The occupation of Poland added two dimensions to the previous “Jewish politics” of Nazi Germany. More than two million Polish Jews were now under German control, and the war atmosphere allowed atrocities, which upon the German invasion were carried out on a large scale against the Polish elite and Jews. At the outset of World War II, Hitler ordered a full-scale euthanasia program aimed at the murder of tens of thousands of people defined as mentally ill, handicapped, or retarded. In this, the war combined with yet another devaluation of human lives, and experience was gathered in executing mass murder in gas chambers.

On September 21, 1939, the chief of the Nazi “Security Police” (Gestapo and Criminal Police) and the SD, Reinhard Heydrich, discussed with his aides the Jewish Question as a whole, including the German Jewish issue, the evacuation of Jews into Poland, and a possible evacuation of Polish Jews into Soviet-occupied Poland. Finally, Heydrich issued an express letter to his subordinates in Poland with regard to the shorter-range solution of the Jewish question and longer-range plans. He ordered the concentration of Polish Jews in such a way that they could later be moved as quickly as possible. The final stop for the evacuees was not clearly specified, but it is clear that Heydrich was aiming at a “Reservat,” a specific territory in the eastern part of occupied Poland. This Reservat was planned also to absorb all Jews from Greater Germany.