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== Euphemisms? ==
I do not understand your point in reverting my changes, since the article includes some false informations.
It's interesting how the article uses language almost euphemistically. "Expulsion" is used in place of where "ethnic cleansing" would be appropriate nearly every single time; Contrast with articles dealing with the Armenian Genocide which use "harsher" language more liberally, so to speak. This article has some major issues. ] 15:04, 14 January 2020


Expulsion is used when transfered people are guilty, ethnic cleansing when transfered people are innocent. The Sudeten Germans Flocked to Hitler - Herrenvolk und Lebensraum. They were guilty.<!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 07:46, 12 March 2022 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
AM


There is no such thing as collective guilt. It exists only in propaganda and such language displays inhumane thinking. And maybe you should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate. --] (]) 14:47, 15 May 2022 (UTC)
---------------------------
I'd like to see a source for the following (deleted) sentence:
:The true aim was the plan by the Soviet Union and its satellite states to overtake as many countries as they could get away with.
I'm always interested in uncovering the true motivations of sneaky underhanded people who are trying to exploit others. ], if it was you who wrote the above, please supply the source so I can put it back in. ]
------------
To ].
I just came across this. Here are some interesting websites:
Truman library;]
and ]
There were also meetings and conferences of the Communist leaders of all European countries in the early 1930's at Moscow. I do not have a direct link to it, but when I come across it, I will let you know.


Supposing there were enough of them remaining.<br>
Need to state again, that under Truman a number of previous administration highest ranking US officials and policy makers were exposed as Communists and were quietly retired by Truman. Interestingly, my wikipedia start on this subject also quietly disappeared.
You should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate in Dachau concentration camp and elsewhere during the Nazi-German occupation of the democratic Czechoslovakia. <!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 14:52, 29 June 2022 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->


It is claimed that Sudeten Germans expelled from Czechoslovakia were based on the concept of collective guilt. This is not true.<br>
I just found out too, that all the so-called 'evidence' presented at the Nuremberg trials was furnished by Soviets, who made up much of the evidence.
Almost every decree explicitely stated that the sanctions did not apply to anti-fascists.<br>
About 90% of the German population of the Czech borderlands had supported the Nazi and affilation to Nazi-Germany. Some 280 000 Germans in Czechoslovakia remained Czechoslovak citizens after the transfer. <!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 15:37, 10 June 2022 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->


:I've noticed this issue too. This expulsion led to the use of forced labour, rapes, executions, massacres, and the extinction of German language dialects and cultures. It surpassed the Jewish Holocaust of World War Two in terms of numbers of victims and was a great travesty for German heritage. Take Kaliningrad, where Germans were executed and used as slaves and German culture was erased and replaced (evidence most strikingly in the new architecture of the city. It is simply another example of the vilification of Germans post-war. ] (]) 13:49, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
No wonder so many people wish to keep it all under the rug.
]


: @"didn't apply to anti-fascists": in terms of the degrees this may be technically true (although not all of them contained this restriction), but in practice it meant nothing: one set of my grand parents lived in Czecheslovakia for a few generations. They were communists, and actively fought the Nazis. My grand father died in the process, and my grand mother spent the several years in a Gestapo prison, and was even officially acknowledged as an anti-fascist (including getting special stipend for the rest of her life from the East German government). And she was indeed formally offered the chance to stay in the village she was born: as one of a single-digit number of people (of the entire village), none of which she knew. Now, want to guess what this meant in practice? ] (]) 17:51, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
:This article should be reworded to more accurately reflect that it was an ethnic cleansing. "Expulsion" is only appropriate when talking about removing the Germans who had settled in areas that the Nazis conquered in WWII. When we're talking about removing Germans from areas where they had been living for hundreds of years, that's ethnic cleansing by any reasonable definition of the term. Whether removing the Germans was justified or not is frankly irrelevant, as this does not change the fact that it was an ethnic cleansing. Just because Nazi Germany committed one of the worst crimes in history with the Holocaust doesn't mean that we should use euphemisms to talk about what happened to Germans after the war.
:I propose largely replacing "expulsion" with "ethnic cleansing" whenever it refers to Germans living in areas where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed. ] (]) 17:25, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
::{{tqq|where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed}}; so expulsion? This entire discussion is flawed because ''expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing'' in the same way population exchange (e.g. ]) is a form of ethnic cleansing in the same way genocide is a form of ethnic cleansing. The full definition of ethnic cleansing is {{tqq|the attempt to get rid of—through '''deportation, displacement or even mass killing'''—members of an unwanted ethnic group}} (emphasis mine). ] (]) 19:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
:::If "expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing", then it shouldn't be controversial for the article to clearly state that millions of Germans were ethnically cleansed from their homes. The reason that can be controversial to say is because there is a difference in connotation between merely "expelling" people and the harsher implications under "ethnically cleansing" an entire demographic. Mass-killing isn't a requirement for ethnic cleansing to have occurred, but even if it were, in some cases, Germans were deliberately mass-killed in revenge for Nazi crimes, and in any case, their removal was done with flagrant disregard to civilian deaths if 500,000 to 1+ million died as a direct consequence. ] (]) 20:01, 8 April 2024 (UTC)


