Why the hell did Hitler want Lebensraum in the East so bad? Who came up with this ridiculous idea?
Like having huge stretches of a barren wasteland (with some resources to be fair) full with millions of people who want to kill you, would solve all their fucking problems.
Nobody could even quarantee that somehow Slavic blood (gasp!) wouldn't infiltrate the German gene pool. This kind of thing is inevitable because men think with their dicks.
>>1112342
He wanted to bring National Socialism to the Slavs to make them escape their ruler ship by the Jews.
>>1112342
He just wanted to conquer stuff because it's cool and edgy. Not because it was really necessary.
>>1112342
>Why the hell did Hitler want Lebensraum in the East so bad?
Probably something to do with his father issues.
Lebensraum was an extension in right wing German ideology of the "place in the sun" imperialism of late Imperial Germany. This was in a 19th century context of scientific racism and the conception of a pseudo-Darwinian action on "the nation." Lebensraum was a way to purify the German Nation of the horrors of industrialisation, war and modernity through an attempt at a pastoral idyll that never existed. (Prussian serfdom was a fucking nightmare.)
So it romanticises the purity of the nation as a "growing" agricultural thing, while also satisfying the eliminationalist genocidal features of German imperialist national building (check out genocide in Namibia, for example).
Not that the US, or UK, or Belgium was any better in the areas they imperially conquored, huge stretches of barren wasteland (with some resources to be fair) full with millions of people who want to kill you.
It helped that Nazism appealed to petits-bourgeois who were declining, and romanticised the countryside, plus "new workers" who were displaced from rural agricultural occupations and forced into the cities.
>>1112342
heimat
It was a way to achieve colonies and Balkanize the Soviet Union at the sane time
>>1112342
>Why the hell did Hitler want Lebensraum in the East so bad? Who came up with this ridiculous idea?
IIRC part of it was that Hitler believed Germany was approaching maximum carrying capacity in agriculture and - given Germany's rising population, and the starvation caused by the British blockade of imports in WW1 - that the only real solution was to annex eastern European land
>>1112725
Also it's worth noting hitler wanted the scarcely populated areas only
>>1112736
Interestingly in the early 1940s the German state had a plan to ensure that the European Soviet Union would be scarcely populated.
>>1112348
Basically this tbqh.
>>1112506
>Probably something to do with his father issues.
xd im goiing to psychoanalzye people on the internet and in history xddddd who here /frude/
>>1112782
general plan ost is a lie
>>1112342
ever hear of the hunger plan?
>a lie
Nope, I'm going to take the peer reviewed papers over you. Also, the hunger plan. Also, the einsatzgruppen.
>im goiing to psychoanalzye people
Hitler's father issues are well known. As you might be illiterate, here's what OP actually said, "Why the hell did Hitler want…". It is a psychological, a biographical question.
Hitler was driven by his ridiculous imperial fantasies. He wanted to become a modern day Frederick II.
Was Hitler inspired by the American conquest of western North America? I heard he was pretty interested in the cowboys and Indians.
>>1113495
I'm not sure whether Hitler was directly inspired, but Hitler legitimated his lebensraum with reference to the American situation of the vitality of a blah blah blah, pushing the uncultured natives aside blah blah blah, agricultural purification blah blah blah.
I think Namiba & a place in the sun are more directly relevant, but America was a clear example alongside the example of European powers in Africa and Asia.
>>1112342
It's a propaganda meme and had nothing to do with his actual agenda. He only discussed the issue once in 'My Struggle' as the German population was exploding. During his reign the Germans were already facing dropping birth rates due to improving living conditions.
>>1113870
Sort of this. They actually did test the idea initially, but only a handful of German families signed up to be settlers in the newly conquered lands, so they quickly abandoned it.
>>1113495
Yes. He was an avid reader of Karl May in his youth and even encouraged other nazis and Germans as a whole to reader. When he talked about conquering Ukraine he imagined creating a "German California".
To a certain degree he was a gigantic Ameriboo even though he hated America.
>>1113893
> a German California
Okay. I respectfully request a reference. Not calling bs, on the contrary, that is cool as fuck. If he said that, it belongs on a T-shirt
>>1113988
Actually, my bad. I looked it up and it was supposedly Himmler who said it, not Hitler. And a Jewish historian brought it up so take it with a grain of salt.
>ideology
>not being retarded and leading to disaster
*sniff*
>>1114005
Thank you, I'll check that out...
We got this!
>>1112342
"Lebensraum" isn't a crazy idea at all, it was basically just the German version of Manifest Destiny. The reason why America became a superpower is expansion into the West and South which allowed great population growth and gave them an abundance of ressources. In contrast, in Germany farmland and other opportunities were scarce which resulted in mass emigration and lower birth rates. I'd say the Lebensraum idea was the only viable way of making Germany a super power.
Besides, Ukraine, Crimea and Southern Russia aren't barren at all, those regions have some of the best soil on the planet. The agricultural production of this region plus coal, ore and oil (in the caucasus area) would make Germany independent from imports. Hitler was really keen on making his country autarc.
>>1112506
>DUDE, it was just ideology
When did leftcucks drop materialism? Your idea that the Slav removal was planned in order to satisfy some kind of inherent genocidal feature of German imperialism is simply absurd.
