The Policy of the USSR and the III Reich Towards the Polish Elites during the Second World War

Abstract

The objective of the paper is to present both the character and specificity of the policy followed by the German Nazi occupational authorities against Polish elites, and the intelligentsia in particular.
Hostility towards the intelligentsia of a nationality other than that predominant in a given nation state is by no means a unique phenomenon, as it accompanied the emergence of nation states throughout the nineteenth century. It was also visible when these states re-emerged or had their borders redrawn following World War I and II. Therefore, this particularly hostile attitude towards the elites, evident also in Poland, had a deep-rooted tradition – all the more understandable as it stemmed from the fact that the intelligentsia had always been the kernel around which nations and nation states developed, as it had the strongest sense of national identity.
During World War II, the policy followed by the Germans with respect to the Polish nation referenced this tradition, but at the same time gave it an entirely new and different meaning. Only those Polish people who could be used for unskilled labor were to survive. The planned mass extermination of Polish elites (Sonderfahndungsbuch) commenced already in September 1939, and was continued in subsequent years (as Aktion AB). The mentally ill or handicapped, considered unfit for labor, were also to be exterminated. Shortly afterwards, the immediate extermination of people of Jewish nationality or descent – some of whom were members of the intelligentsia – was added to the agenda.
In conclusion, hostility towards the Polish intelligentsia did not – as it had previously – form part of a policy aimed at assimilating an ethnically distinct group, but constituted an element of a genocidal policy based on racial criteria.