1941: Netherlands

Nazi Policies of Exploitation.

Nazi exploitation of the Netherlands and of the Netherlanders for the purpose of winning the war was continued and intensified in 1941. Since the German occupation of the Netherlands the State debt has increased by nearly $100,000,000 per month. Expenditures for 1941 are estimated at $1,875,000,000; of this amount $875,000,000 was absorbed by maintaining the German army of occupation and paying other expenses of occupation. It was believed that there were 1,500,000 German troops quartered in the Netherlands at the beginning of the year.

In addition to these extraordinary expenses imposed upon the peace-loving Netherlanders by the Nazi invaders the State Treasury is forced to finance the excess of exports to Germany over the imports from that country. The State Treasury of the Netherlands also must advance the cost of manufacturing German raw materials into finished products in Dutch factories as well as provide funds to pay men working in Dutch factories on goods for Germany. Dutch workers who can not find employment in the Netherlands are faced with the alternative of starvation or leaving their homes and going to Germany to work for their enemies. It is believed that over 100,000 Dutch workmen went to Germany in 1941. This is all part of the Nazi policy to force the peoples which they have conquered to help finance the war and to devote their efforts to the strengthening of the German war machine.

Dutch Resistance.

This policy on the part of the Nazis continued to meet with resistance by the Netherlanders. In the first few days of 1941 the German authorities closed the famous universities of Leyden and Delft because of student strikes and disturbances. Many students were arrested 'in the interest of public safety.' In February, martial law was enforced and a military administration established in North Holland province because of a series of strikes and riots which developed there. A strike had started among municipal workers and then spread to private concerns until it reached serious proportions. Meetings and demonstrations of all kinds were prohibited by the authorities of occupation and activity was forbidden to all political parties. Large collective fines to be paid within one week were imposed upon the cities of Amsterdam, Hilversum and Zaandam. The Mayors and Municipal Councils of these three cities were dismissed and replaced by commissioners directly responsible to the German authorities.

Despite these harsh measures reports of Dutch resistance to the German forces of occupation continued to reach the outside world. German official announcements told of Netherlanders being imprisoned for helping Jews to escape; of executions of Netherlanders who had assisted British airmen shot down over the country, of numerous incidents where Netherlanders had insulted or harmed German troops of occupation. In March a German court in the Hague sentenced eighteen men to death for espionage and sabotage. Later Dr. Colijin, the former Prime Minister of the Netherlands was arrested along with sixty members of his Anti-Revolutionary Party. Throughout the year many prominent politicians, professors, and other intellectuals were sent to concentration camps in Germany.

One of the strongest centers of resistance to the Nazi authorities has been in the Protestant and Catholic churches. When the Germans attacked their Russian allies without warning in 1941 a pastoral letter from Catholic bishops in the Netherlands was read in all Catholic churches warning the people not to be deceived by German propaganda concerning a 'crusade' against Bolshevism. This action infuriated the German authorities who started a violent campaign against Catholic and Protestant officials. The Dutch Nazi commissioner for trade unions took over all the confessional unions. The Reich Commissioner for the Netherlanders warned the Confessional Schools that their State subsidies would be withdrawn if they did not conform to German regulations.

Units of the Dutch navy which escaped at the time of the German invasion and joined the British navy have done their part in 1941 in weakening the Axis Powers. The Isaac Sweers, a Dutch cruiser of about 1,800 tons, was not completed when the Nazis invaded the Netherlands in 1940, but was towed to England before the Germans could seize her and was finished in a British naval yard. By the end of 1941 she took part with British cruisers in a successful naval engagement against Italian cruisers in the Mediterranean.

Nazi Administration.

Shortly after the German invasion both houses of Parliament were dismissed but the local and provincial representative bodies were still allowed to function. In August 1941, a decree suspended all parliamentary provincial and municipal bodies in order 'to strengthen the authoritarian administration of the country.' All trades in the Netherlands have been divided into six groups which correspond almost exactly with Reichsgruppen in Germany. The Germans have also created a Central Labor Office with thirty-seven branches in the country. This organization deals mainly with the transfer of Dutch labor to Germany. The Nuremberg laws for the Jews have been introduced into the country.

The German authorities admitted that Queen Wilhelmina and her government in London were making things difficult for them in the Netherlands when they ordered the seizure of all property in the occupied territory belonging to the Royal Family. Seyss-Inquart stated at the time that 'the former Queen Wilhelmina, by her persistence in adhering to the Bolshevist-Capitalist front, has excluded herself from the unity of the New Europe. She heaps insults on the head of the German Reich and on the German army and from afar exhorts the Netherlanders in the most irresponsible way to deeds of violence against the forces of occupation.'

At the end of 1941, the Netherlands Government in London was encouraging resistance on the part of the Netherlands to the German forces of occupation and directing warfare in the Mediterranean, Atlantic and Pacific against the Axis powers. At the same time the Government looked forward to peace and the re-establishment of the Netherlands, and the future political development of their state. See also NETHERLANDS EAST INDIES.