Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia

The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was a partially-annexed territory of Nazi Germany that was established on 16 March 1939 after the German occupation of the Czech lands. The protectorate's population was mostly ethnic Czech. After the Munich Agreement of September 1938, Germany had annexed the German-majority Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia. Following the establishment of the independent Slovak Republic on 14 March 1939, and the German occupation of the Czech rump state the next day, German leader Adolf Hitler established the protectorate on 16 March 1939 by a proclamation from Prague Castle. The creation of the protectorate violated the Munich Agreement. The protectorate was nominally autonomous and had a dual system of government, with German law applying to ethnic Germans while other residents had the legal status of Protectorate subject and were governed by a puppet Czech administration. During the Second World War, the well-trained Czech workforce and developed industry was forced to make a major contribution to the German war economy. Since the Protectorate was just out of the reach of Allied bombers, the Czech economy was able to work almost undisturbed until the end of the war. The Protectorate administration was deeply involved in the Holocaust in Bohemia and Moravia. The state's existence came to an end with the surrender of Germany to the Allies in 1945. After the war, some Protectorate officials were charged with collaborationism but according to the prevailing belief in Czech society, the Protectorate was not entirely rejected as a collaborationist entity.