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| − | The '''racial policy of Nazi Germany''' is the set of policies and laws implemented by [[Nazi Germany]], asserting the superiority of the so-called "[[Aryan race]]," and based on a specific [[Nazism and race|racist doctrine]] which claimed [[scientific racism|scientific legitimacy]]. It was combined with a [[Nazi eugenics|eugenics programme]] that aimed to achieve "racial purity" of the "Aryan race" by using [[compulsory sterilizations]] and extermination of specific minorities, which eventually culminated in the [[Holocaust]]. The Nazi ideology and policies targeted, first of all, Jews, who were considered as the most "inferior races" of all on a hierarchy that included Jews at the bottom and the "Herrenvolk" (or "[[master race]]") of the "[[Volksgemeinschaft]]" (or "national community") at the top.
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| − | == Hitler and the origin of racial policy ideas ==
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| − | [[Scientific racism]] became popular at the end of the 19th century in Europe, and had a direct influence on the [[pan-Germanism]] movement, including the ''[[Alldeutscher Verband]]'' (Pangermanic League). [[Adolf Hitler]], who lived as a youth in [[Vienna]], administrated until 1910 by the [[anti-semitic]] mayor [[Karl Lueger]], admired the latter and was exposed to anti-Semitic and racially-charged books and literature. He developed these concepts in ''[[Mein Kampf]]'' (1925). He concluded that the Northern European peoples belonged to the "Aryan race", believed to be superior to all other ethnic groups and races. This belief system, fundamental to the Nazi ideology, held that "Aryans" had been responsible for all advances in civilization and morality in world history, and that Jews wanted to destroy it. Hitler also theorized the ''[[Lebensraum]]'' space, claiming that [[Eastern Europe]] should be submitted to the Reich in order to give "living space" for the expansion of the "Aryan race." This would be implemented during the war under the name of the [[Generalplan Ost]].
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| − | ==Racial policies regarding Jews between 1933 to 1940==
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| − | Between 1933 and 1934, Nazi policy was fairly moderate, not wishing to scare off voters or moderately-minded politicians (although the [[Nazi eugenics|eugenics]] program was established as soon as July 1933). The Nazi Party used popular anti-semitism to gain votes. [[Dolchstosslegende|They blamed poverty, unemployment, and the loss of World War I all on the Jews and the left-wing]]. German woes were attributed to the effects of the [[Treaty of Versailles]]. In 1933, persecution of the Jews became active Nazi policy. It only became worse with the years, culminating in the Holocaust, or so-called “Final Solution to the Jewish Problemâ€, which was decided by Hitler during [[World War II]] and officialized at the January 1942 [[Wannsee Conference]].
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| − | On [[April 1]], [[1933]], Jewish doctors, lawyers, police, teachers and stores were boycotted. Only six days later, the [[Law for the Restoration of the Professional Civil Service]] was passed, banning Jews from government jobs. It is notable that the proponents of this law, and the several thousand more that were to follow, most frequently explained them as necessary to prevent the infiltration of damaging, "alien-type" (Artfremd) hereditary traits into the German national or racial community (Volksgemeinschaft). <ref>Eric Ehrenreich, ''The Nazi Ancestral Proof'', 2007, pp.1, 165-167</ref> These laws meant that Jews were now indirectly and directly dissuaded or banned from privileged and superior positions reserved for “Aryan Germansâ€. From then on, Jews were forced to work at more menial positions, becoming [[second-class citizen]]s or to the point they are "illegally residing" in the German Reich.
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| − | The July 1933 [[Law for the Prevention of Hereditarily Diseased Offspring]], written by [[Ernst Rüdin]] and other theorists of "racial hygiene," established "Genetic Health Courts" which decided on [[compulsory sterilization]] of "any person suffering from a hereditary disease." These included, for the Nazis, those suffering from "[[Mental retardation|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 14th, 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).
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| − | After the [[Night of the Long Knives]] on June 30-July 1, 1934, during which the [[SS]] attacked the [[Sturmabteilung|SA]], considered by Hitler to be too “revolutionaryâ€, the SS became the dominant policing power in Germany. [[Heinrich Himmler]] was eager to please Hitler, and so willingly obeyed his orders. Since the SS had been Hitler's personal bodyguard, they were even more obedient and loyal to Hitler than the SA had been. They were also supported by the army, which was now more willing to comply with Hitler's decisions than when the SA had still existed.
