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U.S. Government Publicity photo of American machine tool worker in Texas.

The home front covers the activities of the civilians in a nation at war. World War II was a total war, homeland production became even more invaluable to both the Allied and Axis powers. Life on the home front during World War II was a significant part of the war effort for all participants and had a major impact on the outcome of the war. Governments became involved with new issues such as rationing, manpower allocation, home defense, evacuation in the face of air raide, and response to occupation by an enemy power. The morale and psychology of the people responed to leadership and propaganda. Typically women were mobilized to an unprecedented degree. The success in mobilizing economic output was a major factor in supporting combat operations.

Overview

The major powers devoted 50–61% of their total GDP to munition production. The Allies produced about three times as much in munitions as the Axis powers.

Munitions Production in World War II
(Expenditures in billions of dollars, US 1944 munitions prices)
Country/Alliance	Year
Country/Alliance	1935-9 ave	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	Total 1939–44
U.S.A.	0.3	1.5	4.5	20.0	38.0	42.0	106.3
Britain	0.5	3.5	6.5	9.0	11.0	11.0	41.5
U.S.S.R	1.6	5.0	8.5	11.5	14.0	16.0	56.6
Allies Total	2.4	10.0	20.0	41.5	64.5	70.5	204.4
Germany	2.4	6.0	6.0	8.5	13.5	17.0	53.4
Japan	0.4	1.0	2.0	3.0	4.5	6.0	16.9
Axis Total	2.8	7.0	8.0	11.5	18.0	23.0	70.3

Source: Goldsmith data in Harrison (1988) p. 172

Real Value Consumer Spending
Country	Year
Country	1937	1939	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	1945
Japan	100	107	109	111	108	99	93	78
Germany	100	108	117	108	105	95	94	85
USA	100	96	103	108	116	115	118	122

Source: Jerome B Cohen, Japan's Economy in War and Reconstruction (1949) p 354

Allies

The Allies called themselves the "United Nations" (even before that organization formed in 1945), and pledged their support to the Atlantic Charter of 1941. The Charter stated the ideal goals of the war: no territorial aggrandizement; no territorial changes made against the wishes of the people; restoration of self-government to those deprived of it; free access to raw materials; reduction of trade restrictions; global cooperation to secure better economic and social conditions for all; freedom from fear and want; freedom of the seas; and abandonment of the use of force, as well as disarmament of aggressor nations.

China

China suffered the second highest number of casualties of the entire war. Civilians in the occupied territories had to endure many large-scale massacres, including the Nanking Massacre. In a few areas, Japanese forces also unleashed newly developed biological weapons on Chinese civilians leading to an estimated 200,000 dead.^[1] Tens of thousands are thought to have died when Nationalist troops broke the levees of the Yangtze to stop the Japanese advance after the loss of the Chinese capital, Nanking. Millions more Chinese died because of famine during the war.

Millions of Chinese moved to the Western regions of China to avoid Japanese invasion. Cities like Kunming ballooned with new arrivals. Entire factories and universities were often taken along for the journey. Japan captured major coastal cities like Shanghai early in the war; cutting the rest of China off from its chief source of finance and industry.

The city of Chongqing became the most frequently bombed city in history.^[2]

Though China received aid from the United States, China did not have sufficient infrastructure to properly arm or even feed its military forces, let alone civilians. Much of the aid was also funneled away through corruption.

Communist forces led by Mao were based mainly in Northern China and employed guerrilla tactics against the Japanese. However, it is now felt that they were at most minimally involved in the Japanese resistance..

In occupied territories under Japanese control, civilians were treated harshly, and young men were drafted into a puppet Chinese army.

