AI
Operations Blue 1942 German Offensive Eastern Europe
Weaponized abortion. Depopulation agenda. Sounds a lot like Sanger and planned Parenthood if you read both closely
(If you want more of the history read it on the link to which I'm responding)
Inside Germany
Within Germany itself, Hitler had long advocated government- funded birth control to weed out the 'unfit.' In his 1924 Mein Kampf, Hitler wrote that one of the seven major responsibilities of government was, "to maintain the practice of modern birth control. No diseased or weak person should be allowed to have children."[32]
On subjects such as eugenics, sterilization, and abortion, Nazi ideology had much in common with the leftist birth control and sex-reform groups of the era (British and American as well as German). As Anita Grossman notes, "The stress on eugenics and race hygiene was typical of the sex- reform groups and suggests a complex ambivalent relationship between right-wing nationalist population policy and leftist sex reform."[33]
Grossman points out that during 1931 the Hamburg RV (a sex-reform group closely associated with the Social Democratic Party) held a series of lectures on subjects such as "Introduction to Population Politics," "Race Theory, Eugenics, and Sterilization," and "The Elimination of Unfit Life." (The latter refers to legalized killing of retarded, senile and mentally-ill people.)
Once in power, Hitler quickly acted to reduce the birth rates of the genetically 'unfit' (including, of course, the Jews). Sterilization came first with the Law for the Prevention of Progeny with Hereditary Diseases issued on 14 July 1933.34 During the Nazi regime between 320,000 and 350,000 people would be sterilized with at least 100 people, mostly women, dying during the procedure.[35]
Abortion came next. In September of 1934 Hitler told Dr. Wagner, Reich Physicians' Leader, that "pregnancies could be terminated in the case of hereditary ill women, or women who had become pregnant by a hereditary ill partner."[36] Formal legalization came a year later on 26 June 1935 with an amendment legalizing abortion up to viability. It was signed by Hitler and included the following two clauses:
If, by virtue of the law, a Hereditary Health Court has decided upon the sterilisation of a woman who is pregnant at the time the operation is carried out, the pregnancy may be terminated, with the consent of the woman concerned, unless the foetus is already capable of independent life, or unless the termination of the pregnancy entails a serious danger to either the life or health of the woman herself. The foetus is to be regarded as being incapable of independent life if the termination takes place before the completion of the sixth month of pregnancy.[37]
Ironically, harsh as they were, the Nazi programs were far less harsh than those advocated by birth control groups in Western democracies. The reason was simple. The fighting and deaths of World War I had resulted in a German 'birth dearth' of some 3-4 million. Coming twenty years after the end of that war, Germany entered World War II underpopulated and desperately short of young men. Whatever the Nazis might claim, they could not afford to be choosy about their births. Strange as it sounds, Hitler was more tolerant of human imperfection than many American, British and German birth controllers and more optimistic about the ability of environment to alter hereditary. Hitler reflected this greater tolerance in a conversation on the evening of 29 August 1942 at which he said:
Have things changed much to-day, I wonder? I am not sure, and many of the things I see around me incline me to the opinion that they have not. I was shown a questionnaire drawn up by the Ministry of the Interior, which it was proposed to put to people whom it was deemed desirable to sterilise. At least three-quarters of the questions asked would have defeated by own good mother. One I recall was: "why does a ship made of steel float in the water?" If this system had been introduced before my birth, I am pretty sure I should never have been born at all! [38]
As a result, Nazi eugenics stressed quantity as much as quality and was actually less discriminatory than the eugenics advocated by affluent, educated American birth controllers. This relatively greater tolerance upset American birth control groups who had initially been excited by what was happening in Germany. For instance, in 1940, Woodbridge Morris, General Director of the Birth Control Federation of America, criticized Germany noting, "We, too, recognize the problem of race building, but our concern is with the quality of our people, not with their quantity alone."[39]
Because of the need for soldiers and workers, within Germany, 'negative eugenic' programs were paralleled by positive programs encouraging births among the 'fit.' Laws limited access to birth control and tightened the punishment for abortion among the racially wanted. As Germany conquered other countries, similar positive programs were developed for 'racially valuable' groups in Nordic and Baltic regions.[40] Groups who were not considered Germanic were targeted with only negative programs.
The positive programs at home, along with the need to keep secret why Germany was so eager to help Slavs and other minorities limit births, created confusion about Nazi policy. That confusion led to Hitler's remark about "shooting up" anyone who tried to ban abortions in the Ukraine. For instance, in the Spring of 1942, SS Reichsfuhrer Himmler had to get the chief of German police in Poland, SS-General Krueger, to intervene so the courts would no longer punished Poles for having abortions. Similar court behavior in Byelorussia led SS-General Berger to remark that some administrators, "have no idea what the German Eastern policy really means."[41]
Hitler's Own View
Within Germany, the Nazis claimed their programs were for the "protection of motherhood." Their real purpose, however, was to increase the German population and thus strengthen the country's military and economic power. The idea of individual rights were as irrelevant here as anywhere else in the Nazi dictatorship. Hitler believed rights belong only to those strong enough to defend them. The weak or small and powerless had no 'inalienable' right to life. In Mein Kampf he wrote of those with incurable diseases:
If the power to fight for one's own health is no longer present, the right to live in this world of struggle ends. The world belongs only to the forceful 'whole' man and not to the weak 'half' man.[42]
Because of this crude Social Darwinianism, Hitler felt abortions by the 'racially valuable' were acceptable for social problems or to prevent family embarrassment. On 5 November 1941, Hitler told several people that he felt the penal system made a mistake exposing young men from "respectable families" to "living communally with creatures who are utterly rotten."[43]
To prove his point, Hitler told of a young man who had been in the prison with him after the failed 1923 Beer Hall Putsch. Earlier this young man had "fruitful relations with a girl" and "advised her to go to an abortionist. For that he was given a sentence of eight months." Hitler felt the "disgrace" that the family "could never outlive" was far too harsh. According to Hitler, such a "nice boy" should simply get a "sound licking."