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| − | On [[August 2]], [[1934]], President [[Paul von Hindenburg]] died. No new President was selected; instead the powers of the Chancellor and President were combined. This change, and a tame government with no opposition parties, allowed Hitler full control of law-making. The army also swore an oath of loyalty personally to the “[[Führer]]†(“Leaderâ€), giving [[Hitler]] complete power over the army. The Nazi ideologues would theorize the “[[Führerprinzip]]â€, which granted preeminence to Hitler’s words over the law. Hitler now had more direct control over the government and political attitude to Jews in Nazi Germany.
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| − | ===The Nuremberg Laws===
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| − | Between 1935 and 1936 persecution of the Jews increased apace while the process of "''[[Gleichschaltung]]''" (lit.: "standardisation", the process by which the Nazis achieved complete control over German society) was implemented. In May 1935, Jews were forbidden to join the [[Wehrmacht]] (the army), and in the summer of the same year, anti-semitic propaganda appeared in shops and restaurants. The Nuremberg Laws were passed around the time of the great Nazi rallies at Nuremberg; on [[September 15]] [[1935]] the "[[Law for the Protection of German Blood and Honor]]" was passed, preventing marriage between any Jew and [[Gentile]]. At the same time, the "[[Reich Citizenship Law]]" was passed and was reinforced in November by a decree, stating that all Jews, even quarter- and half-Jews, were no longer [[citizenship|citizens]] of their own country (their official title became "subjects of the state"). This meant that they were deprived of basic citizens' rights, e.g., the right to vote. This removal of citizens' rights was instrumental in the process of anti-semitic persecution: the process of [[denaturalization]] allowed the Nazis to exclude, [[de jure]], Jewish people from the “national community†(“Volksgemeinschaftâ€), thus granting judicial legitimacy to their persecution and opening the way to harsher laws and, eventually, extermination of the Jews. Philosopher [[Hannah Arendt]] had pointed out this important judicial aspect of the Holocaust in ''[[The Origins of Totalitarianism]]'' (1951), where she demonstrated that to violate [[human rights]], Nazi Germany first deprived human beings of their citizenship. Arendt underlined that in the [[Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen]], citizens’ rights actually preceded human rights, as the latter needed the protection of a determinate state to be actually respected.
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| − | The drafting of the Nuremberg Laws has often been attributed to [[Hans Globke]]. Globke had studied British attempts to 'order' its empire by creating hierarchical social orders, for example in the organization of “[[martial races]]†in India.
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| − | <!-- Image with inadequate rationale removed: [[Image:Einsatzgruppen Killing.jpg|left|thumb|200px|A member of ''[[Einsatzgruppe]] D'' murders a Jew who is kneeling before a filled mass grave in Vinnitsa, [[Ukraine]], in 1942. The back of the photo is inscribed "The last Jew in Vinnitsa".]] -->
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| − | In 1936, Jews were banned from all professional jobs, effectively preventing them from having any influence in education, politics, higher education, and industry. There was now nothing to stop the anti-Jewish actions that spread across the German economy.
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| − | Between 1937 and 1938, new laws were implemented, and the [[racial segregation|segregation]] of Jews from the “German Aryan†population was completed. In particular, Jews were punished financially for being Jewish.
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| − | On [[March 1]], [[1938]], government contracts could not be awarded to Jewish businesses. On September 30 of the same year, "Aryan" doctors could only treat "Aryan" patients. Provision of medical care to Jews was already hampered by the fact that Jews were banned from being doctors.
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| − | On August 17, Jews had to add "Israel"(males) or "Sarah" (females) to their names, and a large letter "J" was to be printed on their passports on October 5. On November 15, Jewish children were banned from going to public schools. By April 1939, nearly all Jewish companies had either collapsed under financial pressure and declining profits, or had been persuaded to sell out to the government, further reducing their rights as human beings; they were, in many ways, effectively separated from the German populace.
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| − | The increasingly [[totalitarian]] regime that Hitler imposed on Germany allowed him to control the actions of the SS and the army. On [[November 7]], [[1938]], a young Polish Jew named [[Herschel Grynszpan]] attacked and shot German diplomat [[Ernst vom Rath]] in the Nazi-German embassy in Paris over the treatment of his parents by the Nazi-Germans. [[Joseph Goebbels]] ordered retaliation. On the night of November 9 the SS conducted ''the Night of Broken Glass'' ("[[Kristallnacht]]"), in which the storefronts of Jewish shops and offices were smashed and vandalized. Approximately 100 Jews were killed, and another 20,000 sent to [[concentration camp]]s. Collectively, the Jews were made to pay back one billion RM in damages; the fine was collected by confiscating 20% of every Jew's property.