France

After the stunningly quick victory in June 1940, France was knocked out of the war and became an informal ally of the Germans. A powerful Resistance movement sprang up, as the Germans fortified the coast against an Allied invasion and occupied the northern half of the country.^[3] The Germans captured 2,000,000 French soldiers, and kept them in prisoner of war camps inside Germany for the duration of the war, using them as hostages to guarantee French cooperation. The French government, called the Vichy regime, cooperated closely with the Germans, sending food, machinery and workers to Germany. Several hundred thousand Frenchmen and women were forced to work in German factories, or volunteered to do so, as the French economy itself deteriorated. Nevertheless, there was a strong Resistance movement, with fierce anti-resistance activities by the Nazis and the French police. Most Jews were rounded up by the Vichy policy and handed to the over to the Germans, who sent them to death camps.^[4]^[5]

Food shortages

Women suffered shortages of all varieties of consumer goods and the absence of the men in POW camps.^[6] The rationing system was stringent but badly mismanaged, leading to produced malnourishment, black markets, and hostility to state management of the food supply. The Germans seized about 20% of the French food production, which caused severe disruption to the household economy of the French people.^[7] French farm production fell in half because of lack of fuel, fertilizer and workers; even so the Germans seized half the meat 20% of the produce, and to% of the champagne.^[8] Supply problems quickly affected French stores which lacked most items. The government answered by rationing, but German official set the policies and hunger prevailed, especially affecting youth in urban areas. The queues lengthened in front of shops. Some people—including German soldiers—benefited from the black market, where food was sold without tickets at very high prices. Farmers diverted meat especially to the black market, which meant that much less for the open market. Counterfeit food tickets were also in circulation. Direct buying from farmers in the countryside and barter against cigarettes became common. These activities were strictly forbidden however and thus carried out at the risk of confiscation and fines. Food shortages were most acute in the large cities. In the more remote country villages, however, clandestine slaughtering, vegetable gardens and the availability of milk products permitted better survival. The rationing system was stringent but badly mismanaged, leading to malnourishment, black markets, and hostility to state management of the food supply. The official ration provided starvation level diets of 1300 or fewer calories a day, supplemented by home gardens and, especially, black market purchases.^[9]

Netherlands

The Dutch famine of 1944, known as the "Hongerwinter" ("Hunger winter") was a man-made famine imposed by Germany in the occupied western provinces during the winter of 1944-1945. A German blockade cut off food and fuel shipments from farm areas. A total 4.5 million people were affected, of whom 18,000 died from the episode despite an elaborate system of emergency soup kitchens.^[10]

Poland

Jews in Warsaw Ghetto: 1943

On September 1, 1939, Germany invaded Poland, conquering it in three weeks, as the Soviets invaded the eastern areas. During the German occupation, there were two distinct civilian uprisings in Warsaw, one in 1943, the other in 1944. The first took place in an entity, less than two square miles in area, which the Germans carved out of the city and called "Ghetto Warschau." Into the thus created Ghetto, around which they built high walls, the Germans crowded 550,000 Polish Jews, many from the Polish provinces. At first, people were able to go in and out of the Ghetto, but soon the Ghetto's border became an "iron curtain." Unless on official business, Jews could not leave it, and non-Jews, including Germans, could not enter. Entry points were guarded by German soldiers. Because of extreme conditions and hunger, mortality in the Ghetto was high. Additionally, in 1942, the Germans moved 400,000 to Treblinka where they were gassed on arrival. When, on April 19, 1943, the Ghetto Uprising commenced, the population of the Ghetto had dwindled to 60,000 individuals. In the following three weeks, virtually all died as the Germans fought to put down the uprising and systematically destroyed the buildings in the Ghetto.^[11]

Warsaw Uprising of 1944

The uprising by Poles began on August 1, 1944 when the Polish underground, the "Home Army," aware that the Soviet Army had reached the eastern bank of the Vistula, sought to liberate Warsaw much as the French resistance had liberated Paris a few weeks earlier. Stalin had his own group of Communist leaders for the new Poland and did not want the Home Army or its leaders (based in London) to control Warsaw. So he halted the Soviet offensive and gave the Germans free rein to suppress it. During the ensuing 63 days, 250,000 Poles of the Home Army surrendered to the Germans. After the Germans forced all the surviving population to leave the city, Hitler ordered that any buildings left standing be dynamited and 98% of buildings in Warsaw were destroyed.^[12]

Soviet Union

During rapid German advances in the early months of the war, nearly reaching the cities of Moscow and Leningrad, the bulk of Soviet industry which could not be evacuated was either destroyed or lost due to German occupation. Agricultural production was interrupted, with grain harvests left standing in the fields that would later cause hunger reminiscent of the early 1930s. In one of the greatest feats of war logistics, factories were evacuated on an enormous scale, with 1523 factories dismantled and shipped eastwards along four principal routes to the Caucasus, Central Asian, Ural and Siberian regions.^[13] In general, the tools, dies and production technology were moved, along with the blueprints and their management, engineering staffs and skilled labour.