== Genocide Denial ==
----
I think this sentence is controversial and needs clarification :
:Some allege that the purpose of this policy was to punish Germany for its actions during World War II and to create ethnically homogenous nations.
#Who is "Some" ? We should name them.
#Is there any support for this passage in any historical documents if not it should go away.
#Besides, it IS natural consequence of the war started by Hitler. In this passage however there's implication that Hitler was great because he wanted prosperous Third Reich for Germans and the Allies were bad because they did not leave Germans alone after their defeat
<br>]
:] -- I think you should be glad you live in the US. If you lived in Germany today, much of what you say might be construed as denying the Holocaust, which is illegal under German law. Ironic, isn't it?


What's up with the genocide denial in this article? ] (]) 08:14, 8 October 2022 (UTC)
The evidence came from German records. Many of those records had been in Soviet hands '''because the Soviet army liberated those cities and concentration camps'''. Furthermore, you have just called my grandmother and grandfather liars: I know about the Holocaust from their reporting of their own experience. Apologize. '''Now.''' ] 12:33 Aug 22, 2002 (PDT)


:Because this wasn't a genocide. Not even close. ] (]) 01:16, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
---
::It was a genocide under the ] which says that
'' I just found out too, that all the so-called 'evidence' presented at the Nuremberg trials was furnished by Soviets, who made up much of the evidence. No wonder so many people wish to keep it all under the rug. ] ''
::any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, '''in whole or in part''', a '''national, ethnic''', racial or religious group, as such:
::(a) Killing members of the group;
::(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
::(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical
::destruction in whole or in part;
::(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
::(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. ] (]) 11:55, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
:::The Allied expulsion removed the Nazi Herrenvolk und Lebensraum ideology from the Czech crown lands once and for all. ] (]) 08:18, 2 April 2024 (UTC)


No one has denied Holocaust in this article. <!-- Template:Unsigned IP --><small class="autosigned">—&nbsp;Preceding ] comment added by ] (]) 12:01, 19 October 2022 (UTC)</small> <!--Autosigned by SineBot-->
* You know, I've stayed out of the Great ] Correction Squad because others had more knowledge of the subjects than I and were doing a better job. (Thanks, JHK and others!) But I happen to have a decent amount of information on ] and its many errors of fact and logic. If things keep going in this direction I'll have to join the GHJC Squad pronto. For starters, Vicki is correct: most of the most damning evidence was from ''German'' records, and some of those were captured by the US as well as the Soviets. I growl at those trying to add non-science to science articles; kindly apply accepted techniques of historical verification before trying to add material to history articles. ]
:I showed an interesting documentary to my students -- although ] would probably say it was fabricated. It was a documentary made by the US Army at the time of the liberations. What was really amazing to me was that, at one mental hospital where the mentally ill and disabled were executed/euthanized, sometimes after experimentation, death certificates were issued and kept on file by the officials running the institution! There was a concrete paper trail for the Allies to follow. I'm sure that this must have been true for many institutions, and believe that records were also kept for some of the camps until the great push to eliminate the evidence as the Allied troops gained ground. Another interesting thing shown was the inhabitants of a neighboring town (I think near Hanover, but cant be sure) brought in by the US and British commanders in charge of the camp liberation. The civilians, mostly women, came in with smiles on their faces, clearly thinking that the silly Allies were gooing to try to make them believe something untrue about their government. It then showed these civilians as they saw the camp -- beginning with lampshades made to order for an SS commandant's wife from human skin, and then past mass graves (uncovered) and then survivors. Two things were clear -- these people had no concept of what was going on, and that they would be the first to tell you that the Holocaust had happened -- no fabrication of evidence by the Allies. ]


