Talk:Flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–1950)/Archive 5

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Werwolf

"At the end of the war a German resistance group called "Werwolf" was created and thus German minority was seen as threat to the security of states recently liberated from Nazi occupation." In 1945, German minority in Poland and other states recently liberated consisted of women, children and old people ie all those who had not been able to carry a gun in order to defend the rests of Hitler`s Reich of "a thousand years". For what reason ever Germans had been expelled such expulsion did definitively not take place because the German minority of 1945 was a threat. If there is anyone who wishes to defend this claim, please do so now. If not, I will delete it soon. (213.70.74.165 14:36, 5 May 2006 (UTC))

Please sign your comments. Second, the article does not claim german minority was in reality threat to security, but it was _seen_ as such, which definely to some extent was true. Szopen 09:06, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, women, children and old men were_seen_as a threat to security? That sounds not very conclusive to me, please give some quotes for this opinion. However a better academic approach would be to display the factual reasons for the expulsion instead of giving an overview of what certain groups thought the reasons were. Otherwise some may eg say genocide and racism were seen as the reason for the expulsion. (213.70.74.164 10:52, 5 May 2006 (UTC)).

I am not sure what are you trying to argue here. The fact is that German minority wholesale was seen as dangerous and noone was deliberating, whether that minority consist of old man, woman and children. And, in fact, genocide and racism _is_ given as one of the reasons: mainly, as the last reason

"Also, there was little empathy for German victims after the World War II experience, especially since the German government was itself ethnically cleansing a large number of areas (e.g. Reichsgau Wartheland) during the war."

Why German minority was seen as such, it is also obvious from the paragraph - because during the war German minority was enthusiastically supporting Nazi regime. While today you may say that it is not justified to expell whole family because for example. kids were throwing stones and spitting on some hopeless Poles (as in many of tales from Greater-Polish brand of my family), or because 10% of male Germans were in Selbschutz, but this is exactly why at the time people were affraid that letting those innocent German children will result in creation of danger to the state within one generation, when those child will grow up. Szopen 13:01, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

There is obviously a missunderstanding, I mean: Otherwise some may say that the reason for the expulsion was that eg the Poles were racists. As for the rest of your comment, I cannot identify any point why people (allegedly) thought that women, children and old men (and that were the only Germans who were present in the liberated countries at this time) are a threat to security. You should not mix up the various reasons given on the page. And that children will grow up and become a future threat would just be a further reason for expulsion but has actually nothing to do with Werwolf or Selbstschutz. (213.70.74.164 14:02, 5 May 2006 (UTC))

If the view that e.g. the reason for the expulsion is e.g. natural racism of Czech nation was held by signifficant number of people, documented in literature, etc. it would be good to include it in the article. As it doesn't seem to be, it is not included.

Well, great logic => when it is not in, it is not right, and when it is in, it must be right... where are the quotes for the statement that a significant number of people held the view that the reason for the expulsion was that people were in credible fear of crimes to be commited by Selbstschutz and/or Werwolf after 1945? As far as I know, there had not been one notable assault by these groups at all after 1945 that may have given rise to such a presumption. (213.70.74.164 16:01, 9 May 2006 (UTC))

Generally, please read about WP:NPOV. Wikipedia article is about presentation of all signifficant views, and whether you think some of them right, wrong, just or unjust should not influence how do you describe them.

The thoughts were about German minority in general. That's all. Maybe: in that time the concept of "family" probably had stronger meaning than in most western coutries today, so nobody thought about the idea only some members of a family should be expelled and the rest should stay.

(and that were the only Germans who were present in the liberated countries at this time) - do you really proppose all German man died during the war? --Wikimol 16:41, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

No, I do not propose that all young man died during the war but were prisoners of war (some of them for more than 10 years) ie in 1945 - 1947 when most of the expulsion took place presumably 95% of the German minority in the liberated countries consisted of women, children and old men (eg just take a look on the picture on the main side). By the way, as far as I know the few members of Selbstschutz that remained in the liberated countries had been convicted and imprisoned. (213.70.74.165 16:00, 9 May 2006 (UTC))

I can't udnerstand what you say. I had not said that "people were seeing woman, old man and children as threat". I said that they saw german minority as threat, not trying to differentiate whether this German minority cnosisted of only woman, old man, children without any single living male.

Nevertheless, I have removed the passage that "they were seen as threat", but the rest of the paragraph will stay. If you want to dispute it, do it, but do not engage into revert war. Szopen 16:46, 5 May 2006 (UTC)

I have removed the passage as the paragraph is nonsence in connection with (credible) reasons given for the expulsion of Germans after 1945. If you want to dispute it, do it, but do not engage into revert war (213.70.74.164 10:42, 8 May 2006 (UTC)).

You are starting revert war. Since it is you who have failed to convince as why to remove this perfectly valid reason (the fears that German minority will be 5th column WERE there) and since I already tried to reword the sentence, I will first ask for third party's opinion.

Note you engaged into revert war instead of trying to convince us. You removed paragraph and took the position: "tell me why I am wrong" instead of "I'll tell you why I am right" Szopen 15:32, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

The "discussion of the reasons" is a paragraph that wouldn't be found in other articles and is, in my opinion, an excuse to list the wrongdoings of Germans to water down the actions against them (moral relativism). The disputed paragraph also tries to bring forth arguments why the insane principle of collective guilt was reasonable. What were the reasons for numerous raids on trains loaded with expellees when they were leaving anyway? They just robbed the womens' last possessions. There were no reasons for rape other than exploiting the situation, at least it was not fear. The people could retaliate and gain personal advantage, and on the national level they had good arguments for territorial demands. That's it. Before a certain admin continues to use admin rollback, which is made for vandalism only, or sb calls a position in a content dispute "vandalism", it would be good if you could find sources for the role of this fear, if it played any role at all and was not just a mere pretext. Only in this way is it possible to determine whether the paragraph actually represented "valid information". Sciurinæ 15:52, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, I think it may at best be the reasons of the people in the occupied countries. A lack of empathy is one point mentioned here but Churchill did not lack it. "...my heart is saddened by the tales of the masses of German women and children flying along the roads...before the advancing armies.... The misery of the whole world appalls me, and I fear increasingly that new struggles may arise out of those we are successfully ending."[1]

When it comes to reasons, there must be a focus on the Yalta Conference and Potsdam Conference. Sciurinæ 16:36, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

I got here via the RFC. I've only read through half of the discussion and my general impression is that you guys are arguing over the truth of an assertion rather than whether the fact that the assertion was made. Can you cite sources? It's enough to say that "Werwolf" was used as a reason for the expulsion. There are plenty of examples in history where not very valid reasons were used as excuses for unconscionable behavior. Earlier in this discussion, someone said something like "one might conclude that Poles were racists". Actually, this is a claim that has been made in a different context (anti-Semitism). Given the history of ethnic cleansing in the Balkans and anti-Semitism in Russia, it's not unreasonable to believe that there might have been some Poles in power that were racist.

--Richard 16:13, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

Cite your sources is always a good advice. And perhaps most if this can go to the article about Werwolf?--Piotr Konieczny aka

Prokonsul Piotrus ^Talk 16:19, 9 May 2006 (UTC)

IMO, some context to the expulsions is needed, otherwise one could get the impression that the Poles and Czechs just run amok and without any justifications (bad or good) were harassing innocent German population, who have done nothing to deserve it. And if the context (given as list for reasons) is given, then why just to remove some of the reasons? Szopen 07:30, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

http://www.uvi.si/eng/slovenia/background-information/germans/index.print.html "The fate of the German national minority in Yugoslavia and "Germans" in Slovenia was undoubtedly marked by Nazism and the Second World War. The German national community had already begun to be nazified in Slovenia very early. Certainty about collective German guilt for the expulsion of Slovenes during the Second World War in Slovenia existed not only in the Communist camp, but also in the opposing camp and among the leadership of the Yugoslav resistance movement. During the war, the German national community in Slovenia thus further confirmed its role of national enemy in both camps, which, for historical reasons, it had already brought into the first Yugoslav state. Even during the war, therefore, the political camps in Slovenia were clearly committed to a post-war reckoning with local Germans, not because of their nationality, but because they were convinced that they must pay compensation for Nazi crimes committed, in line with the then allied policy towards the Nazi regime." "In Slovenia, a proposal for the treatment of the Germans was already produced during the war in the Scientific Institute of the Liberation Front. They started from the premise that a historical opportunity would be provided to the Slovene nation at the end of the war "to get rid of its German minority on the northern border, which had caused so much misery before and during the war." The German minority was supposed to be punished because it had collectively followed Hitler's principle that every member of the German nationality, even if a foreign citizen, was bound to loyalty to the Reich and not the state in which it lived."

http://cadmus.iue.it/dspace/bitstream/1814/2599/1/HEC04-01.pdf

"The charge against German population was of disloyalty and of supporting the destruction of the states .. and collaboration with occupants... in this [they] were deemed to share the collective guilt" p.5, on the very bottom.

p.15 - 1.200k out of whole 3.230k Germans belonged to SdP. Later the context is given, as minority participated in collaboration, crimes against Czechs etc.. Also from the end of 1941 Czechoslovak authorities stressed that expulsions of Germans is needed for "stability of the state".

later again it stresses the concept of collective guilt applied to whole German population for their participation in German occupation.

p.22: In 1941-44 15 million people were resettled, while afte rthe war: 31 million. So German expulsions are "significant but a part" of ethnic cleansing during and after the war.

p.26: discussion of reasons. it does not mention fears of disloyalty, but mentions general anti-German hatred

p.34: In Hungary German minority was not seen as threat to the state.. _unlike in Poland and Czechoslovakia_ (emphasis mine)\

p.59: In Poland and Czechoslovakia expulsion were made to help integrate and stabilize the states.

In response to User:Szopen's comment above, I think this article focuses too much on reasons and not enough on what actually happened. I can't tell who wrote the stuff below his signature but a lot of that stuff should be put into the article.

I also noticed that the article lumps all expulsions of Germans into one phenomenon. Based on the text immediately above, it now seems that Germans were expelled from Poland and Czechoslovakia (anywhere else?). The reasons in the article are confusing because I always thought we were talking about expulsions of Germans from Poland and I couldn't quite figure out why the Sudeten Germans in Czechosolvakia wre being discussed. Maybe it would help to explain all this and also explain any differences between how Germans were expelled from Poland and how they were expelled from Czechoslovakia.

Hope this helps.

--Richard 07:40, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

This revert warring between Szopen and 213.70.74.164 is a bad thing. Perhaps a vote to determine consensus would help.

A request for mediation might help. Try the informal Mediation Cabal or the more formal Mediation Committee Wikipedia:Mediation Committee.

Another alternative is to request semi-protection which will bar anonymous edits from IP addresses. Note that semi-protection is intended to be a temporary measure to force editors to register and thereby subject themselves to blocking for violation of Wikipedia policies such as edit warring.

This is only a temporary solution as protection and semi-protection of pages are intended to be temporary events not permanent ones.

--Richard 10:37, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Ok. I will abstain from editing the article for about the week. However, I feel that removing the reasoning that the German minority was collectively punished for the collaboration is strange. Why omit one of the reasons? The sentence even use "dubious justification" which quite rightly qualifies this kind of collective punishment. Szopen 11:31, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, Richard, I really appreciate that you try to arbitrate in that case. But, firstly, I doubt that it makes scense to vote about facts (e.g. what would happen if more than 50% of the voters say 1+1=3? Would we have to handle this result as a fact and allege 1+1=3 although it is 2?). Secondly, as you have already mentioned it and for the sake of an objective and academic article, we should talk about the real facts and not about what some groups of people thought the reasons were. In so far, I recommend to amend the whole passage: Before/instead having a "discussion about the reasons" we should try to display the reasons/facts in the first place (e.g. Germany started and lost the war and hence deserved it to be punished, Truman and Stalin divided the world/tailored a new world (and they did not care what Churchill or Stalin`s Eastern European string-puppet-governments of 1945 or anyone else thought about it), Poland required land as a substitute for the ultimative loss of its eastern territories annexed by the Soviet Union in the course of the Hitler-Stalin-Treaty in 1939, German minority would perhaps be a FUTURE but not a PRESENT threat for security what has nothing to do with an obviously not existing threat by Selbstschutz or Werwolf in 1945!). (213.70.74.164 09:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC))

Germany started and lost the war and hence deserved it to be punished, If Germany would have waged conventional war without using racial extermination as one of its main goals, and German minority wouldn't assit it in this, it is doubtfull such proposals would have been made. Anyway I added link to scholary paper on why Polish government and politicians advocated such measures and what was their motivation for doing so. They already proposed this in 1941. I translated important parts of the paper and gave a link to it. The paper is by doctor Wardzyńska from IPN institute. --Molobo 11:44, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I just tried to give examples how the article could be amended not saying that this should be the exact wording at the end of the day. By the way, thanks for the link but - excuse my wording please - I am sure that Stalin & Truman while dividing Europe did not give a shit for what the Polish exil government proposed in 1941... (213.70.74.164 12:32, 11 May 2006 (UTC))

I am sure that Stalin & Truman while dividing Europe did not give a shit for what the Polish exil government proposed in 1941... Please give a scholary source supporting your private view. --Molobo 12:51, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I have nothing to add except that MY/YOUR/HIS/HER view is always private otherwise it would not be MINE/YOURS/HIS/HERS.(213.70.74.164 12:54, 11 May 2006 (UTC))

The image

The image given in link is IMO misleading. Is it from before 1945? Well, in 1939 e.g. in Bromberg there were registered (in firs census organised by nazis) about 10% of population as German. How it is that suddenly in 1945 it is centre of German majority area? Maybe it includes the volksdeutsche, new settlers etc? If so, maybe also map presenting situation before 1939 should be given or explanation for the image given? Szopen 09:22, 5 May 2006 (UTC) I agree the image is very disputable. The same image is given for situation in 1937 and 1945. Two totally different situations. It is in conflict with credible data on German population in Poland before the war. --Molobo 14:25, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Unsourced statements

Again, an unsourced statement has been added to the article (the paragraph which contains descriptions of massacres in Czech lands). I have removed a paragraph like that some time ago, because it was not only unsourced, but also sort of german-nationalist POV (something like "the czech mob was burning german schoolchildren on stakes in central squares of Prague") and I couldn't find any references to those events on internet - except from this wikipedia article. Some idiot argued above, that it might be true, even if it can't be found on internet - believe me, if it WAS true, Sudetendeutsche Landsmannschaft and every other i-want-my-nazi-granddad's-house-in-czechia-back-so-I-can-sell-it-and-buy-a-new-car-dumbass would have pictures on their webpages. However, this is not the case as these statements seem quite realistic. But I am pretty tired with this because someone always comes and puts his ideas and stories into the article without mentioning a source and without realising that if they are not true, they can be pretty offending. I added citation needed to the paragraph and totallydisputed to the heading, as the statements contained in the article might not be true (x factual accuracy) and there will cerainly be some POV in it too. 85.70.5.66 02:54, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Please, tone done your words. No name calling.

