[1] The Dutch armed forces surrendered two days later as they had been unable to withstand the speed of Germany's Blitzkrieg style attack.

The government-in-exile was still in control of the Dutch East Indies with all its resources and was the third-largest oil producer in the world, after the United States and the Soviet Union.

[citation needed] As the hope for liberation was now the entry of the Americans or the Soviet Union into the war, the Queen dismissed De Geer as prime minister.

She replaced him with Pieter Sjoerds Gerbrandy, who worked with Churchill and Roosevelt on ways to smooth the path for an American entry.

[citation needed] In September 1944, the Dutch, Belgian and the Luxembourgish governments in exile began formulating an agreement over the creation of a Benelux Customs Union.

[8] In June 1944, the allies landed in Normandy and re-opened the western front, and in the ensuing months gradually advanced to the Siegfried Line.

That same day the Militair Gezag was established in the Netherlands, with Maastricht as its capital and Kruls at its head, marking the return of the Dutch government to its own country, albeit under a military administration rather than an elected one.