Sehr geehrte Listenmitglieder,
Ich wurde in einer Kritik von meinem ehemaligen Bonner Kollegen Hans Boehme, die kuerzlich im Internet verbreitet wurde, sachlich z.T. falsch angegriffen, worauf ich zu geeigneter Gele enheit spaeter einmal eingehen werde. Da Herr Boehme zudem aus seiner Gegendarstellung in der Frankfurter Rundschau vom 15.10. 1999 schoepfte, die sich gegen meinen Artikel anlaesslich des Hamburger Geographentages über "die verlorene Ehre der deutschen Geographie" richtete, ohne dies jedoch in seiner Kritik kenntlich gemacht zu haben, und diese Kritik an mir mit der Kritik an meinem Buch vermengte, moechte ich den Listenmitgliedern weitere Hintergrundinformationen hinsichtlich der Beteiligung von deutschen Geographen und anderen Wissenschaftlern am Genozid, die ich u.a. in meinem Buch in dem Kapitel Sammlung Leibbrandt und Osteuropäische Forschungsgemeinschaft abgehandelt habe (S. 590ff.), zugaenglich machen, um die Debatte einer groesseren Oeffentlichkeit als nur der deutschen zu praesentieren.
Mich erreichte eine Anfrage von Richard Benert (s.u.), die ich Ihnen gekuerzt weiterleite, da ich der Ueberzeugung bin, dass sie von grundsaetzlicher Bedeutung fuer den weiteren Verlauf der Forschung zu sein scheint. Mir fehlen insbesondere angesichts des gegenwaertigen Forschungsstandes (S.Heim/G. Aly, K.H. Roth) Hinweise zu Fritz Arlt in Oberschlesien. Zudem duerften weitere Arbeiten zur Deutschen Volksliste unterwegs sein.
Moeglicherweise sind die Ostforschungsinstitute, das BMI oder das AA im Stande, Doubletten von weiteren ominösen volksdeutschen Zeitschriften als Carepaket an Herrn Benert in die USA zu liefern. Ich glaube jedoch nicht, dass man den VDA damit betrauen sollte, weil es kaum damit getan sein kann, deutsches Propagandamaterial zu liefern.
Fuer eine Kopie Ihrer Antwort an Richard Benett in deutsch oder englisch bin ich Ihnen sehr verbunden, da ich im Oktober an der GSA-Conference in Houston ohnehin ueber die ethnopolitischen Spezialisten allerdings im RSHA sprechen werde. Ich gehe davon aus, dass solche Fragen ebenfalls dort an mich herangetragen werden.
Ich danke Ihnen fuer die Unterstuetzung
Michael Fahlbusch
PS. Vorab moechte ich Sie jedoch auf drei Literaturhinweise von grundlegendem weiterfuehrenden Wert in dieser Debatte aufmerksam machen:
Eric J. Schmaltz and Samuel D. Sinner,
" The Nazi Ethnographic Research of Georg Leibbrandt and Karl Stumpp
in the Ukraine, and Its North American Legacy." in:
Holocaust and Genocide Studies", 14, 1, Spring 2000
Ingo Haar, Historiker und Antisemitismus, in:
Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft Heft 6, 2000
Gideon Botsch, Geheime Ostforschung im SD.
Zur Entstehungsgeschichte und Tätigkeit des Wannsee-Instituts
1935-1945, in:
Zeitschrift für Geschichtswissenschaft Heft 6, 2000
Von: Richard Benert <rbenert@ptd.net>
An: fifa@swissonline.ch
Betreff: Re: Michael Fahlbusch?
Datum: Montag, 5. Juni 2000 04:31
Dear Herr Fahlbusch,
I hope that by now you have returned from your conference in Berlin, and that it was not as unpleasant as you expected (...) I am a member of the American Historical Society of Germans from Russia, both sides of my parentage having come from Volhynia, Russia. This organization, as you may know, was started with the help of Dr. Karl Stumpp, late in his life. This (loose) connection with National Socialist ideas has intrigued me ever since I learned of it, and I have also for a long time been intrigued by what seems to me to be the exaggerated concern the Germans have had for their emigrants throughout the world, and to what extent the AHSGR might itself be a part of this long-established concern, only now transferred to this side of the Atlantic Ocean. I might also add that, although I have not taught history since 1974, I did earn a Ph.D. in European history (Renaissance period) back in the 1960s, and I am now, I suppose, trying to resurrect my earlier historical interests in this field which is close to my family history. A few years ago, I learned of a list of about 2700 German emigrants from Poland to Russia that was compiled in 1940-41 by a Dr. Hans Hopf. I did some research on this (his letters and the list can be found in the "Captured German War Documents" in the U.S. National Archives) and published the list and some brief introductory remarks about Hopf's two years in Poland, working for the DAI and the General Government, Abteilung Innere Verwaltung (under Dr. Arlt in Cracow). His letters (mostly back to the DAI in Stuttgart) refer often to his work assessing applications from ethnic Germans for Kennkarten. He was given this job by Arlt, apparently, because of his previous experience researching genealogical and settlement records in Polish archives. At the same time, I was reading Robert L. Koehl's book on the RKFDV and learning about the Volksdeutsche List and the identity cards associated with it. In writing about his identity card applications, Dr. Hopf seldom mentioned the program being run under Himmler's direction. Only once did I notice him referring to VOMI, and it was as an organization with which he had nothing to do. So my question here is rather simple (I hope):
1. Did the General Government, or Dr. Arlt, have a separate system of identity cards for the General Government, separate, that is, from the SS, RKFDV and VOMI? With all these organizations, I still get rather confused about who was doing what to whom. Or were the applications upon which Hopf was passing judgment applications for inclusion on the Volksdeutsche List? Perhaps you haven't run into Dr. Hopf before? (...) He eventually had to enter military service and was captured, I think, by the British. After the war he worked for the Bundesarchiv in Koblenz doing Ostforschung.