\
I'm sorry I came into this so late. I was busy at work today working with testimonies from American GIs who liberated concentration camps. ]'s claim is too ludicrous for any comment. The fact that '''some''' (or even '''much''') evidence was brought by the Soviets does not mean that the evidence is false. If, however, other corroborative evidence is necessary for you, ], I will be happy to provide you with enough British and American testimonies to keep you quite busy. ]


== Hungary section of the article ==
There is little doubt in my mind that Stalin had strong desires to punish Germany, in fact to an extent that seemed rather incredible to Churchill. What I do not understand about Heimatvertriebene -whose plight I deplore even though my family was on the other end of the dispute- is that even after all these years they still cannot see the real culprit of their demise : der grosse Irrefuehrer Adolf Hitler. Without him they would still have lived quite happily in Koenigsberg or whatever. ]
----
For those interested in the subject, a google search on Alfred de Zayas will turn up an interesting speech that he gave, as well as links to other books, articles, and discussions of his work. What we should note is that deZayas provides context in his speech, at least, and points out that first, the policy of expulsion was really one begun by Hitler, and second, that the legality of the situation was very sketchy, although his conclusion is that the expulsion of the Germans would have to qualify as a crime against humanity (he's a UN specialist on international law). He also praises the victims for their willingness to accept their change in circumstances and to work peacefully in the new West Germany. ]
-------------------------------


In contrast to expulsions from other nations or states, the expulsion of the Germans from Hungary was dictated from outside Hungary. The section mixes the term "forced labor" with expulsion. Approximately 200 000 civilian Hungarian citizens were deported to the Soviet Union as forced laborers irrespective of their ethnicity/nationality. It's not to be mixed with the expulsion of the ethnic Germans to Germany. For the expulsion there was no "dictate from outside Hungary". The source of this information in the article is inactive. ] (]) 10:35, 17 January 2024 (UTC)
To ],


== Population Movements Chart ==
I just read your note and first off let me tell you, that I am truly sorry and feel very bad about whatever happened to your family on any other family for that matter.


The section Population Movements includes a chart regarding the change in ethnic Germans in various countries. However, the title says it compares 1958 and 1930–31, while the actual columns of data refer to 1939 and 1930–31. I would assume that the data is actually from 1958 and it’s just a typo that has never been noticed for the last decade, but the numbers come from reference books, and I can’t be sure what the correct answer is. I am changing the column to 1958 because that makes far more sense, but wanted to flag it in was I am in the wrong—in which case it should still be cleared up.
About 'the evidence' and 'the Soviet army liberated those cities and concentration camps, etc'


Separately, population numbers for the Netherlands were added to the chart several years later—but while the rest of the entries show the reduction in German population via subtraction, this one does not. It provides two similar citations which may or may not be to the same source, but it is hard to tell what they are specifically pointing to (which is kind of the point of a citation). ] (]) 19:06, 17 November 2024 (UTC)
I am very sorry that I have to disagree with your official version of "cleansed history" or whatever you want to call this.

:I am also sorry that you feel the need to deny the history established by a huge variety of evidence, including eyewitness testimony and German records. I am not, however, willing to grant your falsehoods because you call the truth "official" and "cleansed." There is nothing clean about the history of the Holocaust. ]

I know this official politically correct version is written in many books. It is nevertheless a very sick and twisted statement, in light of what really went on. A glimpse of this might be read in John Sack's book "An Eye for an Eye" , http://www.amazon.com or http://www.google.com : John Sack for his own website.