For reference on Ústí massacre see the article. For other massacres, see the now attached reference. --Wikimol 06:52, 10 May 2006 (UTC)

Map

The map of ethnic distrubution is very strange. Here it states that it presents population from WW2 without mentioning that German population in WW2 was increased by settlement and expulsion of Poles from various regions during Poland's occupation by Germany. The same map states on another page it is from 1937. It is in conflict with data on on distrubution of Germans in Poland in 1921, 1931. I think it is very disputable map and it has no source given, perhaps it should be removed ? --Molobo 12:06, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Headline disputable

deliberate abuse by milicians, deliberate malnutrition by Soviets and Poles, and because of senseless killing Hmmm ? Polish people were deliberatly starving Germans ? That's very strange wording. More fitting would be Polish authorities, however I would like to see a credible source claiming that such actions were deliberate or in fact occured at all. ? The use of word senseless killing seems emotional and intendend to sensationalise rather then inform. I would prefer neutral wording. I would also like to see sources confirming this. --Molobo 12:10, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Further POV

Some were persecuted because of their activities during the war; most were persecuted solely because of their German ethnicity. This is very POV. It would be more neutral to say that they were deported as a result of actions of their co-citizens which engaged in genocide. --Molobo 12:33, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

More POV

The article states that some escaped from advancing Red Army. This seems POV as the article is about situation after the war. If this is included should I take that the losses written in the article include also the war losses ? Shouldn't it be mentioned that death marches were ordered by Nazi officials ? --Molobo 12:36, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Support for Nazi's

Only 32% of Germans voted the national-socialist party into power, even some of the German victims of Dresden sheltered Jewish families from deportation, and at the end of the war German civilians also suffered from malnutrition. While perhaps only 32% voted for Nazis's this seems an original research. It ignores the fact that there was also another party supportive of Hitler which gained votes-thus more people supported nationalistic aggressive ideology then 32%. Furthermore after the elections Hitler gained more popularity-this is also ignored. Another fact ignored is that the vote count for Nazis in territories subject to deportations was much higher then 32 % and in fact in some cases over 50%. Also another fact ignored is that for example even in 1947 over 50% of Germans supported National Socialism as "good idea" according to polls made by American authorities in their occupation zone. Thus the above quoted statement seems original research and a false one also. --Molobo 12:42, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Does the article mention clearly

That "expelled" also include people moved into occupied territory after 1939 ? Settlers ? --Molobo 12:59, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

If you find anything like this, just remove the crap. And add the information that some of the "expelled" germans were settlers (find sources, know the proportion and add it to the article). The page was clearly edited by some german nationalist some time ago, who instead of precisely describing this event of ethnic cleansing (wich the expulsion was), tried to persuade the word that Germans, particularly Germans living in present Poland and Czech republic, were actually the poor victims terrorized by their Slavic governments before the war and then after the war. Not only ignoring the fact that German politicians participated in the "repressing" governments as ministers, but also using the nazi-propaganda arguments for annexing these territories. Remember, that the editor who added this crap probably didn't discuss anything with anyone before he added the information into the article and it went on without someone noticing it. It's a poor practice that anyone can add any crap to an article without mentioning it on the discussion page, but if it is to be removed, you have to discuss it with uneducated people who are from Canada and from reading wikipedia, they actually think that 10-19th century Bohemians as a nation were German and that the present Czechs are some late 19th/early 20th century slavic invaders. See above the discussion with Jadger for your reference. 85.70.5.66 17:04, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

To scrucinae

Do you really think that the map displayed at the Expulsions article is appropriate without a map that would reflect the pre-WW2 areas with german majority AND with a map that reflects the state under german occupation? I don't know anything about the extent, but I think that it is possible, that there was some new german expansion during WW2, therefore the map showing the land traditionally - I mean more than 2 centuries - inhabited by germans would be more appropriate. If we are talking expulsions, we talk about deporting people from their homes, not from the houses of polish Jews which they gained in WW2. I second the removal of the map from the article. You can RfC if you dont agree. 85.70.5.66 19:36, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

P.S. Im fed up with german nationalism and WW2 revisionism in the edits here. When I first saw the article it was about poor germans suffering under evil czechs in a "kunststaat" czechoslovakia then being expelled after their brothers wanted to help them. This is really nauseating. Check the history books and you will see, that unlike Czechs in the Austrian monarchy, Germans did have their ministers in pre-WW2 czechoslovak government. Compare real facts, numbers, laws etc., don't use arguments that "germans felt repressed by the Czechoslovak government" - stupid POV PLUS using the old nazi argument for invasion - jesus german social democrats were in those governments. Are you all still searching for an excuse for WW2? Are you trying to find it in Czech nationalism? Popular idea, some tried already but failed and you should stop. Sorry for the tone.

I haven't said anything about the map. But a map more or less clearly showing where Germans expulsed came from isn't inappropriate for the article about the expulsion of Germans. Maps that aren't copyrighted are hard to get and the article is in urgend need of images. Sciurinæ 00:01, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Irrelevant map

Historisches_deutsches_Sprachgebiet.PNG is irrelevant in this context, as it reflects german-speaking people, not ethnic Germans. There is a difference in this, as the Czechs who lived in towns were also german speaking - so the fact that many czech towns were german speaking doesn't make them German towns or towns with german majority. Even the mother of the first Czechoslovak president Tomas Masaryk, was German-speaking - that however doesn't make her or him German. Czech was at that time more of a peasant - language, and the educated czechs learned the czech language again in the 19th century, for reference see Czech_lands:_1648-1867. Moreover, the map doesn't specify the period of history, in which these areas were german speaking. So main points:

• not specific for one period of history
• related to the language, not nationality
• obviously reflects also the german speaking non-german nationals

ackoz 20:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

That is just sillynes. What the map shows is areas where the mother tongue of people is German. If your statement was correct, then Prague itself, the "centre" of "educated" Czechoslovakia, would be shown as a German language area. Since this is not the case, you must be wrong Stor stark7 21:06, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

No I am not. Czech the article for Prague and you will see that there was no german speaking majority just because Prague was always too diverse. PLUS there were areas in Prague that were german-speaking. Read first, call me silly later. ackoz 21:11, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The map is not irrelevant, as it shows where ethnic Germans lived until the expulsions. Your statement about Czechs speaking German is misleading. Sure, many Czechs and the educated at least could speak German as that was the administrative language during the Habsburg Empire. However, the map does not refer to such bilingual people but to those speaking German as their mother tongue. Neither does it claim that there was a majority of Germans in Prague - it merely says that Germans lived there: Germans were the majority in the regions on the boundaries (later known as Sudetenland) and in the "Sprachinsel" of Iglau - there were substantial minorities in the two capitals Prague and Brno. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 21:54, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The map is not irrelevant, as it shows where ethnic Germans lived until the expulsions.

• May I ask why in the view of the author of the map the ethnic population of Germans remains unchanged from 1937 till 1945 ? Seems the author has ignored massive settlement of Germans into Poland after 1939 (estimated by some at over 1 million with certain number of hundreds of thousands). Can author explain why the same map is used for several different era's-1937, 1945 and WWII ignoring the fact of major population changes in WW2 ? Why doesn't the map show exact date as German population changed in very significant way during XX century in Central Europe ? Does the map present those Germans born in Poland or those who spoke German as mother language ? Second option would indicate he counts occupation in his map. The use of colours is very strange since it hardly shows significant populations of Poles in Silesia left after 1921.
• And finally the map conflicts credible scholary data on German population.

For example-map of Poles before WW2 [2] clearly shows that German settlement isn't as widespread in Poland as the author has shown on the map. Another example, a list of Polish areas with German minority listed: http://raven.cc.ku.edu/~eceurope/hist557/lect11_files/11pic2.jpg In 1921 Pomerania 1921-18 % of population is German Poznan 1921-16 % of population is German This numbers obviously don't support the map presented here where the impression is that in those areas Germans made up almost total majority. And in 1931: Pomerania 1931-9% % of population is German Poznan 1931-9 % of population is German Upper Silesia 1931- 6 % of population is German

• Another data:

According to p.27 of the Reich Statistical Yearbook for 1941 the population of the territories annexed from Poland was as follows in June 1940: Province Ostpreussen: 994,092. Reichsgau Danzig-West-Preussen (not including Danzig): 1,487,452. Reichsgau Wartheland: 4,538,922. Prov. Schlesien: 2,603,550. General Gouvernment: 12,107,000 According to p.6 of "Documents on the Expulsion of the Germans from East-Central Europe" Volume 1, (Bonn, 1954) the following was the German population of these areas when they were annexed from Poland in 1939: Polish Territories attached to the Provinz of Ostpreussen: 31,000. Polish Territories of the Reichsgau Danzig-Westpreussen: 210,000. Polish Territories of the Reichsgau Wartheland: 230,000. Eastern Upper Silesia: 238,000. Generalgouvernment: 80,000.

None of this sources or data support the vision of the author of the map. --Molobo 22:18, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The map is, all in all, accurate. Your figures don't contradict it. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 22:34, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The map is inaccurate. How come area where Germans are 9% of population is covered whole in green ? --Molobo 22:35, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

You are right about some areas in Poland, they should rather be in lighter green (just as Upper Silesia). But apart from that, in general, it is accurate. If you do have a better map, provide one. But don't just delete it. If you are well-equipped software-wise you can also download the map and edit it. Str1977 ^{(smile back)} 23:42, 11 May 2006 (UTC) You are right about some areas in Poland, they should rather be in lighter green (just as Upper Silesia). But apart from that, in general, it is accurate. As Poland was reason for WW2 and German minority was used as pretext for invasion by Germany the issue or proper presentation why the claims of Nazi Germany were false I find very important. And they are several other issues that are still unanswered.Date, using it on various different periods etc. I don't believe that 9% of Germans in a region should mean the whole area painted in colour indicating German presence. A false map will create greater harm then lack of an map. --Molobo 23:55, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Proposal

Perhaps in place of higly POV map with obvious bias towards German population as seen by numbers quoted above a table with percentage of Germans in each neighnouring country would be more neutral ? --Molobo 22:23, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

No. That won't convey the same information, and will be much harder to read. A map shows on the first glance that there were large German-speaking populations in many places, even if they were not a large percentage of the total population of a country. Kusma (討論) 22:37, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I disagree, right now we have a very biased map which presents areas where German were only 9% of population as whole in green. In contrast areas in Germany where hundreds of thousands of Poles lived are hardly noticable. In Pomorze out of 1,000,000 people only 100,000 were Germans yet the green colour is equall to distribution of grey colour if not even more. It gives false impression that Germans had significant numbers of population there. The map doesn't even show exact time and is used for various different periods completely ignoring changes that happened between them. --Molobo 22:40, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

map shows on the first glance that there were large German-speaking populations in many places The problem is that they weren't according to reliable data. The map is presenting a biased image. Whole areas are painted green where Germans were just a small minority. They are now four editors that are concerned with neutrality of this map. Obviously something is not right with the way it is presented. --Molobo 22:41, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

If you say there were 9% Germans in total in these areas (green and grey), then that means there were probably above 20% Germans in the green areas, which represents a significant German population. The map doesn't say how large the percentage of Germans had to be to become "green". How do you suggest to represent in an easy way the fact that a minority German population was widely spread in Poland, Hungary, and Romania? That is sort of hard without a map that shows where they lived. Kusma (討論) 22:53, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

If you say there were 9% Germans in total in these areas (green and grey), then that means there were probably above 20% Germans in the green areas, which represents a significant German population You can check the number of Germans in each Polish county in the areas here[3]. I hoped you would see my arguments before responding. Right now the map doesn't present Germans as minority in those areas. In fact it gives impression they were significant number and some areas where they were just 9% are presented as dominated by Germans, it shows in no presentable way that in fact those areas had overwhelming Polish majority, it uses double standards as 530,000 Poles in German Silesia are barely noticable while 100,000 Germans out ot 1,000,000 people of Pomorze are seen on the map as significant number. --Molobo 22:58, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

I don't see that as a problem that a good caption for the map couldn't solve. The map is only interested in the German language, not in the distribution of other languages within majority German-speaking languages, so it doesn't show Poles in Silesia. Kusma (討論) 23:03, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

not in the distribution of other languages within majority German-speaking languages, so it doesn't show Poles in Silesia. I am sorry but the map is used to describe aspects of Polish-German relations for example the border or war, to present a neutral view of things and for example not give false impression that Germans were any kind of majority in Poland before WW2 it should be as neutral as possible. Right now the map can't be seen as neutral. The fact that four independent from each other editors from countries neighbouring Germany have voiced their concerns seems to prove that the map contains a bias in the view of other contributors of Wiki. --Molobo 23:08, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

The Author of the image, which originates in Wikimedia, is active in the German Wikipedia. If you want answers to the source data for the image, I suggest you contact him on his talk page, preferably in German. at de:Benutzer_Diskussion:Postmann_Michael

Stor stark7 23:04, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

But It was you who started to put it articles ? I am sorry but this is a problem on English Wiki, not German, and I am not fluent in German language. This problem must be solved on English Wiki. Right now I am wondering why 530,000 Poles in German Silesia are barely noticable but 100,000 Germans in Pomorze are showed as dominating the region. If the author feels concerned that the map isn't used on English wiki he is free to come here and defend its validity and neutrality. However since the map was put by you I believe you had grounds to see it as neutral ? If you haven't arguments for its supposed neutrality (already disproven by credible maps and data on German population) then I believe you shouldn't voice objections to its removal ? --Molobo 23:10, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Btw :I looked at German wiki on this article and the German editors didn't seem to include this image in the article. --Molobo 23:15, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Can we get a better map from somewhere? I don't think this map is that problematic, but I can understand why it is seen as misleading (it doesn't say exactly what it shows, what data was used, when...). It gives a pretty good impression of where the areas of German settlement during the Middle Ages were (that's what it is used for on the German Wikipedia), though, which is somewhat relevant in this context, because the areas where Germans lived in 1937 were mostly part of these settlement areas. I would like to have a map here that shows the extent of German minority areas all over Eastern Europe. Kusma (討論) 23:21, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Look, the map would be good if it was better for the topic here. It is not. It only shows very generally where the German settlers were, BUT, it creates an expression that all this land was German somehow. That is what's wrong about it. It is very dangerous. I was already talking about Jadger, a Canadian, who had the impression that Bohemians were not Czechs but Germans. And their Premyslid kings too. He couldn't get the fact, that "Czechs" is a new (19/20th century) name for "Bohemians" in English. I would point him to relevant articles on german wikipedia but I don't know if he could speak German. So I explained why the map is misleading, and why it's dangerous. Any young German boy could come across the webpage and start wanting his German Land back. Do you want that? ackoz 23:40, 11 May 2006 (UTC) I share ackoz concerns in that subject also. Looking at the map I got the impression that somebody could think that Poland before WW2 had a huge numbers of Germans within its territory and It could easly be given as argument supporting Reich's claims of protecting German settled territories. Of course my opposition isn't limit to that but indeed the map can create such worry due to its unbalanced presentation. --Molobo 23:44, 11 May 2006 (UTC)

Poland section

I like current Poland section for giving well description of why collective punishment was applied. However, it now consists only from _reasons_, but without the _results_. Because i declared I will abstain from edition of the article, I will not touch it, however the section should be nmow IMO balnaced by description of expulsion (with link to Lambianowice to satisfy some editors maybe?) Otherwise, it won't be seen as balanced. Szopen 07:56, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Are you doing that deliberately or is it just because you have a substantial lack of knowledge of the English language or are you simply not capable to comprehend the topic of the side? However what has Werwolf/Selbstschutz to do with the "Chronicle of the expulsion"? Nothing, so please refrain from using this side as a platform for your moral relativism. (213.70.74.164 09:18, 12 May 2006 (UTC))

What? It should be given as the context, justifications given, the results. Can't you understand that or you just think that reasons and justifications should be ommitted altogether? What Selbschutz has with expulsion: a lot. Since a lot of German minority participated in Selbschutz, which participated in many crimes and was seen with uniform crimes, this was one of _dubious justifications_ that Germans should be punished collectively.

