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

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OR tag

Latest comment: 18 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

I removed the tag. I already provided you with the name of a book Der 'Volksdeutsche Selbstschutz' in Polen 1939/40 von Christian Jansen, Arno Weckbecker.. As both are German authors and university teachers, I would hesitate to claim that Molobo is doing some original research about Selbstschutz here. Your main objection (Sciurinae) was that no internet sources mentions Selbstschutz as important to the prewar nationality struggle background. I would say, that if there are historians who write books of this topic, we shouldn't consider it irrelevant. ackoz   17:17, 5 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

The book has been reviewed http://www.ikgn.de/zeitschrift_nordost-archiv.ausgabe.1997.02.htm#rezensionen

Xx236 08:11, 6 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Expelled by

Latest comment: 18 years ago2 comments2 people in discussion

"Expelled by" column ignores that:

• many Germans were evacuated by German authorities (East Prussia, Silesia, Poland) and died during that evacuation,
• the basis of the expulsion was Potsdam treaty signed by the USA, UK and SU, not by Poland or Romania.
• The Soviets expelled, deported to the SU or killed many Germans in any "liberated" by them area. In your table German POWs from e.g. Silesia were allegedly expelled by "Poland". They were transported to Siberia, many died there, later the survivors were tranferred to Western Germany. The only Poles they met were eventually Polish prisoners in Siberia.
• Poland was directly controlled by Soviet authorities in 1945 (till at least 1947) - Red Army, NKVD, Soviet Embassy. The same for former Nazi allies - Hungary, Romania. I don't know if and how much Czechoslovakia was independend 1945-1948.

Xx236 10:58, 7 June 2006 (UTC)]Reply

OK, I put most of the above text into the article below the z-g-d table. However, it occurs to me that another approach is to simply delete the column altogether. I'd like to hear what other people think about this issue.

--Richard 12:42, 7 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Table in "Summary of German Expellees"

Latest comment: 18 years ago1 comment1 person in discussion

I finally focused on what this table is and how it was constructed.

I now believe this table is based on unacceptable original research. Here's my argument:

Immediately above the table, the text says

According to Federal Statistics Bureau of Germany in 1958 more than 2.1 million had lost their lives during this process.^{[citation needed]} The monumental statistical work of the Gesamterhebung zur Klärung des Schicksals der deutschen Bevölkerung in den Vertreibungsgebieten, Bd. 1-3, München 1965, confirms this figure. The standard study by Gerhard Reichling "Die deutschen Vertriebenen in Zahlen" concludes that 2,020,000 Germans perished as a result of the expulsion and deportation to slave labour in the Soviet Union. ^{[citation needed]} The Centre against Expulsions estimates that just under 2 million German civilians died.

One German researcher, Rüdiger Overmans, has claimed that only 1,100,000 people lost their lives. ^{[citation needed]} These lower figures and the methodology for obtaining them are disputed by some scholars including Dr. Fritz Peter Habel and Alfred de Zayas, who maintain in the newest editions of their publications that the death toll was well over two million. ^{[citation needed]}

Four of the above sources are mentioned as sources for the table (Reichling, Overmans, Habel and de Zayas). However, these sources differ in their estimates of lives lost. Specifically, Overmans believes it was 1,100,000 whereas the others believe it was over 2 million.

The notes for the table indicate that Overmans estimate was used to adjust the numbers in the table downward. As a result, you have a set of numbers that none of the sources would agree to. This is most easily understood by looking at the "Civilian losses" row. The total is 1.3 million which is not a number that any of the four sources would agree to.

I believe this is a good example of how easy it is to slip into original research. One or more of the Wikipedia editors built this table as a composite of the research done by the four sources. This would have been marginally OR if every number in the table could be sourced to a specific source. (An example would be numbers for Poland from one source, numbers for Czechoslovakia from another source.)

However, when you start modifying numbers by using one source to revise the numbers of another source, you are definitely in the realm of OR.

The problem is that you have no guarantee that any source would agree that the methodology used to apply Overmans estimate to come up with 1.3 million would be accepted by any reliable source. Three of the sources would say "Nein. 2 million +". Overmans would say "Nein. 1.1 million". So, who can you cite that would support "1.3 million"? Nobody. That makes it OR.

A better way to present this information is to find a set of numbers that one source (Reichling, Habel or de Zayas) presents and then present Overmans adjustments as a separate idea in a follow-on paragraph. It may be reasonable to blend Reichling, Habel and de Zayas in one table IF the numbers are close. The text of the article say the Habel and de Zayas estimate "well over 2 million". I don't know what "well over" means. Are we saying 2.1 million or 2.3 million? If it's 2.1 million, their numbers could be blended with Reichling's numbers. If it's 2.3 million, then it's debatable whether their numbers are effectively the same as Reichling's or are substantially different.

However, it's not obvious why we would need to blend the three sources. If they are in substantial agreement, it should be sufficient to pick one and say that the other two are in substantial agreement.

If there is a consensus among Wikipedia editors that my analysis above is correct, then we will need someone to fix the table according to the points made above.