Hitler ideas about sex were also quite liberal. He felt that homosexuality was a private, personal matter and no concern of society. It was Ernst Rohm, a homosexual, who "more than any other one man, was responsible for launching Hitler . . . into German politics."[44] One historian noted:
Hitler knew all about Rohm's tendencies but insisted that they were his own affair. When Rohm took on his job as Chief of Staff of the SA, Hitler, who was still officially head of the SA, issued a parting order that the SA was "not a girls' finishing school, but a tough fighting formation." Complaints about people's private habits he rejected "indignantly and on principle" as "supposition" and "entirely private matters." [45]
Germany During the War
During the war Nazis brought millions of foreigners to Germany to work in factories and on farms. Many of these so- called 'guest workers' were women who became pregnant. In their home countries abortions were legal and encouraged by the Nazi occupation. Within Germany, however, abortion was generally illegal except for Jews and those with what were thought to be hereditary diseases.
In the spring and summer of 1943 and under great secrecy, German authorities legalized abortion on demand up to viability for these women.[46] The fact that these women were typically sent to university clinics or schools of midwifery and used to train students suggests that in the future the authorities intended to make abortion more widely available. Of course, even here racial thinking intervened. Women who appeared to be "of German or related blood" and who made "a good racial impression" could be denied an abortion.[47]
Abortion legalization occurred in the opposite order as the territories, first for female Eastern workers and later for Polish women. A captured Nazi document describes the steps:
The Reich Leader of Public Health [Conti], in a directive of 11 March 1943, decreed that pregnancy of female Eastern workers may be interrupted at will. The Reich Leader SS [Himmler], with regard hereto, on 9 June 1943, issued a decree of implementation proceedings and extended this decree as of 1 August 1943 also to interruptions of pregnancy for female Poles.[48]
As in the occupied territories, the campaign was backed by propaganda stressing the disadvantages of having children. Emphasis was placed on separating the working mother from her child soon after birth to make motherhood less rewarding.[49]
Extending legalized abortion inside Germany created controversies within German medicine. A secret police report dated 25 October 1943 described objections to the new abortion policy by physicians.
Some physicians (mostly Catholic) protested "that the decree was not in accordance with the moral obligation of a physician to preserve life" and stressed that medicine did not permit making distinctions based on nationality.
On the other hand, many "politically sound" physicians, while recognizing "racial. . . considerations" still felt the policy was a "very dangerous experiment." They pointed out that "if the decree becomes known. . . encouragement will be given to. . . abortions" by Germans themselves.[50] The latter indicates that, whatever the law, abortion was available for Germany's healthy blond Aryans.
Bringing to Justice
Hitler clung to his plan for 'living space' in the East until his suicide in a Berlin bunker with Russian soldiers only a few blocks away. On 29 April 1945 in his last message to the chief of the German general staff, Keitel, he stressed, "the aim must still be to win territory in the East for the German people."
After the war, the Nuremberg Trials brought to justice many of those involved in Nazi crimes against humanity. Because SS Reichfuhrer Heinrich Himmler committed suicide, no one involved in RKFDV's population control program was tried when the International Military Tribunal judged top Nazi leaders.
Between October 1947 and March 1948, however, the U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg did try the leadership of the RKFDV in its Case 8. Among the charges was one that "protection of the law was denied to the unborn children of the Russian and Polish women in Nazi Germany. Abortions were encouraged and even forced on these women."[51]
The defense argued that abortions had not been coerced. While this was true in general, among the Nazi documents was one that said:
It is known that racially inferior offspring of Eastern workers and Poles is to be avoided if at all possible. Although pregnancy interruptions ought to be carried out on a voluntary basis only, pressure is to be applied in each of these cases.[52]
One defendant was SS Lieutenant General Richard Hildebrandt, Chief of the RKFDV's Race and Settlement Main Office in Berlin. Under direct examination by his attorney, he protested that, "Up to now nobody had the idea to see in this interruption of pregnancy a crime against humanity." His protest had no effect. In this area like many others the Nuremberg Trials broke new ground and he was given a 25-year sentence.[53]
Other sentences ranged from a life sentence given Ulrich Griefelt, the chief executive officer of the RKFDV, to the ten years given Fritz Schwalm, the officer responsible for racial examinations to determine if a woman had an abortion.
Sometimes justice was a long time being served. In Jerusalem during December of 1961, Adolf Eichmann was convicted of four counts of crimes "against the Jewish people." One count was "directing that births be banned and pregnancies interrupted among Jewish women" at the Theresienstadt concentration camp.[54]
Genocide Convention
After the war, worldwide condemnation of Nazi behavior led to the definition of a new crime under international law, the crime of genocide. Article II of the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide" defines genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical [ethnic], racial, or religious group."
Based on the Nazi experience, Article II further defines as a genocidal act "imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group."[55] Nazi policies in Eastern Europe provide the historical context for that part of the Convention. Any nation, organization or individual using similar tactics is guilty of genocide under international law. Even more important, any individual participating in such activities can be tried for 'crimes against humanity' even if such actions were legal in the country where they occurred. In the United States the Genocide Treaty applies with particular force. Now that it has been ratified by the Senate, the treaty carries the same legal authority as the Constitution and overrides as other laws and court decisions. Anyone participating in such activity can be prosecuted for genocide.
