Ostdeutsche (TNO:ANM)
Ostdeutsche | |
|---|---|
| Total population | |
| c. 4.31 million | |
| Languages | |
| German |
The Ostdeutsche, in English called East Germans, were the ethnic Germans and their descendants who migrated from Germany into the country's eastern colonial holdings as part of Generalplan Ost and the Drang nach Osten movement. The term was also used to describe Germans who resided in the territory of the former Soviet Union before World War II, including the Volga Germans and Black Sea Germans.
The Nazi Party intended to ethnically cleanse and replace the native populations of its newly acquired territories and colonies with German settlers through the Generalplan Ost. It was envisioned that the settling German population would eventually become a dominant majority in the regions settled; in reality, German colonization of most regions was unsuccessful, with only the Baltic region and Crimea seeing successes. Colonization programs continued up until the mid 1960s, when in the 1970s many German colonists were either recalled back to Germany or were resettled in the Baltics or in Gotenland. The Ostdeutsche today remain a sizable minority in countries such as the Ukraine and Lithuania.
Polish Ostdeutsche
The Polish Ostdeutsche can formally be divided into two groups: Germans who were settled in the conquered territories of the Second Polish Republic (such as the Reichsgau Danzig-West Prussia and Wartheland), and Germans who were settled in the territory of the General Government. Whereas the aforementioned regions were considered legally part of Germany and were integrated with the rest of the country, the General Government was intended first as an occupational authority for the nonexistent Polish state and secondly as a colony of Germany to be Germanized eventually.
Problems arose as a result of the incompetency of the Governor-General of the region, Hans Frank, in Germanizing Poland. Frank intentionally hid the fact that colonization attempts in the region were largely unsuccessful behind forged reports of successful Germanization. Documents would reveal that most of Poland remained un-Germanized, with only a significant minority scattered across urban areas and other regions.
The independence of Poland posed a serious threat to the plans of Germanization of the country; something which had been in progress since 1939. Albert Speer's rise to power as the dictator of Germany entailed a reshuffling of attitudes towards Poland in particular, with Germany opting to renegotiate Poland's status as a protectorate of the Reich with its German minority enjoying special protections in exchange for concessions to Poland. Following the end of German colonization programs in Poland, Germany's attitudes towards the Polish Ostdeutsche turned towards making the ethnic minority a fifth column, so that if Poland were to ever step out of line that they could use the Ostdeutsche as an excuse to invade and overthrow the government of Poland, or alternatively to serve as a sizable resistance movement.
The 1970s, with the democratization of Germany, entailed another policy reshuffle of Germany. Colonization attempts began to reverse with agreements between Germany and the nations of Eastern Europe. Germany signed an agreement with Poland for a population transfer between Germans in Poland and Poles that remained in Germany (most residing in Wartheland and the Weissberg Bezirk). Germany's reasoning behind this population transfer was rooted in a wish for the former western territories of Poland to be "as German as Berlin or Silesia", and to prevent irredentist claims of Poland on German territory. The result of these population transfers, which ended by the 1980s, was the transformation of regions such as Danzig-West Prussia and Wartheland from heterogenous regions into homogenous eastern terrtories of Germany. As many Polish Germans were recalled back to these aforementioned regions, many inhabitants of Danzig-West Prussia and Wartheland are either descendants of German colonists or were German colonists that were returned to Germany.
Gotenland Ostdeutsche
The Crimea and Tauria were seen as prime locations for German colonization by the Nazis, as Crimea was home to a large German minority and the Nazis believed that the Crimean Goths, supposedly descendants of the ancient Germanic Goths, had survived long enough to integrate themselves with the local German population. The Generalplan Ost called for the direct annexation of Tauria and Crimea to Germany, the deportation of its Slavic population and its repopulation by Germans. Gotenland, as the new territory was to be called, would go on to become Germany's most prestigious settler colony and among the most Germanized regions of Germany's eastern conquests. Gotenland to this day remains almost homogenously German, with a large Crimean Tatar population as well.
Russian Ostdeutsche
European Russia, like the rest of Germany's eastern Reichskommissariats, was intended to serve as a large colony that would be Germanized and settled. Germanization in certain parts of Russia, such as the region surrounding the former Volga Germany and Saint Petersburg, was markedly successful. In other regions under German control, German colonization was either aborted or was far too unprofitable for the government to promote due to the regional instability of the region. German colonization thus was concentrated around the Saint Petersburg region and greater Volga Germany.
The fate of the Russian Ostdeutsche was that of expulsion and flight when the Soviet Union invaded Muscovy and the Caucasus in the late 1970s. The German population in Russia, believed to have numbered in the 1 to 2 million range, was either expelled or fled westwards as Soviet armies advanced, both because of an order from retreating German authorities and because of propaganda of Soviet atrocities against Germans. This large refugee population emigrated and settled across Europe. Ingria Germans mostly settled in the neighboring Baltics, in the process displacing the native Baltic and Estonian populations, whilst many Volga Germans and other Germans residing in Russia migrated into the Ukraine; many in particular migrated to Gotenland. A minority resettled back in Germany.
The expulsion and flight of Germans from Russia is a cause for animosity between Germany and the Soviet Union.
Ukrainian Ostdeutsche
The Ukraine was historically home to a significant German minority, mostly within Volhynia and around the Black Sea. Like with many of the German minorities in the former Russian Empire, many Ukrainian Germans opted to migrate to the United States or elsewhere with mounting anti-German sentiment in Russia.
The conquest of the Ukraine by Germany in World War II resulted in a new colonization program as part of the Generalplan Ost. In places like Crimea, colonization was exceptionally successful, however as the Nazis intended for Ukraine to serve as a breadbasket to be exploited rather than as a settler colony like Ostland, German colonization remained limited. The Volhynia Germans and Black Sea Germans partially benefited from the racial hierarchy that the Nazis had established, but many of these Germans had emigrated elsewhere or had assimilated in with the local Russian or Ukrainian populations, dwindling their numbers.
The 1970s saw a "Heim ins Reich" movement conducted by Germany that called for groups like the Ukrainian Ostdeutsche to return to Germany. Most colonists in Ukraine opted against repatriation, choosing instead to remain in Ukraine. Ukraine today is still home to a significant German minority, but their numbers have been dwindling as communities either die off or migrate back to Germany. Of those who do migrate back to Germany, most have opted to move to Gotenland.