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| − | ===Jewish responses to the Nuremberg Laws===
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| − | [[Image:Jewish Children in Nazi Germany Exercise Class.jpg|thumb|220px|A Gymnastics lesson from 1936 in a Berlin Jewish school]]
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| − | After the promulgation of the Nuremberg Laws the Reichsvertretung* der Juden in Deutschland (Representation of the German Jews) announced the following:
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| − | <blockquote>
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| − | The Laws decided upon by the Reichstag in Nuremberg have come as the heaviest of blows for the Jews in [[Germany]]. But they must create a basis on which a tolerable relationship becomes possible between the German and the [[Jewish]] people. The [[Reichsvertretung der Juden]] in Deutschland is willing to contribute to this end with all its powers. A precondition for such a tolerable relationship is the hope that the Jews and Jewish communities of [[Germany]] will be enabled to keep a moral and economic means of existence by the halting of defamation and boycott.
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| − | The organization of the life of the Jews in Germany requires governmental recognition of an autonomous Jewish leadership. The Reichsvertretung der Juden in Deutschland is the agency competent to undertake this.
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| − | The most urgent tasks for the [[Reichsvertretung]], which it will press energetically and with full commitment, following the avenues it has previously taken, are:
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| − | Our own Jewish educational system must serve to prepare the youth to be upright Jews, secure in their faith, who will draw the strength to face the onerous demands which life will make on them from conscious solidarity with the Jewish community, from work for the Jewish present and faith in the Jewish future. In addition to transmitting knowledge, the Jewish schools must also serve in the systematic preparation for future occupations. With regard to preparation for emigration, particularly to [[Palestine]], emphasis will be placed on guidance toward manual work and the study of the [[Hebrew (language)|Hebrew]] language. The education and vocational training of girls must be directed to preparing them to carry out their responsibilities as upholders of the family and mothers of the next generation.
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| − | </blockquote>
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| − | ==Other "non-Aryans"==
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| − | Though the laws were primarily directed against Jews,<ref>[http://www.anti-racism.supanet.com/rac/concept.htm The Concept "Jew" in Nazi German "Race" Legislation]</ref> other "non-Aryan" people were subject to the laws, and to other legislation concerned with [[racial hygiene]]. The definition of "Aryan" was imprecise and ambiguous, but was clarified over time in a number of judicial and executive decisions. Jews were by definition non-Aryan, because of their [[Semitic]] origins, but most European peoples were automatically included under the definition of Aryan as "[[Indo-European people|Indo-European]]". The fact that Aryan is essentially a linguistic rather than a racial category led to some difficulty reconciling Nazi-supported racial typologies with the Aryan concept. There was some dispute about the position of the [[Roma people|Roma]], who were Indo-European in origin, speaking an [[Indo-Aryan language]]. However, they were thought to "share certain racial characteristics with Jews." <ref>Günther Lewy, ''The Nazi Persecution of the Gypsies'', 2000, p.141</ref> Roma were eventually declared to be non-Aryan, sometimes lower than Jews or more racially comparable to Africans, and the Nazis exterminated at least 200,000 Roma during [[Porrajmos]] (extermination of Gypsies). Non-Indo-European Africans and Asians were automatically excluded. In Africa, only the [[Berbers]] from North Africa, particularly the [[Kabyle people|Kabyles]], were classified as Aryans<ref>(a)"''The Berbers, among whom even today one finds light skins and blue eyes, do not go back to the Vandal invasions of the fifth century A.D., but to the prehistoric Atlantic Nordic human wave. The [[Kabyle people|Kabyle]] huntsmen, for example, are to no small degree still wholly Nordic (thus the blond Berbers in the region of Constantine form l0 % of the population; at Djebel Sheshor they are even more numerous).''", [[Alfred Rosenberg]], ''[[The Myth of the Twentieth Century]]'', 1930; (b) "''Among the Berbers, particularly the Kabyles in the Riff and in the Aures range, a Nordic strain shows itself clearly''", [[Hans F.K. Günther]], ''The racial elements of European History'', 1927</ref>. The Nazis portrayed [[Swedish people|Swedes]], the [[Afrikaaners]] who are white European descendants of Dutch-speaking Boers in [[South Africa]] and higher-degree Northern/Western Europeans of South America (Mainly from Uruguay, Brazil and Argentina) as ideal "Aryans" along with the German-speaking peoples of Germany, Austria and Switzerland (the country was neutral during the war).
