Drang nach Osten Drang nach Osten ( German for " yearning for the East " , " thrust toward the East " , " push eastward " , " drive toward the East " or " desire to push East " ) was a term coined in the 19th century to designate German expansion into Slavic lands . The term became a motto of the German nationalist movement in the late nineteenth century . In some historical discourses , " Drang nach Osten " combines historical German settlement in Central and Eastern Europe , medieval military expeditions like the ones of the Teutonic Knights , and Germanisation policies and warfare of Modern Age German states like the Nazi Lebensraum concept . It was one of the core elements of German nationalism and part of Nazi ideology ; as Adolf Hitler said on 7 February 1944 : " It is eastwards , only and always eastwards , that the veins of our race must expand . It is the direction which Nature herself has decreed for the expansion of the German peoples . " Origin of the term . The first known use of " Drang nach Osten " was by the Polish journalist Julian Klaczko in 1849 , yet it is debatable whether he invented the term as he used it in form of a citation . Because the term is used almost exclusively in its German form in English , Polish , Russian , Czech and other languages , it has been concluded that the term is of German origin . Background . " Drang nach Osten " is connected with the medieval German " Ostsiedlung " . This " east colonization " referred to the expansion of German culture , language , states , and settlement into eastern and Northern European regions inhabited by Slavs and Balts . Population growth during the High Middle Ages stimulated movement of peoples from the Rhenish , Flemish , and Saxon territories of the Holy Roman Empire eastwards into the less - populated Baltic region and Poland . These movements were supported by the German nobility , the Slavic kings and dukes , and the medieval Church . The majority of this settlement took place at the expense of Polabian Slavs and pagan Balts ( see Northern Crusades ) . The future state of Prussia , named for the conquered Old Prussians , had its roots largely in these movements . As the Middle Ages came to a close , the Teutonic Knights , who had been invited to northern Poland by Konrad of Masovia , had assimilated and forcibly converted much of the southern Baltic coastlands . After the Partitions of Poland by the Kingdom of Prussia , Austria , and the Russian Empire in the late 18th century , Prussia gained much of western Poland . The Prussians , and later the Germans , engaged in a policy of Germanization in Polish territories . Russia and Sweden eventually conquered the lands taken by the Teutonic Knights in Estonia and Livonia . " Drang nach Osten " in German discourse . The term became a centerpiece of the program of the German nationalist movement in 1891 , with the founding of the Alldeutschen Verbandes , in the words : „ Der alte Drang nach dem Osten soll wiederbelebt werden " ( " The old Drang nach Osten must be revived " ) . Nazi Germany employed the slogan in calling the Czechs a " Slav bulwark against the Drang nach Osten " in the 1938 Sudeten crisis . Despite " Drang nach Osten " policies , population movement took place in the opposite direction also , as people from rural low - developed areas in the East were attracted by the prospering industrial areas of Western Germany . This phenomenon became known by the German term " Ostflucht " , literally the " flight from the East " . " Drang nach Westen " . A new " Drang nach Osten " was called for by German nationalists to oppose a Polish " Drang nach Westen " ( " thrust toward the West " ) . World War I had ended with the Treaty of Versailles , by which most or parts of the Imperial German provinces of Posen , West Prussia , and Upper Silesia were given to reconstituted Poland ; the West Prussian city of Danzig became the Free City of Danzig . The Polish paper Wprost used both " Drang nach Osten " and " Drang nach Westen " in August 2002 to title stories about German RWE company taking over Polish STOEN and Polish migration into eastern Germany , respectively . " Drang nach Westen " is also the ironic title of a chapter in Eric Joseph Goldberg ' s book " Struggle for Empire " , used to point out the " missing " eastward ambitions of Louis the German who instead expanded his kingdom to the West . " Drang nach Osten " in Polish and Panslavic discourse . According to Henry Cord Meyer , in his book " Drang nach Osten : Fortunes of a Slogan - Concept in German - Slavic Relations , 1849 - 1990 " the slogan " Drang nach Osten " most likely originated in the Slavic world , where it also was more widely used than in Germany : " its main area of circulation has been the Slavic world . Indeed , most German scholars have rejected the slogan as mere Panslav ( or later , Soviet ) agitation against Germany . " It was " a mainstay in Soviet bloc historiography - - and propaganda . [ . . . ] Even if the concept has found broad acceptance in Slavic historiography since World War II , this does not mean that it is factually accurate . The phrase is most often used to suggest a basic continuity in German history from the eleventh century to the present ; it is closely linked to Slavic stereotypes of the German national character . " With the development of romantic nationalism in the 19th century , Polish and Russian intellectuals began referring to the German " Ostsiedlung " as " Drang nach Osten " . The German Empire and Austria - Hungary attempted to expand their power eastward ; Germany by gaining influence in the declining Ottoman Empire ( the Eastern Question ) and Austria - Hungary through the acquisition of territory in the Balkans ( such as Bosnia and Herzegovina ) . Lebensraum concept of Nazi Germany . Adolf Hitler , dictator of Nazi Germany from 1933 – 1945 , called for a " Drang nach Osten " to acquire territory for German colonists at the expense of central and eastern European nations ( " Lebensraum " ) . The term by then had gained enough currency to appear in foreign newspapers without explanation . His eastern campaigns during World War II were initially successful with the conquests of Poland , the Baltic countries , Belarus , Ukraine and much of European Russia by the Wehrmacht ; Generalplan Ost was designed to eliminate the native Slavic peoples from these lands and replace them with Germans . The Wehrbauer , or soldier - peasants , would settle in a fortified line to prevent civilization arising beyond and threatening Germany . This was greatly hindered by the lack of German people who actually desired to settle in the east , let alone act as Teutonic Knights there . Settlements actually established during the war did not receive colonists from the Altreich , but in the main part East European Germans resettled from Soviet " spheres of interest " according to the Molotov - Ribbentrop Pact , and such Poles as deemed Germanizable by Nazis . However , the Soviet Union began to reverse the German conquests by 1943 , and Nazi Germany was defeated by the Allies in 1945 . Expulsion of Germans from the East after World War II . Most of the demographic and cultural outcome of the " Ostsiedlung " was terminated after World War II . The massive expulsion of German populations east of the Oder - Neisse line in 1945 - 48 on the basis of decisions of the Potsdam Conference were later justified by their beneficiaries as a rollback of the " Drang nach Osten " . " Historical Eastern Germany " , which historically was the land of the Baltic people called Old Prussians who had been colonised and assimilated by German Drang Nach Osten , was split between Poland , Russia , and Lithuania ( a Baltic country ) and repopulated with settlers of the respective ethnicities . The Oder - Neisse line has been gradually accepted to be the eastern German boundary by all post - war German states ( East and West Germany as well as reunited Germany ) , dropping all plans of ( re - ) expansion into or ( re - ) settlement of territories beyond this line . The Old Prussians were conquered by the Teutonic Knights in the 13th century , and gradually assimilated over the following centuries ; the Old Prussian language was extinct by the 17th or early 18th century .