SOBIBÓR - Holocaust Handbooks

J. GRAF, T. KUES, C. MATTOGNO, SOBIBÓR 335
fresh roots anywhere. First they are sent to the General Gouvernement.
Then the town in which they were settled is ‘purged.’ In their
new place of residence a ghetto is established. But even the ghetto
does not give the Jews the security of a permanent residence, and
they are again removed further east.
In many cases the immediate motive for expulsion or deportation
was to make room for Germans. The first victims of expulsion on a
grand scale were the Jews of the incorporated western Polish provinces,
who were expelled along with the Polish inhabitants, in both
cases to make room for the ‘repatriated’ Germans. Later, Jews were
deported because, according to the official statements, they owned
apartments suitable for alien refugees from cities subject to airraids.
[1024]
At the same, however, another factor, perceptible since the end of
1940 and now assuming growing importance, is strongly operating
in a contrary direction – namely, the needs of the German war
economy. As a result, Germany’s Jewish policy may be described as
a compromise between extermination of the Jews and their utilisation
in the war economy.
Early in 1941 a semi-official German article described with satisfaction
the exclusion of the Jews working population from economic
life. Already in 1938 the Jews had been ‘released’ from productive
work on a wide scale. ‘But,’ the article continues, ‘in consequence
of the incipient strain on labour resources and of the necessity
of harnessing all the available supply of manpower, a trend in
the opposite direction soon became noticeable.’ At first the Jews
were used for unskilled jobs, but later the ‘more efficient’ among
them were given suitable higher grade work. Jews were not, of
course, reinstated in the professional activities from which they had
been expelled. They were conscripted as forced labour, at first to
‘release German workers for urgent construction work for the
Reich,’ but later also for direct employment in industries manufacturing
army supplies. In a number of cases the Jews were not removed
because they were needed as workers; in others, they were
deliberately sent to places where they could be put to work. To some
1024 The “Zusammenhang zwischen dem Wohnraummangel im Reich und den Judendeportationen”
(relationship between housing shortage in the Reich and Jewish deportations), also
in connection with “Wohnungen für Bombengeschädigte” (housing for victims of
bombing), has been illustrated by Peter Witte, op. cit. (note 595), pp. 43-46.