Editing Racial policy of Nazi Germany (section)

==Basis of Nazi policies and the constitution of the Aryan Master Race==
{{Main|Nazi racial theories}}
[[File:Bundesarchiv Bild 135-KB-15-083, Tibetexpediton, Anthropometrische Untersuchungen.jpg|thumb|[[Bruno Beger]] conducting anthropometric studies in [[Sikkim]]]]

The Aryan [[master race]] conceived by [[Adolf Hitler]] and the other Nazis graded humans on a scale of pure Aryans to non-Aryans (who were viewed as [[Untermensch|subhumans]]).{{sfn|Davies|2006|p=167}} At the top of the scale of pure Aryans were Nordic-type Germans and other Nordic-Aryan [[Germanic peoples|Germanic]] and Northern European peoples, including the [[Dutch people|Dutch]], [[Scandinavia]]ns, and the [[English people|English]].{{sfn|Davies|2006|p=167}} [[Italic peoples|Latins]] were held to be somewhat inferior, but were tolerated; and the French were thought to have a suitable admixture of Germanic blood.{{sfn|Davies|2006|p=44}}

The feeling that Germans were the Aryan ''[[Herrenvolk]]'' (Aryan master race) was widely spread among the German public through Nazi propaganda and among Nazi officials throughout the ranks, in particular when the [[Reichskommissariat Ukraine|Reichskommissar of Ukraine]] [[Erich Koch]] said:

{{blockquote|We are a master race, which must remember that the lowliest German worker is racially and biologically a thousand times more valuable than the population here.|Erich Koch, 5 March 1943{{sfn|Shirer|1960|p=939}}}}

The Nazis considered the [[Slavs]] as Non-Aryan ''[[Untermenschen]]'' ("sub-humans") who were to be enslaved and exterminated by Germans.<ref name="ReferenceB"/>  In countries where these people lived, there were according to Nazis small groups of non-Slavic German descendants. These people underwent a "racial selection" process to determine whether or not they were "racially valuable", if the individual passed they would be re-[[Germanisation|Germanised]] and forcefully taken from their families in order to be raised as Germans.<ref name="Bendersky2013">{{cite book | last = Bendersky| first = Joseph W. |title = A Concise History of Nazi Germany | date = 2013 | publisher = Rowman & Littlefield | isbn = 978-1-4422-2270-0 | page = 180}}</ref><ref name="GellatelyStoltzfus2001">{{cite book | last1 = Gellately| first1 = Robert | last2 = Stoltzfus| first2 = Nathan | title=Social Outsiders in Nazi Germany | year = 2001 | publisher = Princeton University Press| isbn = 978-0-691-08684-2 | page = 106}}</ref>{{sfn|Davies|2006|pp=167, 209}} This secret plan [[Generalplan Ost]] ("Master Plan East") aimed at expulsion, enslavement and extermination of most Slavic people. Nazi policy towards them changed during [[World War II]] as a pragmatic means to resolve military manpower shortages: they were allowed, with certain restrictions, to serve in the [[Waffen-SS]], in spite of being considered subhumans.{{sfn|Davies|2006|pp=167, 209}} Nazi propaganda portrayed people in [[Eastern Europe]] with an Asiatic appearance to be the result of intermingling between the native Slavic populations and Asiatic or Mongolian races as sub-humans dominated by the Jews with the help of [[Bolshevism]].{{sfn|Longerich|2010|p=241}} At the bottom of the racial scale of non-Aryans were [[Jews]], ethnic [[Polish people|Poles]], ethnic [[Serbs]] and other Slavic people, [[Romani people|Romani]], and [[black people]].<ref name="Simone Gigliotti">Simone Gigliotti, [[Berel Lang]]. ''The Holocaust: A Reader''. Malden, Massachusetts, US; Oxford, England, UK; Carlton, Victoria, Australia: Blackwell Publishing, 2005. pp. 14.</ref> The Nazis originally sought to rid the German state of Jews and Romani by means of deportation (and later extermination), while black people were to be segregated and eventually eliminated through [[compulsory sterilization]].<ref name="Simone Gigliotti" /><ref>"Hitler's Home Front: Wurttemberg Under the Nazis" Jill Stephenson p. 113 " Other non-'Aryans' included Slavs, Blacks and Roma and Sinti (Romanies)"</ref>

