Talk:Flight and expulsion of Germans (1944–1950)


Euphemisms?

It's interesting how the article uses language almost euphemistically. "Expulsion" is used in place of where "ethnic cleansing" would be appropriate nearly every single time; Contrast with articles dealing with the Armenian Genocide which use "harsher" language more liberally, so to speak. This article has some major issues. User: Dehler 15:04, 14 January 2020

Expulsion is used when transfered people are guilty, ethnic cleansing when transfered people are innocent. The Sudeten Germans Flocked to Hitler - Herrenvolk und Lebensraum. They were guilty.— Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.15.218.62 (talk) 07:46, 12 March 2022 (UTC)[reply]

"Ethnic cleansing" as a term, legal or not, does not make an estimation of if the ethnically cleansed population "deserved it". That's what those conducting ethnic cleansing do. "Ethnic cleansing" is a systematic removal of a defined population from a given area with the intent of homogenization, by "cleansing" of the targeted group. 2A02:1210:1C27:2900:A435:CBE3:E249:410F (talk) 23:32, 3 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

There is no such thing as collective guilt. It exists only in propaganda and such language displays inhumane thinking. And maybe you should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate. --93.203.105.178 (talk) 14:47, 15 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Supposing there were enough of them remaining.
You should do a little research on the Sudetendeutsche opposision to the Nazis and their fate in Dachau concentration camp and elsewhere during the Nazi-German occupation of the democratic Czechoslovakia. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.23.6.193 (talk) 14:52, 29 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

It is claimed that Sudeten Germans expelled from Czechoslovakia were based on the concept of collective guilt. This is not true.
Almost every decree explicitely stated that the sanctions did not apply to anti-fascists.
About 90% of the German population of the Czech borderlands had supported the Nazi and affilation to Nazi-Germany. Some 280 000 Germans in Czechoslovakia remained Czechoslovak citizens after the transfer. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.23.6.193 (talk) 15:37, 10 June 2022 (UTC)[reply]

I've noticed this issue too. This expulsion led to the use of forced labour, rapes, executions, massacres, and the extinction of German language dialects and cultures. It surpassed the Jewish Holocaust of World War Two in terms of numbers of victims and was a great travesty for German heritage. Take Kaliningrad, where Germans were executed and used as slaves and German culture was erased and replaced (evidence most strikingly in the new architecture of the city. It is simply another example of the vilification of Germans post-war. Doorfrench (talk) 13:49, 22 October 2023 (UTC)[reply]
@"didn't apply to anti-fascists": in terms of the degrees this may be technically true (although not all of them contained this restriction), but in practice it meant nothing: one set of my grand parents lived in Czecheslovakia for a few generations. They were communists, and actively fought the Nazis. My grand father died in the process, and my grand mother spent the several years in a Gestapo prison, and was even officially acknowledged as an anti-fascist (including getting special stipend for the rest of her life from the East German government). And she was indeed formally offered the chance to stay in the village she was born: as one of a single-digit number of people (of the entire village), none of which she knew. Now, want to guess what this meant in practice? 174.59.220.235 (talk) 17:51, 22 January 2024 (UTC)[reply]
This article should be reworded to more accurately reflect that it was an ethnic cleansing. "Expulsion" is only appropriate when talking about removing the Germans who had settled in areas that the Nazis conquered in WWII. When we're talking about removing Germans from areas where they had been living for hundreds of years, that's ethnic cleansing by any reasonable definition of the term. Whether removing the Germans was justified or not is frankly irrelevant, as this does not change the fact that it was an ethnic cleansing. Just because Nazi Germany committed one of the worst crimes in history with the Holocaust doesn't mean that we should use euphemisms to talk about what happened to Germans after the war.
I propose largely replacing "expulsion" with "ethnic cleansing" whenever it refers to Germans living in areas where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed. Megathonic (talk) 17:25, 8 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
where Germans had historically lived who were then forcibly removed; so expulsion? This entire discussion is flawed because expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing in the same way population exchange (e.g. Population exchange between Greece and Turkey) is a form of ethnic cleansing in the same way genocide is a form of ethnic cleansing. The full definition of ethnic cleansing is the attempt to get rid of—through deportation, displacement or even mass killing—members of an unwanted ethnic group (emphasis mine). Curbon7 (talk) 19:20, 8 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
If "expulsion is a form of ethnic cleansing", then it shouldn't be controversial for the article to clearly state that millions of Germans were ethnically cleansed from their homes. The reason that can be controversial to say is because there is a difference in connotation between merely "expelling" people and the harsher implications under "ethnically cleansing" an entire demographic. Mass-killing isn't a requirement for ethnic cleansing to have occurred, but even if it were, in some cases, Germans were deliberately mass-killed in revenge for Nazi crimes, and in any case, their removal was done with flagrant disregard to civilian deaths if 500,000 to 1+ million died as a direct consequence. Megathonic (talk) 20:01, 8 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Terms such as "Expulsion" or "Population Exchange" being forms of ethnic cleansing is the subject of the issue many people raise with the POV of this article: While the object of the article does talk about outright mass-killing alongside expulsions, the application of the term "Expulsion" for all of it is clearly euphemistic here as in either case the label "Ethnic Cleansing" would give a less POV terminology towards the content in the article. People have also raised the cross-article inconsistency of other articles describing the same content while clearly using the label "Ethnic Cleansing" or (see Circassian Genocide, Armenian Genocide, etc) the label "Genocide" for identical actions. While this is partially embedded in POV sourcing, sources alone do not fully account of the terminology used in the article. 178.192.109.96 (talk) 23:43, 3 October 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Genocide Denial