--Richard 12:24, 7 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Some more data about numbers expelled and number of deaths

Latest comment: 18 years ago4 comments2 people in discussion

This is from the Axis History Forum. Thanks to User:Szopen for providing the link to the forum. http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=1698&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0

The Statistisches Bundesamt of West Germany prepared a detailed account of these horrors in 1958, the key data of which can be found in Gunnar Heinsohn's Lexikon der Völkermorde, published in 1998 by the Rowohlt Taschenbuch Verlag in Reinbek by Hamburg. They are reproduced hereafter:

Baltic Countries and Memel Territory
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 256,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 256,000
Thereof killed during flight
or expulsion: 66,000

Yugoslavia
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 550,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 523,000
Thereof killed during flight
or expulsion: 135,000

German Eastern territories (East Prussia, East Pomerania, East Brandenburg, Silesia, Danzig)
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 10,000,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 7,400,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 1,225,000

Poland
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 1,400,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 675,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 263,000

Romania
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 785,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 347,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 101,000

Checoslovaquia
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 3,274,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 2,921,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 238,000

Hungary
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 597,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 259,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 53,000

Total German Eastern territories and Eastern Europe
Ethnic German population 1944/45: 16,862,000
Thereof fled or expelled: 12,381,000
Thereof killed during flight or expulsion: 2,081,000

These figures refer to the postwar period 1945-1950. During the war itself, according to Heinsohn's "Lexikon", ca. 1.1 million ethnic Germans from the above mentioned territories lost their lives, as members of the German armed forces, through the outrages of and on the flight from the conquering Red Army or through allied bombing. According a statement by the Bundesminister für Vertriebene in 1962, quoted by Heinsohn, there were 128,000 refugees from the Eastern territories among those killed by allied bombing in Germany.

--Richard 12:56, 7 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Question to Molobo. You claimed that the numbers from the Centre Against Expulsions were unacceptable because the Centre was founded by a Nazi. Do you also dispute the Statistisches Bundesamt of West Germany as an acceptable source? Not the truth of the numbers but the acceptability of the source. We have Ruediger Overmans as a source for a much lower number and we are working on text that argues that the 2 million number is considered too high by some historians. So I'm not asking you to accept 2 million deaths. I am asking you to accept that there are reliable sources that put the number at 2 million.

For example, I think we could re-construct the Center's table with the numbers from the Statistisches Bundesamt and get the same numbers. If we sourced the new table to the Statistisches Bundesamt, would this be acceptable to you?

P.S. I still believe in principle that the Center is a reliable source and that the claim that was founded by a Nazi doesn't affect this. However, since it seems evident that the Center is a secondary source and we now have a primary source available, it seems that the we should use the primary source instead.

--Richard 13:12, 7 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Question to Molobo. You claimed that the numbers from the Centre Against Expulsions were unacceptable because the Centre was founded by a Nazi. No, BdV which created the center was led by Nazi as its first president. Do you also dispute the Statistisches Bundesamt of West Germany as an acceptable source? It is an acceptable source if one does mention that the numbers are of those Germans that were unnacounted for, and automatically were registered as "dead". --Molobo 12:18, 8 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

This is also from the Axis History Forum.

Numbers quoted from Richard Overy "Historical Atlas of the Third Reich"

a-Pre-war population b-German war losses (includes losses during expulsion) c-german population by 1950 still in the territory d-Settled in FRG e-Settled in GDR f-Settled in Austria

Baltic States: a-249500 b-65600 c-15000 d-109900 e-56900

Dantzig: a-380000 b-111900 c-4000 d-230200 e-60600

Poland(pre-1939 frontiers): a-1371000 b-293000 c-431000 d-419600 e-268400

Czechoslovakia: a-3477000 b-446600 c-250000 d-1917800 e-1082000

Hungary: a-623000 b-89000 c-270000 d-149500 f-103500

Romania: a-786000 b-136000 c-400000 d-178200 f-34800

Yugoslavia: a-536800 b-175800 c-82000 d-148000 f-149500

Eastern Germany:

Silesia: a-4576500 b-727100 c-870000 d-2090000 e-1138600

East Brandenburg: a-642000 b-214000 c-16000 d-152900 e-277100

East Pomerania: a-1883700 b-461900 c-55000 d-922800 e-541800

East Prussia: a-2473000 b-489400 c-160000 d-1375500 e-608900

As it can be seen these numbers are still incomplete. For instance it is well known that some people from Czechoslovakia took refuge in Austria. How many?

Some others (from all the territories) were settled in the USA, Canada, Brazil, Argentina, Australia,.... Again Mr Overy doesn't tell us.

It is difficult to understand from Mr. Overy if Memel is included in East Prussia or in the Baltic States.

Some germans from the western territories of the USSR might have avoided the transfer to Siberia and Central Asia in 1941. How many of them took refuge in post-war Germany, Austria or the Americas? ( There were for instance 400000 germans in the Ukraine SSR prior to 1939)

A lot of POW settled in the countries where they had been retained. How many and in which countries he doesn't tell us.

Finally some germans civilians from Romania, Hungary and other territories were taken by the soviets during the period 1944/1950 to the USSR. It seems that Mr. Overy didn't took notice of this either.