And, BTW, were is my moral relativism? WHERE? Did I say this were _good_ justifications? Did I say: "collective punishment is good thing"? Did I say "it was ok to kill Germans"? No. I had written that amongst some reasons given post war WAS collective punishment (a fact) and I even gave my opinion on this (it was _dubious justification_). Similarly, I understood your feeling that the _perceived threat_ by german minority was arteficial, and modified sentences to reflect more that those were just (maybe irrational) fears, fueled by pre-war, during war German minorities activities and post-war activities of wehrwolf. I

Now, are you trying to say

The context of expulsion should be omitted

The context should not give references to the actions of too many members of German minorities

The reasons popularly given in literature should be omitted?

If so, discuss it.

(NOTE that I have not inserted the sections into Poland) Szopen 12:31, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

1) Systematic of the article

Please have a look on what is e.g. written under the "chronicle of expulsion" concerning Hungary or Czech Republic => it is about HOW and WHEN the Germans had been expelled in the respective country and not WHY they had been expelled. Hence, as far as Poland is concerned under this section it is not about Selbstschutz/Werwolf but WHEN/HOW the Germans were expelled. The reasons for the expulsion (i.e. WHY) are displayed above in the article. (However if it was not you who had inserted the text under the Poland section I would hereby like to bag your pardon as I thought it was you.)

2) Selbstschutz/Werwolf

You know as well as I know that it were Stalin and Truman - and only them - who decided to divide Europe and to expell the German minority. The Eastern European governments at this time were soley string-puppets directed by Moscow and Stalin was definitively not interested in what the Polish people thought about the whole issue not to mention that he would have asked them before making his decision. Hence, it was not an autonomous and conscious decision made e.g. by the Polish government who inter alia said German minority is seen as a threat for our security because of Selbstschutz/Werwolf. The Poles rather co-executed Stalin`s plans for a Germanfree Eastern Europe under Russian control by assisting the Red Army to enforce the decisions made on the Potsdam conference i.e. kicked out women, children and old men. As for other arguments, please read above ("Werwolf") what we have already discussed this week.

3) Last but not least,

please do not take it personally, discussions and disputes are sometimes very close together... However I wish you a pleasant (history-disputing-free) weekend!

(213.70.74.164 13:13, 12 May 2006 (UTC))

Hi guys, since I'm the one who did the restructuring, let me tell you what I was thinking. I got here through the RFC process. I have learned a lot about this topic as a result of the article and the Talk Page. What was clear to me was that the article was a bit of a mess in the way it told the story so I restructured it. I think it is better now but I wouldn't be so arrogant as to say it is perfect now.

The main thing I did was to separate the chronicle of what actually happened from the legacy of the events (i.e. the impact on events after the actual expulsion). I kept the reasons separate because there seemed to be value in doing that. However, it is also possible to either move all the reasons into the chronicle (especially if the reasons are widely different from one country to the next). Another possibility is to keep the reasons that are in common (e.g. Potsdam) in the reasons section and move the country-specific reasons into the country subsections of the chronicle section. I'm not sure if this would help the discussion/dispute above.

Happy editing.

--Richard 16:58, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

You know as well as I know that it were Stalin and Truman - and only them - who decided to divide Europe and to expell the German minority. The Eastern European governments at this time were soley string-puppets directed by Moscow and Stalin was definitively not interested in what the Polish people thought about the whole issue not to mention that he would have asked them before making his decision Wrong. Plans of territorial changes in regards to Germany were already made in 1939, and the proposal to remove Germans was made in 1941, during the time that SU was just as likely to be defeated. --Molobo 17:02, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

I did not talk about PLANS/PROPOSALS I talked about DECISIONS and decisions were made (without Poland) in 1945 (213.70.74.164 09:21, 15 May 2006 (UTC))

Nonsense

I have just come across this http://www.answers.com/topic/expulsion-of-germans-after-world-war-ii webpage, with an old version of this article. It contains the text:

In the late summer of 1945 the Czech lands were the location of the most brutal attacks against German civilians. These crimes were primarily perpetrated by Czech nationalist and communist militiamen, who were tolerated by the Soviets, who had replaced the American allied forces after June of the same year. In Aussig an der Elbe militiamen publicly shot thousands of German men in the city square, afterwards throwing their corpses in the Elbe river, which became saturiated with blood and decomposing human remains. In the capital of Prague the Czech mob itself took revenge on the historically large German minority in the city. Reports were sent by perplexed Soviet soldiers of the mob burning ethnic German school children alive in the central squares of the city.

First off:

• Soviets did not replace the Americans on most of the Czech republic, Prague for instance was "liberated" by Soviets
• There are no other references except from this and the Answers webpage about ethnically German school children being burned alive in the central squares of Prague.
• Even German sources (serious ones) dont say that the number of victims in Usti / Aussig was in "thousands"
• The numbers in this texts are exaggerated, even when compared to German sourced and the text as a whole was / is unsourced, contains blatant lies (Americans being replaced by Russians) and is of questionable intent.

The result is, that more webpages will contain this German nationalist propaganda, citing this Wikipedia article.

It is a slap in the face of victims of WWII who are presented as the "Czech/Polish mob" that burns schoolchildren.

Because of this stupid wikipedia policy, that any nationalist idiot can add anything to an article and if you want to remove it, you have to discuss it on the talk page and reach consensus with other nationalist idiots there, Wikipedia will never be a reliable source.

That is why I added the the totallydisputed tag, so German boy please dont accuse Molobo, it was my work and the tag will stay.

I am also removing the map, as it doesnt describe the period it is related to, it is factually inaccurate. It could describe the german speaking territory from tenth century on, or just the nineteenth, but noone knows and its misleading. Moreover, you should be more sensitive about the nationalist subtones here.

Cant add the signature as my keyboard top row doesnt work. Sorry Ackoz

"...disputed tag, so German boy please dont...". "Moreover, you should be more sensitive about the nationalist subtones here."

I would say that this is a classic case of "venire contra factum proprium" (213.70.74.164 12:06, 15 May 2006 (UTC))

Totally disputed tag, answers.com and edit warring

Rmhermen removed a "totally disputed" tag on the grounds that "you can't add a disputed tag for text in a mirror site". Can you explain this please? What text is in a mirror site? --Richard 03:46, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Nonsense, I added the totallydisputed tag even before I saw the mirror site, check the history of the page. Then see the discussion at Talk:Expulsion_of_Germans_after_World_War_II#Nonsense, the mirror is www.answers.com. Previously, the tag was removed by someone stating that it was Molobo who added it (not true, I did), then it is removed by someone who doesn't read the reasons. I believe the article is still POV and factually inaccurate. Thats why. But screw that I'm bored I don't see the sense of life in bargaining for words. ackoz 06:52, 14 May 2006 (UTC)

Sorry, I'm still confused. My first point of confusion, according to you, the answers.com website is a mirror of an old version of this article. Presumably, what you're saying is that the old erroneous text has since been removed from the current Wikipedia version of the article. So what's the problem with the current version of the text in the Wikipedia version of the article?

My second point of confusion, you say that you placed a {{totally disputed}} tag on this article. Is there a place above where you succinctly explain why? The discussion on this Talk Page is long and torturous. I've read through it once but I don't wish to read through it again just to find your argument.

If there isn't already a one or two paragraph explanation of the reasons for the {{totally disputed}} tag, could you provide one now? There is obviously a brewing edit war over this tag and, frankly, I'm having trouble figuring out what it's about.

My third point of confusion, there is another edit war brewing over the "Fear of disloyalty among the German population". Is your dispute related to this edit war?

I'm not taking sides on this POV dispute. I know darn little about this topic except what I've learned from the article and from the Talk Page. I'm just trying to find an NPOV solution that will satisfy all sides.

--Richard 17:49, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Unexplained deletions of text

I just reverted an unexplained deletion of text by anonymous user User:213.70.74.164. Failure to win a POV dispute on the Talk Page should not be resolved by deleting the disputed text in the article. Repeated incidents of this kind of behavior can lead to being blocked.

If you are unhappy with the text of the article, formulate a vote to determine consensus, issue a Request for Comment and THEN ABIDE BY THE RESULTS OF THE CONSENSUS.

Alternatively, insert text into the article that explains the nature of the POV dispute.

--Richard 17:34, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

This sentence needs to be fixed

In the "Legacy of the expulsion" section ...

"US Congressman B. Carroll Reece of Tennessee, in the House of Representatives on May 16, 1957, called the deportation and violent expulsion of German civilians genocide, possibly because of the millions of German civilian casualties the Western Allies had counted after scientific research into the expulsion reality."

Besides being a long, run-on sentence, the phrase "after scientific research into the expulsion reality" is an awkward expression. Is the idea that Reece called it genocide based on scientific research into the actual facts of the expulsion? What does "scientific research" mean in this context?

--Richard 11:41, 15 May 2006 (UTC)

Does an US Congressman define the law in Europe? Does he even know, where Europe is (not so obvious knowldge in the USA)? (unsigned comment)

Disclaimer: I didn't write the text in question. Somebody else did. Based on the text, I don't think Reece was attempting to "define the law in Europe". And, in 1957, everybody knew where Europe was (post WWII period, middle of the Cold War). We Americans may be an ignorant bunch but we weren't quite so ignorant in 1957.

However, the problems that I see with the current txt are these:

1. Are we sure that Reece talked about "millions of German civilian casualties"?
2. What the heck was the "scientific research" that could yield "millions of casualties"?

I'm going to trim the text pending sourcing of the more egregious claims. Either Reece was misquoted, or he was a fool. --Richard 16:15, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Just a quick admission of rashness... I wrote that "either Reece was misquoted or he was a fool". I wrote that because I thought that 3 million deaths was way too high. However, on re-reading the article, I noticed that the estimated deaths reach as high as 2 million. Thus, Reece was off by a factor of 50% which, while a substantial difference, could be attributed to receiving a bad estimate rather than being a fool. However, the variance from current estimates reinforces my sense that his estimates were not based on "scientific research" but rather a wild-assed guess.

If anyone has time and interest, it would be good to read and critique the entire speech. There might be some good information in the 35+ pages.

--Richard 02:30, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I think your putting quotation marks around "ancient homes" implies a sarcasm or that they had not lived there for long periods of time, implying a bias. You may not have meant it, but it is clearly sarcastic, I have changed it a little, is it agreeable?

--Jadger 01:34, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

I put quotation marks around "ancient homes" to indicate that those were Reece's words, not ours. I think the use of the word "ancient" is a bit stilted because it is a rhetorical flourish that is meant to evoke emotion. If I were writing it, I would have said "their homeland". So, I would prefer the quotations remain around "ancient homes".

If this really bothers you, I would also be OK if we change the words to something less flowery like "their homeland" or simply "their homes". Or something factual like "the place where their forebears have lived for hundreds of years" (if that's true).

Another solution would be to expand the text inside the quotes. The implied sarcasm (which I did NOT intend) comes from the fact that the quotes seem to focus on the word "ancient". If the quoted text were expanded, the focus would shift away from "ancient" and hopefully the implied sarcasm would disappear.

--Richard 02:22, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

What is a connection between a statement of a politician and the "Legacy"? Or is this rather a collection of the accidental statements against the expulsion? Xx236 12:43, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Is 1986 book "recent'?

I doubt very much. Xx236 13:42, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

people from Warsaw were deported

People of Warsaw were "deported" but Germans were "expelled". Who writes this propaganda? Xx236 13:47, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

At first, I had difficulty seeing your point. However, I have changed the text to read "expelled to western Poland or deported to gulag camps in Siberia". The idea is "expelling" means "throwing people out of an area but not to anywhere specific" and "deporting" means "taking people out of one area to a specific destination". I don't know if this is the dictionary definition but it gets rid of the inconsistency between what the Soviet Union did and what Germany did. I hope this satisfies your concern.

In the future, you could be bold and make the change yourself.

--Richard 15:58, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

There is a German idea to present the Expulsion of Germans after World War II as something exceptional and to ignore expulsions committed by Nazi Germany, e.g. the expulsion of the people of Warsaw, not because of "specific destination", but because of alleged short time of the deportation (but Warsaw was to be destroied for always). The Holocaust is, according to the Center against Expulsions, an Expulsion, even if the Jews were transported to specific destinations and many of them to death camps.

I didn't want to criticize non-German authors, especially native-speakers. Xx236 07:37, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

can you provide a source that says that it is viewed as unique by Germans? You are mistaken, it is not viewed as "exceptional" and the expulsions done by the Nazis are not ignored. Rather there is a fight against the common ignorance of most people that think that only the Nazis committed atrocities in WWII. It is a fight against the tu quoque fallacy, it was not deserved or "coming to them" because the same had been done by their government.

--Jadger 01:55, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

"the expulsions done by the Nazis are not ignored"

The expulsion of Warsaw people is ignored by almost any German source, including the Center against Expulsions.

When I visited a German bookstore last year, I had the impression that there are more books about the expulsion of Germans there than about all Nazi crimes. I admit I haven't counted the books. Many books about the expulsion of the Germans ignore the historical context created mainly by the Germans 1939-1945.

There exists "common ignorance" in Germany, if we consider crimes against ethnic Poles. Mr President Rau and his team ignored even the existence of Warsaw Uprising, when invited to Warsaw. The Wehrmacht Ausstellung presented crimes 1941-1945. Only 60 years after the war the first exhibition documenting Wehrmacht crimes in Poland was organized. The planned destruction of Warsaw is being ignored till today, see above. ZgV ignores the Zamość region expulsion, even if Mr President Koehler was born in Skierbieszów as the result of this expulsion. Erika Steinbach propbably ignores the expulsion of Poles from her "Heimat" and mass executions there. I have never read any her text discussing the subjects.