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| − | ===German Mulattoes===
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| − | Of particular concern to the Nazi scientist [[Eugen Fischer]] were the "[[Rhineland Bastard]]s": mixed-race offspring of [[Senegalese]] soldiers who had been stationed in the Rhineland as part of the French army of occupation. He believed that these people should be [[Sterilization (surgical procedure)|sterilized]] in order to protect the racial purity of the German population. At least 400 mixed-race children were forcibly sterilized in the Rhineland by 1938. This order only applied in the Rhineland. Other African Germans were unaffected. Despite this policy there was never any systematic attempt to eliminate the (very small) black population in Germany, though mixed marriage and interracial sex was illegal. According to Susan Samples the Nazis went to great lengths to conceal their sterilization and abortion program in the Rhineland.<ref>Samples, S., "African Germans in the Third Reich", ''The African German Experience'', Carol Aisha Blackshire-Belay ed.</ref> [[Hans Massaquoi]] describes his experience as a half-African in Hamburg, unaware of the Rhineland sterilizations until long after the war.<ref>Massaquoi, Hans J., ''Destined to Witness: Growing Up Black in Nazi Germany'', Harper Perennial, 2001. He mistakenly states that they were later murdered in the Holocaust, p.2</ref>. Samples also points to the paradoxical fact that African-Germans actually had a better chance of surviving the war than the average German. They were excluded from military activity because of their non-Aryan status, but were not considered a threat and so were unlikely to be incarcerated. Samples and Massaquoi also note that African-Germans were not subjected to the segregation they would have experienced in the United States, nor excluded from facilities such as expensive hotels. However, both she and Massaquoi state that downed black American pilots were more likely to become victims of violence and murder from German citizens than were white pilots.{{Fact|date=August 2007}}
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| − | ===Other groups===
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| − | In Nazi-occupied countries throughout Europe, the Nazis encountered small [[ethnic Chinese|Chinese]], Southeast Asian (i.e. [[Vietnamese people|Vietnamese]]), [[North African]] and [[Latin American]] communities mostly made of hired workers and diplomats were classified as ''Untermenschen'' ("inferior peoples"). The racial restrictions were relaxed for [[Waffen-SS]] soldiers to the extent that [[Turkic peoples|Turkic]] [[Tatar]], or [[Mongol]] [[Kalmyk]] (from occupied USSR) units were recruited. A similar formation was the [[India]]n [[Indische Freiwilligen-Legion Regiment 950]]. However, the Nazis' alliance with a non-European country: [[Imperial Japan]] meant at the time, about 10,000 [[Japanese people|Japanese]] nationals (mostly diplomats and military officials) residing in Germany were given "Honorary Aryan" citizenship with more privileges than any other "non-Aryan" ethnonational group. {{Fact|date=October 2008}}
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| − | In [[Occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany|Norway]], the Nazis favored marriages between Germans and Norwegians, in an attempt to spawn a new “Aryan†generation of Nordics. Around 10,000 to 12,000 [[war children]] (''Krigens Barn'') were born from these unions during the war. Some of them were separated from their mothers and cared for in so-called "''[[Lebensborn]]''" clinics ("Fountain of Life" clinics).<ref> [[BBC]], 4 February 2003, [http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/correspondent/729902.stm Norway's Nazi legacy] {{en icon}}</ref><ref> [[Le Figaro]], 8 March 2007, [http://www.lefigaro.fr/international/20070308.WWW000000487_les_enfants_des_nazis_trainent_la_norvege_devant_les_tribunaux.html Les enfants des nazis traînent la Norvège devant les tribunaux] (Children of Nazis bring Norway before the Courts) {{fr icon}} </ref>
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| − | ==Policies regarding Slavs==
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| − | [[Generalplan Ost]] (GPO) was a Nazi plan to realize [[Hitler]]'s "new order of ethnographical relations" in the territories occupied by [[Germany]] in [[Eastern Europe]] during [[World War II]]. It was prepared in 1941 and confirmed in 1942. The plan was part of Hitler's own [[Lebensraum]] plan and a fulfilment of the [[Drang nach Osten]] ("Drive towards the East") state ideology. The final version of Generalplan Ost, essentially a grand plan for [[ethnic cleansing]], was divided into two parts; the ''Kleine Planung'' ("Small Plan"), which covered actions which were to be taken during the war, and the ''Grosse Planung'' ("Big Plan"), which covered actions to be undertaken after the war was won (to be carried into effect gradually over a period of 25-30 years). The Small Plan was to be put into practice as the Germans conquered the areas to the east of their pre-war borders. The individual stages of this plan would then be worked out in greater detail. In this way the plan for [[Poland]] was drawn up at the end of November, 1939. The plan envisaged differing percentages of the various conquered nations undergoing [[Germanisation]], expulsion into the depths of [[Russia]], and other fates, the net effect of which would be to ensure that the conquered territories would be Germanized.