What's up with the genocide denial in this article? 2003:C0:F720:F000:389F:2BEB:D917:7561 (talk) 08:14, 8 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

Because this wasn't a genocide. Not even close. SinoDevonian (talk) 01:16, 21 February 2023 (UTC)[reply]
It was a genocide under the CPPCG which says that
any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such:
(a) Killing members of the group;
(b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group;
(c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical
destruction in whole or in part;
(d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group;
(e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group. Crainsaw (talk) 11:55, 29 May 2023 (UTC)[reply]
The Allied expulsion removed the Nazi Herrenvolk und Lebensraum ideology from the Czech crown lands once and for all. 171.23.6.193 (talk) 08:18, 2 April 2024 (UTC)[reply]
Wikipedia’s role is not to interpret legal definitions ourselves, but to summarize what reliable secondary sources state. The CPPCG definition you quoted is an international legal framework, but unless multiple high-quality scholarly or reputable sources explicitly describe these events as genocide, we cannot label it as such in Wikipedia’s voice. Editors are not allowed to apply primary source texts directly (WP:OR, WP:SYNTH). If you have reliable sources—such as peer-reviewed academic works, recognized historians, or major human rights organizations—that classify it as genocide, please provide them so the article can reflect that viewpoint with proper attribution. Without such sourcing, we must avoid presenting it as fact. 31.182.86.42 (talk) 00:17, 24 September 2025 (UTC)[reply]

No one has denied Holocaust in this article. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 46.15.223.133 (talk) 12:01, 19 October 2022 (UTC)[reply]

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Math error in number of Netherlands Germans

Totals unchanged before and flyer the war but a change in number is shown. 2600:1700:2E40:9270:9848:EFD8:D76A:ACEC (talk) 16:19, 5 May 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Explain death toll?

Could a sentence or two be added to explain how people died during forced migration? Long marches? starvation?

"The death toll attributable to the flight and expulsions …" Dvdtoy (talk) 23:07, 1 November 2025 (UTC)[reply]

Why is Crimses and Mercies cited?

This source has been discredited by a general consensus among scholars. The figure of "6 million" Germans killed should be removed. ~2025-42256-50 (talk) 04:31, 24 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]

I removed it; James Bacques was not a historian and not a reliable source on this topic. LordNimon (talk) 22:45, 24 December 2025 (UTC)[reply]
allikas: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Flight_and_expulsion_of_Germans_(1944%E2%80%931950)