The German Wiki documents the state of German minds. You may check there which subjects are ignored or underrepresented and which ones are overrepresented. Xx236 09:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC) Yes the German centre lists Hitler's colonists as "re-settlers" and Poles are of course deported by Germany not expelled. It also mentions that Gdansk was founded by Germans. --Molobo 17:59, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Likewise in the Opole/Oppeln region in Upper Silesia, German miners and their families were allowed to stay

Not true. Germans of Opole region are mostly peasants and they stayed to keep their farms. The miners in Eastern Upper Silesia spoke Silesian, a Polish dialect with German ~industrial vocabulary. Xx236 07:44, 17 May 2006 (UTC)

Any proof? such as a census or scholarly journal

--Jadger 01:58, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Current data are here: http://pl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mniejszo%C5%9B%C4%87_niemiecka_w_Polsce

Opole region: 104399 Germans Upper Silesia: 30531

The "Silesians", i.e. people speaking dialect are concentrated in Upper Silesia.

The coal mines are in Upper Silesia, not in Opole region.

Many German professionals weren't allowed to left Communist Poland after the war, probably miners too. But the majority emigrated later. Xx236 08:31, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Making room for the Poles

During the war millions of Poles lost their houses or flats, partially as the result of 1939 and 1944/1945 campaigns, partially as the result of German destruction of ghettos, anti-partisan actions (burning of villages), ban on construction works, destruction of Warsaw during and after the Warsaw Uprising. Other millions of Poles were expelled from Eastern Poland, annexed by the Soviet Union (Poland lost about 50% of the pre-war area and 20% after annexation of German lands. Poland was the only "winner", who lost lands and independence as the result of WWII). Millions of Poles had to emigrate, because they lost their working places and farms during the war. A number of ethnic Poles came from Western (mostly from France)and Southern (Bosnya, Romania) Europe.

I suggest to replace the paragraph (which contains errors) with my text. I don't have however the numbers. Xx236 08:16, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

How the hell did my great Oma stay?

My great Oma from Breslau stayed after the war in Poland- all she had to do was take on polnische citizenship. And here I am a proud ethnic Deutscher in Polen, with a German Fahne flapping in front of my Haus and German Staatsangehörigkeit with the right of return to boot. Where is the expulsion (seriously)? 83.5.242.116 09:54, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Jadger

There is no fight on this page about whether there were murders and massacres during the expulsion. That is clear enough. What you shouldn't forget, is that the atrocities and expulsions and murders etc. would never happen without prior Nazi agression, and the fact should be stressed sufficiently in the article. These are primarily the consequences of the WWII, not of Czech / Polish / Russian nationalism.

Your tendency to present the facts as "the Germans suffered the most in WWII" is apalling. They did suffer, but at least in Czechoslovakia, 80% of them voted for the Nazi party, which lead to destruction of the state and allowed much worse attrocities of Germans in the Czech lands. See Lidice for an example. Your claims that pre-war Germans have suffered from massive discrimination in pre-war Czechoslovakia are silly aswell, because if you really checked some mainstream German sources on this matter, you would see that Czechoslovakia not only had the most advanced minority-protection laws in that time, but that also German non-nationalistic politicians participated in governments of Czechoslovakia as ministers.

Certain groups (S. Landsmannschaft) try to compare the Benes decrees to Norimberg laws and Expulsions to Holocaust, but there was no intent to conquer the world and exterminate the Germans by means of z.B. gas chambers in the Expulsion. I condemn these efforts to present massive, state-organised, lagre-scale genocide of Jews as comparable to expulsion, which was accompanied by excesses of individuals and unofficial militia groups.

Moreover, my previous discussion with you, on the topic of your ideas like "Bohemians=Germans" and "Czechs = late 19th century slav invaders" and Premyslid = German etc. shows, that you have no idea about what you are writing about. A completely uninformed editor surely isn't someone to edit an encyclopedia article. Please restrain from contributing until you learn some more.

85.70.5.66 12:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC) Well Jadger also claims Poles didn't exist as a nation till XX century, so I suggest you take his views rather scepticaly. --Molobo 17:55, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

During the years 1933 - 1938 Sudetengermans had more civil rights than in Germany. They didn't however had the right to Cwould have had less problems without Sudeten, like Poland without Western Ukraine. Xx236 09:32, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Please Molobo, I have never claimed that, if I have, please quote me, and please try to do it in context for once. I said a Polish nation did not exist between the last Partition of Poland until following WWI. you were trying to imply that a nation is the same thing as an ethnic group/peoples in an article, in order to make something minor (such as Poland not existing) look as if it was a major crime against humanity.

--Jadger 02:57, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Please stop the edit war...

There is a revert war going on between User:Molobo and User:213.70.74.165. It's true that the disputed text could be OR but it is rebutting text that is also arguably OR. What we need here is some citations of verifiable sources.

Please stop edit warring by inserting text and reverting it. This is going nowhere.

--Richard 17:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

All my information is sourced. If you feel that anything I entered is OR feel free to ask me for sources.

--Molobo 17:55, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

The claim that they were only women and children is A-completely inconnected to fears of future acts similiar to previous ones by German minority. B-absurd since even on the frontpage we see several men on the picture. --Molobo 17:57, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Here's what needs to be sources (IMHO)

The current edit war seems to be over this text

"The fears of disloyalty of German minority were made stronger by the creation after the end of the war of a German resistance group called "Werwolf". However such fears, provided they existed, were provably unsubstantiated as the German minority consisted of women, children and old men and, furthermore, not one single act of terrorism were commited by Werwolf on the liberated territories. Moreover, such arguments do not apply to the large areas of annexed German motherland with a historically pure German population (e.g. Schlesia) as minorty organisations did not exist there."

There are several high-level assertions to consider

1a) That some/many/most members of the German minority were involved in supporting the Nazis 1b) Perhaps the number of people involved in support/collaboration might have been smaller than reported in the article

2a) That this support/collaboration led to "fears of disloyalty" 2b) But maybe it didn't

3a) That "fears of disloyalty" were part of the rationale for expulsion 3b) Or maybe it wasn't

4a) That the "fears of disloyalty" were a valid rationale for expulsion 4b) Or maybe the "fears of disloyalty" were not a valid rationale because there was no reason to fear disloyalty or, at lea st, no reason to expect that "women and children" could do anything effective

You will notice that every a/b pair consists of an assertion and its rebuttal.

Here's my point: with the exception of Selbstschutz and Werwolf whose existence I assume are verifiable, none of the rest of the text is verifiable (as in can be cited to a reliable source.

Let's face it... Most of Wikipedia is unsourced and "needs citations". You only need to dig deep and provide citations if you are challenged or if you are trying for featured article status. There is plenty of challenge to this section so now is the time to dig up those sources and provide citations for the assertions. We need now to move away from "X is true" and "X is not true" to saying "Historian A says that X is true but Historian B says that X is not true".

Otherwise, you guys will be in edit war hell forever.

--Richard 18:13, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Perhaps the number of people involved in support/collaboration might have been smaller than reported in the article Or perhaps larger ? As to the number I am ready to give my sources.

But maybe it didn't Except we have sources from Polish historians that it did. Or maybe it wasn't Except we have sources from Polish historians that it was.

Or maybe the "fears of disloyalty" were not a valid rationale because there was no reason to fear disloyalty or, at least, no reason to expect that "women and children" could do anything effective This is original research sorry. If Poles believed it was valid then it will be stated so if they are sources confirming this. You can't put your own opinions in the article.

Most of Wikipedia is unsourced and "needs citations". Thanks for agreeing with that. I am of the same opinion, that's why I added links to scholary research on the subject after the sentences that contain this information. --Molobo 18:34, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Molobo, please understand that the reason that I provided a/b pairs (or to be precise x/not x pairs), is that these are the points that are being disputed. Thus each of these points needs to be sourced.

I want to preface what follows by saying that I am trying to take an objective, neutral point of view based on the fact that I knew little or nothing about this topic until a couple weeks ago.

I am not trying to attack your position. I suspect that I agree with you but that's not really relevant. What you, User: 213.70.74.165 or I believe to be true is not important because it is OR. What matters is citations of verifiable sources.

Let's look at this text "Every tenth German living in Poland was a member of Selbstschutz, while 25% of German population belonged to Nazi sponsored organizations aiding in the Nazi conquest of Poland. Germans living in Poland have made lists of Poles targeted for execution and hunted down and interned thousands of Poles. Historians estimate that in such operations in areas that were incorporated to Reich 40,000 Poles were murdered and 20,000 sent to concentration camps. Only a few percent survived. Overwhelming majority of those victims were selected by local Germans who pointed them as enemies of Reich."

These numbers (10%, 25%) need sourcing. Even the phrase "overwhelming majority of those victims were selected..." needs sourcing.

There are two links at the end of the section being disputed. Unfortunately, these links suffer from two problems: (1) they are websites and, as such, are not acceptable sources (2) foreign language sources are not acceptable unless translated.

Please provide translations of the relevant German and Polish text on the websites that you reference. I recognize that this may be difficult especially if the text on the websites may be copyrighted and so that no direct translation may be legally allowed.

Finally, it is not adequate to say "Polish historians say ...". What's needed is "In journal P, Polish historian A said that X is true." Now, if User: 213.70.74.165 wants to counter and add "However, in journal Q, German historian B said that X is not true", then we should consider keeping both statements. In any event, it is unacceptable (although common) to have "naked statements" like "Some people say X is trre. However, others argue that X is not true." These statements are not verifiable and therefore are considered "original research".

Every tenth German living in Poland was a member of Selbstschutz, 82,000 [4] out of 740,000 Germans [5]

Even the phrase "overwhelming majority of those victims were selected..." This is sourced by the text already linked[6]. If you want more: [7] In the early days of occupation 90% of those sent to concetration camps were sent from lists made by local Germans. --Molobo 19:28, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

they are websites and, as such, are not acceptable sources There isn't any Wiki rule that forbids online scholary sources not to be used. Actually the German link isn't really needed, the first Polish one is a scholary document by doctor Wardzynska from IPN insitute that talks about population changes after WW2. --Molobo 19:28, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Molobo, please understand that I am making suggestions to make your text defensible. I know that it's a lot of work (I've been on the receiving end of this from someone who challenged something I wrote). I'm not challenging the truth of what you wrote but other people are. Until it's sourced, it can be challenged and can only be considered to be a little better than the OR text which User: 213.70.74.165 has written. All of what I write about Molobo's text goes double for User: 213.70.74.165's text.

1) Please put the sources mentioned above in the text as in-line citations.

2) Try to think of some way to get around the language problem. If I wanted to challenge your sources, I wouldn't think it fair that you cited German and Polish sources. This is English Wikipedia. At a minimum, you need to translate the name and title of the author as well as the title of the publication, title of the article and the date of publication. Here's what the rules are from reliable sources.

Sources in languages other than English : Because this is the English Wikipedia, for the convenience of our readers, English-language sources should be provided whenever possible, and should always be used in preference to foreign-language sources (assuming equal quality and reliability). For example, do not use a foreign-language newspaper as a source unless there is no equivalent article in an English-language newspaper. However, foreign-language sources are acceptable in terms of verifiability, subject to the same criteria as English-language sources.

Keep in mind that translations are subject to error, whether performed by a Wikipedia editor or a professional, published translator. In principle, readers should have the opportunity to verify for themselves what the original material actually said, that it was published by a credible source, and that it was translated correctly.

Therefore, when the original material is in a language other than English:

Where sources are directly quoted, published translations are generally preferred over editors performing their own translations directly. Where editors use their own English translation of a non-English source as a quote in an article, there should be clear citation of the foreign-language original, so that readers can check what the original source said and the accuracy of the translation.

I interpret the above to mean that you should provide some translation of the Polish language article. Not necessarily all of it but the portions that you are using as a basis for what you wrote.

3) You wrote "There isn't any Wiki rule that forbids online scholary sources not to be used." Well, I guess that's true. Let's look at what the rules are on verifiability.

"Self-published sources: Anyone can create a website or pay to have a book published, and then claim to be an expert in a certain field. For that reason, self-published books, personal websites, and blogs are largely not acceptable as sources. Exceptions may be when a well-known, professional researcher in a relevant field, or a well-known professional journalist, has produced self-published material. In some cases, these may be acceptable as sources, so long as their work has been previously published by credible, third-party publications. However, exercise caution: if the information on the professional researcher's blog is really worth reporting, someone else will have done so."

You are arguing that "doctor Wardzynska from IPN insitute" is a well-known, professional researcher. I will accept your claim but I think you need to provide the evidence for this in the text of the article either in-line or in the references at the end (preferably both). It's not me that you have to convince, it's every Tom, Dick and Harry who comes along and doesn't quite believe what you wrote. It's not a question whether they believe Molobo. It's a question of whether they believe doctor Wardzynska from IPN insitute. It would help if you explain what the IPN institute is. We have lots of "institutes" in the U.S. that are partisan think tanks (e.g. the American Enterprise Institute). Publications from these kinds of think tanks are less credible than those published by a professor at an educational institute like the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

According to WP:V...

The burden of evidence lies with the editors who have made an edit or wish an edit to remain. Editors should therefore provide references.

Any edit lacking a source may be removed, but some editors may object if you remove material without giving people a chance to provide references. If you want to request a source for an unsourced statement, a good idea is to move it to the talk page. Alternatively, you may tag the sentence by adding the {{fact}} template, or tag the article by adding {{not verified}} or {{unsourced}}. You could also make the unsourced sentences invisible in the article by adding <!-- before the section you want to comment out and --> after it, until reliable sources have been provided.

Be careful not to err too far on the side of not upsetting other editors by leaving unsourced information in articles for too long, or at all in the case of information about living people. Jimmy Wales has said of this: "I can NOT emphasize this enough. There seems to be a terrible bias among some editors that some sort of random speculative 'I heard it somewhere' pseudo information is to be tagged with a 'needs a cite' tag. Wrong. It should be removed, aggressively, unless it can be sourced. This is true of all information, but it is particularly true of negative information about living persons."

I'm going to start adding {{citation needed}} tags in the text where I think they are needed. Please consider these as helpful suggestions to help you improve the text.

The above guideline from WP:V also applies to text written by User: 213.70.74.165 as well.

One last time, it doesn't matter how good your argument is. If you can't cite someone reputable who said it, it doesn't belong here. Sorry.

