Reichskommissariat Moskowien Reichskommissariat Moskowien ( also rendered as Moskau , abbreviated as RKM ; ) , literally " Reich Commissariat of Muscovy ( or Moscow ) " , was the civilian occupation regime that Nazi Germany intended to create in central and northern European Russia during World War II , one of several similar " Reichskommissariat e " . It was also known initially as the Reichskommissariat Russland ( Reich Commissariat of Russia ) . Siegfried Kasche was the projected " Reichskomissar " , but due to the German failure to occupy the territories intended to form the " Reichskommissariat " , it remained on paper only . Background . The German Nazis intended to destroy Russia permanently , irrespective of whether it was capitalist , communist or tsarist . Adolf Hitler ' s Lebensraum policy , expressed in Mein Kampf , was to dispossess the Russian inhabitants – as was to happen with other Slavs in Poland and most of Eastern Europe - and to either expel most of them beyond the Ural mountains or to exterminate them by various means . German colonial settlement was to be encouraged ( Generalplan Ost ) . As the campaign against the Soviet Union advanced eastward , the occupied territories would gradually be transferred from military to civilian administration . Hitler ' s final decision on its administration entailed the new eastern territories being divided into four " Reichskommissariate " in order to destroy Russia as a geographical entity by dividing it into as many different parts as possible . These new institutions were to be under the nominal supervision of Reichsleiter Alfred Rosenberg as head of the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories ( " Reichsministerium für die besetzten Ostgebiete " ) . The leaders of these provinces , the Reichskommissar s , would however be direct subordinates of Hitler himself , and answerable only to him . Conquered territories of most of Russia proper were initially to become a " Reichskommissariat Russland " ( Reich commissariat of Russia ) according to Rosenberg ' s plans , although this was later changed to " Moskowien " ( Muscovy ) informally also known as " Moskau " ( Moscow ) . These eastern districts were thought to be the most sensitive to administer of the conquered territories . As a consequence , they would be managed from the regional capitals and directly by the German government in Berlin . The plans were ultimately never fulfilled . The German military operation to capture Moscow and central Russia ( " Fall Taifun " ) failed and marked the high - water point of German success in the region . The transfer of conquered territories to Nazi civilian rule was therefore never completed . Territorial planning . The envisioned province included most of European Russia between the Ural mountains ( as well as some districts east of it , including the city of Sverdlovsk ) and its boundaries with Finland , the Baltic states , Belarus , and the Ukraine . The Russian parts of the Caucasus region were to be controlled by a separate Reichskommissariat Kaukasus , while the rest of southern Russia was to be integrated into the Reichskommissariat Ukraine for its intended extension eastward to the border with Kazakhstan . Smaller parts that were excluded were the Pskov , Smolensk and Leningrad areas ( included in the Reichskommissariat Ostland ) , and Eastern Karelia and the Kola peninsula , which were promised to Germany ' s co - belligerent Finland in 1941 for its contribution to the campaign in the east . It would therefore encompass more or less the same lands that were once under the control of the mediaeval state of Muscovy . Its final territory was to be bounded on the west by the Reichskommissariat Ostland and the border with Finland , on the north by the Arctic ocean , in the east by the Ural Mountains and Ural River , and in the south by the massively expanded Reichskommissariat Ukraine . The planned administrative subdivisions of the province were largely based boundary - wise on the pre - existing Russian oblasts , and supposed to be seated in Leningrad , Gorki , Tula , Moscow , Kazan , Kirov , Molotov , and Ufa . The administrative capital was tentatively proposed as Moscow , the historical and political center of the Russian state . As the German armies were approaching Moscow during the 1941 campaign however , Hitler determined that Moscow , like Leningrad and Kiev , would be levelled and its 4 million inhabitants killed to destroy it as a potential center of Bolshevist resistance . For this purpose Moscow was to be covered by a large artificial lake which would permanently submerge it , by opening the sluices of the Moscow - Volga Canal . During the advance on Moscow Otto Skorzeny was tasked with capturing these dam structures . During a conference on 16 July 1941 , Hitler stated his personal desires on the division of the eastern territories to be acquired for Germany . The Crimean peninsula , together with a large hinterland to its north encompassing much of the southern Ukraine was to be " cleared " of all existing foreigners and exclusively settled by Germans , becoming Reich territory ( part of Germany ) . The formerly Austrian part of Galicia was to be treated in a similar fashion . In addition the Baltic states , the " Volga colony " and the Baku district ( as a military concession ) would also have to be annexed to the Reich . At first , the plans had assumed an eastern limit at the " A - A line " , a notional boundary running along the Volga river between the two cities of Archangelsk and Astrakhan . Since it was expected well - ahead of the operation that the Soviet Union would in all likelihood not be totally defeated by military means despite being reduced to a rump state , aerial bombardments were to be carried out against the remaining enemy industrial centers further to the east . Political leadership . Rosenberg had initially proposed Erich Koch , notorious even among the Nazis as a particularly brutal leader , as Reichskommissar of the province on 7 April 1941 . Koch rejected his nomination in June of that year because it was , as he described it , " entirely negative " , and was later given control of Reichskommissariat Ukraine instead . Hitler proposed Wilhelm Kube as an alternative , but this was rejected after Hermann Göring and Rosenberg deemed him too old for the position ( Kube was then in his mid - fifties ) , and instead assigned him to Belarus . SA - Obergruppenführer Siegfried Kasche , the German envoy in Zagreb , was selected instead . Hamburg senator and SA general promoted himself to be nominated as the Commissioner for Economic Affairs for the Moscow area . Kasche ' s nomination was opposed by Heinrich Himmler , who considered Kasche ' s SA background as being a problem and characterized him to Rosenberg as " a man of the desk , in no wise energetic or strong , and an outspoken enemy of the SS " . Erich von dem Bach - Zalewski was to become the regional Higher SS and Police Leader , and was already assigned to Army Group Centre as " HSSPF - Russland - Mitte " ( Central Russia ) for this purpose . Odilo Globocnik , then the SS and Police Leader in Lublin was to head Generalkommissariat Sverdlovsk , the easternmost district of Moskowien . Rosenberg suggested Wolf - Heinrich Graf von Helldorf as " Hauptkommissar " of the Yaroslavl district .