Only 100% communists might truly believe this liberation bit. People, such as ], who was in the Soviet military, saw what was really being done. He dared to oppose and was put in ] for it.

I have never spoken to or of, nore ever mentioned your grandparents and have never called them a liar. I do not doubt what your grandparents said for the simple reason that I have no idea what they said .

]

:They told me about the Holocaust. They told me about having their store and personal property taken from them because they were Jewish. They told me about fleeing from Germany, and spending the war hiding in France after the Germans invaded. My grandfather wasn't a Communist: he was a decent, honest German shopkeeper. A decent, honest German Jewish shopkeeper.

:You like books, so here's a reference: _Shattered Crystals_, by Mia Amalia Kanner and Eve Rosenzweig Kugler. CIS Publishers, Lakewood, NJ. ISBN 1-56062-317-9. You can get it from Amazon if your library doesn't have it.

:Oh, and while I'm glad you've finally learned to spell my first name, my username is ].
-------------------------------
To ]

I will be glad to look for your family history book and I am anxious to read about your relative's experiences.

I can understand that you are very sensitive about anything having to do with events that brought you here.

I am going to post here again the text of the messages between Ed Poor and myself. When you read this through , calmly, you will see that we were talking or rather writing about events done by Soviets Communists, and about the take-over of German land and the expulsion of Germans and in no way talked about anything else.

: I already read it. You dismissed huge mountains of real documents and other evidence because they had been in Soviet hands. Yes, the Soviet Union was expansionist. So was the German empire that you valorize. So were the US and Great Britain. That doesn't mean that what they report didn't happen. ]

]
-------------------------------
-------------------------------
''The true aim was the plan by the Soviet Union and its satellite states to overtake as many countries as they could get away with.
I'm always interested in uncovering the true motivations of sneaky underhanded people who are trying to exploit others. ], if it was you who wrote the above, please supply the source so I can put it back in. Ed Poor
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
To Ed Poor. I just came across this. Here are some interesting websites: Truman library;] and ] There were also meetings and conferences of the Communist leaders of all European countries in the early 1930's at Moscow. I do not have a direct link to it, but when I come across it, I will let you know.
Need to state again, that under Truman a number of previous administration highest ranking US officials and policy makers were exposed as Communists and were quietly retired by Truman. Interestingly, my wikipedia start on this subject also quietly disappeared.

I just found out too, that all the so-called 'evidence' presented at the Nuremberg trials was furnished by Soviets, who made up much of the evidence.

No wonder so many people wish to keep it all under the rug. ] ''

], if you can't see the connection between what you said and how '''all''' of the rest of us took it, I am truly sorry for you. Apparently, you just don't get it.
]
--------------------------
--------------------------
''The evidence came from German records. Many of those records had been in Soviet hands '''because the Soviet army liberated those cities and concentration camps'''. Furthermore, you have just called my grandmother and grandfather liars: I know about the Holocaust from their reporting of their own experience. Apologize. '''Now.''' ] 12:33 Aug 22, 2002 (PDT)

'' I just found out too, that all the so-called 'evidence' presented at the Nuremberg trials was furnished by Soviets, who made up much of the evidence. No wonder so many people wish to keep it all under the rug. ] ''
---------------
] --

As i said above, you are damned lucky to be living in the States, because in Germany, you might be liable for prosecution as a Holocaust denier. The only sick and twisted person around here is you. If you look back over months of working on this site, you will find that people have continually objected to the fact that you have no earthly idea how to read sources critically and how to interpret information in ways acceptable to people who actually do know these things.

You are absolutely correct that the plight of the Heimatvertriebene is something more people should know about. This is normal in history -- new things come to light after many years, and historians examine the evidence and help integrate it into a larger picture.

