Polish-Jewish Relations: 1,300 Keyword-Phrase-Indexed Book Reviews (by Jan Peczkis)

The Compensation of Nazi Germany’s Forced Laborers: Demographic Findings and Political Implications, by Mark Spoerer and Jochen Fleischhacker. 2002. POPULATION STUDIES 56(1)5-21

Compensating Forced Laborers: Gross Disparities Favoring the Jews

This is a detailed, somewhat technical work. The authors focus on the German compensation settlement of July 2000. (p. 5).  Spoerer and Fleischhacker estimate that there were overall 13.5 million foreign workers in the Third Reich, of which as least 12 million were forced laborers. (p. 10). Of the 2.7 million still alive in mid-2000, only some 2/5^th of these had a chance to receive compensation. (p. 12). So much for justice.

NOT ALL JEWS DIED AT THE HANDS OF THE NAZIS

In the standard Holocaust supremacist narrative, all the Jews were to be put to death, and this oft-repeated allegation is used to elevate the Holocaust over all other genocides. We are often told that those Jews that did not die in Nazi gas chambers or before firing squads got to die by starvation and overwork in forced labor. Not quite.

The authors have determined that an astonishing 307,000 Jewish forced laborers survived the Third Reich, and were alive in mid-1945. (Table 5, p. 13). The authors do not answer this question: If the Nazi German intent was to kill the Jewish forced laborers by means of deliberately-unsurvivable conditions, why were so many Jewish forced laborers still alive at the defeat of the Third Reich?

POLES AND NOT ONLY JEWS WERE RACIAL ENEMIES OF THE THIRD REICH

Even though the authors present Jews as the worst victims of German forced labor, and do so without presenting any supporting evidence, they acknowledge the fact that Jews were not the only existential enemies of the Third Reich. Spoerer and Fleischhacker acknowledge that, “The basis of this unequal treatment was racial prejudices and political considerations. Foreigners from Scandinavia, the Netherlands, and Flanders were seen as ‘Germanic’, while those from most other countries were divided into axis and non-axis aliens. At the very bottom of the Nazis’ racial scale were Poles, Soviet citizens, Gypsies, and Jews. Hence, civilian laborers and prisoners of war (POWs) from Poland and the Soviet Union were subjected to very harsh conditions of life and work.” (p. 6).

DISALLOWING MOST POLISH CLAIMANTS

Consider those forced laborers still alive in mid-2000. The authors’ Table 7 (p. 15) is telling. All 75,000 Jewish forced laborers represented by the JCC (Jewish Claims Conference) were deemed eligible for compensation. In contrast, almost half of the Polish forced laborers, that is 165,000, were reckoned ineligible. For more on the inferred ineligibility of many Polish forced laborers, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2019/11/04/property-restitution-lack-of-transparency-eizenstat/

COMPENSATING FORCED LABORERS: JEWISH FORCED LABORERS GET A WINDFALL

Authors Spoerer and Fleischhacker make these eye-opening statements, “Although our calculations are based on several bold assumptions, we feel confident in concluding that the JCC will receive a much higher share of money per surviving victim than would be expected from the historical and demographic evidence.” (p. 16).

Let us focus again on Table 7 (p. 15). The disparity between Jews and Poles, in terms of compensation monies received, is staggering! The 75,000 eligible Jewish forced laborers obtained 28,324 DM (Deutschmarks) per head. By contrast, 36,000 Polish forced laborers only got 15,000 DM per head, while the vast majority of Polish forced laborers (that is 175,000) got a meager 7,889 DM per head. The corresponding figures for other non-Jewish forced laborers are comparable to that of the Poles.

This is whose idea of justice?

Spoerer and Fleischhacker conclude, “According to our calculations, the compensation settlement is very favorable for the Jewish Claims Conference, which was able to secure a sum that is nearly twice as large as that shown in our ideal scheme.” (p. 15). That’s putting it mildly!

For more on the gross disparity between the benefits received by Jewish and non-Jewish claimants, see:

https://www.jewsandpolesdatabase.org/2022/09/25/holocaust-industry-improprieties-compensating-forced-laborers-jews-get-paid-and-other-victims-of-nazi-genocide-do-not-facts-and-figures-practical-victim-hierarchy-active-victimhood-competition/