Talk:Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy

France: do we need this milhist here for context?

it could probably help another article if not: Vichy was also reluctant to either disarm or surrender its naval fleet in North Africa to the British, who worried that it might fall into German hands. Eventually the British Royal Navy sank or disabled most of the French Navy, killing over a thousand French sailors in a July 1940 attack on the Algerian naval port at Mers-el-Kébir.

References

Spain

Why Francoist Spain isnt here? we literally have an article https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wolfram_Crisis telling us how Franco provided the Reich wolframium to make bombs. The Spanish Civil War was a rehearsal for ww2, at least for mussolini's italy and nazi germany: both fascist (as franco) regimes used the spanish conflict to test on weapons, tactics and more. No mention of the Hendaya interview neither? (as spaniard this feels like the same american revisionism that allowed Franco to died in Bed) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.53.113.209 (talk • contribs)

Seems to me, no, neutral trade is something distinct. Sweden was Germany's biggest source of iron ore and also exported weapons and industrial equipment to both sides. Turkey was a major supplier of chromium, and sold modest amounts of other commodities. The Soviet Union also sold much petroleum and other raw materials to Germany during the Battle of Britain and the invasions of Norway, France, Greece, North Africa and a few other countries. Switzerland also continued trade, and even the United States continued to sell small amounts of war materiel to Germany despite the blockade. These examples of trade with neutral countries may in retrospect be seen as a bad idea, but at the time the sellers were not aiding their countries' enemies, which is the usual meaning of "collaboration" in wartime. Perhaps an article about neutral trade during the war would be appropriate. Jim.henderson (talk) 13:42, 24 March 2025 (UTC)

Edit request

Please disambiguate Ingrians in the caption:

−

[[Ingrians|Ingrian]] Wehrmacht volunteers of the [[664th Eastern Battalion]], 1943

+

[[Ingrian Finns|Ingrian]] Wehrmacht volunteers of the [[664th Eastern Battalion]], 1943

The introduction of the article 664th Eastern Battalion confirms that this is the right interpretation for the term "Ingrian". 130.234.120.6 (talk) 13:13, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

I did not do it. Instead, I have doubts about the change from the redirect into a disambiguation page. The Banner talk 14:24, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

 Done [1] +JMJ+ (talk) 14:27, 20 March 2025 (UTC)

French aftermath

• In addition to the collaborators who faced trial and/or rose to high office after the Liberation, the broadcaster Philippe Henriot was assassinated in June 1944, just before Paris' liberation, while the ex-Communist Jacques Doriot's plane was shot down by the Allies in February 1945 when he was en route to meet (under German pressure) his great rival the ex-Socialist Marcel Déat. Déat himself was able to escape to Italy, where he died in 1955.
• I've also read that some of the lay French public was shocked to learn about the collaborationist activities of ordinary French citizens (for example, uniformed French gendarmes as well as Germans herding Jews into eastbound cattle cars) from Marcel Ophuls' documentary The Sorrow and the Pity (Le Chagrin et la Pitié)

While I know this from my past reading, I can't now source these facts independently of their Wikipedia articles.

1. Does anyone else here have a reference, and
2. Would these items add useful detail to the Aftermath sub-section or just increase its length?

@Elinruby @Mathglot @Piotrus —— Shakescene (talk) 04:56, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Greater Germany

This article seems to define collaboration as collaboration in places which came under German or Italian military and/or political occupation by people and institutions that were not themselves German or Italian.

However, several places outside the Reich, usually with substantial or majority German populations, in 1933 were later absorbed into or assimilated with Greater Germany. We do mention Luxembourg and the Sudetenland. But do we include under our rubric (perhaps as a separate section) those who campaigned for reunion with Greater Germany in other areas outside its jurisdiction? For example (perhaps hypothetical):

• Austria before Anschluss in 1938
• Danzig
• the Saarland before the 1934 plebiscite
• German minorities in western Poland (several of whose provinces were absorbed as Gaue into the Greater German Reich).

@Elinruby @Mathglot @Piotrus —— Shakescene (talk) 18:59, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

I believe the case of German minority in Poland is somewhat relevant, but I'd need to dig for sources. What is your question, exactly? @Dreamcatcher25 may have some thoughts on this too _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 23:10, 31 May 2025 (UTC)

Thanks, @Piotrus

I had been thinking of pro-German and pro-Nazi (or pro-Italian/fascist) collaboration in countries outside—at the time—the German Reich, an example being Konrad Henlein in Czecho-Slovakia before the Munich agreement.

This is one of those gnarly Scope, Policy & Definition problems we've been wrestling with, such as how much co-operation or acquiescence (by train-drivers, mayors, police, merchants, etc.) becomes collaboration and whether Axis countries can be said to collaborate with the Axis itself.

A further question is how should Wikipedia treat collaboration in neutral countries (Franco, the Irish Republican Army, Switzerland conniving with Nazi racial policies, etc.)

So I'm asking for others' thoughts on editorial scope as much as seeking specific history.

@Mathglot @Elinruby @Dreamcatcher25

Best wished for June. —— Shakescene (talk) 00:04, 1 June 2025 (UTC)

@Shakescene You may find these articles of interest - they may need translation (but these days AI does a good job): [2], [3], [4], [5]... _{Piotr Konieczny aka Prokonsul Piotrus| reply here} 00:11, 1 June 2025 (UTC)