>>1114077
With one minor difference, the European east had an industrial giant with the biggest land army on Earth while the Americans only had to face a handful of drunken redskins on horseback in the middle of buttfuck.
>>1112506
Nazi Germany wanted to emulate America, not Britain. What they wanted was an American-style empire, where you take lands contiguous to yours and exterminate everyone on it.
>>1112342
ITT: A bunch of guys argue about one of Hitler's most central beliefs and what he meant by it and will do anything to keep from reading his fucking book where he describes exactly what he meant by it and how he'd implement it.
>>1114124
People asked why Hitler, and by extension Nazis, believed what they believed. The material reasons for the genocide are pretty fucking obvious if you've read functionalist einsatzgruppen studies, but we aren't talking about the reasons for the genocide, but rather the reasons for the ost-heimat beliefs.
>>1114413
>trusting autobiography
Dude, are you in high school?
ukraine is the most fertile land in yurop
siberia is a gigantic oil and gas field
at that point in history iron and coal was big, russia had and still have gigantic amount of it
for a grand plan like his, populating half of earth with his own kind, the place is a goldmine
>>1114433
You must be crackers. Someone's own book is the best possible source for their beliefs and intentions.
>>1114449
ha ha oh wow. Please go into something simple like STEM.
>>1114413
...I wasn't aware Generalplan Ost is in Mein Kampf
>>1114451
I already have my Masters in History faggot, specialising in Nazi ideology.
>>1114454
If you're seriously claiming that Mein Kampf is the best possible source of information about Hitler's plans in the east then you don't have an MA in History
>>1114456
There's better sources about the detailed planning. There could be nothing better than the horse's mouth for the broad spectrum intentions and ideology.
>>1114460
mein kampf was written 15 years before any military moves in the east were made
it's entirely possible hitler changed his mind in that time
what school did you go to
>>1114460
Ask for your money back on that MA, they don't seem to have given you any historiography.
>>1114466
Nobody said it is irrelevant. Just that using Mein Kampf as your go-to source on Nazi ideology ignores historical contingency, which is pretty much a cardinal sin
>>1114469
I didn't say it was the single go to but if you have studied anywhere that doesn't consider Mein Kampf as the cornerstone of any study of Nazi ideology then it must have been a pretty shitty Uni.
>>1114479
>cornerstone
Yeah, the alterkampfer were so significant to NSDAP politics in practice. Fuck me, back to your intentionalist shit hole.
>>1114486
So essentially you are just some Nazi-boo from /pol/
>le Nazis weren't bad guys meme
>>1114466
Mein-kampf is a historical reference. All people who think shoulr read this.book to avoid it happen again. I m reading.
>>1114492
You claim to have done an MA in History, specialising in "Nazi ideology" and you don't know what functionalism is.
>>1114500
The intentionalist vs functionalism debate is about the Holocaust you retard. I don't think there is any serious claim, other than from white supremacist types that the invasion of Russia wasn't intentional.
>>1112348
Lebensraum means living space, as in living space for jews, hence why a huge portion of the Polish and Belarussian population was slaughtered and the process of German colonization had already begun by the time the Soviets turned the tide of the war.
>>1114508
Are you claiming to have a "MA in Nazi Ideology" and seriously saying that the Holocaust and Generalplan Ost weren't linked
>>1114519
The fact they were 'linked' doesn't make your point in the slightest.
What a ludicrous strawman.
>>1114517
LOLOL I meant living space for Germans. Fuck my life.
>>1114524
...you know functionalism and intentionalism refers to all Nazi acts of genocide, right, which includes the east
You're like a super-hard intentionalist (to the point where I'm not even sure if anybody seriously even makes so strong a claim) by saying that a) Hitler was the sole drive of NDSAP ideology and b) that he had made up his mind to do so when he wrote Mein Kampf
Stop lying on the internet, you're not impressing anyone
>>1114517
>the process of German colonization had already begun by the time the Soviets turned the tide of the war.
I know of German colonization efforts in Western Poland (former West Prussia) but I'm not aware of any noteworthy colonization happening already in the USSR.
Lebansraum was not Hitler's idea, he just took a long standing notion that Germany was too small for its populace and expanded on it.
>>1114541
*sigh*
this is what happens when someone with some actual qualifications in history talks to a nit-wit from /pol/.
>>1114551
Yeah, I pretty much meant Poland. My understanding though is the Nazis planned on stretching out maybe all the way to the Urals had they won the war.
>>1114574
what are you referring to
>>1112342
>Who came up with this ridiculous idea?
German school of geopolitics back in 19th century. In fact the ideal was born somewhere in middle ages - hence Germans in let's say - Baltic countries(outside of big ports like Riga, where you could link them to Hansa) but generally it's kind of manifest destiny.
>Like having huge stretches of a barren wasteland
Including single most fertile area in Europe - Hitler was kinda agrarian, you see.
>full with millions of people who want to kill you, would solve all their fucking problems.
>Nobody could even quarantee that somehow Slavic blood (gasp!) wouldn't infiltrate the German gene pool. This kind of thing is inevitable because men think with their dicks.
These were to be addressed by genocide and mass-sterilisation.
>>1114144
And guess why have Germans lost.
>>1114498
Mein Kampf is pretty shitty book desu senpai.
>>1114508
>is about the holocaust
No, it is about social causation in a modern state.