--Richard 20:24, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

I could give citations right away but the 3RR forbids me so :/ --Molobo 20:41, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Moreover, such arguments do not apply to the large areas of annexed German territory with a pure German population (e.g. Silesia) as minorty organisations did not exist there. [citation needed] => there is no citation needed as this is logical. In Schlesia and many other Western parts of today`s Poland the former German population was NOT a minority, these people were THE population. Given that, minority protection organisations were not necessary as there was nothing to protect (no minority = no Selbstschutz). (213.70.74.165 07:29, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

Every tenth German living in Poland was a member of Selbstschutz, 82,000 [15] out of 740,000 Germans [16] => great quotes! Up to 17 million people were expelled and Molobo tries to convince us with an article written in Polish concerning 82,000 (=0,48%) people out of 740,000 (=4.3%) - that is unscientific and randomised moral relativism. (213.70.74.165 08:16, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

The figure is regarding German population in Poland in 1939 and it shows the extent of German minority's collaboration with Nazi Reich which worried Polish government during the war. --Molobo 09:33, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Given that, minority protection organisations were not necessary as there was nothing to protect (no minority = no Selbstschutz). You are inccorrect. Approximately 736,000 Poles and 260,000 Germans lived in Polish Silesia and 532,000 Poles and 637,000 Germans in German Silesia. Silesia was hardly German "motherland" as it was taken from Austria(a multiethnic state) in 1741 and had mixed ethnic population. Even in XIX century they were places were only 10 % of people spoke German. But that is irrelevant to the subject at hand. --Molobo 09:33, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

You tend to make your own facts (What is German Silesia? Since when are more than 50% a minority? What about the other parts of the German Reich annected? Austria belonged to the German Reich until 1806 and they are ethnic Germans as well). Basically, this article is about the expulsion of Germans and not a platform for your Werwolf/Selbstschutz/Nazi issues. I start to collect quotes from now on and I will demonstrate how cherry-picked, unscientific, polemic, unsystematic and morally doubtfull your statements are. Furthermore, I will concentrate on what happened to the German minority during the expulsion (Polish concentration camps, starvation, torture & rape). Please abstain from molesting me with your homemade history. From now on only facts displayed in a sound context will be valid and that is definitively nothing for a professional and nationalistic history-twister like you. (213.70.74.165 10:00, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

German Silesia is the part of Silesia that remained with German state after WWI.

Basically, this article is about the expulsion of Germans and not a platform for your Werwolf/Selbstschutz/Nazi issues The population transfer of Germans from the point of view of Polish government was made necessary by the issue of Selbstschutz, German state atrocities against Poles, and the collaboration of German minority in pre-war time.As such it is neccassary to include among the reasons.

I start to collect quotes from now on and I will demonstrate how cherry-picked, unscientific, polemic, unsystematic and morally doubtfull your statements are Hmm ? I only provide statements of historians, I don't present my views.

Austria belonged to the German Reich until 1806 and they are ethnic Germans as well Nope, Austria didn't belong to German Reich and it wasn't ethnic German. It belonged to "Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation" which despite the name wasn't made only of Germans but other nationalities as well. If you believe Austria was an ethnic German state It seems you lack much knowledge of history as Austria was made out of Czechs's, Poles, Germans, Hungarians and other nationalities. --Molobo 10:40, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Right, as you say it, Austria did not even exist 1741 and its ancestor Habsburg belonged to the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation called "1st German Reich" (fyi: approx. 880 - 1806 1st German Reich, 1871 - 1918 2cd German Reich, 1933 - 1945 3rd German Reich). Which other nationalities (in significant numbers) except for the German belonged to the 1st German Reich? (213.70.74.164 12:21, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

May I ask - do you call Auschwitz a German or a nazi camp? Xx236 10:11, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

? Yes you may but what has that to do with the expulsion of the Germans ? (213.70.74.164 10:16, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

I want to measure your objectivity. Xx236 10:23, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Ah, I see, you are something like a professional objectivity-measurer and this sophisticated question supports you rendering another of your brilliant and famous analysises of German/Nazi Wiki-users. (213.70.74.165 12:10, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

Still no answer. I have asked - was according to you Auschwitz a German or a Nazi camp? Xx236 12:18, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I do not understand the purpose of the question. What do you try to find out?

You have written "Polish concentration camps". So I ask - was Auschwitz, according to you, a German or a Nazi camp? Xx236 12:40, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I see, well, you are right, the wording is not political correct, sorry. Therefore, I would like to amend my statement to "concentration camps operated by the statutory Polish intelligence service". (213.70.74.164 12:57, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

What about German camps, run by the German statutory service Stasi? Xx236 14:04, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

What has that to do with the topic (expulsion of the Germans)? What "Stasi" camps? Where is the context? (213.70.74.164 14:17, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

---

I apologize for not reading the whole discussion, and not doing actual research, just adding some pointers to reference (due to lack of time).

1a) That some/many/most members of the German minority were involved in supporting the Nazis 1b) Perhaps the number of people involved in support/collaboration might have been smaller than reported in the article

In case of Czechoslovakia, this can decided by any source counting membership od SdP and its election results. The numbers certainly can be found in the book "Facing history" (link to pdf is in the article)

2a) That this support/collaboration led to "fears of disloyalty" 2b) But maybe it didn't

I think something like that can be referenced from the Europen Insitute study, pg. 5, "charge of disloyalty".

3a) That "fears of disloyalty" were part of the rationale for expulsion 3b) Or maybe it wasn't

4a) That the "fears of disloyalty" were a valid rationale for expulsion

4b) Or maybe the "fears of disloyalty" were not a valid rationale because there was no reason to fear disloyalty or, at least, no reason to expect that "women and children" could do anything effective

1. The preposition "women and children" is untrue. 2. The "fears of disloyalty" existed both in short-term and long-term perspective. POW had to sooner or later return to their families.

Separate questions are

• was there a reason to fear disloyalty?
• was the German population capable of any resistance? in long-term the answer is so obviously "yes" I'm affraid it would be hard to source
• were just the fears valid rationale from moral standpoint? this is a matter of POV

--Wikimol 21:15, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Hi, Wikimol. I don't blame you for not wanting to read the entire discussion. It's long and not very pleasant to read. However, I fear you miss the point of my a/b pairs. These are a summary of the points presented here in the Talk Pages by other Wiki editors. On almost every one of my "a/b" pairs, the dispute between "a" and its negation "b" has resulted in multiple edit wars and heated debate here.

My point in listing them was not to convince anybody that a was true or that b was true. It was to say, "OK. If you want "a" in the article, then source it. If you want "b" in the article, then source that." If both "a" and "b" can be sourced, then both should be in the article

Wikipedia is not interested in truth, it is intererested in verifiability. Your arguments that a is true or b is true is no more valuable than my opinion. Both are worthless as far as Wikipedia is concerned. On the other hand, if you can find a Polish, German, Russian, British or U.S. scholar, historian, politician, civic leader or newspaper that said "a" or "b", that's a reliable source for the statement.

Please, no more arguing that "a is true" or "b is true". If there is no consensus to let a statement stand unsourced, then it must either be sourced or removed.

--Richard 21:31, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I did not intended to show where is the truth :-) I only wanted to point where some of a&bs can be sourced, with the hope someone else will do it. Well, I see I slipped a bit in case 4., I admit... Sory. The intended point was, some statemnts may be hard to source either way (Q. Do kanagaroos eat elephants? a. yes b. no - find me credible reference supporting either) ... in which case should be removed completely. In this case probably even very ridiculous statements can be sourced & attributed to various newspaer and politicians, so my point was actually not valid.

Btw, while I failed expressing what I wanted, I understand your intention perfectly and agree with it. Enforcing WP:CITE is the way to go, stop unproductive edit warring,..

--Wikimol 00:08, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

Wow Molobo, so you state you never give your opinion, you only cite historians? So that's why you have been banned multiple times, sometimes for months at a time: for giving credible sources. And that must also be why there is a vote to have you permanently banned from Wikipedia, not because you have been proven wrong constantly and use sources in Polish language that don't even say what you are claiming, and it certainly isn't for fighting with other credible wikipedians, you've never done that.

--Jadger 03:07, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

IPN : Institute for National Remembrance

It would help if you explain what the IPN institute is. http://www.ipn.gov.pl/index_eng.html

The Institute of National Remembrance - Commission of the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation (IPN) was established by the Polish Parliament on December 18th, 1998 with a special bill. The Institute is headed by the President whose post is independent of the state authorities. The President of the IPN is elected for a five-year term.

The Institute of National Remembrance - Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nation (IPN) has been charged with fulfilling this mission. On the basis of the statute constituting the IPN, Communist crimes are understood as the deeds performed by officials of the Communist state in the period from September 17th, 1939 to December 31st, 1989, whose activities led to repress individuals and groups of people or to break human rights in another way. Crimes against humanity are understood mainly as crimes of genocide defined by the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide of December 9th, 1948, as well as other forms of persecution and oppressions by official agents which were directed against people who belong to a defined national, political, social, racial or religious group. In accordance with the principles conveyed in international law, no statutory limitation shall apply to war crimes, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity, whether committed in time of war or in time of peace, irrespectively of the date of their commission. Thus, the IPN is responsible for gathering, assessing, custody and disclosing the documentation created between July 22nd, 1944 and the December 31st, 1989 by Polish security agencies. The documentation would also include records pertaining to Communist, Nazi and other crimes committed against Polish citizens in the period from September 1st, 1939 to December 31st, 1989 as well as political repressions carried out by officials of the former Polish investigative and justice organs in that time. The documentation concerning the activities of the security organs is also the subject of interest of the IPN. The access to the IPN records is granted to foreigners on the basis of reciprocity. Another major responsibility of the Institute is to investigate Communist and Nazi crimes as well as war crimes and crimes against humanity and peace. The IPN is obliged to investigate crimes against not only Polish nationals but also other nationals of Polish citizenship and other citizens who were harmed in the Polish territories. Finally, the IPN is in charge of public education and has been engaged in research with regard to years 1939-1989 as well as dissemination of research results in the form of publications, exhibitions, seminars and in other ways. The activities performed by the IPN while fulfilling its mission must take into consideration the need to protect personal data of the repressed people. --Molobo 20:33, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Thanks. It turns out there's a Wikipedia article about it already (I shoulda known). Please reference this as appropriate. Also, if you have time and interest, maybe you could put some of the ideas from the website into the Wikipedia article. The Wiki article is very small and needs expansion.

--Richard 20:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Churchill

I have removed "In his famous Iron Curtain speech of March 1946, Churchill condemned the expulsions [8]" from the paragraph Preventing ethnic violence, because it isn't about etnic violence. If you like the quote, put it somewhere. Xx236 12:45, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Answer to 213.70.74.164

Right, as you say it, Austria did not even exist 1741 and its ancestor Habsburg belonged to the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation called "1st German Reich" (fyi: approx. 880 - 1806 1st German Reich, 1871 - 1918 2cd German Reich, 1933 - 1945 3rd German Reich). Which other nationalities (in significant numbers) except for the German belonged to the 1st German Reich?

(213.70.74.164 12:21, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

Hello 213.70.74.164, I would like to point you to the German wikipedia article http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heiliges_Römisches_Reich which should be an enough answer for you question. At the beginning of the period you were talking about (880), the Reich was not even called "German" (the name "of the German nation" is in use circa since 16th century, also see Holy_Roman_Empire for further explanation of reasons) . As some editor on the German wikipedia noted, if you still call the 1st Reich "of the German nation", you didn't do your homeworks well. The most notable non-german part of the Empire was Bohemia, and I will be repeating myself when I say that Czechs is just a new 19th century english / german name for Bohemians, and that the original dynasty, Premyslid, who joined the Empire with Bohemia were Slavs, ie. Czechs. However, the fact that Bohemia was a part of the HRR still serves some idiots as an argument, that "the land was German", because it was a part of the HRR of the German nation. It doesn't actually have any logic, because there was no immigration of Slavs into Bohemia after year 700, and there would be no explanation for the presence of Czechs.

It is very funny, that English wikipedia is full of people like you, who don't even have the slightest idea about the topic they try to write about, but they are here to defend the "German thing." However, the corresponding articles on German wikipedia are edited by people who actually studied the topics (and I mean University studied) and articles there are non-biased, factual, and any nationalist edit is reverted pretty fast. If you really want to contribute (by which I mean add some value) to the article, do some reading please, German wikipedia could be a good start for you.

Hello, thx for the precious information but that was not the point of the discussion. The point is that in 1741 Austria was Habsburg and belonged to the so called 1st German Reich (even the Kaiser was Habsburgian), and that in Silesia and many other parts where expulsions took place the Germans were not a minority but the vast majority. Hence, as far as this parts are concerned one could hardly refer to minority organisations. However I cited the official name, HRR of German Nation and that is ok/political correct. By the way, please do not act that arrogant. I am sure that my education is at least as good as yours and my manners are definitively better. (213.70.74.165 14:02, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

No it is not ok to call the HRR "of German nation" anymore. It is true, that for centuries, Czechs were pretty much assimilated into the German nation. That ended with the "national revival" of Czechs in the 19th century. It might be funny that people with German names like http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Josef_Jungmann were the fathers of Czech patriotism (and the fact that German wikipedia contains an article about him, whereas the English version only has an article about an unnotable priest copied from the catholic encyclopedia is also very fuuny). But it led to what we know now - one Czech nation that is independent from Germany politically (we actually depend on Germany with our economics more than we ever did). The reason for HRR not correctly being called "of German nation" anymore is exactly this - it ignores the Czechs. My ancestors (and ancestors of 10 milion of other Czechs) were also subjects of HRR kings and emperors, though they were not Germans. By saying "of German nation", you are actually excluding Czechs from the common history, as if they didn't belong to the whole HRR. Similarly, many people born in the Czech lands before the national revival are now described as "German" or "Austrian" authors/scientists etc. There are nationality disputes about Kafka, Rokitansky etc., and these are all stupid - you could be born in Prague (Kafka), have a Czech name (Kafka), be Jewish (Kafka), have Austrian citizenship (Kafka) then Czechoslovakian citizenship (Kafka), speak Czech (Kafka) and German (Kafka) and write in German (Kafka). The result is that Kafka was mean to wikipedia editors, because there will always be German editors who would consider him German, Jewish editors consider him Jewish, and Czechs consider him Czech. Same applies to Rokitansky, Skoda and many others. This nationalities stupidity we are actually talking about the whole time started at that time and we should just let it go. Please let go the "German nation" of HRR. ackoz 20:22, 20 May 2006 (UTC)

http://www.posen-l.com/pos/GPJ.html Germans, Poles and Jews The Nationality Conflict in the Prussian East, 1772 - 1914 by William W. Hagen Publ. 1980 by University of Chicago Press, ISBN 0-226-31242-9 In Upper Silesia, conquered together with the rest of that province by Frederick the Great, a large population of Polish-speaking peasant-serfs tilled the lands of German or Germanized Slavic noblemen and magnates. Polish was spoken among the common people in the towns as well. In central Silesia to the east of the Oder, Polish villagers and urban workers also survived in a largely Germanized setting, but most of Silesia had been lost to the Poles in the first wave of German eastward expansion. So much about your claims about ancient German "motherland". --Molobo 14:10, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Help! Please, are you doing that on purpose? Why can`t you accept that in many parts subject to expulsions in 1945 the Germans were not a minority but (for what reason ever) the majority and, therefore, in this parts minority organisations did simply not exist. (213.70.74.164 14:22, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

You are confusing different issues here. --Molobo 14:41, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

sure... (213.70.74.164 14:47, 19 May 2006 (UTC))

Yes you are 213, and your logic is totally flawed. There are for sure areas in Germany, where muslims, arabs or turks form a majority. I actually lived in such an area. And I am sure, that there are more areas like this in other countries of Europe (Netherlands, Britain for instance). Your logic would imply, that as muslims form a majority of population in these areas, there is no way their organisations could be called "minority". Subsequently, you could be defending efforts of these groups to do some de-facto "heim ins Reich" and apply their own religious, political etc rules on the land they live on. Greetings 85.70.4.141 17:06, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

85.70.4.141, the question was which nationalities lived in the FIRST German Reich which was abandonded in 1806. In 1806, there lived definitively no arabs, turks or other muslims in Germany. You are obviously to stupid to even understand the content of the easiest questions. So, next time read the question more carefully and/or ask your mother to help you. Greetings

I've been trying to follow this discussion. I haven't followed every last point but here's what I understand of it.

