If your daughter does not want to listen to you, she faces the danger of being placed in protective custody. We emphatically point out to you and to your daughter the serious consequences of this behavior, one that obviously does not possess the slightest feeling for the honor of the Volk [''nicht das geringste völkische Ehregefühl besitzt''].<ref>“Völkische Lebensfragen: Das Rassenpolitische Amt gibt Auskunft,” Neues Volk: Blatter des Rassenpolitisches Amt der NSDAP, vol. 10, no. 5, PAAA R99175, Inland Partei Akten, Umgang fremdrassiger Ausländer mit deutschen Mädchen, 1941–43.</ref>}}

Although the Nazi leadership agreed with the content of the reply, they criticized the journal for publishing it, because, in a foreign policy point of view, it was really clumsy ("denkbar ungeschickt") to publish before defeating the British in [[Middle East]].<ref name=":02" /><ref name=":4" /> For example, [[Franz von Papen]], the German ambassador to Turkey, informed the German Foreign Ministry that the publication of this text "has serious foreign policy considerations". He noted that such statements could aid "our [[Anglo-Saxons|Anglo-Saxon]] opponents" in their "propaganda against us" and asked the Office of Racial Politics not to publish such things in the future.<ref name=":02" /> On May 16, 1942, [[Franz Rademacher]], director of the Office of Jewish Affairs in the German Foreign Ministry, wrote to [[Walter Gross (politician)|Walter Gross]], the founder and editor of the magazine, that he "had no objection to the content of the information from a racial-political viewpoint but that it was "from a foreign policy standpoint, really clumsy” and "a political blunder" that would have "embarrassing and awkward foreign policy implications".<ref name=":02" /> Nazi officials sought to prevent [[miscegenation]] between Turks and Germans and, if necessary, sought to imprison or deport the "offending" Turkish man.<ref name=":02" />

=== Crimean Karaites ===
The [[Crimean Karaites]], Turkic speakers following [[Karaite Judaism]], managed to get a declaration from the Reich Agency for the Investigation of Families that they were not to be considered of Jewish religion and their racial classification should be done individually.<ref>YIVO archives, Berlin Collection, Occ E, 3, Box 100, letter dated January 5, 1939.</ref> However, not every Nazi officer or soldier were aware of the official position and a small number Karaites were murdered by German troops in Russia, as if they were Jews. The majority of the Karaites fared much better than the Turkic-speaking Jews, the [[Krymchaks]].<ref name="Haaretz">{{cite news |title=Somewhat Jewish, Fully Russian: Crimea Karaites Recall Past Glory |language=en |work=Haaretz |url=https://www.haaretz.com/jewish/crimea-karaites-welcome-russia-1.5341282 |access-date=2 March 2022}}</ref>