1938-40 - The Impact of the War Against Poland

Summary of the war against Poland

• September 1939

• The German conquest of Poland provided the regime with new territories in which Jews could be settled

• Also brought more Jews under Nazi rule

What the war against Poland provided the Nazi regime with

• A national emergency - enabled them to act with more dictatorial power and in greater secrecy

• A propaganda machine to bring about patriotism and hatred of Germany’s enemies

• New territories to the Reich under the expanding bureaucratic power of the SS

• A way for the Germanisation of the occupied territories in Poland and a ‘Jew-free’ Nazi empire

Changes made to Poland during the German war against them

• The country was split up into three separate areas

• Eastern Poland - occupied by USSR - in accordance with the Nazi-Soviet Pact in August 1939

• Western Poland - incorporated into the German Reich and placed under the rule of Nazi Gauleiters

• Remaining areas - became the ‘General Government’ of Poland - under Nazi Governor Hans Frank

• The Nazi master plan was to create a Lebensraum for ethnic Germans by driving Poles and Jews out of West Prussia and the Warthegau so that ‘empty’ lands could be completely ‘Germanised’

The ‘General Government’ of Poland

• The Nazis intended to use the General Government district as a dumping ground for Poles and Jews displaced from the areas that were to be colonised by ethnic Germans

• A reservation was established to contain the deported Poles and Jews

• The Nazis deliberately intended for the conditions in the reservation to be so bad that most of the people deported there would die

Nazi control of Jews after the war against Poland

• After the conquest of Poland, the number of Jews under Nazi control increased

• According to the official census in Poland in 1931, there were 3,115,000 Jews in Poland, of whom 61% were in the territory occupied by Germany at the end of 1939

Deportation of Jews out of Poland

• October 1939 - Muller instructed the head of the Central Agency for Jewish Emigration to arrange the deportation of 70,000-80,000 Jews from the district of Katowice in Germanised Poland

• At the same time, Hitler demanded the deportation of 300,000 Jews from Germany and the removal of all Jews from Vienna - would prove to be impossible to implement this order as problems of dealing with Jews already in Poland were so pressing

• Between November 1939 and Feb 1940, the SS attempted to deport 1 million people eastwards - 550,000 were Jews

• Transported to the General Government where they faced terrible conditions - authorities couldn’t cope with mass deportations

• Governor Hans Frank complained to his supervisors in Berlin that the General Government could not take any more Jews - led to the Madagascar Plan