Molobo and others are arguing that Selbstschutz and Werwolf gave the Polish government reason to distrust the loyalty of ethnic Germans living in Poland. As long as these ethnic Germans lived in Poland, there would always be concern that a re-militarized Germany would lay claim to those areas or use the ethnic Germans as a fifth column for a future invasion. For these reasons, the Polish goernment would wish to expel the ethnic Germans living in Poland.

Yes the scholary article clearly mentions Selbstschutz was seen as example of such threat.--Molobo 22:04, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

213.70.74.164 is arguing that ethnic Germans were the majority in some areas of Poland and therefore there were no "minority German organizations" such as Selbstschutz. This may be true but it would help to have citations to back up the assertion.

However, in the absence of verifiable sources, we should be a bit skeptical of the assertion that Werwolf did not operate in areas where ethnic Germans constituted the majority.

213.70.74.164 is essentially saying that Selbstschutz only existed where ethnic Germans were in the minority and thus had no raison d'etre in an area where they were in the majority. However, that is only one way to perceive the mission of Selbstschutz. If Selbstschutz's task were to protect the rights of ethnic Germans in Poland, it would wish to recruit all ethnic Germans in Poland regardless of whether those Germans lived in an area where they were in a minority or where they were in the majority.

As of now I am trying to find the Werwolf reference. I have nothing against cutting that to simple statement that similar organisation like Selbstschutz was also formed in 1945. --Molobo 22:04, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

From a U.S. point of view, we have an organization called NAACP which advocates the civil rights of African-Americans. Would you expect that this organization would only have members in areas where African-Americans were in the minority? African-Americans are in the majority in the inner city of many U.S. metropolitan areas (e.g. Atlanta, New York City, Los Angeles, etc.) Would you expect that the NAACP would only recruit outside those areas or would you expect them to recruit heavily where there are large concentrations of African-Americans ? (NB: I am NOT equating NAACP to Werwolf. Not in the least.)

Even if Selbstschutz did NOT operate in areas where ethnic Germans were in the majority, can we also conclude that Selbstschutz did not operate in those areas? It would seem to me that ethnic Germans living in majority German areas would be more likely to support a German invasion than those living in a minority German area. This is pure speculation, I know but the logic is, if you live in a minority German area, you might be more likely to assimilate whereas, if you live in a majority German area, you might be more likely to self-identify as German.

Finally, just because 213.70.74.164, can draw a distinction between the majority German areas and the minority German areas doesn't mean the Polish government of the time drew the same distinctions. Yes, they could have said "Hmmm, let's just expel Germans from the areas where Selbstschutz and Werwolf were active but not from the areas where Germans were loyal." However, it is more likely that they just said "Hey, Germans were, are and always will be disloyal and it's in our interest to get them out of here. Let's do it. Get 'em all out and now!"

--Richard 17:47, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Redistrubution

I don't agree with it. The article I gave as source mentions both fears of new fifth column and previous cooperation with German state by German minority. I will merge the two once 3RR is over. --Molobo 16:48, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Can you explain this? It sounds like you are saying that you don't agree with the separation of the "Selbstschutz" text from the "Werwolf" text. If so, I can understand your desire to keep them together. However, please consider this line of reasoning...

1 There were historical reasons why the victorious Allied powers wanted to expel Germans (including Selbstschutz)

2 This led to decisions like the Potsdam Conference

3 As the war drew to a close and even after the war, some events may have intensified the desire to expel Germans (e.g. Werwolf)

This is the logical flow that I am trying to recast the article into.

There is no reason that you can't provide citations to the source in both places (i.e. where Selbstschutz is mentioned AND where Werwolf is mentioned). Where Werwolf is mentioned, you can add test that says that the previous cooperation with the Nazi cooperation intensified the negative reaction to Werwolf.

Does this work for you?

--Richard 16:56, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

I suggest cutting Werwolf to simple statement that similiar organisation was made as Selbstschutz. As to 'schutz I have enough citations that are needed. --Molobo 22:04, 21 May 2006 (UTC)

Nationalist POV

There always be some users on this page, who will try to push their POV, which could be described as "German civilians were not responsible for the actions of their leaders and they were the main victims of WWII because of the expulsions". That will never ever be true. We spend lots of time discussing with them, but we can never persuade them. However, the common knowledge is clear = people were afraid of Germans after the war ended, and angry at them too, so they expelled them. There were no concentration camps, no intention to "solve the German question" by killing and burning all ethnic Germans (parallel with the Jews). It was ethnic cleansing, and it was unfair sometimes and individuals and militant groups DID commit crimes. BUT - nothing like that would ever happen, if there was no WWII. And the responsibility for WWII will always be on the German side - noone else elected Hitler, noone else contributed so much to Holocaust, no other nation was stupid enough to be persuaded that they are the highest race on Earth.

My point is - we spend so much time arguing over and over again with individuals, who don't even know the hisotry of the region and claim that Bohemian kings and inhabitants were originaly German. We should make a sub-page for this discussion, in which we list all the (sourced) facts that are available. Then we could rv all the stupid changes and we wouldn't have to discuss the basics over and over again with every German nationalist.

ackoz 18:48, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I had gathered most of that and I agree with most of what you wrote. The one thing that I think we need to be really careful of in order to maintain NPOV is this: People were afraid of Germans and angry with them. However, it's also clear that the majority of ethnic Germans were not directly responsible for the Nazi invasions or the activities of Selbstschutz and Werwolf. They may have been sympathizers and even covert funders and supporters but the figures quoted ate 10% and 25%. That means there were 90% and 75% that were not directly involved.

As I understand it, none of these ethnic Germans voted for Hitler because they were not living on German territory. I don't know if any of them were German citizens and eligible to vote but I would guess that the vast majority of them were not.

I have since learned the distinction between Reichsdeutsche and Volksdeutsche. So it is possible that some of the Reichsdeutsche voted for Hitler? --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

So, what we get is a large population that was punished for the sins of the few or the sins of others. It's true that many of them may have sympathized with the Nazis and the collaborators. However, it's not reasonable to say of the expulsions that they was "unfair sometimes". The expulsions were completely unfair all the time and unjustified and bordering on a "crime against humanity".

If there had been an effort to round up known and suspected members of Selbstschutz and Werwolf and punish or expel them, that would have been fair. Expelling entire populations for the sins of individuals is unfair. Period.

A good analogy is whether the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII was "unfair sometimes" or "completely unfair". The difference is that the Japanese-Americans were only interned and were not expelled. However, many of them lost their property and businesses. They were allowed to return after the war but their homes and businesses were taken away in the meantime by other opportunistic neighbors and, in many cases, never returned. Many returnees had to start over again with nothing. Another key difference is that there are no known allegations of rape and murder.

Was the fear of Japanese-Americans justified? Maybe, maybe not. Was the internment and associated property confiscation (theft) justified. Many people then (including FDR) would have said yes. Most people today would say "No". Let's apply this attitude towards the expulsions of Germans.

I now see that the case of the Japanese-Americans during WWII is different from the case of the expulsion of Germans after WWII because there is no significant opinion that claims the internment of the Japanese-Americans was justified whereas there is apparently a strong sentiment that wishes to claim that the expulsion of the Germans was justified.

--Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

We should document the fear of ethnic Germans because it existed and because we can document that it existed. However, we should stay away from any suggestion that the fear was justified or that the fear justified the expulsions. Doing that would require a moral judgment which we are not supposed to insert in Wikipedia.

If you want to argue that the fear was justified or that the fear justified the expulsions, then you have to allow someone else to argue that the fear was not justified and that the fear, if it existed, did not justify the expulsions.

Actually, neither side of this question should be argued unless adequately sourced through citations of reliable sources.

If we can keep the article on that narrow line, I would feel comfortable defending the article against POV attacks from people like User:213.70.74.164. However, if you cross over that line into suggesting that the expusions were justifiable, then you are adopting a POV and making yourself vulnerable to POV attacks from the other side.

All this is, of course, just My Humble Opinion.

--Richard 19:28, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

They may have been sympathizers and even covert funders and supporters but the figures quoted ate 10% and 25

Ah but this from all population, you would have to deduct women, children and elderly from the overall population. And this numbers indicate those were active members of Nazi organisations meaning they engaged in murders, spying, fights not those that supported Hitler.

Regardless, it is one thing to round up every known and suspected member of Selbstschutz and Werwolf and deport them to concentration camps. It's another thing to expel (transfer) entire populations for the sins of the individuals, even if those individuals are your husbands, sons, fathers and brothers. --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

However, it's also clear that the majority of ethnic Germans were not directly responsible for the Nazi invasions or the activities of Selbstschutz and Werwolf. I can provide maps showing the support towads NSDAP in the regions that were subject to those events. Most had high support for Hitler.

Support is one thing. Active support is another. To punish "support" is to punish "thought crime". To punish "active support" is to punish "treason". You can sympathize with the enemy, you cannot help the enemy. A fine point, to be sure, but an important one. --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

The expulsions were completely unfair all the time and unjustified and bordering on a "crime against humanity".

Not really, first this was population transfer not expulsion, sadly it was distored during Cold War. Second it was made under good conditions and ended German colonisation of the East. In fact many colonised regions still remain under German control.However this is OT.

On what basis is population transfer justified? --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Expelling entire populations for the sins of individuals is unfair. That was just one reason for the population transfer.

Yes? And what are the others? Are they any more fair? --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

A good analogy is whether the internment of Japanese-Americans during WWII This isn't a good analogy. It would be if Japanese would colonise America then deny America those territories, believed that Americans are animals etc. I also would like to point out that German minority already supported ethnic cleansing of Poles in First World War. And I can cite sources if it is needed.

It is far from being a perfect analogy. However, the analogy holds with respect to fear of the Japanese being similar to fear of the Germans.

Let's apply this attitude towards the expulsions of Germans. This isn't acceptable. America wasn't occupied with the active involvment of Japanese minority.

Yes, it was. The Japanese on the West Coast were interned in relocation camps in Colorado specifically to get them away from the Coast where they could (so it was feared) assist invading Japanese forces. This happened despite the fact that many of them had been born in the United States and had lived there for two or three generations (a moderately long time at that point in the history of the West Coast). --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Actually, neither side of this question should be argued unless adequately sourced through citations of reliable sources. I agree 100 % with this. --Molobo 15:19, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Well said, Richard. IMO it was _understandable_, but not _justified_. As I once put the example: X murders Y whole family. Then Y goes and murders both X and his whole innocent family. Y committed terrible crime, but I think most of us would agree he could understand the reasons behind it, though also most of us, i hope, would still condemn Y. Understand the motives, condemn the resulting actions. Szopen 07:50, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

There was a framework of mass expulsions and population transfers created by the SU, USA and Great Britain, the governments - some of them (partially ?) independent like the one of Czechoslovakia, some puppet ones (Poland) and finally common people. There were crimes or faults on any of the three levels. Many "expelled" Germans believe that they know the "truth", that only the Poles or Czechs were guilty. Trefuse to understand facts (Potsdam) and context. Xx236 09:11, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

OK, I think a lot of the controversy has been some people wanting to have the article say "yes, it was justified" or "no, it wasn't justified". As long as the article leans in one direction or another, there will be people who object.

I propose that we add text that says something like "To this day, there remains heated and emotional controversy over the morality of the expulsions. There is a significant element within Germany that believes that the expulsions were an atrocity perpetrated against innocent Germans. There are many Eastern Europeans who believe that the expulsions were justified for a number of reasons."

Then, we need to support these statements with citations from people who said these things within the past two decades.

Your comments for improving the above text are solicited. I will put the text into the article sometime later today unless someone objects or suggests an improvement.

It might also be useful to have text that explains why the Potsdam participants agreed to the expulsions. It might have been part of the Morgenthau Plan. It might have been something that was agreed to because it was something Stalin wanted and Churchill and Roosevelt figured they were unable to stop. On the list of priorities, it probably ranked low on Churchill and Roosevelt's agendas. This is important to focus on. Why would the British and the U.S. agree to this? If we have any credible information that sheds light on this question, it would be very helpful.

--Richard 13:47, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

What about the morality of the Soviet annexations and expulsion of Poles, expulsions of Chechens, Tatars and others? You take the expulsion of the Germans from the context and you obtain that it was somethhing special. It wasn't, it was standard in Eastern Europe since 1939. The fate of the Germans was better than that of Soviet workers deported from Germany to the SU. Germany, even after the Morgenthau Plan, would have been a better place to live than the Soviet Union with post-war famine and cannibalism but with nuclear bombs. The main reason why we discuss the Expulsion of Germans is the freedom in Western Germany which allowed to collect millions of documents and accounts. Neither Ukrainians nor Kasakhs had the chance to document the famine of 1933. Xx236 14:32, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

I will say it again... "You guys will NEVER get out of this back-and-forth discussion unless you agree to document both sides of the controversy using citable sources."

Stop trying to decide whether the expulsions were justifiable or not and stop trying to convince everybody else of your POV. First, you're not likely to succeed and second, this is not the place for it. If there are substantial numbers of people who hold an opinion, then that opinion should be documented as an opinion that exists.

There should be balanced treatment of all mainstream opinions. If it's an opinion held by a small fringe minority, then we are not obligated to give it equal time and respect.

I also think this article is sorely lacking in historical context. If there are relevant background facts like what was going on in the rest of Eastern Europe or what happened to Czechs after WWI, then let's document those.

