Editing Volksdeutsche (section)

==Historical background==
{{See also|Ostsiedlung}}
[[File:Osadnictwo niemieckie na wschodzie.PNG|thumb|200px|Stages of [[History of German settlement in Central and Eastern Europe|German eastern settlement]], 700–1400]]
In the sixteenth century [[Vasili III of Russia|Vasili III]] invited small numbers of craftsmen, traders and professionals to settle in Russia from areas that would later become Germany so that Muscovy could exploit their skills. These settlers (many of whom intended to stay only temporarily) were generally confined to the [[German Quarter]] in [[Moscow]] (which also included Dutch, British and other western or northern European settlers whom the Russians came to indiscriminately refer to as "Germans"). They were only gradually allowed in other cities, so as to prevent the spread of alien ideas to the general population.{{citation needed|date=June 2016}}

In his youth, [[Peter I of Russia|Peter the Great]] spent much time in the 'German' quarter.  When he became Tsar, he brought more German experts (and other foreigners) into Russia, and particularly into government service, in his attempts to westernise the empire. He also brought in German engineers to supervise the construction of the new city of [[Saint Petersburg]].

[[Catherine II of Russia|Catherine the Great]], herself ethnically German, invited Germanic farmers to immigrate and settle in Russian lands along the [[Volga River]]. She guaranteed them the right to retain their language, religion and culture.

Also in other areas with an ethnic German minority people of other than German descent assimilated with the ethnic German culture and formed then a part of the minority. Examples are people of Baltic and Scandinavian descent, who assimilated into the minority of the [[Baltic Germans]]. Jews of [[Province of Posen|Posen province]], [[Galicia (Eastern Europe)|Galicia]], [[Bukovina]] and [[Bohemia]], with their [[Yiddish]] culture derived in part from their German heritage, often mingled into the ethnic German culture, thus forming part of the various ethnic German minorities. But anti-Semitic Nazis later rejected Jewish ethnic Germans and all Jewish German citizens as 'racially' German.

Ethnic Germans were also sent in organised colonisation attempts aiming at Germanisation of conquered Polish areas. [[Frederick the Great]] (reigned 1740–1786) settled around 300,000 colonists in the eastern provinces of Prussia, acquired in the [[First Partition of Poland]] of 1772, with the intention of replacing the Polish nobility.  He treated the Poles with contempt and likened the "slovenly Polish trash" in newly occupied West Prussia to [[Iroquois]], the historic [[Indigenous peoples of the Americas|Native American]] confederacy based in what is now the state of New York.<ref name="Ritter1974">{{Citation|last=Ritter|first=Gerhard|author-link=Gerhard Ritter|title=Frederick the Great: A Historical Profile|year=1974|publisher=University of California Press|location=Berkeley|isbn=0-520-02775-2|pages=[https://archive.org/details/stayawayjoenovel00cush/page/179 179–180]|quote=It has been estimated that during his reign 300,000 individuals settled in Prussia.... While the [[Prussian Settlement Commission]] established in the Bismarck era could in the course of two decades bring no more than 11,957 families to the eastern territories, Frederick settled a total of 57,475.... It increased the German character of the population in the monarchy's provinces to a very significant degree.... in West Prussia where he wished to drive out the Polish nobility and bring as many of their large estates as possible into German hands.|url=https://archive.org/details/stayawayjoenovel00cush/page/179}}
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"In fact from Hitler to Hans we find frequent references to Poles and Jews as Indians. This, too, was a long standing trope. It can be traced back to Frederick the Great, who likened the 'slovenly Polish trash' in newly' reconquered West Prussia to Iroquois". David Blackbourn, James N. Retallack, ''Localism, Landscape, and the Ambiguities of Place: German-speaking Central Europe, 1860–1930'', University of Toronto, 2007
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Prussia encouraged a second round of [[colonisation]] with the goal of Germanisation after 1832.<ref>Wielka historia Polski t. 4 Polska w czasach walk o niepodległość (1815&ndash;1864). Od niewoli do niepodległości (1864&ndash;1918) Marian Zagórniak, Józef Buszko 2003 p. 186</ref> Prussia passed laws to encourage Germanisation of the [[Prussian Partition]] including the provinces [[Province of Posen|of Posen]] and [[West Prussia]] in the late 19th century.  The Prussian Settlement Commission relocated 154,000 colonists, including locals.

===Treaty of Versailles===
{{Main|Treaty of Versailles}}
[[File:Deutsche Siedlungsgebiete in Osteuropa 1925.jpg|thumb|Distribution of the German population in 1910 on the map of countries existing in 1925 in Central and Eastern Europe]]
The [[Second Republic of Poland|reconstitution of Poland]] following the [[Treaty of Versailles]] (1919) made ethnic German minorities of some [[Provinces of Prussia|Prussian provinces]] of the [[German Empire]] citizens of the Polish [[nation state]]. Ethnic German inhabitants of provinces of the dissolved [[Austro-Hungarian Empire]], such as [[Bukovina Germans]], [[Danube Swabians]], [[Sudeten Germans]] and [[Transylvanian Saxons]], became citizens of newly established [[Slavs|Slavic]] or [[Hungarian people|Magyar]] nation-states and of Romania. Tensions between the new administration and the ethnic German minority arose in the [[Polish Corridor]]. The [[Austrians|Austrian Germans]] also found themselves not allowed to join Germany as [[German Austria]] was strictly forbidden to join [[Weimar Republic|Germany]] as well as the name "German Austria" was forbidden so the name was changed back to just "Austria" and the [[First Austrian Republic]] was created in 1919.