The whole of the Soviet Union become dedicated to the war effort. Conditions were severe. In Leningrad, under German siege, over a million people died of starvation and disease. Many factory workers were teenagers, women and old people. Despite harsh conditions, the war led to a spike in Soviet nationalism and unity. Soviet propaganda toned down extreme rhetoric of the past as the people now rallied by a belief of protecting their motherland against the evils of German invaders. Ethnic minorities thought to be collaborators were forced into exile.

Religion, which was previously shunned, became a part of Communist Party propaganda campaign in the Soviet society in order to mobilize the religious elements.

United States

See United States home front during World War II.

UK and Commonwealth

Britain

See Timeline of the United Kingdom home front during World War II.

Britain's total mobilization during this period proved to be successful in winning the war maintaining strong support from public opinion. The war was a "people's war" that enlarged democratic aspirations and produced promises of a postwar welfare state.

Munitions

In mid-1940, the R.A.F. was called on to fight the Battle of Britain but it had suffered serious losses. It lost 458 aircraft—more than current production—in France and was hard pressed. The government decided to concentrate on only five types of aircraft in order to optimize output. They were Wellingtons, Whitley V's, Blenheims, Hurricanes, and Spitfires. They received extraordinary priority. Covering the supply of materials and equipment and even made it possible to divert from other types the necessary parts, equipments, materials and manufacturing resources. Labour was moved from other aircraft work to factories engaged on the specified types. Cost was not an object. The delivery of new fighters rose from 256 in April to 467 in September—more than enough to cover the losses—and Fighter Command emerged triumphantly from the Battle of Britain in October with more aircraft than it had possessed at the beginning.^[14] Starting in 1941 the U.S. provided munitions through Lend lease that totaled $15.5 billion^[15]

Rationing

Food, clothing, petrol, leather and other such items were rationed. However, items such as sweets and fruits were not rationed, as they would spoil. Access to luxuries was severely restricted, though there was also a significant black market. Families also grew victory gardens, and small home vegetable gardens, to supply themselves with food. Many things were conserved to turn into weapons later, such as fat for nitroglycerin production. People in the countryside were less affected by rationing as they had greater access to locally sourced unrationed products than people in metropolitan areas and were more able to grow their own.

Evacuation

From very early in the war, it was thought that the major industrial cities of Britain, especially London in the south east, would come under Nazi German Luftwaffe air attack, which did happen with The Blitz. Some children were sent to Canada, the USA and Australia and millions of children and some mothers were evacuated from London and other major cities when the war began under government plans for Evacuations of civilians in Britain during World War II, but they often filtered back. When the Blitz bombing began on the night of September 6, 1940, they evacuated again. The discovery of the poor health and hygiene of evacuees was a shock to many Britons, and helped prepare the way for the Beveridge Report.^[16] Children were evacuated if their parents agreed but in some cases they did not have a choice. The children were only allowed to take a few things with them, including a gas mask, books, money, clothes, ration book and some small toys.