Summary
Nazi population policy can be summarized in the following way:
o Medical and legal policies on contraceptives, abortion, and child-rearing were designed to reduce the birthrate of unwanted groups. Contraceptives were freely available and often supplied without charge. Abortion was made legal, safe, and conveniently available through special clinics or local physicians. Mothers were expected to work and were deliberately separated from their children at an early age to make motherhood less meaningful.
o For non-Jews, population control appeared voluntary, but coercion was always present at least to the extent that avoiding birth was made easier than childbearing. For those living under difficult conditions, that is enough to constitute coercion. For Jews sterilization and abortions were often forced. o The media cooperated by stressing the personal disadvantages of having children and telling how childbirth could be avoided by birth control and abortion. Pornography and sex without children (including homosexuality) were promoted to weaken the family, distract from political resistance, and destroy spiritual values. o Much like the Holocaust, the real purpose of these policies-reducing the population of unwanted groups-was kept a closely guarded secret. This sometimes lead to conflict between those who set up the policies and those who carried them out without knowing their purpose. After the war, Nazi population policies in Eastern Europe led to the recognition of a new crime under international law, the crime of genocide. References:
[1] Alexander Dallin, German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945 (London, 1957), 141f. Clarissa Henry and Marc Hillel, _Of Pure Blood_, Trans. Eric Mossbacher (New York, 1976), 148. Ihor Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum Policy in Eastern Europe During World War II" (Ph.D. dissertation, Univ. of Ill., 1957) (Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilm, # 25,236), 172-73, Ihor Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans for Eastern Europe_ (New York, 1961), 143, Joachim C. Fest, _Hitler_ (New York, 1975), 683-84.
[2] Nora Levin, The Holocaust (New York, 1973), 232-33.
[3] Jochen von Lang with Claus Sibyll, _The Secretary_, Trans. Christa Armstrong and Peter White, (New York, 1979), 209-11, David Irving, Hitler's War (New York, 1977), 402-03 Robert L. Koehl, _RKFDV: German Resettlement and Population Policy 1939-1945_ (Cambridge, 1957), 227. For a book-length treatment see: Dallin, _German Rule_.
[4] Dallin, _German Rule_, 141.
[5] Leon Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_ (Syracuse, NY, 1954), 272-74. _Nuremberg_: NO-1878. Dallin, _German Rule_, 457. German text in Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans_, 197-99.
[6] For more on RKFDV see: Koehl, _RKFDV_, Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans_, Michael R. Marrus, _The Unwanted: European Refugees in the Twentieth Century_ (New York, 1985), 219-227. Anna Bramwel, _Blood and Soil_ (Abbotsbrooke, England, 1985), 146f.
[7] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 171.
[8] Raul Hilberg, _The Destruction of European Jews_ (Chicago, 1961), 642. _Nuremberg_: NG-844.
[9] Dallin, German Rule, 457.
[10] Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_, 272-74. _Nuremberg_: NG-2325.
[11] _Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals_ [Called _NMT_ below] (Washington, 1949-54) V:109. Russian physicians were familiar with changing abortion laws. In November 1920 Lenin legalized abortion on demand. In 1936, as war tensions grew, Stalin had abortion declared illegal. see Edward H. Carr. _Socialism in One Country_, 1924-26, 3 vols. (London, 1958), I:28-29, 33. Richard Stites, _The Women's Liberation Movement in Russia_ (Princeton, 1975), 264-65, 355, 385-88, 403-05.
[12] _NMT_ , IV:1122. _Nuremberg_: NO-5311.
[13] Kamenetsky, Secret Nazi Plans, 114.
[14] Jan Karski, _Story of a Secret State_ (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1944), 307. See also p. 243.
[15] Dallin, _German Rule_, 458. The cooperation of a "newsman" is not surprising. Unlike the churches or the military, very few members of the German news media belonged to the anti-Nazi resistance
[16] Graupe, Heinz Moshe. _The Rise of Modern Judaism, An Intellectual History of German Jewry 1650-1942_. Huntington, NY: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Co., 1978, 92. Frederick the Great was also hostile to historic Christianity.
[17] Wallace R. Deuel, _People Under Hitler_, (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1942), 189-190. The figures in the next paragraph come from the same source.
[18] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123. See also: Gitta Sereny, _Into That Darkness_, (New York: McGraw Hill, 1974), 62.
[19] Leon Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_, (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1954), 192.
[20] Gerald Reitlinger, _The Final Solution_, 2nd ed. (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1961), 188-189. See also: Nira Feldman, "Concentration and Extermination Camps," _Holocaust_, (Jerusalem: Keter Publ. House, 1974), 88. Originally published in the _Encyclopedia Judaica_.
[21] Christopher Thorne, _Allies of a Kind_ (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 158-159.
[22] Eugen Kogon, _The Theory and Practice of Hell_, (New York: Berkley Books, n.d.), trans. by Heinz Norden, 168.
[23] Yad Vashem, _Documents of the Holocaust_, (Jerusalem: Ktav Publishing House, 1981), 350. From R. Hoss, _Commandant of Auschwitz-The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoss_, (London, 1961), 206-208.
[24] Yad Vashem, _Documents of the Holocaust_, (Jerusalem, 1981), 401.
[25] _Documents of the Holocaust_, 451.
[26] Nira Feldman, ``Concentration and Extermination Camps,'' in _Holocaust_, (Jerusalem, 1974), 84-85.