It's not my goal to make this article come down on one side of this issue or another. Nor should it be yours. Don't try to tell the reader the truth as you see it.

It's my goal to improve this article by helping the reader understand all sides of the issue and provide facts which will enable him to make up his mind for himself.

That should be the goal of every controversial Wikipedia article.

--Richard 23:16, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

you cannot be serious Molobo, first this was population transfer not expulsion,. I guess then the Holocaust according to you was not mass murder, but the transfer of the Jewish population of Europe to the Jewish afterlife.

Germans "colonising" [sic] the east, please Molobo, be realistic. the German borders have not been this far west since the 1100s, that is more than 3 eras ago, long before anyone can remember (except for you of course, you probably have personal diaries of Poles who were supposedly murdered by Germans back then). It was German territory, There were plebscites and they had voted to remain in Germany following WWI. Your reasoning would be the same as saying: why don't all non-Native Americans get shipped back to where they came from? they all came from somewhere else, and it's only been a couple hundred years, they have not been there nearly as long as the Germans had been in what is now being called "Poland"

--Jadger 02:58, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Jadger, I am not familiar with these post WWI plebiscites. Can you provide more detail? Thanx. --Richard 16:16, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

• de:Schlesien
• pl:Plebiscyt na Górnym Śląsku

Many emigrants came from Western Germany to vote. This option was legal, but it distorted the real image (Drang nach Westen) of the migrations. Xx236 13:58, 25 May 2006 (UTC) 1.The Polish speaking "Germans" voted for welness, peace, order and liberty in Germany rather than powerty, dictatorship and anarchy in Poland. (Kind of someone buys a Toyota rather than a Romanian car.) We know what they got - not exactly what they expected.

2. There exists an extensive documentation made by the Germans themselves. Quite many Germans were racists in 1945, they despized Jews and Slavs. They were also Nazi, more than 50% of Germans believed that the Nazi idea was OK, only the implementation failed.

3. The majority of Germans in the East didn't have bombing experience, the lived in beautiful cities, where Slavic Sklaves and prisoners did the hard work. They should have been informed that there was the war and the genocides, practically, not by leaflets written in bad German and excursions to Dachau. Xx236 09:09, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Strategic border

I have written:

"In 1945 the future of Germany was unclear, rather neutralisation than division was expected. The Polish/Czech - German border was to be the western border of the Soviet camp. Szczecin and Świnoujście were needed to control Odra river. Świnoujście was to be a Soviet navy base, 300 km more West than Hel or Gdynia."

Stalin designed the Western border of his estate. It was the only natural border West from Vistula, based on Sudeten. Would you please prove that Stalin didn't care about strategy? Xx236 14:21, 23 May 2006 (UTC)

Social differences between the Poles and the Germans

After the Holocaust, mass executions of educated Poles, mass emigration, destroied educational system in Poland during WWII - the majority of Poles in annexed Lands would have been arm and uneducated, the majority of Germans rich and educated. There were two options - Germanization of millions of Poles ( impossible shortly after the war) and/or social and national tensions.

The ideal solution would have been to construct Poland in ethnic Polish lands, with ,say, 20 000 000 000 USD help. Unfortunately noone was able to help Poland at that time. I believ ethat even with little help poalnd would have better results like with German lands and Communism. Noone asked the Poles, what they wanted.

Xx236 14:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Polish-German relations

What is the "Prussian Trusteeship"? --Richard 19:07, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

I'd guess this: [9] --Wikimol 19:55, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

What are the "Benes" decrees?

Current text of the article has this line in the "German-Czech" relations section...

"The Benes decrees however continued to remain in force in Czechoslovakia."

What are the Benes decrees?

--Richard 21:23, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

See Beneš decrees and Pursuit of Nazi collaborators#Czechoslovakia --Wikimol 21:32, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

Expulsions and Jadger revisited

• I agree with 213 that the expulsions were unfair, and criminal. All of them. The governments should have pursued only those who commited the crimes - regardless of nationality.
• Once said this, we should never forget that the whole WWII was unfair and criminal. However, not only Germans commited crimes, and there were many collaborators with the regime - even among the Czechs.
• Any other claims, like it was a mere "population transfer", "it had no signs of genocide" etc. are not true.
• Borders of Bohemia didn't move since like 700. It was always intact as it is except for the WWII where the borders was changed in Muenchner Abkommen. German started re-colonising the border parts of Bohemia by Czech Premyslid kings. Jadger, you have already claimed that those kings were German, and that the original population was German. Go check the books. It is really getting on my nerves.
• It is true, that Germans living in Bohemia didn't want the Czech (which is a synonym for Bohemian) language to be official in Bohemia during the Austro-Hungarian period, then they didn't want the state of Czechoslovakia to ever happen, and then they didn't want to be a part of it. They were however not oppressed, the minority laws guarranteed them German-speaking schools, authorities, they had ministers in the Czechoslovakian government, everything. However, they were always subjects of Bohemian kings. Sadly, the Battle_of_White_Mountain and its consequences for Wikipedia (installment of German nobility, limitation in use of the Czech as an official language) are not contained in wikipedia... yet. (unsigned, apparently by User:85.70.5.66

Questions about length of this article and the "Background" section

This article is getting on the long side (57kb) which is just above the article size range of 30-50kb recommended by Wikipedia:Article size. This is not excessively long but I do have concerns about readability and whether emphasis is placed in the right areas.

I am the reason the article has grown so dramatically in the last few days. I wanted to provide the rationale for one of the major expansions that I have made, the "Background" section, and solicit your thoughts about whether the length and level of detail is appropriate or if this section should be scaled back.

When I began editing this article, there was little or no historical background in this article. The article just dove in and assumed that the reader was familiar with the German colonization of Eastern Europe ("Drang nach Osten"), the rise of European nationalism and the "Heim ins Reich" rhetoric of Hitler's Nazi Party. Of course, there were links to the Ethnic German, nationalism and Adolf Hitler articles but my feeling is that the reader is not given adequate historical context to understand the core material of the article.

Of course, it is difficult to understand the reasons for the expulsions without understanding this historical context.

My questions are: Does the "Background" section do an adequate job of providing the historical background? Is this overkill or does it help? Should the "Background" section be trimmed further and, if so, how?

--Richard 16:30, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

Removed text

User:80.226.182.169 removed text from the section "Distrust of German communities in Poland". I don't much care for deletions of text without prior discussion or, at least, an explanation. However, since this text has been the subject of much dispute in the past and lacks citations, I'm not going to revert the deletion.

I am inserting the deleted text below. If anyone wants to provide the needed citations, they are welcome to re-insert the text into the article.

Some Polish historians point out that, as a result of these activities, there wasn't a political party that would agree with German minority staying in Poland.

It has been argued that these fears of insurrection and subversion were unfounded since the German minority consisted of women, children and old men and, furthermore, not one single act of terrorism were committed by Werwolf on the liberated territories.

The reasons for that were both rational and emotional. The rational reasons were based on experience from interwar years and the war era, where German minority cooperated with Reich against Polish state on a large scale. To Poles, deportation of Germans was seen as an effort to avoid such events in the future and as a result Polish authorities proposed population transfer of Germans already in the late 1941.

Among the emotional reasons that the Polish representatives advocated such measures was the fact that there wasn't a Polish family that didn't suffer material or family loss as a result of German agression. One has also to remember that during the war Germany under National Socialism classified Poles as "inferior to animals" [10] further adding to hostility between the two ethnic groups.

Thus, splitting up the two extremely hostile populations was seen by some as a sensible solution to avoiding conflict.[11][12].

--Richard 22:56, 25 May 2006 (UTC)

I added the needed source. --Molobo 11:18, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Thank you, Molobo. I continue to have problems with references to sources in foreign languages. I wonder if you could copy the relevant Polish text into this article and then insert a "articles in need of translation" tag. See Centre_Against_Expulsions article for an example. This is not a desirable solution but, in the long run, it is preferable to citing a foreign language source in English Wikipedia. We can hope that, sooner or later, someone will come along and help us with the translation. Presumably, we can claim "fair use" as a defense against charges of copyright violation.

--Richard 13:53, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I will translate the relevant parts later. --Molobo 14:22, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Rational and emotional reasons

I have made so many changes to this article in the last couple of days that it won't be immediately clear that I have made some significant and substantive changes to the content itself.

I wanted to draw attention to and provide an explanation for this particular change because I hope that others will agree and not reinsert text along these lines.

I was bothered by the distinction made between "rational" and "emotional" reasons. To label some reasons as "rational" and others as "emotional" makes a value judgment. "rational" implies reasonable and "emotional" suggests that these reasons were irrational, unreasonable, unfounded or exaggerated. I don't know if that's what the original author intended but that's the impression that I read into the text that made this distinction.

I think it is inappropriate to make these kinds of moral judgments from the perspective of the Wikipedia editor. In other words, it is not for us to say that one reason is "rational" and another is "emotional". Now, if you can find a reliable source who makes this distinction, I suppose we can use the distinction although I really would prefer not to.

Me personally, I don't think any of the reasons are "rational" so I would prefer not to make any distinction at all. Saying that one of the reasons was "rational" lends a legitimacy to that reason and implies that the expulsions were justified by that "rational" reason.

If you re-read the whole article as I have reorganized and rewritten it, you should be able to see an argument that the expulsions are understandable in the context of German and Polish nationalism and the pro-Nazi activities of some members of German minorities. However, I try to stay away from any judgment that the expulsions were justified. The article doesn't really say that the expulsions weren't justified.

I hope I have met my goal of presenting the events and explaining why they happened while still avoiding passing moral judgment on them.

--Richard 14:05, 26 May 2006 (UTC) Actually

Lwów migrants

Trains from Ukraine (including Lwów) went to Silesia rather than to Gdańsk. Are there any proves that many Lwó people settled down in Gdańsk? Xx236 14:16, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Flucht and Vertreibung

The German name for the "Expulsion" was originally "Escape and Expulsion". Only recently the Escape has been forgotten and the whole blame put on wild Slavs. Hundreds thousands of Germans died during the delayed evacuation - on Goya (ship), Dampfschiff General von Steuben, Wilhelm Gustloff (ship), under Soviet and Western air raids, e.g. in Dreseden. The numbers of German victims include those of the Escape. The article doesn't mention the Escape, only under "See also" Evacuation of East Prussia is mentioned. What about Silesia?

A book by the co-chair of the Centre agains expulsion gave the number of German victims from Czechoslovakia as about 30 000, i.e. about 8 times lower than given by the Centre.

Some German authors of quoted German sources had Nazi background, eg.:

• de:Theodor Oberländer
• de:Theodor Schieder
• de:Werner Conze
• de:Albert Brackmann.

and are regarded as biased even by many Germans. Xx236 14:44, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Good we shouldn't let former Nazi's dictate history. I hope those sources will be deleted. --Molobo 14:47, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

The sources contain certainly many true details, but the numbers are doubtful, eg. because of the division of Germany. Xx236 15:01, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Sources are sources. I would not delete any of them. However, I do believe it is reasonable to provide information that puts sources in the proper light. (This is me speaking, I'm not sure if there is a Wikipedia policy about this). Doing this is bordering on original research. Ideally, we should not criticize sources by saying "numbers in this source are unreliable". Instead, we should say "Historian X says the numbers in source Y are unreliable."

Look at the bottom of the Aztec article. We put in text that tries to qualify the reliability of the sources. I'm afraid to recommend this approach here as I suspect the wording of such text would be highly controversial and the subject of much heated debate.

Nonetheless, doing that is preferable to an edit war over which sources should be cited and which should not.

--Richard 15:48, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Only reliable sources should be used on wikipedia. Nazi authors are not reliable sources, and using then in the article is wrong, even if you provide explanation somewhere. The articles should reflect the mainstream NPOV, reflect minority POVS, but no extremist POVs should be allowed. However, I couldnt find the names you provided in the article. 85.70.5.66 19:33, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

I was going to disagree but it occurred to me that there's a distinction between a Nazi author and a neo-Nazi author.

Nazi authors may not be reliable sources about some things but it is not the case that they lied about everything. See Wikipedia:Reliable sources#Evaluating sources.

* Do the sources have an agenda or conflict of interest, strong views, or other bias which may color their report? Remember that conflicts of interest are not always explicitly exposed and bias is not always self-evident. However, that a source has strong views is not necessarily a reason not to use it, although editors should avoid using political groups with widely acknowledged extremist views, like Stormfront.org or Al-Qaeda. Groups like these may be used as primary sources only as sources about themselves, and even then with caution and sparingly, or about their viewpoints.

* Were they actually there? Be careful to distinguish between descriptions of events by eyewitnesses and by commentators. The former are primary sources; the latter secondary. Both can be reliable.

* Find out what other people say about your sources.

Just because somebody was a Nazi doesn't mean he/she might not be a reliable source. Obviously, we wouldn't want to cite them as evidence about the humanity of Jews or Poles. However, you might expect a Nazi author to be knowledgeable about things like the number of Germans in the Wehrmacht or the SS. A neo-Nazi author, on the other hand, should be treated with a great degree of skepticism.

--Richard 19:46, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Probably one of the worst examples of the latter was run by Salomon Morel

Concentration camps in Communist Poland were run by Polish-Communist security police and NKVD 1944-1956. They were for Poles, Ukrainians and Germans. Many camps for Germans, some of them very harsh, existed only during several months. Morel committed many crimes, but he was a Communist officer, not a criminal persecuted by the state. His crimes were accepted by his superiors. The USA and GB allowed Soviet crimes in Poland against anyone, not only the Germans. Xx236 14:58, 26 May 2006 (UTC)

Claims of German nationalists

Quote: Before the Czechs reached the interior of Bohemia and Moravia in the middle of the 6th century, this land had been inhabited for more than 500 years by Germanic tribes, the Marcomanni along the Elbe in Bohemia and the Quadi in Moravia. In the 12th and 13th centuries, the Bohemian dukes and kings then summoned Germans into the country to be farmers, miners, artisans, merchants and artists to develop and to cultivate especially the hitherto very sparsely settled mountainous border areas. Centres of the territory were German cities such as Leitmeritz (Czech: Litomeøice; Germans city status in 1227), Eger (Cheb; 1242), Brünn (Brno; 1243), Pilsen (Plžen)1288), etc.

This is a part of an article from the Centre against Expulsions webpage. Firstly, it states, that the lands were inhabited by German tribes, like if it was significant, that now German lands were then (before the Migration Period inhabited by Celts. It correctly states, that Bohemian dukes summoned Germans into the country after it was Czech 700 years. But the cities - except for Litomerice and Cheb, there was never a German majority in Brno (as we discussed above, 30 000 expelled Germans from cca 240 000 inhabitants after WW2), or Pilsen.