--Richard 13:12, 7 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

OK .. Richard ..plus the numbers don't reflect the fact that some ethnic Germans were allowed to stay in 1945 (around 200 000), but chose to leave later (typically after 1948). That simple math 3200 000 - 2000000 = 200 000 deaths doesn't work here. ackoz  

Restored "Deaths" column to the Center Against Expulsions table

Latest comment: 18 years ago6 comments4 people in discussion

It seems their numbers are not more biased than the general bias of German numbers for most of the postwar period. I think it is adequate to call all the numbers into question by saying that some German historians (along with the Poles and the Czechs) believe the numbers are much lower.

We are now faced with the fact that these tables are huge and take up way too much space in the article.

I'm wondering if this level of detail is useful in the article. Somebody (I think it was Wikimol it was Szopen) suggested moving the debate over the numbers to an article about the historiography of the expulsions.

I didn't like the idea at the time but we may have to do something in order to manage the surfeit of numbers. At this point, having all these tables of numbers will more likely serve to confuse than to enlighten the reader.

It seems that, at the very least, we should choose between the Statistisches Bundesamt table and the Center Against Expulsions table. In truth, I like the Center Against Expulsions table better because it's more informative (modulo the issues about things like who was actually responsible for the expulsions which are noted below the table). On the other hand, there are people who would make charges of bias against the Center Against Expulsions. Similar charges can be made against the Statistisches Bundesamt but at least the underlying bias of their numbers is less politically suspect.

Where I want to go with this is to say that the preponderance of German historians believed the 2 million number for decades but recently there has been evidence from German, Polish and Czech historians suggesting the real number might be much lower. At this time, there is no clear consensus whether the real number is closer to 1.3 million or closer to 2 million.

Comments?

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Richardshusr (talk • contribs)

The table is OK. The over-inflated explanatory text is not. German and Czech (or German and joint German-Czech) results are different because the "German" numbers also include people killed fleeing from areas that were coming under the control of the Red Army. We should try to find sources for this (differences between what is seen under "Expulsion") and put this into the article, not discuss if Poland or Hungary were under Soviet control, therefore excusing the actual perpetrators of the crimes. ackoz   06:51, 8 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I strongly object against statement "expelled by Poland".

• The decision was made in Yalta and Potsdam, eventually in Moscow. The Polish nation didn't decide about its fate, borders, economical and political system. Eventually - expelled by the USA, UK, SU and Poland.
• The Red Army committed many crimes against the Germans in Poland both before any Polish administration was organized or later.
• Poland was under Soviet occupation in 1945, when the worst crimes were committed. The Polish administration (of the London government) was destroyed, frequently imprisoned, and replaced by the Communist one, organized by Soviet citizens or Polish (?) Communists educated by the NKVD. The administration was frequently based on criminals. The pre-war Polish police was totally destroyed during the war, physically by the Soviets Katyń, morally and politically by the Germans and Soviets. The pro-Soviet government called the state "People's Poland", not Poland. "Poland" meant the London government, its symphatyzers in the country and hundreds of thousands of emigrants.

I don't think that the basic facts, ignored by the majority of the readers, are excusing anyone. The responsible should be named literally rather than German steretypes about the expulsions reprinted. The Center agaisnt expulsions isn't an academic institution. Why do you copy false data? Because it's simple?Xx236 14:26, 8 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes, to some extent, because it's easy. I got the z-g-v tgable from their website. Wikimol pointed me to the Statistiches Bundesamt info on the Axis History Forum. Putting these numbers into Wiki format is time-consuming but I did it.

You got better data? Cough it up.

You don't like the data presented? Explain why.

I don't think we should change the headings of the table because then you confuse the reader into believing that the z-g-v's table represents your POV. It doesn't and you wouldn't want the reader to think it does. SO, it's better to let the z-g-v table stand as it is and then criticize it separately.

--Richard 15:22, 8 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Xx236, the table of z-g-v is the best thing we have now. There will always be differences in numbers, but this article is not a place to find the real truth. I you can find some lower estimates, with reliable sources, add them to the article as a range, (ie number 1 - number 2) and provide the sources.

ackoz   23:57, 10 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

That wasn't me.. --Wikimol 12:31, 11 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Sorry, you're right, it was Szopen that pointed me at the Statistisches Bundesamt figures in AxisHistory Forum.

--Richard 16:17, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

"It is argued by some"

Latest comment: 18 years ago6 comments4 people in discussion

It is argued by some that the "Expelled By" column in the above table does not take into account the following facts:

Who has argued this? Someone on Wikipedia? In that case, this is original research, is it not? I mean, really, does this mean I can wander over to this article, decide that 7,200,000 German-Albanians were expelled from Belgium by Fidel Castro in 1944 and insert a chunk of text beginning with "It is argued by some..."? Colonel Mustard 10:10, 11 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

You are right :-) Its funny. ackoz   21:55, 11 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I can see how it is wrong, but also ackoz's edit is also contentious, as it says expelled from while at the time the borders were under dispute and reorganization, so e.g. expelled from Poland could mean Silesia or like areas which were in fact German, but became Polish once the German majority had been expelled at the end of WWII. your edit also does not make sense as the next column says Expelled, Deported, Fled from which would cover whatever you had just put in the previous column, yet it was different.

perhaps what could be stated is something like "government/authority responsible for expellation"

Also, using the Treaty of Potsdam or the Yalta conference as an excuse or reasoning is nonsense, the ideas for the expellation had to come from somewhere, it did not magically appear on a piece of paper and the conquering powers all obeyed. Its basis did not come from some paper, it came from political ideas such as those of Hitler's Lebensraum, only in reverse.

