. NMT04-T0635
Volume IV · Page 635
| Schwalm became chief of the Litzmannstadt
[Lodz] Field Office in 1941 which, among other things, carried out racial
examinations in connection with Germanization and resettlement actions. Later,
he became staff leader of RuSHA in which capacity he acted a, deputy to the
chief of RuSHA. There were also RuS field leaders (Fuehrer in Rasse- und Siedlungswesen) who represented RuSHA on the staffs of the higher SS and police leaders in the various districts. The defendant Huebner served as the RuS field leader for the SS Administrative district "Southwest", with headquarters in Stuttgart and later was field leader in the Warthegau, with headquarters in Poznan. RuSHA, through these field leaders and their racial examiners, decided the fate of hundreds of thousands of people in part upon the basis of whether the subject had high cheek bones and blue eyes, a proper "political attitude", and perhaps a greatgrandfather of German nationality. Such racial examinations were made in connection with the Germanization of citizens of Poland and other countries, transfers of populations, abortions, slave labor, persecution of Jews, punishment for sexual intercourse between Germans and non-Germans, and kidnaping of children. In some cases the RuS field leaders also represented Lebensborn. Lebensborn was a registered society which was founded in December 1935. It was at first a department of RuSHA, but in 1936 it became part of the Personal Staff of Himmler. The early aim of Lebensborn was the perpetuation of the blood of the members of the SS. The minimum family expected of an SS man was four. Himmler expressed the reason for this very clearly in his "Day of Metz" speech when he said — |
"* * * We stand or die with this leading blood of Germany, and if the good blood is not reproduced we will not be able to rule the world. Please understand, we would not be able to hold the great Germanic Reich which is about to take shape. I am convinced that we can hold it, but we have to prepare for that. If we once had not enough sons those who would come after us would have to become cowards. A nation which has an average of 4 sons per family can venture a war; if 2 of them die, 2 transplant the name. The leadership of a nation having one son or two sons per family will have to be fainthearted at any decision on account of their own experience because they will have to tell themselves, we cannot afford it." |
| Those unable to have children of their own were expected to adopt suitable children and bring them up on National Socialist lines. Lebensborn was to assist in this process and insure the support of both legitimate and illegitimate children of SS men. Its tasks were to help large families "valuable from the racial and |