Belfast during the war

Belfast in Northern Ireland was a representative British city that has been well studied by historians.^[17]^[18] It was a key industrial city producing ships, tanks, aircraft, engineering works, arms, uniforms, parachutes and a host of other industrial goods. The unemployment that had been so persistent in the 1930s disappeared, and labour shortages appeared. There was a major munitions strike of 1944.^[19] As a key industrial city Belfast became a target for German bombing missions, but it was thinly defended; there were only 24 anti aircraft guns in the city for example. The Northern Ireland government under Richard Dawson Bates (Minister for Home Affairs) had prepared too late, assuming that Belfast was too distant. When Germany conquered France in spring 1940 it gained closer airfields. The city's fire brigade was inadequate, there were no public air raid shelters as the Northern Ireland government was reluctant to spend money on them and there were no searchlights in the city, which made shooting down enemy bombers all the more difficult. After seeing the Blitz in London in fall 1940 the government started constructing air raid shelters. The Luftwaffe in early 1941 sent reconnaissance missions that identified the docks and industrial areas to be targeted. Especially hard hit were the working class areas of East Belfast where over a thousand were killed and hundreds were seriously injured. Many people left the city afraid of future attacks. The bombings revealed the terrible slum conditions. In May 1941, the Luftwaffe hit the docks and the Harland and Wolff shipyards, closing the yards for six months. Apart from the numbers dead, the Belfast blitz saw half of Belfast houses destroyed. Approximately twenty millions pounds worth of damage was caused. The Northern Ireland government was criticized heavily for its lack of preparation. The criticism forced the resignation of Prime Minister J. M. Andrews. The bombing raids continued until the invasion of Russia in summer 1941. The U.S. American army arrived in 1942-44, setting up bases around Northern Ireland, and spending freely.

Canada

Canada joined the war efforts on September 10, 1939. This was a week after Britain joined because of the Statute of Westminster, which meant Canada had to vote before entering a war. With the war going on in Europe and Asia, Canada didn't have any major problems in building supplies for the war other than switching factories to make war equipment. Many factories were set up which helped increase the employment rate. More or less out of range of Axis attacks, Canada became one of the largest trainers of pilots for the Allies. Many Canadian men joined the war efforts, so with the men overseas and industries pushing to increase production, women took up positions to aid in the war effort.

Women

At this time of war many supplies were needed and there was a low supply of goods. Women took the initiative to recycle and salvage in order to come up with needed supplies. They gathered recycled goods, handed out information on the best methods to use that one may get the most out of recycled goods and organized many other events to decrease the amount of waste. Volunteer organizations led by women also, prepared packages for the military overseas or for prisoners of war in Axis countries.

With World War II came the dire need for employees in the workplace, without women to step in the economy would have collapsed. By autumn 1944 the number of women working full-time in Canada’s paid labour force was twice what it had been in 1939, and that figure of between 1,000,000 and 1,200,000 did not include part-time workers or women working on farms.”^[20] Women had to take on this intensive labour and while they did this they still had to find time to make jams, clothes and other such acts of volunteering to aid the men overseas.

Australia

The government greatly expanded its powers in order to better direct the war effort, and Australia's industrial and human resources were focused on supporting the Australian and American armed forces. There were a few Japanese attacks, most notably on Darwin in Feb. 1942, along with widespread fear in 1942 that Australia would be invaded.

Australia entered the war in 1939 and sent its forces to fight the Germans in the Middle East (where they were successful) and Singapore (where they were captured by the Japanese in 1942). By 1943, 37% of the Australian GDP was directed at the war effort. Total war expenditures came to £2,949 million between 1939 and 1945.^[21]

The Curtin Labor Government took over in October 1941, and energized the war effort, with rationing of scarce fuel, clothing and some food. When Japan entered the war in December, 1941, the danger was at hand, and all women and children were evacuated from Darwin and northern Australia. Canberra took control of all income taxation in 1942, giving extensive new powers to the Federal Government and greatly reducing the financial autonomy of the states.^[22] Manufacturing grew rapidly, with assembly of high performance guns and aircraft a specialty. The number of women working in factories rose from 171,000 to 286,000.^[23] The arrival of tens of thousands of Americans was greeted with relief, as they could protect Australia where Britain could not. The U.S. sent in $1,1 billion in Lend Lease, and Australia returned about the same total in services, food, rents and supplies to the Americans.^[24]

India

With the massive demands of manpower for the British Indian Army fighting in European, African and CBI (China-India-Burma) theatres of war, there was a shortage of able bodied men for agriculture. The British were also afraid the Bengali plains might fall into Japanese hands, so cultivation of border areas was prevented, all rice stocks were moved back towards Kolkata, and there was forced procurement of rice for the war effort in Europe. This led to severe food shortages, made worse by maladministration, culminating in the Bengal famine of 1943 in which 3 million Indian civilians are said to have perished.^[25]

With the British recruiting Indian soldiers in large numbers as well as the Japanese recruiting Indian expatriates into the Indian National Army (INA), a state of civil war existed on the east Indian border with Indians killing Indians. This, in turn, led to civilians who supported either the British or the INA rioting against each other.