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| − | A Russian historian Vadim Erlikman has detailed Soviet losses totaling 26.5 million war related deaths. Military losses of 10.6 million include 7.6 million killed or missing in action and 2.6 million [[POW]] dead, plus 400,000 paramilitary and Soviet [[Soviet partisans|partisan]] losses. Civilian deaths totaled 15.9 million which included 1.5 million from military actions; 7.1 million victims of Nazi [[genocide]] and reprisals; 1.8 million deported to Germany for [[forced labor]]; and 5.5 million [[famine]] and [[disease]] deaths. Additional famine deaths which totaled 1 million during 1946-47 are not included here. The official [[Poland|Polish]] government report of war losses prepared in 1947 reported 6,028,000 war victims out of a population of 27,007,000 ethnic [[Poles]] and [[Jews]]; this report excluded ethnic [[Ukrainians|Ukrainian]] and [[Belarusians|Belarusian]] losses.
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| − | In addition to the forces of the Slavic countries allied to Germany or its puppet states during WWII, hundreds of thousands{{Fact|date=July 2008}} of Slavs were recruited to serve in the Nazi police and military forces, including several Slavic (that is Belarussian, Bosnian, Croatian, Russian and Ukrainian) ethnic [[Waffen-SS divisions]]. Many of these forces participated in the Third Reich's genocidal activities, including killings of the fellow Slavic [[non-combatant]]s.
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| − | Interestingly, in the spring of 1943, the [[Mufti]] of [[Jerusalem]], [[Mohammad Amin al-Husayni#Recruitment|Mohammad Amin al-Husayni]]<ref>"''With his blond hair and blue eyes, he gives one the impression he is a man with more than one Aryan among his ancestors and one who may well be descended from the best Roman stock''", Adolf Hitler, ''Hitler's Table Talk 1941-1944'', Enigma Books, 2000, p.547</ref>, was recruited by the [[Nazis]] to assist in the organization and recruitment of Bosniaks or slavic muslims into several divisions of the SS Waffen and other units in Yugoslavia. He was successful in convincing the Bosniaks to go against the declarations of the [[Sarajevo]], [[Mostar]], and [[Banja Luka]] Clerics, who had since 1941, forbidden [[Bosniaks|Bosnian Muslims]] to collaborate with Croat-Nazis ([[Ustashe]]).[citation needed]
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| − | ==Germanization between 1939 and 1945==
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| − | Nazi policy stressed the superiority of the [[Nordic race]], a sub-section of the [[White people|white]] European population defined by [[anthropometric]] models of racial difference. From 1940 the [[General Government]] in occupied Poland divided the population into different groups. Each group had different rights, food rations, allowed strips in the cities, separated residential areas, special schooling systems, public transportation and restricted restaurants. Later adapted in all Nazi-occupied countries by 1942, the Germanization program used the racial caste system of reserving certain rights to one group and barred privileges to another. In addition with their predominant religion and ethnicity per individual of that ethnic group or nationality. Listed from the most privileged to the least:{{Fact|date=August 2007}}
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| − | *Germans from Germany (''Reichdeutsche'') - Nordic Germans are said most favorable, but all German citizens are in the top category.
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| − | *Germans from outside, active ethnic Germans, honorary "Aryans" from axis European countries in [[Volksliste]] category 1 and 2 (see [[Volksdeutsche]]).
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| − | *Germans from outside, passive Germans and members of families, handicapped, political dissidents, common criminals in Volksliste category 3 and 4.
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| − | *Other Germanic peoples closely related to Germans (Norwegians, Danes, English, Swedes, and Dutch) but treated as categories 1 and 2 in most privileges, especially pro-Nazi sympathizers. Until 1942, the Greeks were included in this category by virtue of their being descendants of the ancient Greeks.
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| − | *Italians (particularly from regions North of Rome, e.g. Tuscany, Lombardy, etc.), Spaniards (particularly Basques) and Portuguese were treated as category 1 and 2, especially pro-Nazi sympathizers (e.g. [[Fascist Italy]] and [[Spain under Franco|Francoist Spain]] diplomats). Some Southern Italians were treated as least (Suspicion of [[miscegenation]] with African and Semitic peoples), but within the same category. The Greeks are included in this category after 1943, due to their strong anti-Nazi resistance movement.
