The Lebensraum reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Lebensraum

Lebensraum ("Living space") is a Nazi Germany dogma that was used to justify its expansionist politics.

First mentioned by Adolf Hitler in Mein Kampf, was the program of the territorial expansion towards Eastern Europe ("Drang nach Osten"), that was intended to give Germany the substantial basis to compete with the biggest superpowers.

The elements of the program included 3 parts:

• idea of military expansion and force expulsion of the nations of (Poland,Ukraine, Russia and other countries) in order to prepare settlements for German people (both Reichsdeutsche and Volksdeutsche). The German historians underlined German claims to those countries.
• idea of supporting births among the German women
• idea of selection of young German women and German soldiers, in order to produce optimal from the racial point of view Germanic material to replace soldiers killed in action. Implemented in institutions recalling brothels.

The Lebensraum ideology was a major factor in Hitler's launching of Operation Barbarossa in June 1941.

Lebensraum is also the name of a contemporary play by playwright Israel Horovitz, in which the chancellor of Germany wakes up one night after a nightmare and decides to invite 6 million Jews to come live in Germany as retribution for the Holocaust.

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