Life Under Nazi Occupation : The Struggle to Survive During World War II

‘When diplomacy ends, war begins.’Adolf Hitler Adolf Hitler had envisaged establishing by force a New Order in Europe, which Germany would govern with an iron fist. Conceived as the natural successor to the Holy Roman Empire of 800–1806 and the German Empire of 1871–1918, the Third Reich would last a thousand years, would leave imposing ruins to compare with those of ancient Rome and would make either subjects or slaves of all the nations of Europe. Hitler believed himself to have been chosen by Providence to lead ‘the revolutionary struggle’ against Bolshevism and to raise a defeated and humiliated nation from its knees and urge it on to glory. When the Nazis invaded, they did not intend to govern fairly. Instead they stripped defeated nations of their treasures, industry and natural resources, with the aim of asserting German supremacy and imposing Hitler's New Order in Europe. Paul Roland tells the story of daily life under Nazi rule - in France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Poland, Italy, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Denmark, Norway, Guernsey and the Channel Islands- to be brought to heel by bribery and brutality, rape and torture, inducement and intimidation as the Germans carried out their vile policies. We hear of quislings and collaborators who conspired with their captors, the 'enemies of the Reich' including Jewish citizens who were rounded up and exterminated, as well as stories of incredible courage by individuals who struck back against the Führer. Featuring haunting photographs of the people and places under occupation, this shocking book confronts us with the reality of the Nazi rule - a regime which would have swept the entirety of Europe, had Germany won the war.