Axis

Germany

Germany had not fully mobilized in 1939, nor even in 1941. Not until 1943 under Adolf Hitler did Germany finally redirect its entire economy and manpower to war production.

Economy

Although Germany had about double the population of Britain (80 million versus 40 million), it had to use far more labour to provide food and energy. Britain imported food and employed only a million people (5% of labour force) on farms, while Germany used 11 million (27%). For Germany to build its twelve synthetic oil plants with a capacity of 3.3 million tons a year required 2.4 million tons of structural steel and 7.5 million man-days of labour. (Britain imported all its oil from Iraq, Persia and North America). To overcome this problem, Germany employed millions of forced laborers and POWs; by 1944, they had brought in more than five million civilian workers and nearly two million prisoners of war—a total of 7.13 million foreign workers.

Rationing

For the first part of the war, there were surprisingly few restrictions on civilian activities. Most goods were freely available in the early years of the war. Rationing in Germany was introduced in 1939, slightly later than it was in Britain, because Hitler was at first convinced that it would affect public support of the war if a strict rationing program was introduced. The Nazi popularity was in fact partially due to the fact that Germany under the Nazis was relatively prosperous, and Hitler did not want to lose popularity or faith. Hitler felt that food and other shortages had been a major factor in destroying civilian morale during World War I which led to defeatism and surrender.

However, when the war began to go against the Germans in Russia and the Allied bombing effort began to affect domestic production, this changed and a very severe rationing program had to be introduced. The system gave extra rations for men involved in heavy industry, and extremely low starvation rations for Jews and Poles in the areas occupied by Germany, but not to the Poles inside Germany.

There were also significant differences between German rationing policies based on region (Germany proper or occupied territories) and ethnicity. The German occupiers of Poland attempted to coerce persons to work in Germany by providing favorable food rations for families who had members working in the Reich. The ethnic German population in Poland Volksdeutsche were given better rations and were allowed to shop for food separately prior to the ethnic Poles thus guaranteeing them a favorable allocation. The German occupiers created a draconian system of food controls. Many Polish inmates in prisons and camps were ensnared by the German attempts to eliminate the black market. Overall there was an increase in mortality due to the general malnutrition among the Polish population.^[26]^[27]^[28]

By mid 1941, the German minority in Poland received 2613 calories per day while Poles received 699 and Jews in the ghetto 184.^[29] The Jewish ration fulfilled 7.5 percent of their daily needs; Polish rations only 26 percent. Only the ration allocated to Germans fulfilled the full needs of their daily calorie intake.^[30]

Distribution of food in Nazi occupied Poland as of XII 1941^[31]
Nationality	Daily calorie intake
Germans	2310
Foreigners	1790
Ukrainians	930
Poles	654
Jews	184

Additionally the Generalplan Ost plan of Nazis which envisioned elimination of Slavic population in occupied territories, and artificial famines-as proposed in Hunger Plan were to be used.

The points system

According to a 1997 post by Walter Felscher to the Memories of the 1940s [sic] electronic mailing list:

"For every person, there were rationing cards for general foodstuffs, meats, fats (such as butter, margarine and oil) and tobacco products distributed every other month. The cards were printed on strong paper, containing numerous small "Marken" subdivisions printed with their value – for example, from "5 g Butter" to "100 g Butter". Every acquisition of rationed goods required an appropriate "Marken", and if a person wished to eat a certain soup at a restaurant, the waiter would take out a pair of scissors and cut off the required items to make the soup and amounts listed on the menu. In the evenings, shop-owners would spend an hour at least gluing the collected "Marken" onto large sheets of paper which they then had to hand in to the appropriate authorities."

