German Occupation Of France Essay

4.2.4 Occupation of France The German occupation of France between 1940 and 1944 created an avenue through which, by occupational payments, the country made the largest recorded international transfers to supply funding for the German war machine (Occhino et al., 2006). Thus, the French economy became an integral segment of the German war effort. The systematic utilization of occupied countries offered vital contributions towards the Nazi government (Götz, 2000). Milward (1970) projected that for the entire period of the war Germany must have obtained revenue from all occupied countries amounting to 40 percent of the revenue that it accumulated by its own taxation, and of this 42 percent of these funds came from France. Occhino et al. (2006) describes the rationale behind this maneuver: When the German Army first rolled through the Netherlands, Belgium and finally France, the Reichskreditkassen was created on May 3, 1940 to supply the armies of the Reich with an occupation currency, the Reichskreditkassenschein. The German authorities had no desire for this money to spawn inflation in Germany. The occupation currency could not be spent in Germany or exchanged against the Reichsmark, hoping to bottle up any inflationary pressure in France. (p. 8)

Within the stipulations of this agreement, the French fleet was disarmed. France lost departments in Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and the Moselle to the Reich, while those of the Nord and the Pas-de-Calais were enjoined with that of occupied Belgium. An area of Mentone was allotted to Italy. The rest was divided into the Occupied Zone, under direct German control, and the Free Zone. Thus, the Banque de France “had to accept occupation notes and redeem then in francs, charging them as costs of occupation to the French government” (Occhino et al.,