--Jadger 02:42, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Comment #1 - Jadger's last point is worth expanding on. Are there any sources that explain the reasoning behind the re-organization of national boundaries in Eastern Europe? A full treatment is outside the scope of this article but it would be worth summarizing that in a paragraph before the discussion of Yalta and Potsdam.

Comment #2 - Aside from ackoz's edit being contentious, I object to it on two technical grounds.

1) It is my intent that the table stand exactly as it is provided on the z-g-v's website. To change it is to indulge in OR.

2) The specific change that ackoz made to the column heading makes a mess of the table. What is the difference now between that column and the one immediately to the right of it? Both seem to say "Expelled from" and thus the reader would be justified in saying, "Huh? What's the difference between these two columns."

A better solution would be to remove the "Expelled by" column altogether. That is still bordering on OR but it could be explained in a note that says "The table on the z-g-v's website provides a column that indicates which government authorized the expulsion. However, because there are debates about where the true responsibility lies, this column has been omitted from this article."

I don't like this solution. My preference would be to keep the "Expelled by" column with the "Expelled by" column heading and then provide a note explaining the controversy.

Comments?

--Richard 16:11, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I don't possess any language complex enough to describe the nationalist conflict you are bringing here. You say "were in fact German, but became Polish once the German majority had been expelled". Shitty argument Jadger, again, how do you decide what was German and what Polish? Is the nationality of inhabitants the key fact? Are large areas in Britain, Netherlands or Canada Indian, Paki or Turkish because they form a majority there? ackoz   08:52, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Ackoz, I think you missed Jadger's point. He's saying that Germans were expelled from territories that were still legally part of Germany at the time of the expulsions. These territories had not yet legally become Polish territory. These territories did not become legally Polish until after the Germans had been expelled. Note: It is possible to read a causality into the previous sentence but I don't think Jadger meant there to be a causality. The territories did not become Polish BECAUSE Germans had been expelled. In fact, if anything, Germans were expelled BECAUSE the territory was about to be made Polish. That decision didn't have anything to do with whether the territory was majority German or majority Polish. The decision was based on geopolitics and the decision to move the Germans out was just part of the implementation of the higher-level decision to make the territory part of Poland.

All Jadger is saying is that, technically, those Germans were not expelled from Poland because the territory wasn't technically Polish yet.

P.S. I hope that I have interpreted Jadger's comments correctly. I don't know anything about this and, even if I have interpreted Jadger's comments correctly, I am not saying he is correct. I just think that Ackoz has misunderstood Jadger's argument.

--Richard 16:11, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Molobo's recent "correction of an inaccuracy", marked as "minor"

Latest comment: 18 years ago6 comments3 people in discussion

Molobo recently made the following change...

Replaced

Likewise in the Opole/Oppeln region in Upper Silesia, natives which were considered "autochtones" (members of Polish minority in Germany) were allowed to stay, though the German language remained forbidden for the next forty years. Secretly German traditions and dialect survived however, to be slowly recognized since the late 1990s.

with

Likewise in the Opole/Oppeln region in Upper Silesia, natives which were considered "autochtones" (members of Polish minority in Germany) were allowed to stay, and their status as national minority was accepted in 1955, alongside with state's help in regards to economical assistance, and education .

While I'm concerned about the obvious POV switch here, I do not have the time this morning to try and find the NPOV position between these two POV stances.

However, what I do want to draw immediate attention to is the fact that Molobo marked this as a "minor" edit. "Minor edits" are intended to indicate corrections of a typographical nature such as spelling, punctuation, capitalization, etc. Grammatical corrections are also considered minor.

Changes in diction (i.e. improving the way something is said without changing the meaning) are arguably not "minor". I probably violate this last rule from time to time.

Anything that changes meaning is not "minor". Wikipedia guidelines say "even changing just a single word" might push something out of the category of being considered a "minor" change.

Molobo's edit is a blatant misuse of the "minor edit" flag.

Please do not do this again.

--Richard 14:41, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Molobo, could you please provide a source that would show that the German traditions did not have to be kept secret for 40 years? ackoz   15:00, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Ackoz, that's a really difficult request to fulfill (essentially, asking someone to prove a negative). It would be better for you to provide a source showing that German traditions did have to be kept secret for 40 years. Examples could be first person, biographical narratives of Germans living in Poland. Another could be a source describing the re-emergence of German traditions in the Poland of the 1990s.

My initial sense (based on instinct not knowledge) is that both points of view are correct and that the NPOV position is to mention both. The two sets of statements can be reconciled in a way such that they are both true and yet keep the essential meaning of what they are trying to say.

As an analogy (although probably not perfect), my parents are Taiwanese. While living under Japanese occupation, they went to Japanese schools and had to pay a fine whenever they accidentally spoke Taiwanese in school. After the end of WWII, the mainland Chinese took over and the national language became Mandarin Chinese. Kids then had to pay a fine if they accidentally spoke Taiwanese in school.

Taiwanese was not forbidden at home (it would have been an effectively unenforceable ban).

