“German scientists developed a plan according to which slow starvation would eliminate the Jewish population of Europe, while exterminating all those who had not perished by other means…” – Starvation over Europe (Made in Germany): A Documented Record, 1943 – Hunger in Europe (Made in Germany): A Documentation, 1943 – a historical report on the Nazi method of starving the Jews and the citizens of the occupied countries. Written in real time by Boris Shub, published by The Institute of Jewish Affairs under the leadership of Dr. Jacob Robinson (advisor to the U.S. prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials and later, in 1961, advisor to the State of Israel’s prosecutor at the Eichmann trial). New York, 1943 – First edition – the copy of Dr. Jacob Robinson, who, in his various roles, headed the commission that investigated the Nazi starvation policy. Ownership signature of Robinson on the title page.
An in-depth study and status report on the deliberate malnutrition created by the Nazis in the occupied countries of Europe during World War II, with a particular focus on German policy and its devastating effects on various populations. The detailed report, written in real time, describes how the Nazi regime implemented deliberate starvation programs in the occupied territories, especially in Eastern Europe, and how the German state turned the “science of nutrition” into a tool of control both within Germany and in the occupied countries in an unprecedented manner.
The “Hunger Plan” was designed to deliberately divert food resources to Germany, causing death by starvation to millions of people in Poland and other occupied countries. The report includes detailed documentation of the harsh living conditions in the ghettos, such as the Warsaw Ghetto, where thousands of Jews died of starvation and disease due to insufficient food rations and a deliberate policy of oppression.
The report also provides a snapshot of how Germany itself prepared in terms of food supplies in the years preceding the outbreak of World War II. The seizure of Europe’s food resources was as much a part of Germany’s war preparations as its military buildup. Through barter trade and the extortion of the Balkan states, Germany managed to take control of significant food reserves across Europe even before the war began. “All this was achieved without firing a shot, ” Boris writes. Against the backdrop of severe food shortages across Europe, Germany entered the war without experiencing hunger at all, and the average German diet contained sufficient quantities of essential foods to enable the population to go to war stronger than ever. Germany’s “food experts” had deliberately engineered this situation through both acts of plunder and by laying the groundwork for the complete mobilization of food resources for the war effort as early as 1933.
“German scientists developed a plan according to which slow starvation would eliminate the Jewish population of Europe, while exterminating all those who had not perished by other means, ” Boris writes. Here, the various methods employed by the Nazis to deliberately deprive the Jews of basic nutrition and bring about “slow death” are described in detail. These included the establishment of ghettos that prevented Jews from participating in the black market food trade and barred them from accessing rural areas. Even before the outbreak of the war, the Germans restricted Jews’ shopping hours under the pretense of separating them from “Aryan” customers. Food ration cards marked with the letter J under German orders were intended to prevent Jews who managed to reach “forbidden” areas from using food coupons purchased from the local population. Additionally, every few weeks, the Nazis would invalidate even the marked ration cards in order to deliberately reduce the Jewish population. At the same time, regulations prohibiting the local population from selling food to Jews under threat of severe punishment were constantly enacted. The report provides precise data on the meager food quantities available in the Jewish ghettos and describes the escalating restrictions the Germans imposed on food supplies over time. German forces would enter ghettos and announce specific days on which no food would be sold to Jews (as occurred in the Łódź Ghetto, the Warsaw Ghetto, and others), aiming to accelerate starvation and hasten the deaths of those already suffering from extreme malnutrition. After the Nazis reduced the ghetto streets to a scene of ghost-like figures, they brought in German photographers to depict the ghettos as filthy and dangerous places “because of the Jews” who, they claimed, failed to maintain hygiene. German newspapers published articles describing the Jewish ghetto as follows: “The starvation in the ghetto is terrifying. The residents appear to be living corpses. Their faces and eyes are sunken, Jewish life in the ghettos is tragic, bleak, and hopeless. The Jews are waiting and yearning for a new Moses, ” it was written. A Polish doctor described the streets of the Warsaw Ghetto: “I saw with my own eyes nine Jews lying against the wall of a corner house at the intersection of Franciszkańska and Nalewki Streets, in the final throes of death from starvation. At first, when a man or woman collapsed on the sidewalks of the Warsaw Ghetto from hunger, people tried to do something to help the victim, but now there are so many of them lying in the streets, and people simply walk past the dead.”
The report also provides information on the effects of starvation on other populations across Europe, including Greece, where hundreds of thousands died of hunger during the German occupation. The report is based on a wide range of sources, including official reports, personal testimonies, and seized documents, which enabled a thorough examination of Nazi food policy and its consequences. For example, it describes how, in Belgium, children suffered from severe protein, fat, and calcium deficiencies as early as 1941, with many losing up to 13 pounds during the first months of that year alone. In the Netherlands, Seyss-Inquart implemented a deliberate starvation policy as punishment for the population’s unwillingness, as he claimed, to “make supreme sacrifices like the Germans in the war against Bolshevism.” In France, the average caloric intake per person dropped by 50%. In Norway, there were acute shortages of fish and meat. In Poland, the general population was forbidden to eat bread baked from wheat flour or from a wheat-rye mixture. During the war years, Poles were allowed to eat only bread made from potato flour. According to orders, Italians received only half the bread, meat, fat, and sugar rations allotted to the German people.
As a result of all this, Boris describes the flourishing of “black markets” in all the occupied countries, as the civilian population struggled to steal food coupons—and even more so, to forge them. In Belgium alone, four secret printing plants were discovered, where over two million counterfeit coupons were seized by the Nazis. Severe punishments were imposed on those caught: public executions by hanging or shooting were carried out to instill terror among the population.
The report is accompanied by charts and comparison tables reflecting the amount of food per capita in Germany compared to the occupied countries. For example, one chart showing the distribution of meat rations places Germany at the top with 100%, followed by Czechoslovakia with 86%, with the percentages gradually decreasing country by country — Poland, Belgium, France — until finally “the Jews” appear with a figure of 0% in meat distribution. Another table presents the percentages of caloric intake per capita, again showing Germany with 93%, and at the very bottom of the list, the Jews with 20%. The appendix pages feature numerous numerical data comparing the quantities of food across the various countries.
Dr. Jacob Robinson (1889-1977) a lawyer, one of the leading attorneys in Lithuania, a Lithuanian politician, diplomat, Zionist activist, educator and lecturer. At the Nuremberg trials (1945-1946) he served as an adviser on Jewish affairs to Judge Robert H. Jackson, who headed the prosecution team on behalf of the United States, and his name is associated with playing a key role in convincing him to accept the new concept of “crimes against humanity” as an indictment of the Nazis for crimes against Jews (the term appeared for the first time in the indictments of the Nuremberg trials). After the main war criminals’ trial, he continued to closely monitor the clarification of the fate and punishment of war criminals in a series of trials known as the “Subsequent Nuremberg Trials”. He advised, for example, the chief prosecutor in the trial of Friedrich Flick, Brigadier General Telford Taylor. When Adolf Eichmann was captured, he was invited to join Gideon Hausner’s prosecution team. His experience at the Nuremberg trials, his knowledge of Germany and Germans, and his expertise in Israeli criminal law made him a central figure on the prosecution team. Following the trial, he published the book “And the Crooked Shall Be Made Straight: The Eichmann Trial, the Jewish Catastrophe, and Hannah Arendt’s Narrative”, as a response (criticism) to Hannah Arendt’s book “Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil”.
109 [1] pages. Repaired tear on the last page. Good condition.