HOWEVER -- you are absolutely wrong to try to compare it to the Holocaust in any way. You are also wrong to try to discuss it without judging it in the context of the time. This was not just a horrible Soviet plan carried out by Poles who wanted to take away Prussia's land, which is what you seem to be saying. One of your sources, de Zayas, even says that the forced expulsion and massacre of ethnic populations was something begun by the Germans, and that the expulsion of ethnic Germans has much to do with retribution. He doesn't say it was right, but he also doesn't try to present a one-sided, Germans were the greatest victims, picture.

This last is what you do. You cannot seem to be able to look at issues from more than your viewpoint. Your sources are often questionable. Even when you do present facts that are correct, you interpret them in ways that no legitimate historian would conceive. <b>This means, that however noble your intent, <i>you often imply things that are incorrect and even lies</i>. Because of this, no one can take the issues seriously, and you come off as being someone stuck in Bismarck's (and occasionally Hitler's) Germany.</b> Either try to work with us and apologize to Vicki (that was no apology -- it implies that her grandparents could have been lying, but you don't know), or leave.]

I think it's time for Frau ] to find another place to peddle her nonsense. -- ]
--------------------------
To ]

Again, let me state, that the discussion with Ed Poor was about the intentions of the Soviet Union in their take-over of as many countries as they could get away with. For text , which affirms that same motive , read the Truman library web site, which I have posted above. I will also post it on the subject page. Neither Ed, nore I had discussed any other topic.

You are the one that mentioned the holocaust. Since John Sack's book An Eye for an Eye talks about Polish Soviet take-over of Silesia, I am entering this here also. For John Sack's website see: http://www.johnsack.com/about_john_sack.htm and http://www.johnsack.com/dictionary_of_literary_biography_an_eye_for_an_eye.htm

His socalled enormously controversial and provocative statements are actually very careful and timid statement of facts. The truth is much worth. There were the same number of camps, the same brutal murders of ethnic civilian Germans by Czechoslowakians and both the Polish and Czech brutality was mild compared to the Soviet Russian Army. I have to also tell you at the same time, that among Polish, Russians and Lithuanians, there were a lot of good people also, who did their best to help. To this day there are people, who were hidden as orphaned German children in land overrun by Soviets and they were raised by Russians, Poles or Lithuanians. They were old enough to remember their real name and are now looking for surviving relatives. There is a lot on internet.

There are a lot of events, that are very inaccurately described in the official histories of the last 50 years. Why ??? Why did John Sack have such a hard time publishing his book ? As he says, he had to tell it, knowing about it and not telling about it, is wrong.

]

: No ] you were the one who brought the Holocaust into this when you said that the information at the Nuremburg trials was falsified by the Soviets. Many countries included the Soviets contributed evidence to the trials which were about German war crimes especially the Holocaust.
--rmhermen
---------------
to ],

There were a number of people aquitted, charges dropped and their charges against them had nothing to do with the holocaust to begin with. In the case of ] , navy commander , even US navy commander (Nimitz ?) spoke in behalf of him. The Nuremburg trial was not only about the holocaust. But I am sorry, that my mentioning it, could be taken for mentioning the holocaust. That was not my intention. Perhaps you , or anyone else, can let me know here, if it is a standard procedure, that any mentioning of the Nuremberg trial is automatically taken as talking about the holocaust. Or is this more your personal opinion ? I will look at the answer(s), but this is the last thing I will have said about this.

Thanks for letting me know.
]
----
''Someone removed this from ], but maybe it belongs here:''

]. Between 1945-1950 about 9 million Germans from Germany east of the Oder-Neisse line plus 9 million ethnic Germans from various parts of eastern Europe were resettled. About 2.1 million Germans died as a result of the resettlement. They included many distinct different ethnic German groups. The brutal expulsions were done by ], ] and ]'s military and civilian authorities. Expulsion survivors live scattered as refugees.

Should the above be part of this expulsion article? What do you think, ]? --]
---------------------
to ]
I think it was JHK who condensed it to what it now says. It is ok now, because it does state "that Germans living east of the ], etchnic Germans living in Poland and Sudeten-Germans in Czechoslowakia..and etchnic Germans from other easter European countries..were expelled. The article does connect to ] and to Oder-Neisse line. Lets leave that part the way it is.
Back to the other discussion about the Soviet take-over. I am going to post the websites here again:

''Truman library;]
and ]
There were also meetings and conferences of the Communist leaders of all European countries in the early 1930's at Moscow. I do not have a direct link to it, but when I come across it, I will let you know.