However, as a result of the above rules in school, I have Taiwanese cousins who grew up with Mandarin Chinese as their primary language and Taiwanese as a poor second language. At times, I (as an American) have asked them, "How do you say X in Taiwanese?" and they look at me and say "You know, I have no idea."

The ironic thing is that the Taiwanese are the majority people in Taiwan but they have only been able to assert their national identity in the last decade.

OK, thanks for putting up with this digression.

My point is, you can be legally recognized as a minority and have certain rights including assistance in education and still have to suppress your language and cultural identity.

I would ask everyone to avoid an edit war over this section and try to find an accurate NPOV way to capture the real situation, both the reality and the perception. By this last phrase, I mean that the ethnic German minority may have felt a need to assimilate and act Polish in order to gain equal treatment. It may be that there were legal rights but social prejudice that kept Germans from being treated as "good Polish citizens". Thus, if you could learn Polish and adopt a Polish name, then perhaps you would blend in better and not be discriminated against. All this despite being "legally recognized as a minority" and having certain protected rights.

The above is all conjecture based on my understanding of the difficulties of being a minority.

What we need is someone who can write an accurate, sourceable description of the status of Germans in Poland in the postwar period. Without the acrimonious debate of "Poles mistreated Germans", "Did not!", "Did too!"

--Richard 15:53, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Richard, I don't think that we can find someone like that. The unbiased sources are sparse, and if you use one, someone will argument that it's not reliable at all. Then you use another and someone else will object. Maybe - does anybody know about an non-German non-Czech/Polish author who wrote something about this? ackoz   16:17, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I disagree, Ackoz. I'm not looking for an "unbiased source". "Reliable source" does NOT mean "unbiased source". It means that it's not the wacky thoughts one one or two people on Wikipedia.

I'm looking to present both sides of the story. I would hope that 15 years after the fall of the Berlin wall, somebody has written a book explaining what it was like to be an ethnic German living in postwar Poland. A book written in German perhaps and with its inherent biases, of course, but, at least, there would be some evidence that "German traditions had to be kept secret". I don't know what this phrase means. It might mean something banal like they had quiet Oktoberfests instead of big boisterous ones. Or that they were secretly Lutheran in a Catholic country. Certainly, I expect that kids who grew up speaking German at home learned to shut up and speak Polish if they wanted to go to university. I have no idea of the details. But, I believe the basic assertion and I wish someone could put some "meat on the bones" and replace my conjecture with facts.

--Richard 16:24, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes, of course, I provided the reference. I also have documents regarding the building of German language schools in 50s, but that has to wait. --Molobo 07:52, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

85.1.136.157

Latest comment: 18 years ago4 comments4 people in discussion

Do not dare to enhance the article with facts and sources (as you tried it June 12, 10.01 am) because the camarilla which controls this side is not interested in an academic and objective approach to the topic. (213.70.74.164 14:46, 12 June 2006 (UTC))Reply

Stop that, please. I am thinking about restoring some parts of his edit. Would Szopen please explain why he reverted? ackoz   15:01, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Moreover, even if we left Szopen's edits in place, I think he got the parenthetical phrase backwards. He wrote "members of Polish minority in Germany". Didn't he mean to say "members of German minority in Poland? I've heard of rewriting history but this is ridiculous!  :^)

--Richard 16:28, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Nonono. Those who were agreed to stay in Opole region were believed to be members of Polish pre-war minority in Germany (so called autochtones). They have to pass special exams and were then recognised as Poles. Most of them probably had dudal identity and some of them then returned to Germanness.

As for rest of the revert: "the Centre Against Expulsions are not supported by the evidence. However, the joint Czech-German commission, _which is considered highly political_, and whose results have been rejected by a considerable number of experts on the field of the expulsion, did not carry out any in depth demographic study. Its conclusions _are more in the nature of a whitewash_." <- I consider this as POV statements

"The bulk of the German settlers, however, came to the Baltic on invitation of the Polish Kind Konrad von Masovia, to Bohemia and Moravia on invitation of King Ottokar, to Hungary on invitation of King Bela IV and to Russia on invitation of Catherine the Great. The idea of a "drang nach osten" is therefore more akin to a movement of migrant workers than to a settlement following military conquest." <- hmmmm

"Whereas the minority protection treaties provided for respect of minority languages, minority schools, non-discrimination in employment, etc., the Polish government disregarded the treaties, as attested in the judgments of the Permanent Court of International Justice, which repeatedly condemned Poland for violations of the Treaty. Moreover, the League of Nations system of minority protection provided for the possibility of minorities to send petitions to the League. Thousands of petitions from ethnic Germans in Poland and Czechoslovakia are available for consultation by researchers at the archives of the League of Nations in Geneva. Since Poland had no intention to abide by the treates, it unilaterally withdrew from the League's minority protection system in 1934, without diplomatic consequences. Systematic discrimination by the Germans of Czechoslovakia was confirmed by independent observers, including Professor Arnold Toynbee and Lord Runciman." <- IMO both POV statements and inaccuracies.