[27] Hermann Rauschning, _The Voice of Destruction_ (New York, 1940), 34-38. Joseph B. Schechtman, _European Population Transfers, 1939-1945_ (New York, 1946), 266, 296. For Nazi agriculture policy see: _Blood and Soil_, 63f. In the early twenties Hitler had been undecided as to whether Germany should ally itself with Britain and take land from Russia or ally itself with Russia and build up its world trade. For a discussion of how Hitler's ideas developed see: Eberhard Jackel, _Hitler's Weltanschauung_ Trans. Herbert Arnold, (Middletown, CN: Wesleyan University Press, 1972), 32f. Secrecy was needed, not to protect the basic idea that Germany intended to conquer the countries to its east, as Hitler had published a pamphlet on that subject as early as 1926 and in the second volume of _Mein Kampf_. The secrecy was to conceal the fact that Hitler's plans were real and not, as some thought, mere political posturing. Also in his public statements of the twenties Hitler appeared to ignore the fact that Eastern Europe was already populated (_Weltanschauung_, 42f). During the thirties, "depopulation" policies would be developed and those had to remain secret even after the war began and the territiories were taken. One author thinks Alfred Rosenberg developed the details of this policy. See: Louis Leo Snyder, _Hitlerism, The Iron Fist in Germany_ (New York: Mohawk Press, 1932), 145.
[28] Rauschning, _The Voice_, 137-8. See also: Adolf Hitler, _My New Order_, Ed. Raoul de Roussy de Sales, (New York: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1941), 619. It was Georges Clemenceau, the French premier, who talked of "twenty million Germans too many."
[29] Hitler, _My New Order_, 400. See also: Adolf Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk_, 1941-44 Transl. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1953), 261-262.
[30] Hitler, _My New Order_, 401.
[31] Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk_, 1941-44, 697. Kamenetsky,_Secret Nazi Plans_, 80.
[32] Louis L. Snyder ed., _Hitler's Third Reich: A Documentary History_ (Chicago, 1981), 46. Adolf Hitler, _Mein Kampf_, Trans. Ralph Manheim (Boston, 1943), 255, 402-05.
[33] Anita Grossman, "`Satisfaction is Domestic Happiness': Mass Working Class Sex Reform Organizations in the Weimar Republic" in Michael Dobkowski and Isidor Wallimann, Ed. _Towards the Holocaust: The Social and Economic Collapse of the Weimar Republic_ (Westport, CN, 1983), 271. For parallels with the American birth control movement see: M W. Perry, "How Planned Parenthood Got Its Name." _International Review of Natural Family Planning_ X:3 (Fall 1986): 234-42. For a political analysis of those parallels see: M. W. Perry, ``The Sound of the Machine.'' _The Freeman_. July 1988, 257-262.
[34] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany_ 1933-1945 (Cambridge, 1991), 136.
[35] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany 1933-1945_ (Cambridge, 1991), 138. Other estimates run as high as 400,000. See: Robert Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 108.
[36] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany 1933-1945_ (Cambridge, 1991), 140. Oddly, the book's index makes no mention of this lengthy and detailed discussion of abortion legalization even though it includes a mere passing reference to abortion as a valid cause for divorce on page 253.
[37] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany_ 1933-1945 (Cambridge, 1991), 140-141.
[38] Adolf Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk, 1941-44_ Transl. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1953), 674-675.
[39] _Birth Control Review_, XXIV:3 (January, 1940), 38. In 1942 this organization became the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
[40] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 175. _NMT_, IV:1077-79. _Nuremberg_: NO-1803, NO-3520.
[41] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 173. From Himmler's File #1302, Folder H. 11; _Nuremberg_: NO-3134.
[42] Hitler, _Mein Kampf_, 257.
[43] _Hitler's Table Talk, 1941-44_, Trans. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London, n.d.), 112-13.
[44] Heinz Hohne, _The Order of the Death's Head, The Story of Hitler's S.S._ Trans. Richard Barry, (New York: 1966, 1967), 17. [45] Hohne, _The Order_, 81.
[46] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123, 366.
[47] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123.
[48] _NMT_, IV:1082. _Nuremberg_: 1753-PS, NO-3250 (Eastern workers), NO-1384 (Polish women).
[49] _NMT_, IV:1122-27. _Nuremberg_: NO-5311.
[50] _NMT_, IV:1081-84. _Nuremberg_: NO-3512.
[51] _NMT_, IV:1077.
[52] _NMT_, V:112. A German military report of 13 July 1943 referred to "an intensification of countermeasures" against Ukrainians including the "forcible abortion of pregnant women." In William Manchester, The Arms of Krupp (New York, 1964, 1965, 1968), 486. Some forced abortions were probably to punish women who became pregnant to avoid forced labor in Germany. See Dallin, _German Rule_, 435, 458.
[53] _NMT_, IV:1076, 1081, 1090.
[54] Hannah Arendt, _Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil_, (New York: Viking Press, 1963), 222-23.
[55] Nehemiah Robinson. _The Genocide Convention, A Commentary_ (New York, 1960), 57. Leo Kuper, _The Prevention of Genocide_ (New Haven, 1985), 241f. For the origin of the term "genocide" see Raphael Lemkin, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe (Washington, 1944), 79f.