[[Völkisch movement|Volkisch]] theorists believed that Germany's [[Germanic peoples|Teutonic]] ancestors had spread out from Germany throughout Europe.<ref name="George Victor 2007. Pp. 117">George Victor. ''Hitler: The Pathology of Evil''. Washington, DC: Potomac Books, Inc, 2007. p. 117.</ref> Of the Germanic tribes that spread through Europe, the theorists identified that the [[Burgundians]], [[Franks]], and [[Western Goths]] joined with the [[Gauls]] to make [[France]]; the [[Lombards]] moved south and joined with the Italians; the [[Jutes]] made [[Denmark]]; the [[Angles (tribe)|Angles]] and [[Saxons]] made [[England]]; the [[Flemings]] made [[Belgium]]; and other tribes made the [[Netherlands]].<ref name="George Victor 2007. Pp. 117"/>

Nazi racial beliefs of the superiority of an Aryan master race arose from earlier proponents of a supremacist conception of race such as the French novelist and diplomat [[Arthur de Gobineau]], who published a four-volume work titled ''[[An Essay on the Inequality of the Human Races]]'' (translated into German in 1897).{{sfn|Aly|2014|p=154}} Gobineau proposed that the [[Aryan race]] was superior, and urged the preservation of its cultural and [[Racial hygiene|racial purity]].<ref>Evans, Richard J. (2003). ''The Coming of the Third Reich'', p. 33</ref> Gobineau later came to use and reserve the term Aryan only for the "German race" and described the Aryans as 'la race germanique'.<ref>The Cambridge Companion to Tacitus. p. 294 A. J. Woodman – 2009 The white race was defined as beautiful, honourable and destined to rule; as 'cette illustre famille humaine, la plus noble'.74 Originally a linguistic term synonymous with Indo-European,7S 'Aryan' became, not least because of the Essai, the designation of a race, which Gobineau specified as 'la race germanique'</ref> By doing so he presented a racist theory in which Aryans—that is Germans—were all that was positive.<ref>So that the reader not be left in ignorance as to who the Aryans are, Gobineau stated: "La race germanique était pourvue de toute l'énergie de la variété ariane." We see, then, that Gobineau presents a racist theory in which the Aryans, or Germans, are all that is good Comparative literature by American Comparative Literature Association.; Modern Language Association of America. Comparative Literature Section.; University of Oregon. 1967, p. 342</ref> [[Houston Stewart Chamberlain]]'s work ''[[The Foundations of the Nineteenth Century]]'' (1900), one of the first to combine [[Social Darwinism]] with antisemitism, describes history as a struggle for survival between the Germanic peoples and the Jews, whom he characterized as an inferior and dangerous group.<ref>Evans, Richard J. (2003). ''The Coming of the Third Reich''. New York, p. 33–34</ref> The two-volume book ''Foundations of Human Hereditary Teaching and Racial Hygiene'' (1920–21) by [[Eugen Fischer]], [[Erwin Baur]], and [[Fritz Lenz]], used [[pseudoscientific]] studies to conclude that the Germans were superior to the Jews intellectually and physically, and recommended [[eugenics]] as a solution.{{sfn|Aly|2014|p=157}} [[Madison Grant]]'s work ''[[The Passing of the Great Race]]'' (1916) advocated [[Nordicism]] and proposed using a eugenic program to preserve the [[Nordic race]]. After reading the book, Hitler called it "my Bible".{{sfn|Kühl|2002|p=85}}