"However, the administration of the occupied territories was in the hands of Berlin, not of the ethnic Germans. More serious was the fate of the German ethnic minority of Bromberg, Posen and other areas in the former Prussian province of West Prussia. Reliable sources put the deathrate of members of the German minority in Poland at 5,800, mostly victims of the death marches to the east, and of the massacres on "Bloody Sunday", 3 September 1939. Goebbels Propaganda, however, multiplied the figure by ten and announced to the world that 58,000 ethnic Germans had been murdered." <- death marches ?! Also, IMO a lot of of deaths of German minority in 1939 must be attributed to general war conditions.

"This is an intellectually dishonest political debate, since the German expellees were victims, not perpetrators, and they have the same right to their human dignity and to human rights as everyone else, as the first United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Dr. Jose Ayala Lasso stated on 28 May 1995 and again on 6 August 2005. Even George W. Bush condemned the expulsion of the Germans in a statement sent to the international conference held at Duquesne University in November 2000 on the issue of Ethnic Cleansing. Bush said: "Ethnic cleansing is a crime against humanity, regardless of who does it to whom. I support the work of the Institute of German American Relations as they continue to educate the public on the tragedy that displaced fifteen million innocent German women and children, those most innocent souls who became victims of the worst period of ethnic cleansing in the history of the world", quoted in Seven Vardy and Hunt Tooley (eds.): Ethnic Cleansing in Twentieth Century Europe, Columbia University Press, New York, 2003, p. ii." -<- oh, come on. Szopen 08:49, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

The results

Latest comment: 18 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

After all the effort I have to say I'm a bit unsatisfied with the numbers section.

• mostly drawing ideas from this source I recently discovered: http://www.ce-review.org/01/16/odsun16_2.html (I highly recomment reading)

According to Federal Statistics Bureau of Germany (Statistisches Bundesamt) in 1958 more than 2.1 million lost their lives during the expulsions. Statistisches Bundesamt, Die deutschen Vertreibungsverluste, Wiesbaden, Kohlhammer Verlag,

EH: Similarly, the more detailed census in the Federal Republic in 1950 has not—and hardly could have—offered satisfactory information about how many Sudeten Germans had lost their lives in post-war Czechoslovakia. In fact, these results merely said that there should be around 238,000 persons about whom there was no information.[24=Die deutschen Vertreibungsverluste, Bevölkerungsbilanz für die deutschen Vertreibungsgebiete 1939-50, Wiesbaden 1958, p. 355.]

One is general number, other relates to Czechoslovakia, but the question stays - what does the source actualy say? "2.1 million lost their lives", or "according to statistical ballance, there are 2.1 milion persons about whom there was no information". The later claim is also supported by quote from Overmans

The standard study by Dr. Gerhard Reichling "Die deutschen Vertriebenen in Zahlen" concludes that 2,020,000 Germans perished as a result of the expulsion and deportation to slave labour in the Soviet Union. Gerhard Reichning, Die deutschen Vertriebenen in Zahlen, Teil 1, Bonn 1995, Tabelle 7, page 36 (2.020.000). A more recent statistical table which takes into account the newest demographic studies suggests a higher figure 2,225.000. Alfred de Zayas, Die Nemesis von Potsdam, 14th revised edition, Herbig, Munich, 2005, pp. 33-34.

+

However, these estimates are challenged by some as inflated because they include deaths resulting from diseases, malnutrition (post-war humanitarian catastrophe), suicides etc. For example, it is difficult to determine how many Germans... + several ways, by which they could have been kmurdered

...but few paragraphs later, in the Downward revision of the numbers, its exaplained the numbers are challenged on other basis - the numbers dont come from counting of death records or similar concrete data, but of a population balance which concluded that the fate of about 2 million inhabitants of the expulsion territories could not be clarified and that it must therefore be assumed that they had lost their lives in the course of these events. In the last years, however, these statements have been increasingly questioned, as the studies about the sum of reported deaths showed that the number of victims can hardly have been higher than 500,000 persons

So, the challenge isnt "the people died, but because of eg desease" but "the people in fact did not died, or even did not existed at all, as the number of deaths is just product of some statistical calculation"

Moreover, the quote from Overmans contradicts the beginning of the article stating Estimates of the number of deaths of ethnic Germans during the expulsions range from 1.1 million to 3 million.

I'm not sure what is the "standard study" is. (measured among scholars, not by circulation, in witch de Zayas excels) It is quite possible the standard is Overmans (and other "downward revisionists"?) and Alfred de Zayas is considered fringe research. Via Google search on expulsion losses I come to this Let me begin with the facts. Since the book focuses on German suffering, it is imperative to be precise about the extent of that suffering. Yet Barnouw's numbers are consistently inaccurate or simply wrong. The figure of "more than 16 million Germans" (p. 53) who fled or were expelled from Eastern Europe and the alleged death tolls of 2.5 million (p. 143) are wildly exaggerated. Current estimates amount to 14 million refugees and expellees and death tolls of as low as 500,000 (ref. to Overmans) Frank Biess, Department of History, University of California-San Diego, in book review

Czech and Polish sources give a much lower estimate (Czech historians arguing that most of the estimated population drop is because of the soldiers that were killed at the front).

...???, obviously unreferenceable. What are the "Czech sources", who are "Czech historians"? I've seen several serious works by Czech historians (eg. widly known book by Tomáš Staněk) and from what I remember, the usual way is to cite several estimates and statistics, elaborate on thir problems and advantages, lenghty explanations which number means what. Probably the same range of estimates can be found in Czech works as in non-Czech works.