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Author's Note: Research for this article began during graduate study in biomedical history at the University of Washington's Medical School. Mike Perry (206) 365-1624, 1537 34th Ave. NE, Seattle, WA 98125. --
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Weaponized abortion. Depopulation agenda. Sounds a lot like Sanger and planned Parenthood if you read both closely
(If you want more of the history read it on the link to which I'm responding)
Inside Germany
Within Germany itself, Hitler had long advocated government- funded birth control to weed out the 'unfit.' In his 1924 Mein Kampf, Hitler wrote that one of the seven major responsibilities of government was, "to maintain the practice of modern birth control. No diseased or weak person should be allowed to have children."[32]
On subjects such as eugenics, sterilization, and abortion, Nazi ideology had much in common with the leftist birth control and sex-reform groups of the era (British and American as well as German). As Anita Grossman notes, "The stress on eugenics and race hygiene was typical of the sex- reform groups and suggests a complex ambivalent relationship between right-wing nationalist population policy and leftist sex reform."[33]
Grossman points out that during 1931 the Hamburg RV (a sex-reform group closely associated with the Social Democratic Party) held a series of lectures on subjects such as "Introduction to Population Politics," "Race Theory, Eugenics, and Sterilization," and "The Elimination of Unfit Life." (The latter refers to legalized killing of retarded, senile and mentally-ill people.)
Once in power, Hitler quickly acted to reduce the birth rates of the genetically 'unfit' (including, of course, the Jews). Sterilization came first with the Law for the Prevention of Progeny with Hereditary Diseases issued on 14 July 1933.34 During the Nazi regime between 320,000 and 350,000 people would be sterilized with at least 100 people, mostly women, dying during the procedure.[35]
Abortion came next. In September of 1934 Hitler told Dr. Wagner, Reich Physicians' Leader, that "pregnancies could be terminated in the case of hereditary ill women, or women who had become pregnant by a hereditary ill partner."[36] Formal legalization came a year later on 26 June 1935 with an amendment legalizing abortion up to viability. It was signed by Hitler and included the following two clauses:
If, by virtue of the law, a Hereditary Health Court has decided upon the sterilisation of a woman who is pregnant at the time the operation is carried out, the pregnancy may be terminated, with the consent of the woman concerned, unless the foetus is already capable of independent life, or unless the termination of the pregnancy entails a serious danger to either the life or health of the woman herself. The foetus is to be regarded as being incapable of independent life if the termination takes place before the completion of the sixth month of pregnancy.[37]
Ironically, harsh as they were, the Nazi programs were far less harsh than those advocated by birth control groups in Western democracies. The reason was simple. The fighting and deaths of World War I had resulted in a German 'birth dearth' of some 3-4 million. Coming twenty years after the end of that war, Germany entered World War II underpopulated and desperately short of young men. Whatever the Nazis might claim, they could not afford to be choosy about their births. Strange as it sounds, Hitler was more tolerant of human imperfection than many American, British and German birth controllers and more optimistic about the ability of environment to alter hereditary. Hitler reflected this greater tolerance in a conversation on the evening of 29 August 1942 at which he said:
Have things changed much to-day, I wonder? I am not sure, and many of the things I see around me incline me to the opinion that they have not. I was shown a questionnaire drawn up by the Ministry of the Interior, which it was proposed to put to people whom it was deemed desirable to sterilise. At least three-quarters of the questions asked would have defeated by own good mother. One I recall was: "why does a ship made of steel float in the water?" If this system had been introduced before my birth, I am pretty sure I should never have been born at all! [38]
As a result, Nazi eugenics stressed quantity as much as quality and was actually less discriminatory than the eugenics advocated by affluent, educated American birth controllers. This relatively greater tolerance upset American birth control groups who had initially been excited by what was happening in Germany. For instance, in 1940, Woodbridge Morris, General Director of the Birth Control Federation of America, criticized Germany noting, "We, too, recognize the problem of race building, but our concern is with the quality of our people, not with their quantity alone."[39]
Because of the need for soldiers and workers, within Germany, 'negative eugenic' programs were paralleled by positive programs encouraging births among the 'fit.' Laws limited access to birth control and tightened the punishment for abortion among the racially wanted. As Germany conquered other countries, similar positive programs were developed for 'racially valuable' groups in Nordic and Baltic regions.[40] Groups who were not considered Germanic were targeted with only negative programs.
The positive programs at home, along with the need to keep secret why Germany was so eager to help Slavs and other minorities limit births, created confusion about Nazi policy. That confusion led to Hitler's remark about "shooting up" anyone who tried to ban abortions in the Ukraine. For instance, in the Spring of 1942, SS Reichsfuhrer Himmler had to get the chief of German police in Poland, SS-General Krueger, to intervene so the courts would no longer punished Poles for having abortions. Similar court behavior in Byelorussia led SS-General Berger to remark that some administrators, "have no idea what the German Eastern policy really means."[41]
Hitler's Own View
Within Germany, the Nazis claimed their programs were for the "protection of motherhood." Their real purpose, however, was to increase the German population and thus strengthen the country's military and economic power. The idea of individual rights were as irrelevant here as anywhere else in the Nazi dictatorship. Hitler believed rights belong only to those strong enough to defend them. The weak or small and powerless had no 'inalienable' right to life. In Mein Kampf he wrote of those with incurable diseases:
If the power to fight for one's own health is no longer present, the right to live in this world of struggle ends. The world belongs only to the forceful 'whole' man and not to the weak 'half' man.[42]
Because of this crude Social Darwinianism, Hitler felt abortions by the 'racially valuable' were acceptable for social problems or to prevent family embarrassment. On 5 November 1941, Hitler told several people that he felt the penal system made a mistake exposing young men from "respectable families" to "living communally with creatures who are utterly rotten."[43]
To prove his point, Hitler told of a young man who had been in the prison with him after the failed 1923 Beer Hall Putsch. Earlier this young man had "fruitful relations with a girl" and "advised her to go to an abortionist. For that he was given a sentence of eight months." Hitler felt the "disgrace" that the family "could never outlive" was far too harsh. According to Hitler, such a "nice boy" should simply get a "sound licking."