Need to state again, that under Truman a number of previous administration highest ranking US officials and policy makers were exposed as Communists and were quietly retired by Truman.

The Soviet Communist take-over plans were a well-known fact at that time in history and they went as far as they were 'allowed' to. Please let me know after you read them, if you think that warrants re-inserting the Soviet planned take-over again.

Thanks for taking the time
]
:The links to the Truman library don't say anything about Communist meetings in the 30's or about Communists in the Truman administration. What are they supposed to illustrate? What are the names of some of these Truman Communists anyway? ] 06:41 Aug 29, 2002 (PDT)
---------------
], I had started writing about the communists in US government before, but it all disappeared. Here are two websites: http://www.americasfuture.net/bookmonitor/2002/2002-06-30.html
and the Hoover Institute http://www-hoover.stanford.edu/pubaffairs/newsletter/99summer/venona.html declassification of Venona project etc
]

:] -- do you ever actually read the websites you post and think about them? The first is what appears to be a fairly right-wing scare site -- one that actually claims that Alger hiss was the first Secretary General of the UN -- He wasn't, ] was.

:The second deals with a similar subject, but it is clear from the small excerpt that the Professors who wrote the book see the communists in a different context, i.e., as people who thought that communism would help to ensure a better, more equitable world and were motivated by ideals. This is a far cry from your implication that there was some kind of plot to encourage and support Stalin and the Soviet governments' atrocities. ]
-----------------
JHK read ] Stalin, one of the biggest mass murderers, is by true communists regarded as having destroyed communism ]
:] -- my point is, that, from what I understood from the article '''you''' cited, the communists in question were motivated by idealism for true communism -- it is very unclear that they knew about Stalin's atrocities or that they weould have supported them. At least, that's what the article implies. Please stop trying to teach your grandmother to suck eggs. ]
-------------------
Dear ], the people in Soviet Russia and other countries k n e w and experienced what Stalin and his system w a s and what he and his people d i d starting long before September 1939. Only Americans publicly profess to not have known about America's Great War Ally, dear Uncle Joe, but suddenly mysteriously found out by 1947 and immediately upon this at the very same time , started the Cold War.
]


:Dear ], now you're just being sarcastic and offensive. Please stop. You don't do your case any good. My point was, that the article you cited as support for your claims was not, in fact much support. I didn't say that no one in the US knew about what was going on in the Soviet Union (although I think they knew much more about us than we did about them. What I did say was that, from the article you cited, the authors seem to think that the people you think of as backers of atrocities may have had entirely different reasons for spying, and that it isn't clear FROM THAT ARTICLE that they knew wht Stalin ws doing. Please stop. I'm tired of having to deal with personal onslaughts from you every time I ask valid questions or make valid points that are almost always evidenciary in nature. You may not realize it, but I'm one of the people who actually sympathizes with many of your goals, but not your methods. Oh, and by the way, the issue of Soviet atrocities against ethnic Germans (among others), isn't really that big a secret. My daughter says that it's part of the regular curriculum in Bavarian schools. ]

----

Shoudn't this article be merge w/ ]? --] 04:52, 20 Aug 2003 (UTC)

:''Please respond on ]''.

----
I wonder whether a sentence or two should be added to the article that policy of expulsion was started by Hitler. After all, he expelled about million of Poles from Greater Poland into GG, he expelled Poles from Zamojszczyzna region.. One should provide context for what happened. ]
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Unless you can prove that the Eastern countries expelled only those ]s who signed the volkslist and so became legal German citizens (]) and not just any German, the article should say that the expelled were ethnic Germans not German citizens. ] 13:38, Oct 18, 2003 (UTC)
-----
Why dont you prove otherwise. Many Germans from Poland that refused to get Volkslist and survived Nazis enjoyed respect of their neighbours. Have you ever heart of Polish Habsburg family, Germans of Lodz / leaders of Confederation of Polish industry and many others. I have friends that their families followed this way. By the way, who was Maximilian Kolbe if not a Pole of German descent. ]
:I don't claim that all ethnic Germans were expelled. You however are claiming that only German citizens were expeled. That means you have to prove the citizenship of what a couple million people but I have to prove only one non-signer of the Volsklist was deported, transported or fled. I think I would take the odds on this one. ] 16:35, Oct 18, 2003 (UTC)