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| − | *Britons from the British islands. Includes Irish, Scots and Welsh (The English would be treated as Germanic people).
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| − | *French people in France (except German speaking Alsatians, and pro-Nazi French supporters in categories 1 and 2).
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| − | *Highlanders (''[[Goralenvolk]]''): an attempt to split the Polish nation by using local collaborators.
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| − | *Hungarians (despite their non [[Indo-European]] origins), as well as Estonians, Finns, and Baltic peoples (Lithuanians and Latvians).
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| − | *Poles, Czechs and Slovaks (from [[West Slavic]]) group, and Croats and Slovenes (from South Slavic group) were considered to be much more 'Europeanized' than their easterns counterparts).
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| − | *Ukrainians, Russians, Belarusians (from [[East Slavic]] group), Serbs, Slavic Muslims, Bulgarians, Romanians, Macedonians, Turks and Albanians
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| − | Enemy nationals who happened to fall under the white "Aryan" racial category (i.e. [[the United States of America]] and [[Canada]]), but were living in Germany at the time, were treated with suspicion by legal restrictions. But enemy nationals of non-European "Aryan" racial categories (i.e. [[Ethiopia]] and [[Mexico]]) are treated much differently. {{Fact|date=February 2008}}
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| − | The categories of "races" deemed unworthy and subject to discrimination.
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| − | *Jews-divided into various degrees of religious denomination, ''Mischlinge'' or of half/part-Jewish ancestries (esp. of one Jewish parent, highly illegal under the race laws) and ''Rassenschande'' or "Aryan" Germans found as converts into Judaism.
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| − | *"''[[Untermenschen]]"'' (lit. "Under-human"). It included the Gypsies/Roma, also subject to extermination during ''Porrajmos''. Includes minuscule numbers of darker-skinned German nationals: non-whites from colonial African, Middle Eastern, Asiatic and Latin American origin - if of evident non-European ancestries, residing in Germany at the time. Homosexuals and disabled people (based on physical and mental illnesses) were also considered to be part of this category, and subject to eugenics policies, including compulsory sterilization, internment and deportation. Also non Slavic Russians (i.e of Turkic/Caucasian/Central Asian and Siberian/East Asian origins) were listed.
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| − | Nordicist anthropometrics was used to "improve" the racial make-up of the Germanised section of the population, by absorbing individuals into the German population who were deemed suitably Nordic.<ref>[http://www.dac.neu.edu/holocaust/Hitlers_Plans.htm Hitler's plans for the East]</ref>
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| − | Germanization also affected the [[Sorbs]]{{Fact|date=August 2007}}, the minority Slav community living in [[Saxony]] and [[Brandenburg]], whose Slavic culture and language was suppressed to absorb them into German identity. Tens of thousands suffered internment and imprisonment, as well to become lesser-known victims of Nazi racial laws.
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| − | ==References==
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| − | {{reflist}}
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| − | ==Bibliography==
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| − | *[[Yehuda Bauer|Bauer, Yehuda]] ''A History Of The Holocaust'', New York : F. Watts, 1982 ISBN 0-531-09862-1.
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| − | *Burleigh, Michael & Wippermann, Wolfgang ''The Racial State : Germany 1933-1945'', Cambridge : Cambridge University Press, 1991 ISBN 0-521-39114-8.
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| − | *Ehrenreich, Eric. ''The Nazi Ancestral Proof: Genealogy, Racial Science, and the Final Solution''. Bloomington, IN: Indiana University Press, 2007. ISBN 978-0-253-34945-3
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| − | *[[Saul Friedländer|Friedländer, Saul]] ''Nazi Germany and the Jews Volume 1 The Years of Persecution, 1933-1939'', New York : HarperCollins, 1997 ISBN 0-06-019042-6
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| − | *[[Detlev Peukert|Peukert, Detlev]] ''Inside Nazi Germany : conformity, opposition and racism in everyday life'' London : Batsford, 1987 ISBN 0-7134-5217-X.
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| − | ==External links==
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| − | * [http://www.mtsu.edu/~baustin/nurmlaw3.html Nazi Racial Laws in English translation]
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| − | * [http://www.shoa.de/nuernberger_rassengesetze_texte.html Nazi Racial Laws in the German original]
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| − | [[Category:Nazi Germany]]
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