Racist author and Nordic supremacist<ref>{{cite book|title= The Race Gallery: The Return of Racial Science |first=Marek |last=Kohn |publisher=Vintage |year=1996 |page=48}}</ref> [[Hans F. K. Günther]], who influenced Nazi ideology, wrote in his "Race Lore of German People" (''[[Rassenkunde des deutschen Volkes]]'') about the danger of "Slavic blood of Eastern race" mixing with the German<ref>Hund, Wulf D.; Koller, Christian; and Zimmerman, Moshe (2011) ''Racisms Made in Germany'' LT Verlag. p. 19 {{ISBN|9783643901255}}</ref> and combined virulent nationalism with [[Antisemitism]].<ref>Wegner, Gregory (2002) ''Anti-Semitism and Schooling Under the Third Reich''. New York: Routledge. p. 14 {{isbn|9780815339434}}</ref> Günther became an epitome of corrupt and politicized pseudo-science in post-war Germany.<ref>Race, Color, Identity: Rethinking Discourses about "Jews" in the Twenty-first Century Efraim Sicher Berghahn Books,  2013</ref> Among the topics of his research were attempts to prove that Jews had an unpleasant "hereditary smell".<ref>Oisteanu, Andrei (2009) ''Inventing the Jew: Antisemitic Stereotypes in Romanian and Other Central-East European Cultures''. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press. p. 68 {{ISBN|9780803220980}}</ref> While one of the most prominent Nazi writers, Günther still was not considered the most "cutting edge" by Nazis.<ref>Steinweis, Alan E. (2006) ''Studying the Jew: Scholarly Antisemitism in Nazi Germany''. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, p. 26 {{ISBN|9780674022058}}</ref>
[[File:EuthanasiePropaganda.jpg|thumb|right|Propaganda for Nazi Germany's [[Aktion T4|T-4 Euthanasia Program]]: "This person suffering from hereditary defects costs the community {{Reichsmark|60,000|link=yes}} during his lifetime. Fellow German, that is your money, too." from the [[Office of Racial Policy]]'s [[Neues Volk]].]]
The July 1933 [[Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring]]—written by [[Ernst Rüdin]] and other theorists of "racial hygiene"—established "[[Hereditary Health Court|Genetic Health Courts]]" which decided on [[compulsory sterilization]] of "any person suffering from a hereditary disease." These included, for the Nazis, those suffering from "[[intellectual disability|Congenital Mental Deficiency]]", [[schizophrenia]], "[[Manic depression|Manic-Depressive Insanity]]", "[[Epilepsy|Hereditary Epilepsy]]", "[[Huntington's Chorea|Hereditary Chorea]]" (Huntington's), [[Blindness|Hereditary Blindness]], [[Deafness|Hereditary Deafness]], "any severe hereditary deformity", as well as "any person suffering from severe [[alcoholism]]".<ref>''The law for the prevention of hereditarily diseased offspring. (Approved translation of the "Gesetz zur Verhütung erbkranken Nachwuchses"). Enacted on July 14, 1933. Published by Reichsausschuss für Volksgesundheitsdienst.'' (Berlin: Reichsdruckerei, 1935). (Official translation of the law into English)</ref> Further modifications of the law enforced sterilization of the "[[Rhineland bastard]]s" (children of mixed German and African parentage).

The Nazi Party wanted to increase birthrates of those who were classified as racially elite. When the Party gained power in 1933, one of their first actions was to pass the Law for the Encouragement of Marriage. This law stated that all newly married couples of the Aryan race could receive a government loan. This loan was not simply paid back, rather a portion of it would be forgiven after the birth of each child. The purpose of this law was very clear and simple: to encourage newlyweds to have as many children as they could, so that the Aryan population would grow.<ref>Maynes, Mary Jo., and Ann Beth. Waltner (2012) ''"Powers of Life and Death": The Family: A World History'' Oxford: Oxford University Press. p. 103</ref>