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CHAPTER II
EXTERMINATION BY OVERCROWDING
Territorial Amputations
Germany's living space, even in 1937, was small for her
heavy population and afforded important natural resources
only in the form of farm lands and deposits of coal and pot-
ash. Her agricultural lands have been overworked by inten-
sive cultivation for 1,000 to 2,000 years and her soil has been
starved for fertilizer during and since the recent war. Even
when plenty of fertilizer was available and her territory was
intact, Germany was never able to produce more than 80 per
cent of the food and other farm products needed to meet her
domestic needs. I The rest had to be imported in exchange for
coal and manufactured exports.
As her agricultural lands became overcrowded, Germany
had resorted to manufacturing. By importing iron ore and
exploiting her coal and potash resources to the utmost, she had
built up the world's second largest steel and chemical indus-
tries which, in turn, formed the "workshop of Europe," raised
the general European standard of living, and provided direct
or indirect support for fully two-thirds of her own population.
On account of destruction by total warfare and deliberate
Allied policy, these industrial resources are now largely wiped
out. Without them, over half of the German workers must
resort to the soil as their only other means of life. Under the
circumstances it is extremely doubtful that the land, even if
all held in 1937 were left intact, could support the huge, now
jobless, industrial population on even the barest subsistence
level.
Without waiting to see, Germany's conquerors have ruth-
lessly stripped her of lands constituting 28 per cent of her liv-
ing space, producing an even higher proportion of her food,
and containing two of her three principal coal regions. To
make matters still worse, they are expelling into the remain-
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