Tambien
Theseus, Duke of Athens
Norway all the way.
Surviving World War II
- Thread starter Nuka-sama
- Start date
Leifmk
Deity
As a run-of-the-mill civilian, yeah, Norway. Unless you were unfortunate enough to be a member of certain singled-out minorities (statistically unlikely due to said minorities being quite tiny here to begin with) or deeply involved in the wrong kind of politics, you'd have to be very very unlucky to get killed. Hell, for most people here the worst hardship of the occupation was a wounded dignity and a lack of access to imported stuff such as coffee.
Actually, come to think of it, no coffee for five years sounds pretty nightmarish.
Actually, come to think of it, no coffee for five years sounds pretty nightmarish.
wolfigor
Emperor
The situation for civilians in Norway was not so good as it may appear, especially after the German started repressing against Norwegian partisans.
The civilians also suffered from large expropriation of properties and scarcity of food.
Norway had one of the top merchant navy before the war (at level of USA and UK): by the end the war it was almost completely destroyed.
All food, and Norway did not produce lot, was prioritized for the German occupiers: 1 German soldier for every 8 Norwegians.
All north of Norway, the region most close to the Russian border was rendered a desert for defense reasons: all people taken away, all houses destroyed, and all forests cut down.
In Norway, after the war, there was a huge hate against the Germans with most of sympathizers arrested and in some cases executed (death penalty was reintroduced retroactively).
Probably, with hindsight, you would be better off in Finland
The civilians also suffered from large expropriation of properties and scarcity of food.
Norway had one of the top merchant navy before the war (at level of USA and UK): by the end the war it was almost completely destroyed.
All food, and Norway did not produce lot, was prioritized for the German occupiers: 1 German soldier for every 8 Norwegians.
All north of Norway, the region most close to the Russian border was rendered a desert for defense reasons: all people taken away, all houses destroyed, and all forests cut down.
In Norway, after the war, there was a huge hate against the Germans with most of sympathizers arrested and in some cases executed (death penalty was reintroduced retroactively).
Probably, with hindsight, you would be better off in Finland
Verbose
Deity
Me, given the OP, I'd take Denmark over Norway, and Finland over Denmark.
aronnax
Let your spirit be free
I'm Chinese.... so, I'll just lay low in Singapore. Better than nothing, if I feint that I am just a labourer and bow as much as possible... I think I'll make it.
Be Hiwi in Germany. Survive by surrendering.
Verbose
Deity
I seem to recall the Japanese in Singapore rounding up Chinese, chaining them together, and then throwing them into the harbour and machine-gunning them until they sank...
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sook_Ching_massacre
From what I understand the Japanese might well have ended up killing as much as 10%+ of the population, virtually all Chinese.
Winner
Diverse in Unity
If you're into Heydrich, I guess Czechoslovakia is pretty cool
Your poll is kinda unclear about this - where in Czechoslovakia?
Because there were four parts
1) Sudetenland - annexed by Germany and thus basically a part of the Reich proper;
2) Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia - occupied by Germany
3) Slovak State - a puppet state, but until 1944 "independent"
4) Parts of Slovakia and Ruthenia that were annexed by Hungary
---
Anyway, from what my grandparents have told me, the Germans weren't that bad if you lived in a small village in the Protectorate (and it wasn't named Lidice or Ležáky
). Especially my grandmother always said that the Russians were far worse (fortunately they didn't stay for long). The German soldiers were usually polite and not very harsh. They even tried to protect the civilians when the fighting got close in 1945, before they pulled back.So yeah, I pick Denmark
aronnax
Let your spirit be free
They machined gun those who served as a threat to Japan and her occupation.
Usually, the intellectuals, those active in resistance, sometimes the rich. If you were useless and didn't pose a threat to Japan's occupation short of collaboration, you would survive, albeit, starving and abused.
The Japanese military weren't as genocidal crazy as the Germans. They might have saw themselves as a superior race, but not the only one who deserved to lived.
Winner
Diverse in Unity
If you're into Heydrich, I guess Czechoslovakia is pretty cool
Germans (= the army/armed militias of the regime) behaved quite differently from country to country (unless we're talking about the Jews, that is). At places they were extremely brutal, in other places their occupation wasn't extraordinarily bad. The Japanese were on average more... how to put it, well, primitive. The way they treated the Chinese is I think entirely comparable in its brutality with the worst Germany had to offer in the USSR.