The whole Results section can be easily attacked as highly POVed by selection of the facts. Imagine there would be several tables mainly from Czech and Polish historians from communist times, one big table from "League against Prussian nationalism", several comments from "uninvolved" soviet politicians, some work from 1990s by Russian historian widly acclaimed among Slavic nationalists, and one quote of a Czech claiming the numbers are higher. And in the end, there would be this sentence:

German and Austrian sources give a much higher estimate (German historians arguing that most of the difference in population estimates is because the unaccounted people were murdered ).

The solution towards NPOV obviously wouldn't be to delete something, but to include more tables and estimates, and link various estimatiates to various POVs / sides of the dispute.

So, I propose

1. lets remove the whole number mess to separate article, eg. Estimates of number of deaths in connection with expulsion of Germans after WWII
2. here include very brief summary with ranges
3. in the separate article
   • try to separate estimates from different times and add descriptions of what political bias was asserted to various estimates
   • get rid of statements of obvious disputes, such as These lower figures and the methodology for obtaining them are disputed by some scholars including Dr. Fritz Peter Habel and Alfred de Zayas, who maintain in the newest editions of their publications that the death toll was well over two million in part about Overmans, and its possible counterpart 'These high figures and the methodology for obtaining are contradicted by scholars including Richard Overmans + ..., who maintain in the newest editions of their publications that the death toll was under half a million which can be readily inserted under paragraph about Reichling....

--Wikimol 20:56, 12 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

• I strongly support this.

— Preceding unsigned comment added by ackoz (talk • contribs)

• I am uncomfortable with this proposal as I think it's sort of a weird article name but I can't see any other solution. I have been bold and copied the "results" section over to the article title suggested by Wikimol. Now, we need someone to replace the text in this article with a summary. Volunteers, anyone?

The discussion of the numbers has overwhelmed the article and made that portion of it unreadable. I'm not sure what Wikimol means by "get rid of statements of obvious disputes". I think we want to document the disputes as clearly as we can. These are the areas where the reader needs to decide for himself or herself what the "truth" is.

--Richard 00:56, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I meant, where the contradiction is obvious, it donesn't help the reader to add rebuttals. Like "Researcher A states numberA. However, that number is questioned by researchers such as B, who in newest editon of his study concludes the number is in fact numberB. However, that figure numberB and the methodology for obtaining it refuted by A..." and vice versa "Researcher B states numberB. However, that number is questioned by researchers such as A,..." If de Zayas states >2mil and Overmans said <500.000, I think the disagreemnt is obvious, and the rbutals add little information. But if you feel adding a note about disagreemnet under both estimates is uself, do it. --Wikimol 10:42, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Mixing 2 things

Latest comment: 18 years ago8 comments4 people in discussion

In the beginning of the article, the Expulsion was defined as "The expulsion of Germans after World War II was the mass deportation of people considered Germans (both Reichsdeutsche and Volksdeutsche) from Soviet-occupied areas". What we are really talking about here (and from what we are using the numbers) is the whole process, that started in 1944 as the Red Army entered Germany and Germans started escaping, and ended around 1950 when the most of the Germans had been relocated to Germany. What we are doing here, is that we are talking more about the post-Postdam process, yet using numbers that reflect the whole 1944-1950 period.

There is a German Wikipedia article Vertreibung (i.e. expulsion), which describes these events as Die Flucht und Vertreibung der Deutschen (1944 bis 1948) = Escape and Expulsion of Germans (1944 - 1948). Maybe we should consider renaming this article to something similar. ackoz   06:39, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes, I believe this is a good idea. --Molobo 10:30, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Well, we had something like this earlier... I think it wa sintended as series of articles dealing with the escapes, expellings, and later fate of German minority, but it seems project was abandoned (and labelled as POV by some, IIRC) Szopen 10:36, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

found it: German exodus from Eastern Europe Szopen 10:43, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I have seen that before. The trouble is, we cant actually distinguish what exactly is the escape and what the expulsion. Moreover, as the whole thing is covered as "Vertreibung" in German sources, we already have a lot of the escape mixed in this article already. We sould merge the two articles into a new one. --ackoz   11:13, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

I think it might be useful to think of this as a Wikipedia project. Is it reasonable to design a series of articles that would be interlinked and thereby avoid any single article becoming a monster article? For example, there could be a master article "German exodus from Eastern Europe" and daughter articles describing the experiences of individual countries such as "German exodus from Poland". NB: This is just an example of a possible structure. I'm open to other organizing schemes.

--Richard 15:38, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

The problem, Richard, is that the most of the historians treat these events as one process. And why - it's hard to distinguish what was escape and what was expulsion. The numbers we have (2 mio dead, 14 mio resettled) are probably true, but for the whole thing. We use them in an article that is intended to only describe one part of the process - that's wrong. ackoz   22:55, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes, I understand and agree with your point. Nonetheless, while it is difficult to separate flight and expulsion, it is comparatively easier to document what happened in different regions and countries (e.g. East Prussia, Poland, Czechoslovakia, etc.) Despite protestations that the Polish government was not involved, I'm not convinced that the expulsions were entirely the work of the Soviet Army and their Communist cadres. This is conjecture but I would bet that there were Poles, Czechs and other Eastern Europeans involved, too.