Hitler ideas about sex were also quite liberal. He felt that homosexuality was a private, personal matter and no concern of society. It was Ernst Rohm, a homosexual, who "more than any other one man, was responsible for launching Hitler . . . into German politics."[44] One historian noted:
Hitler knew all about Rohm's tendencies but insisted that they were his own affair. When Rohm took on his job as Chief of Staff of the SA, Hitler, who was still officially head of the SA, issued a parting order that the SA was "not a girls' finishing school, but a tough fighting formation." Complaints about people's private habits he rejected "indignantly and on principle" as "supposition" and "entirely private matters." [45]
Germany During the War
During the war Nazis brought millions of foreigners to Germany to work in factories and on farms. Many of these so- called 'guest workers' were women who became pregnant. In their home countries abortions were legal and encouraged by the Nazi occupation. Within Germany, however, abortion was generally illegal except for Jews and those with what were thought to be hereditary diseases.
In the spring and summer of 1943 and under great secrecy, German authorities legalized abortion on demand up to viability for these women.[46] The fact that these women were typically sent to university clinics or schools of midwifery and used to train students suggests that in the future the authorities intended to make abortion more widely available. Of course, even here racial thinking intervened. Women who appeared to be "of German or related blood" and who made "a good racial impression" could be denied an abortion.[47]
Abortion legalization occurred in the opposite order as the territories, first for female Eastern workers and later for Polish women. A captured Nazi document describes the steps:
The Reich Leader of Public Health [Conti], in a directive of 11 March 1943, decreed that pregnancy of female Eastern workers may be interrupted at will. The Reich Leader SS [Himmler], with regard hereto, on 9 June 1943, issued a decree of implementation proceedings and extended this decree as of 1 August 1943 also to interruptions of pregnancy for female Poles.[48]
As in the occupied territories, the campaign was backed by propaganda stressing the disadvantages of having children. Emphasis was placed on separating the working mother from her child soon after birth to make motherhood less rewarding.[49]
Extending legalized abortion inside Germany created controversies within German medicine. A secret police report dated 25 October 1943 described objections to the new abortion policy by physicians.
Some physicians (mostly Catholic) protested "that the decree was not in accordance with the moral obligation of a physician to preserve life" and stressed that medicine did not permit making distinctions based on nationality.
On the other hand, many "politically sound" physicians, while recognizing "racial. . . considerations" still felt the policy was a "very dangerous experiment." They pointed out that "if the decree becomes known. . . encouragement will be given to. . . abortions" by Germans themselves.[50] The latter indicates that, whatever the law, abortion was available for Germany's healthy blond Aryans.
Bringing to Justice
Hitler clung to his plan for 'living space' in the East until his suicide in a Berlin bunker with Russian soldiers only a few blocks away. On 29 April 1945 in his last message to the chief of the German general staff, Keitel, he stressed, "the aim must still be to win territory in the East for the German people."
After the war, the Nuremberg Trials brought to justice many of those involved in Nazi crimes against humanity. Because SS Reichfuhrer Heinrich Himmler committed suicide, no one involved in RKFDV's population control program was tried when the International Military Tribunal judged top Nazi leaders.
Between October 1947 and March 1948, however, the U.S. Military Tribunal at Nuremberg did try the leadership of the RKFDV in its Case 8. Among the charges was one that "protection of the law was denied to the unborn children of the Russian and Polish women in Nazi Germany. Abortions were encouraged and even forced on these women."[51]
The defense argued that abortions had not been coerced. While this was true in general, among the Nazi documents was one that said:
It is known that racially inferior offspring of Eastern workers and Poles is to be avoided if at all possible. Although pregnancy interruptions ought to be carried out on a voluntary basis only, pressure is to be applied in each of these cases.[52]
One defendant was SS Lieutenant General Richard Hildebrandt, Chief of the RKFDV's Race and Settlement Main Office in Berlin. Under direct examination by his attorney, he protested that, "Up to now nobody had the idea to see in this interruption of pregnancy a crime against humanity." His protest had no effect. In this area like many others the Nuremberg Trials broke new ground and he was given a 25-year sentence.[53]
Other sentences ranged from a life sentence given Ulrich Griefelt, the chief executive officer of the RKFDV, to the ten years given Fritz Schwalm, the officer responsible for racial examinations to determine if a woman had an abortion.
Sometimes justice was a long time being served. In Jerusalem during December of 1961, Adolf Eichmann was convicted of four counts of crimes "against the Jewish people." One count was "directing that births be banned and pregnancies interrupted among Jewish women" at the Theresienstadt concentration camp.[54]
Genocide Convention
After the war, worldwide condemnation of Nazi behavior led to the definition of a new crime under international law, the crime of genocide. Article II of the "Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide" defines genocide as "acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical [ethnic], racial, or religious group."
Based on the Nazi experience, Article II further defines as a genocidal act "imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group."[55] Nazi policies in Eastern Europe provide the historical context for that part of the Convention. Any nation, organization or individual using similar tactics is guilty of genocide under international law. Even more important, any individual participating in such activities can be tried for 'crimes against humanity' even if such actions were legal in the country where they occurred. In the United States the Genocide Treaty applies with particular force. Now that it has been ratified by the Senate, the treaty carries the same legal authority as the Constitution and overrides as other laws and court decisions. Anyone participating in such activity can be prosecuted for genocide.
