"Purification" of blood: the secret project of the Nazis to grow superdets

As you know, the ideology of the Third Reich was based on the postulate of the superiority of the Aryan race over all others. The Nazis saw the further development of their ethnic group in the rooting and improvement of their own genetic heritage. For this purpose, a special classified program called Lebensborn was developed, which can be translated as "The Source of Life".

Initially, it consisted in the fact that for officers The SS selected "racially pure" women so that they would nurture and take care of the "superdets" who would lead Germany in the future. As a result of such an alliance, the notorious Anni-Frid Lingstad, the lead singer of the legendary band ABBA, was born. But over time, the concept of the project changed and became terrifying.

The women selected to participate in the program lived and gave birth in special institutions where the most comfortable conditions were created. The first such house appeared in a village near Munich in 1936. And after Germany occupied almost all of Europe, the "production" of superdets was put on stream abroad.

The largest scale of the program has acquired in Norway. The Nazis considered blue-eyed blond Norwegians to be representatives of the Aryan race. For them, the prospect of having a child with a German officer was, in fact, the only way to maintain a relatively normal lifestyle during the war. Therefore, many women did not even have to be ordered, they joined the ranks of women in labor voluntarily.

During the years of Lebensborn's existence, about eight thousand pure-blooded Aryans were born in Germany, in Norway — one and a half times more.

In 1938, it was decided to increase the pace, and then the program was expanded at the expense of women of suitable appearance who were already pregnant. In exchange for financial support, they were offered to give the child to a shelter. There, the children who passed the selection were brought up and fed in a special way. And women who "delivered" several babies were awarded the Iron Cross.

A year later, by the decision of Heinrich Himmler, the Reichsfuhrer of the SS, who supervised the project, the SS simply began to kidnap children and transport them to Germany. Mostly from Poland, Czechoslovakia and Yugoslavia. Upon arrival, they were examined by doctors and divided into groups depending on how much they looked like typical Aryans.

Children who were deemed unfit were sent to concentration camps, and suitable ones were subjected to "Germanization". They were given new names, memories of their parents and homeland were etched out, and the values the Nazis needed were instilled. A special "educational" course was developed for this purpose.

In the process of "Germanization", children were irradiated with ultraviolet light so that their hair got the "right" shade for a truly Aryan child. After passing the basic training, the unfortunate kids were placed in the care of SS families.

Almost all documents related to the Lebensborn program were destroyed in the last months of the war, so it is not possible to say exactly how many children suffered such a fate. Researchers put the figure at two hundred thousand people.

After the surrender of Germany, Norwegian women who voluntarily participated in the enrichment of the Aryan race found themselves in an unenviable position. With the connivance of the authorities, they were often publicly beaten and humiliated in every possible way. Children born of SS men became outcasts. As a gesture of goodwill, neighboring Sweden hosted several hundred rejected children. So Anni-Frid Lingstad, whose father, an SS sergeant, died in the war, also became a Swede.