I guess discussion is pointless. Whoever signed volkslist, was considered German citizen, right? Moreover, not only ethnic Germans were expelled. A lot of so called "autochtones" (Silesians, Masurians) were expelled also, which sometimes didn't consider themselves (at that time) neither Poles, or Germans.
But my quesiton remains (from other article talk): how many?
2,2 million as according to Polish official data, 10 million as quote in some other places?! ]

According to "Siegfried Kogelfranz (Hg.): Die Vertriebenen. Reinbek b. Hamburg: Rowohlt 1985, S. 122f." about 11 Million Ethnic Germans were expulsed. You can find this figure in a document of the state of Saxony, too: http://www.sachsen.de/de/bf/staatsregierung/ministerien/smi/schwerpunkte/kulturfoerderung/download/broschuere.pdf Since large parts of Silesia and East Prussia were cleansed ethnically, 2 Million seems to be too small. But, since, 2 Million is an official Polish figure, the reason therefore is quite clear (-: ] 12:41, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

A reason for the small Polish figure might be, that many Germans lost their passports, to complicate their departure to Germany. For a short time they became stateless. Perhaps the Polish figure counted Germans with passports. ] 12:45, 14 Nov 2003 (UTC)

Latest revision as of 12:24, 18 November 2024

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Euphemisms?

It's interesting how the article uses language almost euphemistically. "Expulsion" is used in place of where "ethnic cleansing" would be appropriate nearly every single time; Contrast with articles dealing with the Armenian Genocide which use "harsher" language more liberally, so to speak. This article has some major issues. User: Dehler 15:04, 14 January 2020

Expulsion is used when transfered people are guilty, ethnic cleansing when transfered people are innocent. The Sudeten Germans Flocked to Hitler - Herrenvolk und Lebensraum. They were guilty.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.15.218.62 (talk) 07:46, 12 March 2022 (UTC)

There is no such thing as collective guilt. It exists only in propaganda and such language displays inhumane thinking. And maybe you should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate. --93.203.105.178 (talk) 14:47, 15 May 2022 (UTC)

Supposing there were enough of them remaining.
You should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate in Dachau concentration camp and elsewhere during the Nazi-German occupation of the democratic Czechoslovakia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.23.6.193 (talk) 14:52, 29 June 2022 (UTC)

It is claimed that Sudeten Germans expelled from Czechoslovakia were based on the concept of collective guilt. This is not true.
Almost every decree explicitely stated that the sanctions did not apply to anti-fascists.
About 90% of the German population of the Czech borderlands had supported the Nazi and affilation to Nazi-Germany. Some 280 000 Germans in Czechoslovakia remained Czechoslovak citizens after the transfer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.23.6.193 (talk) 15:37, 10 June 2022 (UTC)

