There was no need for Lebensraum

There was a general emigration to the industrialised parts of Germany ,not only to the Ruhr,but also to Silesia,and to the big cities.The same happened in the US,France,and also in Scotland ,where the population of the Highlands stagnated .The problem in Germany was that due to the increase of the population(in 187O 41 million ,in 191O 65 million,the German agriculture was unable to feed the population ).
It was not the population of the Wast that was increasing,but that of the cities ,and most of the big cities were in the west .
A comparison of population figures is difficult,because the eastern provinces lost a lot of population

 

after WW I. (a problem with editing )
Some numbers :
Germany in 1871 :40 million
Germany in 1939 (without Austria and Sudetenland ):68 million Increase :7O %
East Prussia :in 1939 :1.934 million;in 1939 :2.488 million Increase :28 %
Another problem was that the number of non Germans in the East was increasing (Poles,Jews )
About East Prussia :contrary to the general belief ,there were only very few large landowners (54 % had less than 10 ha =25 acres )
Hitlers quest for Lebensraum was principally caused by the fear that in case of war the Agriculture sector would be unable to feed the population,and that Germany would be starved again .

 

Don't know any figures but I remember Ian Kershaw writing about the movement of German people in his first 'Hitler' book.

 

For Esat Prussia there was a typo:the first figure was for 188O.
I gave only figures for East Prussia,because the other provinces in the east (Silesia )lost a lot of population after the German defeat in 1918 .
I think the problem was that less people were willing to work on the farms,and this caused a big problem for the German agriculture .
Another problem was that there was not enough land for the German peasants nly 2.1 ha per farmer(for Britain 3.8 ).The output of the German agriculture was very low .For the nazis there was only one solution :Germany had to obtain Lebensraumin the East :there would be big farms with a big return ,that would be able to feed the German population .

 

The whole Nazi policy in the East was hallmarked by not-so-organised chaos. It doesnt seem like they really planned anything in any kind of detail, beyond these broad visions of an empire. Look at the rows that took place between the Government-General and the Warthegau leaders over the disorganised shipping of millions of people all over Poland. Laurence Rees Book 'The Nazis: a warning from History' has a section on this.

 

As for the actual need of Lebensraum:
Himmler said in a speech: "There are people who are afraid we don't have enough people to settle in this space [to be conquered] in the east. I don't believe so, I believe we have enough. I believe, when the Führer will call after the war "to the east!" and will tell people about the conditions, there will be a stream towards the east." Note that he says "believe" rather than "think" which at least in German shows some degree of uncertainty.

The idea of Lebensraum im Osten and all this peasant romanticism also lies in the fact that a lot of people had that "back to nature" kind of wish - they were disillusioned by industrialisation which had been achieved in an extremely short time in Germany (with disastrous consequences esp. for nature). Many early nazis were part of this "return to the soil" movement.

 

That Lebensraum policy was simple hogwash. German economy had more than enough slack to have obtained anything they wanted by a proper expansion programme, allied with a foreign trade policy like other decent countries did: paying imports through exports. They instead decided to go for that nebulous Lebensraum, which really never amounted to much, and for a disastrous Grossraumwirtschaft (large space economy), which was no more than state (badly-)organised pillaging, their campaign of conquest.

Even setting aside direct war damage, this policy amounted as I said to no more than plundering all Europe of as much as possible of their stockpiles, plant and labour.

Lebensraum, in the sense of a resettlement towards East of course was impeded by war, and even when it was attempted it did not amount to much more to a great mess in the Warthegau and little more. There simply was no population pressure to do anything like that, it was all a gleam in Rosenberg's and other theoreticians eye. I doubt the Reich had a firm, coherent and competent policy on anything at all.

 

Its very similar to the Holocaust denial argument. They argue that there is no concrete evidence linking Hitler with the Wannsee Conference and the Final Solution.

Of course there isnt - its not how Hitler worked. He seems to have thought up these broad, sweeping schemes, passed them on verbally to someone else to carry out, and not asked any questions about how they were implemented.

Strangely for a totalitarian state, bureaucracy and administration seems to have been a very low priority.

 

That Lebensraum policy was simple hogwash. German economy had more than enough slack to have obtained anything they wanted by a proper expansion programme, allied with a foreign trade policy like other decent countries did: paying imports through exports. They instead decided to go for that nebulous Lebensraum, which really never amounted to much, and for a disastrous Grossraumwirtschaft (large space economy), which was no more than state (badly-)organised pillaging, their campaign of conquest.

Even setting aside direct war damage, this policy amounted as I said to no more than plundering all Europe of as much as possible of their stockpiles, plant and labour.

Lebensraum, in the sense of a resettlement towards East of course was impeded by war, and even when it was attempted it did not amount to much more to a great mess in the Warthegau and little more. There simply was no population pressure to do anything like that, it was all a gleam in Rosenberg's and other theoreticians eye. I doubt the Reich had a firm, coherent and competent policy on anything at all.
Your argumentation is maybe valid for 2OO9,but flawed,when we are talking on the pre WW II period .THere was no possibility for the German economy to import enough food (the German agriculture was not able to feed the population )and raw materials (Germany had none ) in a period of depression and protectionism .Germany could only pay more imports by exporting more,and every country was trying to block imports . Germany had also very few foreign currency .In 1938 there was a new depression and the world trade fell by 20 % .

 

The idea of Lebensraum im Osten and all this peasant romanticism also lies in the fact that a lot of people had that "back to nature" kind of wish - they were disillusioned by industrialisation which had been achieved in an extremely short time in Germany (with disastrous consequences esp. for nature). Many early nazis were part of this "return to the soil" movement.[/quote]

Kate's reference above brings us back to the fundamentals of the SS spirit and Himmler's vision.Himmler always thought that the countryman was the most ideal recruit to the SS as compared to the urban recruit as they were readily adaptable to lead a simple rural life from the soil.He saw this as the Third Reich would live in the future after his warriors had laid the foundations for the 1000 year Reich.

Postwar, my mind goes back to Peiper,who during the rapid growth in the West German economy could not grasp this way of life for the future.He turned his back on postwar Western Germany to settle in Traves,North Eastern France where he thought he could lead a simple rural existence.He sought to live in rural France despite not being a "Francophile" It has been recorded that he hated the French but was obviously prepared to live among them in a small community.

 

Your argumentation is maybe valid for 2OO9,but flawed,when we are talking on the pre WW II period .THere was no possibility for the German economy to import enough food (the German agriculture was not able to feed the population )and raw materials (Germany had none ) in a period of depression and protectionism .Germany could only pay more imports by exporting more,and every country was trying to block imports . Germany had also very few foreign currency .In 1938 there was a new depression and the world trade fell by 20 % .

Hence the importance of the German-Soviet trade pact, which allowed the import of large amounts of foodstuffs, ores and oil in exchange for manufactured products (and temporary safety). This worked for France, Holland, Belgium, Danemark, etc, all nations enduring the same economic hardships and which were not exactly bent on a war of aggression. Solution for Germany was to embark on a state plundering expedition.

 

Owen, in the convoluted fief politics of the III Reich you are hard put to determine a single coherent policy, it was pratically one for himself, with the Führer on top enjoying the view.

 

Germany had not enough food,raw materials and land for a mechanised agriculture . The SU had a lot of foof,raw materials and land for a mechanised agriculture . Thus Germany was goying to occupy European Russia . The extermination of the Jews would be an extra bonus :this is the essence of the Lebensraum .