The fact, that Czech people widely used German befor the national revival took place in 19th century, is a result of the Germanisation politics of the Austrian monarchy. German had to be used in bussines, officially and in higher education, so no wonder, that most of more educated Czech people spoke and wrote German at that time, and also the fathers of Czech national revival, for instance Josef Dobrovský – "Ausführliches Lehrgebäude der böhmischen Sprache" - note that there is no tschechische Sprache at that time, the original word both in English and German for Czech was Bohemian.

I strongly oppose the use of term "historically German areas" or "areas that were German" or anything, like used by de Zayas and other people connected with the Centre against Expulsions. These people came to Bohemia, which is "Czech land" if we use present terms. The fact, that there are two words for Czechs, ie. the old one, Bohemians, and the 19th/20th century one, Czechs, also serves some people as an argument that Czechs do not actually belong in Bohemia. The fact, that Germans were a minority in that land, doesn't mean that the land has become German, it was still Bohemia. For instance, there were areas in the USA or elsewhere, where Czechs formed a majority, however, that doesnt make the areas Czech. Similarly, there is a Swedish minority in Finnland, but it is still Finland, not "historically Swedish areas east from Sweden proper". There are lots of historical minorities elsewhere. That doesnt make these areas belong to the other state.

This rethorics about "German areas" must be opposed, whatever superstar like de Zayas says. He only became famous because of his controversial work. ackoz 10:43, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

OK... I am the one that created the section titled German claims to territory in "historical Germany". However, I put "historical Germany" in quotes to signal that this was not meant as a sincere appellation but rather one that was used by the Nazis and other German nationalists and which the editors of this article consider questionable. Perhaps the quotes and the actual text of the section don't get that message across.

Frankly, I don't know what phrase they actually used and it's not important to the title. If you can suggest a different title for this section that is acceptable to you, then I will probably go along with it. All I want to communicate to the reader is that German nationalists in the early 20th century laid claim to to lands outside their borders on the grounds that there were Germans who had been living there for a long time (i.e. hundreds of years) and that therefore those lands (in their worldview) should be inside Germany. Not that I want, in any way, to validate their claims. I just want to document it for the reader. I am going to change the section title to "Claims of German nationalists". If you can propose a more suitable title, let me know or just make the change yourself.

Secondly, I'm not sure where else in the article this issue comes up. I have tried to provide the historical context of how Germans got to be spread out all over Eastern Europe (I actually didn't really know this until I read the Ethnic German article. I had either forgotten a lot of it or never knew it at all.). I just lifted a bunch of text from that article and used a condensed version of it here. I'm not sure if there are any problems with the historical accuracy of the text after I edited it. If there are, please point them out or make the appropriate changes.

Remember, I am NOT trying to validate the claims of the German nationalists. All I am trying to do is to help the reader understand the basis of their claims which is that there were areas where Germans had lived for hundreds of years. It's not appropriate for us to suggest that those claims were or were not valid.

The truth is: nationalism is a funny thing. What makes a German? The fact that they speak German? Then, why aren't the French-speaking Belgians French? Does that territory belong inside Belgium or inside France? How about the Flemish-speaking Belgians? Isn't Flemish really a variant of Dutch? Why is Sicily inside Italy? And so on and so forth. I do not personally think that you can come up with any rule that determines whether a group of people belongs to a "people" like "the German people" and therefore I do not think that there is any way to decide a priori whether land belongs inside one country or another based on the people who live there. The 20th century way was "self-determination" via plebiscites. According to the article text, plebiscites were used between the two World Wars but "failed" to solve the problem. Actually, putting it this way is a little problematic. From whose point of view did the plebiscites "fail" to solve the problem? From the Nazi point of view. I will try to fix this.

Anyway, you get the point. I'm not trying to legitimize the claims of the German nationalists. Far from it. To the extent that the article text does that, please change it or point out to me the problem and I'll try to fix it.

I am not equipped to debate questions like "Was there ever a German majority in Brno?" I just don't know enough and, frankly, I think it's irrelevant. I believe the Nazis were not so much saying "We want these areas with German majorities". It was more like "There are a bunch of German-speaking people over here and they are being persecuted so we have to protect them". Moreover, there was the Lebensraum argument and the "Poles are less than animals" which suggests that what they really wanted to do was takeover Poland and make it German. They did takeover Poland and, if they had managed to win the war, they certainly would have made Poles into second-class citizens. But that's just a subtext in this article. I just wanted you to know where I stand on this. I am in no way a sympathizer with German nationalists and welcome any corrections necessary to keep this article from accidentally projecting that POV. NB: I'm not necessarily a sympathizer with Polish nationalists either. These days I'm starting to see nationalism as the evil that caused a lot of violence in the 20th century and continues to do so even today.

P.S. I have not read the Centre against Expulsions website so none of what I have done in this article is based on that. If you feel that there are problems with that organization, you might do well to document those problems in the Centre Against Expulsions article. I don't think a detailed exposition of those issues belongs in this article although maybe a sentence or two indicating their nationalist POV would be appropriate. I wouldn't want people going over to their website and assuming that everything they say is the gospel truth.

--Richard 13:54, 27 May 2006 (UTC)

This article is utterly broken

Further comment on my longer response below to this posting. On re-reading this message, I have to agree that the article is STILL a mess. I was reacting to criticism of my re-organizing the article and I stand by my defense of the re-organization. However, on re-reading this message, I realize that there are criticisms made of work done by other editors and I do agree with some of those criticisms.

I have tried to reorganize the work of multiple editors with opposing POV without deleting much of their text. In fact, I can only recall one specific sentence that I deleted. Thus, in trying to respect the work of other editors, I have perhaps kept more of the random "back and forth" POV debate than I should have. Since this is a controversial article, I didn't want to delete stuff and then get into an edit war with the editor who put it in the article in the first place.

I've tried to take a gentler approach of integrating opposing POVs into a single narrative rather than trying to decide which POV stays and which goes.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

This article is a complete mess. Instead of presenting several points of view in a neatly ordered fashion, people have randomly inserted POV and hysteria all over the place. Colonel Mustard 06:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

I agree but this has been happening for a long time and the article was even more of a mess when I started working on this article a few weeks ago. I haven't seen your username around here for a while so perhaps you are not aware of the huge debate and edit warring that has taken place here over the last few months. This article has been a big mess but I think it's getting better. (I like to think that I have contributed to improving it even if I do say so myself.)

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

"Information" that has been put into the 'Background' section should really be in the "Purported Reasons for the Expulsion" section - i.e. the controversial claims under the heading "Support of Nazi invasion by German population in invaded countries" which are dotted with footnotes that don't actually link to sources. Colonel Mustard 06:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Are you saying that no Germans helped the Nazi invaders or that the number of people who helped the Nazi invaders is debatable? I agree that this might be controversial but the point is that this is historical fact. As I stated in my longer response below, this is history. The expulsions are responses to the history. That is the organizing principle that I used. If you dispute the history, provide sources or challenge the sources provided. I have had trouble with User:Molobo because the source he/she provided was a Polish website written in Polish. I cannot verify the source. I have suggested that he/she insert the Polish text that supports the assertions and then ask for a translation. That has not been done.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

You can't make a statement like: "Germans living in Poland made lists of Poles targeted for execution and hunted down and captured thousands of Poles." without any sources whatsoever. Colonel Mustard 06:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

There's a source provided in the text. As stated above, I'm not able to verify the source in a lot of cases. However, assuming good faith, I have left the text when a source has been provided even if it is in Polish. It's OK for you to challenge the source. There's a tag for that. Add {{citecheck}} tags where you think they belong. It's also OK for you to challenge the assertion itself (i.e. even if there is a verifiable, reliable source, that doesn't mean the assertion is true, it's just true that a reliable source made the assertion). Just provide a verifiable, reliable source who challenged the assertion.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Also, what exactly is the connection between the actions of Germans living in occuped Poland, and the fate of Germans expelled from parts of Germany that became parts of Poland with the stroke of a pen?

Good point. The connection is that the expulsions were sanctioned by the Allies including the new Polish government that apparently did not make the distinction that you made. Neither, apparently did the Polish people who engaged in the expulsions. Just because the reasons were based on faulty logic doesn't mean that they weren't reasons.

As stated earlier, I'm not interested in passing judgment on the reasons. It's not our job to say which reasons were justified and which were not. That's why the section title is "Purported reasons". I created that title. I'm not completely satisfied with it but the intent is to communicate that these are not necessarily justifications for the expulsions, just reasons why people did what they did.

The reason Joe killed Sam is that he thought that Sam was making a pass at Joe's girlfriend. That may not have been a justifiable reason but that IS the reason that Joe killed Sam. We know that Joe killed Sam. We can argue about whether Sam was making a pass at Joe's girlfriend. We can also argue about whether, if Sam WAS making a pass, that justified Joe killing him. We can also argue whether Sam's actions were the real reason that Joe killed him. Maybe Joe just wanted Sam's expensive Nike shoes and used Sam's actions as an excuse. We should write carefully about anything other than the fact that Joe killed Sam.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Richard,

You maintain that there was a "Polish" government in 1945. My story is that Poland was under Soviet occupation till about 1948. The Red Army and NKVD acted directly - robbing, killing, kidnapping people. Later a Communist government was created, which implemented the Communist agenda with limited Soviet "help" - Rokossovsky and Soviet advisors. The first Communist supported by the Poles was Wladyslaw Gomulka in October 1956.

Among "the Polish people engaded in the expulsions" were:

• the people expelled from the East, who had to live somewhere. The majority of those people didn't want to move. They were terrorized nad transported to a random place, where they had to survive.
• victims of the Nazis. If some German victims of the expulsion hate Poles after 60 years, there existed much bigger hatred after 6 years of German exterminations and expulsions. The structure of Polish society was almost fully destroied - educated people killed or expelled, Polish clergy exterminated or liberated from German camps, all policemen persecuted by the new government, new policemen frequently criminals. It was kind of Wild West, but without the possibility to self-organize.
• Communist officers. Those people were selected, trained and controlled by the Soviets.

You cannot use ideas like "government" without defining them. Neither "PKWN" nor 1945 "Governments" were "governments".The only Polish politician was used by the Soviets and didn't have any real power. One has to study to understand 1945. Even academic historian write absurd stories. There is a German book "Die fremde Stadt", which describes many aspects of expulsion, probably not available in English. Xx236 14:14, 31 May 2006 (UTC)

Further absurdity:

As evidence for the view that German "arrogance and haughtinuess" will return, some offer point to the high support for National Socialism in German society even after the German Reich lost the war.

This refers to a poll taken in 1947, and tries to use this as evidence that contemporary German society is going to unleash a Blitzkrieg of nationalistic fury over the Odra tomorrow. Colonel Mustard 06:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

No, I think you have misinterpreted what was written. (I didn't write it.) The idea is that Germany recovered from WWI and, because there were Germans living outside its borders, made belligerent demands for the territory on which those Germans were living and ultimately invaded Czechoslovakia and Poland to gain that territory (and also Lebensraum).

After WWII, the Allies blamed Germany for two catastrophic wars within 40 years. To avoid a repetition of a third aggressive war caused by German nationalism, the Allies decided to partition Germany and also remove Germans from territories outside Germany's borders. What actually happened was not the harshest of proposals (cf. the Morgenthau Plan)

Now, I repeat once again, I am not saying that this justifies the expulsions. With 20/20 hindsight, we can say that it might have been possible for the Poles to hold the German populace blameless for the sins of the Nazis and seek to live in peace with them in a united Poland. After all, isn't that what we expect of South African, Iraq and Rwanda? It IS possible. It ISN'T easy.

We can argue about what the postwar Poles could have or should have done. However, we know what they did do and we have some idea of why. We don't have to agree with their decision but we should document it.

It took 45 years for the two Germanies to be re-united. Even then there were discussions in the papers about whether German nationalism would be revived. It's clear that there are German nationalists in Germany today although they are not in the majority AT THIS TIME. Could a reunited Germany become an aggressive, expansionist power? It's hard to imagine it AT THIS TIME. However, just as it's hard for us to see 40-50 years in the future, it was hard for people in 1945 to see 40-50 years in the future. What they could see was 40 years into the past and see the destruction and suffering that a nationalist Germany had inflicted on them. That is what drove their thought process and resulting actions. We should not judge them with 20/20 hindsight. That would be Monday morning quarterbacking.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Just what in the hell is going on here? It's as though Wladyslaw Gomulka himself has spent several busy afternoons editing this article. This article desperately needs to be completely reorganised, with each side's POV labelled for what it is. Colonel Mustard 06:53, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

No, I disagree with this last assertion vehemently. Trying to label a POV as POV is what leads to edit wars. If an assertion can be sourced it should be allowed to stand although it might be phrased as "Historian A asserts X. Historian B refutes X by asserting Y." See my longer response below.

--Richard 16:45, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

Außerordentliche Befriedungsaktion

Is it what you name Itelligenzaktion? Xx236 14:22, 30 May 2006 (UTC)

We still need confirmation that Intelligenzaktion = Außerordentliche Befriedungsaktion so that we can fix the redlink.

--Richard 16:43, 1 June 2006 (UTC)

I disagree that the article is "completely broken" or even "broken"

...in fact, I would argue that it is far better shape now than it was before. Of course, I would think so, I am responsible for the recent massive reorganization.  ;^)

I was wondering when people would notice the changes and what they would think.

Personally, I think the article was a mess before my reorganization. This was, in large part, because it tried to bring out the POV stuff as a debate. I tried to get rid of the "debate" style of narrative. I don't think I've fully succeeded so, to the extent that this "debate" style of writing still exists in the text, the criticism is fair and should be addressed.

However, the preferred Wikipedia style is not to present side A in its complete presentation and then side B in its complete presentation. (The extreme form of this would be to have two separate articles, one of which is a POV fork). The preferred Wikipedia style is to have a single integrated narrative in which multiple points of view are represented. This is what I have tried to do.

By "debate style" of writing, I mean that there should not be a "back and forth" conversation between editors in the article itself (the "back and forth" should be on the Talk Pages"). Thus, the text should not say "A is true. But some people say B is not true because X is true. However, X is not true because Y is true. Y is not true because Z is true." This would be a debate taking place in the article text and it makes for confusing reading.

I disagree that the "Background" section has stuff that should be in the "Reasons" section. As far as I am concerned, most of the "Background" section provides historical information that provides the context in which the decisions were made. I agree that some of information at the end of the "Background" section could be put into "Reasons". However, I have tried to put indisputable facts into "Background" and leave stuff that can be debated into "Reasons". I'm assuming that no one can dispute that the Nazis laid claim to territories outside their borders, that they called Poles "less than animals" and that organizations such as "Selbstschutz" and "Werwolf" existed.

However, none of these facts constitute a "reason" for the expulsions. The "reasons", justifiable or not, are based on reactions to the facts stated in the "Background" section.

I am happy to debate, defend or change text in response to specific criticisms. I did, however, want you to understand the underlying philosophy for the recent reorganization.

--Richard 16:07, 30 May 2006 (UTC)