Summary
Nazi population policy can be summarized in the following way:
o Medical and legal policies on contraceptives, abortion, and child-rearing were designed to reduce the birthrate of unwanted groups. Contraceptives were freely available and often supplied without charge. Abortion was made legal, safe, and conveniently available through special clinics or local physicians. Mothers were expected to work and were deliberately separated from their children at an early age to make motherhood less meaningful.
o For non-Jews, population control appeared voluntary, but coercion was always present at least to the extent that avoiding birth was made easier than childbearing. For those living under difficult conditions, that is enough to constitute coercion. For Jews sterilization and abortions were often forced. o The media cooperated by stressing the personal disadvantages of having children and telling how childbirth could be avoided by birth control and abortion. Pornography and sex without children (including homosexuality) were promoted to weaken the family, distract from political resistance, and destroy spiritual values. o Much like the Holocaust, the real purpose of these policies-reducing the population of unwanted groups-was kept a closely guarded secret. This sometimes lead to conflict between those who set up the policies and those who carried them out without knowing their purpose. After the war, Nazi population policies in Eastern Europe led to the recognition of a new crime under international law, the crime of genocide. References:
[1] Alexander Dallin, German Rule in Russia, 1941-1945 (London, 1957), 141f. Clarissa Henry and Marc Hillel, _Of Pure Blood_, Trans. Eric Mossbacher (New York, 1976), 148. Ihor Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum Policy in Eastern Europe During World War II" (Ph.D. dissertation, Univ. of Ill., 1957) (Ann Arbor, MI: University Microfilm, # 25,236), 172-73, Ihor Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans for Eastern Europe_ (New York, 1961), 143, Joachim C. Fest, _Hitler_ (New York, 1975), 683-84.
[2] Nora Levin, The Holocaust (New York, 1973), 232-33.
[3] Jochen von Lang with Claus Sibyll, _The Secretary_, Trans. Christa Armstrong and Peter White, (New York, 1979), 209-11, David Irving, Hitler's War (New York, 1977), 402-03 Robert L. Koehl, _RKFDV: German Resettlement and Population Policy 1939-1945_ (Cambridge, 1957), 227. For a book-length treatment see: Dallin, _German Rule_.
[4] Dallin, _German Rule_, 141.
[5] Leon Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_ (Syracuse, NY, 1954), 272-74. _Nuremberg_: NO-1878. Dallin, _German Rule_, 457. German text in Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans_, 197-99.
[6] For more on RKFDV see: Koehl, _RKFDV_, Kamenetsky, _Secret Nazi Plans_, Michael R. Marrus, _The Unwanted: European Refugees in the Twentieth Century_ (New York, 1985), 219-227. Anna Bramwel, _Blood and Soil_ (Abbotsbrooke, England, 1985), 146f.
[7] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 171.
[8] Raul Hilberg, _The Destruction of European Jews_ (Chicago, 1961), 642. _Nuremberg_: NG-844.
[9] Dallin, German Rule, 457.
[10] Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_, 272-74. _Nuremberg_: NG-2325.
[11] _Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals_ [Called _NMT_ below] (Washington, 1949-54) V:109. Russian physicians were familiar with changing abortion laws. In November 1920 Lenin legalized abortion on demand. In 1936, as war tensions grew, Stalin had abortion declared illegal. see Edward H. Carr. _Socialism in One Country_, 1924-26, 3 vols. (London, 1958), I:28-29, 33. Richard Stites, _The Women's Liberation Movement in Russia_ (Princeton, 1975), 264-65, 355, 385-88, 403-05.
[12] _NMT_ , IV:1122. _Nuremberg_: NO-5311.
[13] Kamenetsky, Secret Nazi Plans, 114.
[14] Jan Karski, _Story of a Secret State_ (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1944), 307. See also p. 243.
[15] Dallin, _German Rule_, 458. The cooperation of a "newsman" is not surprising. Unlike the churches or the military, very few members of the German news media belonged to the anti-Nazi resistance
[16] Graupe, Heinz Moshe. _The Rise of Modern Judaism, An Intellectual History of German Jewry 1650-1942_. Huntington, NY: Robert E. Krieger Publishing Co., 1978, 92. Frederick the Great was also hostile to historic Christianity.
[17] Wallace R. Deuel, _People Under Hitler_, (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1942), 189-190. The figures in the next paragraph come from the same source.
[18] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123. See also: Gitta Sereny, _Into That Darkness_, (New York: McGraw Hill, 1974), 62.
[19] Leon Poliakov, _Harvest of Hate_, (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1954), 192.
[20] Gerald Reitlinger, _The Final Solution_, 2nd ed. (New York: Thomas Yoseloff, 1961), 188-189. See also: Nira Feldman, "Concentration and Extermination Camps," _Holocaust_, (Jerusalem: Keter Publ. House, 1974), 88. Originally published in the _Encyclopedia Judaica_.
[21] Christopher Thorne, _Allies of a Kind_ (New York: Oxford University Press, 1978), 158-159.
[22] Eugen Kogon, _The Theory and Practice of Hell_, (New York: Berkley Books, n.d.), trans. by Heinz Norden, 168.
[23] Yad Vashem, _Documents of the Holocaust_, (Jerusalem: Ktav Publishing House, 1981), 350. From R. Hoss, _Commandant of Auschwitz-The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoss_, (London, 1961), 206-208.
[24] Yad Vashem, _Documents of the Holocaust_, (Jerusalem, 1981), 401.
[25] _Documents of the Holocaust_, 451.
[26] Nira Feldman, ``Concentration and Extermination Camps,'' in _Holocaust_, (Jerusalem, 1974), 84-85.
