a policy of genocide and forced assimilation of the population in his area of responsibility. At the start of the war Forster planned ethnic cleansing of all Poles originating from Congress Poland and all Jews by February 1940 from his Gau, but unforeseen problems with agriculture workers and the inadequate character of German settlers forced him to revise his policies. Forster was willing to accept any and all Poles who claimed to have "German blood" as Germans. In practice, the method of determining whether Poles had any German ancestry or not was to send out Nazi Party workers to interview the local Poles; all Poles who stated that they had German ancestry had their answers taken at face value with no documentation required. Refusal to become Germanised was punishable by deportation to the General Government or imprisonment in a concentration camp. In some cases whole settlements were classed as populated by Germans in order to meet quotas Forster laid down. Practical issues like food production could influence Forster's decisions on whom to expel. Forster was at odds with Arthur Greiser, who had complained to Heinrich Himmler, the 'Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of Germandom', that Forster's assimilation policy was against Nazi racial theory. When Himmler approached Forster over this issue, Forster simply ignored him, realizing that Hitler allowed each Gauleiter to run his area as he saw fit. Both Greiser and Himmler complained to Hitler that Forster was allowing thousands of Poles to be classified as Germans, but Hitler merely bounced the problem back to them, telling them to go sort out their problems with Forster on their own. This was a difficult task; Himmler's attempts to cajole Forster to see matters his way met with resentment and contempt. In a discussion with Richard Hildebrandt Forster scoffed, "if I looked like Himmler, I wouldn't talk about race". The outcome of these policies was that two-thirds of the ethnic Polish population of Forster's Gau would be classed as German under the Deutsche Volksliste. Although far fewer Poles would be removed from Danzig-West Prussia than in the neighbouring Warthegau it is estimated that by the end of the war, up to 60,000 people had been murdered in the region and up to 170,000 expelled. Other estimates place the expulsion figure at around 35,000 people. Forster himself reported that 87,000 people had been "evacuated" from the region by February 1940. Conflict with SS