Slogan used to describe one of Adolf Hitler's foreign policies
Heim ins Reich
Home to the Reich
Nazi Germany in 1939 (dark grey) after the conquest of Poland; with pockets of German colonists brought into the annexed territories of Poland from the Soviet "sphere of influence". – Nazi propaganda poster superimposed with the red outline of Poland missing entirely from the original print.[1]
Duration
1938–1944
Location
Territories controlled by Nazi Germany
Type
Ethnic cleansing and population transfer
Cause
Lebensraum, Generalplan Ost
Patron(s)
Adolf Hitler
The Heim ins Reich (German pronunciation:[ˈhaɪmʔɪnsˈʁaɪç]ⓘ; meaning "back home to the Reich") was a foreign policy pursued by Adolf Hitler before and during World War II, beginning in 1938. The aim of Hitler's initiative was to convince all Volksdeutsche (ethnic Germans) who were living outside Nazi Germany (e.g. in Austria, Czechoslovakia and the western districts of Poland) that they should strive to bring these regions "home" into Greater Germany, but also relocate from territories that were not under German control, following the conquest of Poland, in accordance with the Nazi–Soviet pact.[2] The Heim ins Reich manifesto targeted areas ceded in Versailles to the newly reborn state of Poland, various lands of immigration, as well as other areas that were inhabited by significant ethnic German populations, such as the Sudetenland, Danzig (now Gdansk), and the southeastern and northeastern regions of Europe after 6 October 1939.
Implementation of the policy was managed by VOMI (Hauptamt Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle or "Main Welfare Office for Ethnic Germans"). As a state agency of the NSDAP, it handled all Volksdeutsche issues. By 1941, the VOMI was under the control of the SS.[3]
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^Douglas, R. M. (2012). Orderly and Humane: The Expulsion of the Germans after the Second World War. Yale University Press. p. 21. ISBN 978-0300183764. In a keynote address to the Reichstag to mark the end of the 'Polish campaign', Hitler announced on October 6, 1939 ... the Heim ins Reich (Back to the Reich) program. The prospect horrified many ethnic Germans, much of whose enthusiasm for Nazism had been predicated on the expectation that the boundaries of the Reich would, as in the cases of Austria, the Sudetenland, and Danzig, extend to embrace them. The prospect of being uprooted from their homes to face an uncertain future not even in Germany proper, but in the considerably less salubrious environment of western Poland, was much less attractive. So far from rallying enthusiastically to the Führer's call, therefore, many Volksdeutsche greeted the declaration of the Heim in Reich initiative with a deep sense of betrayal.
The HeiminsReich (German pronunciation: [ˈhaɪm ʔɪns ˈʁaɪç] ; meaning "back home to the Reich") was a foreign policy pursued by Adolf Hitler before and...
12-Year Reich, p 153, ISBN 0-03-076435-1 Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, p 151, ISBN 0-03-076435-1 Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, p 366-7...
examined by SS doctors before admission. The first Lebensborn home (known as "Heim Hochland") opened in 1936, in Steinhöring, a tiny village not far from Munich...
The flag of Nazi Germany, officially the flag of the German Reich, featured a red background with a black swastika on a white disc. This flag came into...
Council and in August 1939 to the Council of Ministers for Defence of the Reich. Hitler decreed on the outbreak of war on 1 September 1939 that Hermann...
'Polish campaign', on October 6, 1939, Hitler announced the HeiminsReich (Back to the Reich) program. The prospect of being uprooted from their homes...
Germanic Reich (German: Großgermanisches Reich), fully styled the Greater Germanic Reich of the German Nation (German: Großgermanisches Reich deutscher...
1934, the Law Concerning the Head of State of the German Reich merged the offices of Reich President and Chancellor and conferred the position on Hitler...
or Nazi-occupied regions in Central-Eastern Europe as a part of the HeiminsReich national socialist population transfer policy. Nowadays, most of the...
Cambridge Scholars Publishing. ISBN 978-1443823685. Aly, Götz, Susanne Heim. Architects of Annihilation: Auschwitz and the Logic of Destruction, London...
definition of Volksdeutsche which appeared in a 1938 memorandum of the German Reich Chancellery. That document defined Volksdeutsche as "people whose language...
information back in return. In 1940, the Reich Interior Ministry tried to impose a Hamburg-style system on the whole Reich. After the Nazis passed the Nuremberg...
The Reich Labour Service (Reichsarbeitsdienst; RAD) was a major paramilitary organization established in Nazi Germany as an agency to help mitigate the...
History of the Third Reich. University of California Press. p. 32. ISBN 978-0-520-25383-4. T. W. Mason, Social Policy in the Third Reich: The Working Class...
Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, is a term used to describe the German state between 1933 and 1945...
Third Reich, p. 277, ISBN 978-0299193041 Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, pp. 248–249, ISBN 0030764351 Richard Grunberger, The 12-Year Reich, p. 280...
Peter (1992). Art of the Third Reich. H.N. Abrams. ISBN 978-0-8109-1912-9. Grunberger, Richard (1995). The 12-year Reich: A Social History Of Nazi Germany...
titled Gesetz zur Behebung der Not von Volk und Reich (lit. 'Law to Remedy the Distress of People and Reich'), was a law that gave the German Cabinet – most...
Hans Frank that "If I had had any idea in 1924 that I would have become Reich chancellor, I never would have written the book." Nevertheless, Mein Kampf...
means of propaganda, and it was this organisation that used the phrase HeiminsReich. Several Deputies and high-ranking civil servants were of the opinion...
between 1934 and 1945. During World War II, Rosenberg was the head of the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories (1941–1945). After the war...
abroad, into Nazi Germany and German held territories. Generalplan Ost HeiminsReich Lebensraum Koehl, Robert L. (1957) RKFDV: German Resettlement and Population...
became the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of German Nationhood, tasked with returning all ethnic Germans (Volksdeutsche) to the Reich, preventing...
followed by Generaloberst Alfred Keller until 8 May 1945. Hermann Goering as Reich Marshal was nominal head of the NSFK and was occasionally consulted on issues...