Albert Forster

Albert Forster, Gauleiter of Danzig.

Albert Maria Forster (July 26, 1902 – February 28, 1952) was a German politician.

Forster was born in Fürth, Germany and attended the Humanistisches Gymnasium in Fürth from 1912 to 1920. He became a member of the SA in Fürth in 1923 and observed the high treason process against Erich Ludendorff, Adolf Hitler and the further eight accused, which took place from 26 February to 1 April 1924 in the court of Munich.

In 1930, Forster became the Nazi Party's Gauleiter of the Free City of Danzig (modern Gdańsk, Poland). In the spring of 1933, Forster spearheaded the Nazi take-over of Danzig. Between 1933-1939, Forster became embroiled in a feud with the Nazi President of the Danzig Senate, Arthur Greiser, who was to remain Forster's life-long arch-enemy. In 1939, following orders from Berlin, Forster led the agitation in Danzig to seek re-union with Germany. The Danzig issue was used as a pretext for the German invasion of Poland in 1939.

In the region of north-western Poland annexed to Germany after 1939, called by the Germans the Warthegau , Forster became the Gauleiter and Reichstatthalter (governor) of the province Danzig-West Prussia from 1939 to 1945, thereby concentrating both the State and Nazi Party power in his hands. Adolf Hitler instructed the Gauleiters, namely Forster and his rival Arthur Greiser, in the Warthegau to "Germanize" the area, promising that "There would be no questions asked" about how this "Germanization" was to be accomplished. He pursued a policy of assimilation of the Poles in his area of responsibility, in which all Poles proficient in the German language were classified as Germans. In addition, Forster was willing to accept any and all Poles who claimed to have "German blood" as Germans. In practice, the method of determining whether Poles had any German ancestry or not was to send out Nazi Party workers to interview the local Poles; all Poles who stated that they had German ancestry had their answers taken at face value with no documentation required. Those Poles who claimed not to have German ancestry were expelled into the Government-General. Given the alternative between claiming to have German ancestry or not, the majority of the Polish population under Forster's rule chose the former option.

This policy was in direct contrast to what was happening in the Warthegau under Gauleiter Arthur Greiser. Greiser zealously pursued a policy of ethnic cleansing, attempting to expel the entire Polish and Jewish population under his rule. Greiser was outraged by Forster's polices, and had complained to SS Reichsführer Heinrich Himmler that Forster's assimilation policy was against Nazi racial theory. When Himmler threatened Forster over this issue, Forster simply ignored him, realizing that Hitler allowed each Gauleiter to run his area as he saw fit. Both Greiser and Himmler complained to Hitler that Forster was allowing thousands of Poles to be classified as Germans, but Hitler merely bounced the problem back to them, telling them to go sort out their problems with Forster on their own.

Despite his relatively mild administration of occupied Polish Territory, Forster was responsible for the expulsion of several hundred thousand Poles to the General Government and to Stutthof concentration camp. He was also one of those responsible for mass murder at Piaśnica, where approximately 60,000 Polish and Kashub inteligentsia were killed.

After the war, he was condemned to death by the Polish court for war crimes and crimes against humanity in 1948, but the sentence was soon commuted to life imprisonment. According to S Herbert Levine there are reports that by 1955 Forster was living under a mere house arrest in a farm house near Danzig

References

• Rees, Laurence The Nazis : A Warning From History, foreword by Sir Ian Kershaw, New York : New Press, 1997 ISBN 1-56584-551-X

• Levine, S. Herbert Local Authority and the SS State: The Conflict Over Population Policy in Danzig-West Prussia, 1939-1945 - Central European History (1973)