This is more uninformed conjecture but I would guess that maybe the expulsions were nastier in Poland than in Czechoslovakia. Can anybody confirm or disprove this?

Is it worth discussing how things were done in Poland as opposed to Czechoslovakia? The article begins to discuss this but there isn't enough space in an article of such wide scope to focus on specific incidents in each country. In an article titled "Exodus of Germans from Poland after World War II", however, there would be more space available. Similarly, there would be more space available to discuss post-Cold War relations between Germany and Poland. And so on for Czechoslovakia, Romania and the Baltic states.

However, you would need a Wikiproject to ride herd over all the articles to keep consistency and quality.

--Richard 23:51, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Merge the German Exodus article into this one and then rename the whole thing

Latest comment: 18 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

Please vote here. Also please try to propose the name for the article.

• Support. ackoz   11:17, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply
• Support.--Molobo 12:35, 13 June 2006 (UTC)Reply
• Oppose --Richard 06:35, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Comments

I oppose the proposed merger because I think it's still reasonable to have one general article on the exodus and a separate one on expulsions even if it is hard to quantify exactly how many were evacuated, how many fled and how many were expelled. You may not be able to put hard numbers to the number expelled and the number killed but you can describe what happened. Expulsion is qualitatively different from evacuation, though it is arguable that expulsion and flight are difficult to differentiate from each other.

I have been bold and moved the "Background" section from this article to the German exodus from Eastern Europe article. Perhaps this latter article should be renamed German exodus from Eastern Europe after World War II.

The good news is that this article is now only 43kb long which while, long by the official Wikipedia guideline, is well within the recommended 30-50kb range.

Please take a look at both articles and comment on whether you like this approach.

--Richard 06:35, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Translation from the German Wikipedia

Latest comment: 18 years ago4 comments3 people in discussion

At first, I was thinking "Geez, whoever wrote this stuff has really poor English." Then, I saw Ackoz's edit summary that said he was translating from the German Wikipedia and was tired, to boot.

That explains a lot. It is really hard to write well while translating because the syntax of the original text leaves a strong impression in the mind that is hard to overcome. I have tried to clean up the text but more remains to be done.

In particular, I am puzzling over this text. My lack of knowledge about Germany and German demographics is tripping me up.

The article says:

Other areas, like Bavaria, which had been strongly uniform confessionally and in their traditions had to deal with new inhabitants of different confessions and traditions.

I think what this is trying to say is that Bavaria used to be uniformly Catholic but now had to deal with an influx of non-Catholic and non-Bavarian Germans. Did I get that right?

--Richard 06:12, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yes you did. And thanks for correcting my English. ackoz   06:49, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Ackoz übersetzt Texte der deutschen Wikipedia - großartig, ein Deutschenhasser erster Klasse implementiert hier selbstzübersetzte Informationen aus der deutschen Wiki, da wurde wohl der Bock zum Gärtner gemacht! Wieso sprichst er überhaupt deutsch, wenn er Deutschland und die Deutschen so schrecklich findet? (213.70.74.165 08:51, 14 June 2006 (UTC))Reply

English here, please. I am no "Deutschenhasser"=i.e. someone who hates Germans. I don't find Germany or Germans bad, I lived in Germany and also have German friends. I think that the German article has good quality (perhaps because you don't edit it). If you find the translation incorrect, you can correct it, but I tried my best. Please stop these personal attacks here, and use English if you can. ackoz   09:24, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Assessing blame

Latest comment: 18 years ago3 comments2 people in discussion

Who wrote this section? Any source? Any scholar ever wrote "It would be a mistake to place all the blame for the deaths and suffering of the expelled Germans on the shoulders of the nations who expelled the Germans."? To me, it looks like a blatant OR.

ackoz   06:56, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Yup, I confess... I wrote it and it is OR. You can delete it if you wish but please consider that it was put there to mollify some editors who were objecting (and still are objecting) to text and tables that seem to put the blame on the Polish and Czech governments rather than on the Allied governments, particularly the Soviet Union.

I would prefer you put a {{fact}} tag on the various assertions and help me look for a way to source this POV. Taking it out completely is likely to start up an edit war.

Surely there is some politician or historian from Poland or the Czech Republic who has made this sort of assertion. Or is it just hot air from Molobo and others like him?

Come on, guys. Time to cough up a source for this stuff or it will get deleted.

--Richard 07:37, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Now that I re-read that text several weeks after I wrote it, I think the text is essentially true. It is only OR because I can't cite a book or other publication where a reliable source says it.

We know that it is true that "many deaths" were caused by Soviet concentration camps. The argument in the "Assessing blame" section is really discussing one of the points made in the Estimates of number of deaths in connection with expulsion of Germans after WWII controversy.

Maybe we should just move the "Assessing Blame" text into the "Results" section and reference the Estimates of number of deaths in connection with expulsion of Germans after WWII article.

Comments?

--Richard 07:53, 14 June 2006 (UTC)Reply

Anyone with springerlink access here? Or perhaps you could find this [1] in some library?