2. My other question is of a broader nature. I have become interested, as I said, in the German concern for German emigrants, wondering what might find of an ideological nature in the many journals in the late 19th and early 20th century with names like Auslanddeutsche Volksforschung, Heimat und Welt, Volk und Reich, Deutsche Erde, Das Deutschtum im Ausland, usw., usw. I have a list of 13 such periodicals, and I wonder how many others there were. Do you know if anyone has done research in these journals, or at least if anyone is interested in them? What is your impression of what might be found in them? Of course, I have no idea yet how many of them could even be found in this country, and how I could get access to them on my limited income! But that is another problem. First I should determine whether such a project is even worth thinking about, and I can think of no one more likely to have a valuable opinion on this than you, given the comprehensive book you have written. Perhaps some of the answer to this question is in the early chapters of your book, which I haven't yet read. Since Poland and Volhynia are of immediate familial interest to me, I have also had an interest for some time in looking at the works of Kurt Lueck and Alfred Karasek, or maybe even Kossman and others, for traces of ideological coloration in their treatment of "my ancestors". Well, with Lueck, I know, the "traces" hit you like a ton of bricks. But now I've discovered that you and Michael Burleigh have done quite a lot with Ostforschung already, so perhaps all I have to do is read what you and he have said. (I've been busy with other things in my evening hours, so I haven't yet found time for all this). It might also interest you to know that a woman who contributes quite a lot to the "listserv" I am connected to (called "GR-Heritage", consisting of several hundred people with German-Russian ancestry) recently asked, in all innocence, whether we could morally make use of the genealogical information provided for us by the likes of Georg Leibbrandt and Karl Stumpp! This gave rise to a rather lively discussion over the morality of using any ill-gotten information, such as medical knowledge from Nazi experiments. There was also some disagreement as to whether men like Leibbrandt, Stumpp and Rosenberg really were good, typical examples of Russian Volksdeutsche! So you see, these issues are still very much alive, even in North America, even at the sub-scholarly level. I am hoping, in this connection, to use my years of retirement (which I will be entering shortly) to further the knowledge of what you German-speaking scholars in Europe are doing among the Germans-from-Russia community here in North America. For instance, I am trying to persuade the AHSGR to fund a translation of Neutatz's book, "Die 'deutsche Frage' im Schwarzmeergebiet und in Wolhynien." (...) I mention this just to give you some evidence that there are a few people over here who are very interested in matters of interest to German scholars. I cannot say that YOUR book will be widely discussed here, but I'm sure you know the reason why! It looks like a magnificent study, however (...) I've looked already, of course, at what you have to say about Stumpp and Leibbrandt, and this brings to my mind another question. I'm sorry that this is getting so long, but I hope you'll forgive this one last question. Judging from your contribution to "H-Soz-u-Kult" of last October (Die verlorene Ehre der deutschen Geographie) and another piece I read from Forum Wissenschaft from Darmstadt called "Rassebiologe vom BMI", it seems that the reputation of Karl Stumpp is not very good these days among some German scholars.
The recent conversation we had recently on the GR-Heritage listserv centered on whether, and to what extent, Stumpp adhered to Nazi ideas, or was he merely "doing his job" because he had to do it. Is there a similar debate going on in Europe? What is the latest consensus opinion of Stumpp? Has anything else been written about him recently? He has the image, in AHSGR circles, of being a sort of grandfather of us all! We use his maps regularly, along with his books on German migration to and from Russia. Well, I apologize for the length of this letter, and I hope that my three questions will not take too much of your time to answer. I very much appreciate your willingness to do this.
Sincerely yours,
Richard Benert Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, U.S.A.