As for Czechia, I don't think the occupation was particularly brutal by Nazi standards. The Poles were treated far, far, FAR worse than the Czechs. Mostly because they were less willing to collaborate and work for the final victory of the Reich
Verbose
Deity
Well, sure. Less sure it in any way commends the Japanese occupation of Singapore? Proportional to the size of the city, it was killing on a pretty massive scale even by WWII standards.
Move far enough down that line of thinking, and obviously it would be possible to work for the Japanese as well (not a few did), and thus come through most of WWII in relative comfort - just up until the very end and the come-uppance that is.
Generally speaking, in most places they went the Germans weren't genocidal crazy either. Which still doesn't commend them in any way.
And I'm not entirely convinced some of the leading lights of the younger officers of the Kwantung army weren't just as crazy in matter of race, supposedly, as any believing Nazi...
In some places, working with the Japanese led to you becoming President of a newly independent nation-state. Collaborators don't always get their come-uppance.
I think a key point here, rather than just assuming all collaborators are bad, is to ask ourselves "why didn't they just get their come-uppance".
Because they played the anti-Dutch or anti-Communist card better than others?
ParkCungHee
Deity
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It's a little fuzzy. The general thought is that the death sentence wasn't carried out because he provided information on the communist cell he was in. Of course the fact that he was in a communist cell was swept under the rug after that.
I'm lost who are we talking about now? There's a good half a dozen candidates for becoming Presidents of new nation-states because of collaboration - real or imagined - with the Japanese.
EDIT: In the case of Sukarno which is one of those people that Lord_Baal seems to be alluding to his position was 'collaboration' of the same basic texture as the Danes undertook. Sukarno for one undertook to work with the Japanese after having consulted with his fellow nationalist politicians. The results of which saw that those politicians who had been rather critical of the Japanese before the war elected to go underground and form a resistance in preference to running the risk of having the Japanese catch up with them. A number of politicians who had been in prison - Sukarno for one - and hadn't been able to publish much on the Japanese and those thought to be of a national stature sufficient to insulate them from harm - Mohamed Hatta was one of these, along with Sukarno, the former had published articles critical of the Japanese a number of times - elected to stay above ground and attempt to mitigate the harshness of Japanese rule and if possible use it for nationalist purposes. Sukarno was masterful at doing just this, the best example of which was in his rather successful high-jacking of the inauguration of PUTERA. PUTERA was a Japanese front organisation designed to 'harness' Indonesian 'national sentiment' in service to Japanese war aims. He tried and succeeded in high-jacking it to serve nationalist purposes. Keep in mind that Putera means son in Indonesian and then consider his opening speech: Putera the name which recalls to each Son of his Mother, with the responsibility to honour her so long as blood still flows in his veins and a soul still lives in her body... Frankly, that speech can't but be read as a nationalist speech calling on Indonesians to serve their mother, Indonesia, unto death. That might have been in service to Japan though as the Japanese quickly realised it was far more likely to be used against them. There's other examples... but that should be sufficient, no?
EDIT: In the case of Sukarno which is one of those people that Lord_Baal seems to be alluding to his position was 'collaboration' of the same basic texture as the Danes undertook. Sukarno for one undertook to work with the Japanese after having consulted with his fellow nationalist politicians. The results of which saw that those politicians who had been rather critical of the Japanese before the war elected to go underground and form a resistance in preference to running the risk of having the Japanese catch up with them. A number of politicians who had been in prison - Sukarno for one - and hadn't been able to publish much on the Japanese and those thought to be of a national stature sufficient to insulate them from harm - Mohamed Hatta was one of these, along with Sukarno, the former had published articles critical of the Japanese a number of times - elected to stay above ground and attempt to mitigate the harshness of Japanese rule and if possible use it for nationalist purposes. Sukarno was masterful at doing just this, the best example of which was in his rather successful high-jacking of the inauguration of PUTERA. PUTERA was a Japanese front organisation designed to 'harness' Indonesian 'national sentiment' in service to Japanese war aims. He tried and succeeded in high-jacking it to serve nationalist purposes. Keep in mind that Putera means son in Indonesian and then consider his opening speech: Putera the name which recalls to each Son of his Mother, with the responsibility to honour her so long as blood still flows in his veins and a soul still lives in her body... Frankly, that speech can't but be read as a nationalist speech calling on Indonesians to serve their mother, Indonesia, unto death. That might have been in service to Japan though as the Japanese quickly realised it was far more likely to be used against them. There's other examples... but that should be sufficient, no?
JohnRM
Don't make me destroy you
Norway
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