[27] Hermann Rauschning, _The Voice of Destruction_ (New York, 1940), 34-38. Joseph B. Schechtman, _European Population Transfers, 1939-1945_ (New York, 1946), 266, 296. For Nazi agriculture policy see: _Blood and Soil_, 63f. In the early twenties Hitler had been undecided as to whether Germany should ally itself with Britain and take land from Russia or ally itself with Russia and build up its world trade. For a discussion of how Hitler's ideas developed see: Eberhard Jackel, _Hitler's Weltanschauung_ Trans. Herbert Arnold, (Middletown, CN: Wesleyan University Press, 1972), 32f. Secrecy was needed, not to protect the basic idea that Germany intended to conquer the countries to its east, as Hitler had published a pamphlet on that subject as early as 1926 and in the second volume of _Mein Kampf_. The secrecy was to conceal the fact that Hitler's plans were real and not, as some thought, mere political posturing. Also in his public statements of the twenties Hitler appeared to ignore the fact that Eastern Europe was already populated (_Weltanschauung_, 42f). During the thirties, "depopulation" policies would be developed and those had to remain secret even after the war began and the territiories were taken. One author thinks Alfred Rosenberg developed the details of this policy. See: Louis Leo Snyder, _Hitlerism, The Iron Fist in Germany_ (New York: Mohawk Press, 1932), 145.
[28] Rauschning, _The Voice_, 137-8. See also: Adolf Hitler, _My New Order_, Ed. Raoul de Roussy de Sales, (New York: Reynal & Hitchcock, 1941), 619. It was Georges Clemenceau, the French premier, who talked of "twenty million Germans too many."
[29] Hitler, _My New Order_, 400. See also: Adolf Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk_, 1941-44 Transl. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1953), 261-262.
[30] Hitler, _My New Order_, 401.
[31] Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk_, 1941-44, 697. Kamenetsky,_Secret Nazi Plans_, 80.
[32] Louis L. Snyder ed., _Hitler's Third Reich: A Documentary History_ (Chicago, 1981), 46. Adolf Hitler, _Mein Kampf_, Trans. Ralph Manheim (Boston, 1943), 255, 402-05.
[33] Anita Grossman, "`Satisfaction is Domestic Happiness': Mass Working Class Sex Reform Organizations in the Weimar Republic" in Michael Dobkowski and Isidor Wallimann, Ed. _Towards the Holocaust: The Social and Economic Collapse of the Weimar Republic_ (Westport, CN, 1983), 271. For parallels with the American birth control movement see: M W. Perry, "How Planned Parenthood Got Its Name." _International Review of Natural Family Planning_ X:3 (Fall 1986): 234-42. For a political analysis of those parallels see: M. W. Perry, ``The Sound of the Machine.'' _The Freeman_. July 1988, 257-262.
[34] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany_ 1933-1945 (Cambridge, 1991), 136.
[35] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany 1933-1945_ (Cambridge, 1991), 138. Other estimates run as high as 400,000. See: Robert Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 108.
[36] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany 1933-1945_ (Cambridge, 1991), 140. Oddly, the book's index makes no mention of this lengthy and detailed discussion of abortion legalization even though it includes a mere passing reference to abortion as a valid cause for divorce on page 253.
[37] Michael Burleigh and Wolfgang Wipperman, _The Racial State: Germany_ 1933-1945 (Cambridge, 1991), 140-141.
[38] Adolf Hitler, _Hitler's Table Talk, 1941-44_ Transl. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1953), 674-675.
[39] _Birth Control Review_, XXIV:3 (January, 1940), 38. In 1942 this organization became the Planned Parenthood Federation of America.
[40] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 175. _NMT_, IV:1077-79. _Nuremberg_: NO-1803, NO-3520.
[41] Kamenetsky, "German Lebensraum," 173. From Himmler's File #1302, Folder H. 11; _Nuremberg_: NO-3134.
[42] Hitler, _Mein Kampf_, 257.
[43] _Hitler's Table Talk, 1941-44_, Trans. Norman Cameron and R. H. Stevens (London, n.d.), 112-13.
[44] Heinz Hohne, _The Order of the Death's Head, The Story of Hitler's S.S._ Trans. Richard Barry, (New York: 1966, 1967), 17. [45] Hohne, _The Order_, 81.
[46] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123, 366.
[47] Robert N. Proctor, _Racial Hygiene_ (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1988), 123.
[48] _NMT_, IV:1082. _Nuremberg_: 1753-PS, NO-3250 (Eastern workers), NO-1384 (Polish women).
[49] _NMT_, IV:1122-27. _Nuremberg_: NO-5311.
[50] _NMT_, IV:1081-84. _Nuremberg_: NO-3512.
[51] _NMT_, IV:1077.
[52] _NMT_, V:112. A German military report of 13 July 1943 referred to "an intensification of countermeasures" against Ukrainians including the "forcible abortion of pregnant women." In William Manchester, The Arms of Krupp (New York, 1964, 1965, 1968), 486. Some forced abortions were probably to punish women who became pregnant to avoid forced labor in Germany. See Dallin, _German Rule_, 435, 458.
[53] _NMT_, IV:1076, 1081, 1090.
[54] Hannah Arendt, _Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil_, (New York: Viking Press, 1963), 222-23.
[55] Nehemiah Robinson. _The Genocide Convention, A Commentary_ (New York, 1960), 57. Leo Kuper, _The Prevention of Genocide_ (New Haven, 1985), 241f. For the origin of the term "genocide" see Raphael Lemkin, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe (Washington, 1944), 79f.
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Author's Note: Research for this article began during graduate study in biomedical history at the University of Washington's Medical School. Mike Perry (206) 365-1624, 1537 34th Ave. NE, Seattle, WA 98125. --
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