The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia[a] was a partially-annexed[3] territory of Nazi Germany that was established on 16 March 1939 after the German occupation of the Czech lands.

Since the Protectorate was just out of the reach of Allied bombers based in Britain, the Czech economy was able to work almost undisturbed until the end of the war.

[10] The Four-Year Plan that Hitler launched in September 1936 to have the German economy ready for a "total war" by 1940 was faltering by 1937 owing to a shortage of foreign exchange to pay for the vast economic demands imposed by the ambitious armaments targets as Germany lacked many of the necessary raw materials, which had to be imported.

[11] The British historian Richard Overy wrote the huge demands of the Four Year Plan "...could not be fully met by a policy of import substitution and industrial rationalization".

[12] In November 1937 at the Hossbach conference, Hitler announced that to stay ahead in the arms race with the other powers that Germany had to seize Czechoslovakia in the very near-future.

[14] The British historian Victor Rothwell wrote that the Czechoslovak reserves of gold and hard currency seized in March 1939 were "invaluable in staving off Germany's foreign exchange crisis".

[14] On 16 March when Hitler proclaimed the protectorate, he declared: "For a thousand years the provinces of Bohemia and Moravia formed part of the Lebensraum of the German people.

[16] Neurath seems to be chosen as Reich Protector in because as a former foreign minister and a former ambassador to the United Kingdom, he was well known in London for his avuncular, but dignified manner, which were the personality traits associated with the popular image of a British resident.

Hitler believed that emulating the Raj would make this violation of the Munich Agreement more acceptable to Britain, and as that proved not to be the case the German media launched a lengthy campaign denouncing British "hypocrisy".

[17] The German authorities intentionally allowed the protectorate "all the trappings of independence" in order to encourage the Czech inhabitants to collaborate with them.

The Germans drafted Czechs to work in coal mines, in the iron and steel industry, and in armaments production.

[24] There is also the fact that a relatively restrained policy in Czech lands was partly driven by the need to keep the population nourished and complacent so that it can carry out the vital work of arms production in the factories.

By 1939, the country was already serving as a major hub of military production for Germany, manufacturing aircraft, tanks, artillery, and other armaments.

The deportation of Jews to concentration camps was organized, and the fortress town of Terezín was made into a ghetto way-station for Jewish families.

Directives issued by Heydrich's successor, SS-Oberstgruppenführer Kurt Daluege, and martial law brought forth mass arrests, executions and the obliteration of the villages of Lidice and Ležáky.

Under the authority of Karl Hermann Frank, German minister of state for Bohemia and Moravia, within the protectorate, all non-war-related industry was prohibited.

Most of the Czech population obeyed quietly until the final months preceding the end of the war, when thousands became involved in the resistance movement.

[27] After Heydrich assumed control of the Protectorate, he instituted martial law and stepped up arrests and executions of resistance fighters.

[citation needed] The vast majority of Romani in the Czech Republic today descend from migrants from Slovakia who moved there within post-war Czechoslovakia.

It was designed to concentrate the Jewish population from the Protectorate and gradually move them to extermination camps, and it also held Western European and German Jews.

[33] One spy for the government-in-exile in London reported: "The original, observable chaos and later fear of Gestapo informants and uncertainty has changed to courage and hope.

He was placed on leave in September 1941 after Hitler's dissatisfaction with his "soft policies", although he still held the title of Reichsprotektor until his official resignation in August 1943.

Kurt Daluege, Chief of the Ordnungspolizei (Order Police) or Orpo, in the Interior Ministry, who was also officially a deputy Reich Protector.

He was replaced by Alois Eliáš on 27 April 1939, who was himself also sacked on 2 October 1941 not long after the appointment of Reinhard Heydrich as the new Reich Protector.

Aside from the Office of the Minister President, the local Czech government in the Protectorate consisted of the Ministries of Education, Finance, Justice, Trade, the Interior, Agriculture, and Public Labour.

[35] Hitler had approved a plan designed by Konstantin von Neurath and Karl Hermann Frank, which projected the Germanization of the "racially valuable" half of the Czech population after the end of the war.

[36] The undesirable half contained the intelligentsia, whom the Nazis viewed as ungermanizable and potential dangerous instigators of Czech nationalism.

[37] To keep their jobs, teachers were required to demonstrate fluency in German and were supposed to greet their students with the fascist salute while saying "Sieg Heil!"

[37] Despite these pressures, a number of Czech teachers quietly inserted "anti-Reich" ideas into their lessons while refusing to greet their students with "Sieg Heil!".

This step divided the remaining parts of Bohemia and Moravia up between its four surrounding Gaue: The resulting government overlap led to the usual authority conflicts typical of the Nazi era.