Shortly after the German invasion of Poland , an armed ethnic-German militia , called the '' Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz '' , numbering around 100,000 members , was formed . It organized the Operation Tannenberg mass murder of Polish elites . At the beginning of 1940 , the '' Selbstschutz '' was disbanded , and its members transferred to various units of SS , Gestapo , and German police . The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle organized large-scale looting of property , and redistributed goods to '' Volksdeutsche '' . They were given apartments , workshops , farms , furniture , and clothing confiscated from Jewish Poles and ethnic Poles
Operation Tannenberg
Operation Tannenberg
Collaboration in German-occupied Poland