I've noticed this issue too. This expulsion led to the use of forced labour, rapes, executions, massacres, and the extinction of German language dialects and cultures. It surpassed the Jewish Holocaust of World War Two in terms of numbers of victims and was a great travesty for German heritage. Take Kaliningrad, where Germans were executed and used as slaves and German culture was erased and replaced (evidence most strikingly in the new architecture of the city. It is simply another example of the vilification of Germans post-war. Doorfrench (talk) 13:49, 22 October 2023 (UTC)
@"didn't apply to anti-fascists": in terms of the degrees this may be technically true (although not all of them contained this restriction), but in practice it meant nothing: one set of my grand parents lived in Czecheslovakia for a few generations. They were communists, and actively fought the Nazis. My grand father died in the process, and my grand mother spent the several years in a Gestapo prison, and was even officially acknowledged as an anti-fascist (including getting special stipend for the rest of her life from the East German government). And she was indeed formally offered the chance to stay in the village she was born: as one of a single-digit number of people (of the entire village), none of which she knew. Now, want to guess what this meant in practice? 174.59.220.235 (talk) 17:51, 22 January 2024 (UTC)
This article should be reworded to more accurately reflect that it was an ethnic cleansing. "Expulsion" is only appropriate when talking about removing the Germans who had settled in areas that the Nazis conquered in WWII. When we're talking about removing Germans from areas where they had been living for hundreds of years, that's ethnic cleansing by any reasonable definition of the term. Whether removing the Germans was justified or not is frankly irrelevant, as this does not change the fact that it was an ethnic cleansing. Just because Nazi Germany committed one of the worst crimes in history with the Holocaust doesn't mean that we should use euphemisms to talk about what happened to Germans after the war.
I propose largely replacing "expulsion" with "ethnic cleansing" whenever it refers to Germans living in areas where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed. Megathonic (talk) 17:25, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed; so expulsion? This entire discussion is flawed because expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing in the same way population exchange (e.g. Population exchange between Greece and Turkey) is a form of ethnic cleansing in the same way genocide is a form of ethnic cleansing. The full definition of ethnic cleansing is the attempt to get rid of—through deportation, displacement or even mass killing—members of an unwanted ethnic group (emphasis mine). Curbon7 (talk) 19:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)
If "expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing", then it shouldn't be controversial for the article to clearly state that millions of Germans were ethnically cleansed from their homes. The reason that can be controversial to say is because there is a difference in connotation between merely "expelling" people and the harsher implications under "ethnically cleansing" an entire demographic. Mass-killing isn't a requirement for ethnic cleansing to have occurred, but even if it were, in some cases, Germans were deliberately mass-killed in revenge for Nazi crimes, and in any case, their removal was done with flagrant disregard to civilian deaths if 500,000 to 1+ million died as a direct consequence. Megathonic (talk) 20:01, 8 April 2024 (UTC)

Genocide Denial

What's up with the genocide denial in this article? 2003:C0:F720:F000:389F:2BEB:D917:7561 (talk) 08:14, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

Because this wasn't a genocide. Not even close. SinoDevonian (talk) 01:16, 21 February 2023 (UTC)
It was a genocide under the CPPCG which says that
any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical
destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Crainsaw (talk) 11:55, 29 May 2023 (UTC)
The Allied expulsion removed the Nazi Herrenvolk und Lebensraum ideology from the Czech crown lands once and for all. 171.23.6.193 (talk) 08:18, 2 April 2024 (UTC)

No one has denied Holocaust in this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.15.223.133 (talk) 12:01, 19 October 2022 (UTC)

\

Hungary section of the article

In contrast to expulsions from other nations or states, the expulsion of the Germans from Hungary was dictated from outside Hungary. The section mixes the term "forced labor" with expulsion. Approximately 200 000 civilian Hungarian citizens were deported to the Soviet Union as forced laborers irrespective of their ethnicity/nationality. It's not to be mixed with the expulsion of the ethnic Germans to Germany. For the expulsion there was no "dictate from outside Hungary". The source of this information in the article is inactive. Hagnes2002 (talk) 10:35, 17 January 2024 (UTC)

Population Movements Chart

The section Population Movements includes a chart regarding the change in ethnic Germans in various countries. However, the title says it compares 1958 and 1930–31, while the actual columns of data refer to 1939 and 1930–31. I would assume that the data is actually from 1958 and it’s just a typo that has never been noticed for the last decade, but the numbers come from reference books, and I can’t be sure what the correct answer is. I am changing the column to 1958 because that makes far more sense, but wanted to flag it in was I am in the wrong—in which case it should still be cleared up.

Separately, population numbers for the Netherlands were added to the chart several years later—but while the rest of the entries show the reduction in German population via subtraction, this one does not. It provides two similar citations which may or may not be to the same source, but it is hard to tell what they are specifically pointing to (which is kind of the point of a citation). Butterboy (talk) 19:06, 17 November 2024 (UTC)

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