^[32]

Rare foods

The amounts available under rationing were sufficient to live from, but clearly did not permit luxuries. Whipped cream became unknown from 1939 until 1948, as well as chocolates, cakes with rich crèmes etc., and meat, of course, could not be eaten every day. Other items were not rationed, but simply became unavailable as they had to be imported from overseas: coffee in particular which throughout was replaced by substitutes made from roasted grains. Vegetables and local fruit were not rationed; imported citrus fruits and bananas were unavailable. In more rural areas, farmers continued to bring their products to the markets, as large cities depended on long distance delivery. Because coffee was scarce, people created a substitute for it made from roasted ground down barley seeds and acorns. Many people kept rabbits for their meat when meat became scarce in shops, and it was often a child’s job to care for them each day.

Labour

Women were idealized by Nazi ideology and work was not felt to be appropriate for them. Children were expected to go to houses collecting materials for the production of war equipment. The German industry used forced labour, called Arbeitseinsatz from the countries they occupied.

Japan

The Japanese home front was not well organized, as the government spent more attention on propaganda and not enough on mobilization of manpower, identification of critical choke points, food supplies, logistics, air raid shelters, and evacuation of civilians from targeted cities. There was only a small increase of 1.4 million women entering the labor force between 1940 and 1944. The minister of welfare announced, "In order to secure its labor force, the enemy is drafting women, but in Japan, out of consideration for the family system, we will not draft of them."^[33] The failure of maximum utilization of womanpower was indicated by the presence of 600,000 domestic servants in wealthy families in 1944. The government wanted to raise the birthrate, even with 8.2 million men in the armed forces, of whom 3 million were killed. Government incentives help to raise the marriage rate, but the number of births held steady at about 2.2 million per year, with a 10% decline in 1944-45, and another 15% decline in 1945-46. Strict rationing of milk led to smaller babies. There was little or no long-term impact on the overall demographic profile of Japan.^[34]

The government began making evacuation plans in late 1943, and started removing entire schools in 1944; 450,000 children were moved—with their teachers but not their parents. When the American bombing began in earnest in late 1944, 10 million people fled the cities to the safety of the countryside, including two-thirds of the residents of the largest cities. Left behind were the munitions workers and government officials. Health conditions became much worse after the surrender in September 1945, with so much housing stock destroyed, and an additional 6.6 million Japanese repatriated from Manchuria, China, Indochina, Formosa, Korea, Saipan and the Philippines.^[35]

Food

The Japanese domestic food supply depended on imports, which were largely cut off by the American submarine and bombing campaigns. Likewise there was little deep sea fishing, so that the fish ration by 1941 was mostly squid harvested from coastal waters. The result was a growing food shortage, especially in the cities. There was malnutrition but no reported starvation.^[36] In Tokyo, families used the black market in late 1944 to obtain 9% of their rice, 38% of their fish, and 69% of their vegetables.^[37]

Japanese Rice Supply^[38]
Year	1937	1938	1939	1940	1941	1942	1943	1944	1945
Domestic production	9,928	9,862	10,324	9,107	8,245	9,999	9,422	8,784	6,445
Imports	2,173	2,546	1,634	1,860	2,517	2,581	1,183	874	268
All rice	12,101	12,408	11,958	10,967	10,762	12,580	10,605	9,658	6,713

Deaths

The American aerial bombing of a total of 65 Japanese cities took from 400,000 to 600,000 civilian lives, with 100,000+ in Tokyo alone, over 200,000 in Hiroshima and Nagasaki combined, and 80,000-150,000 civilian deaths in the battle of Okinawa. In addition civilian death among settlers who died attempting to return to Japan from Manchuria in the winter of 1945 were probably around 100,000. Total Japanese military fatalities between 1937 and 1945 were 2.1 million; most came in the last year of the war and were caused by starvation or severe malnutrition in garrisons cut off from supplies.^[39]

Famines

Severe food shortages were common throughout the war zones, especially in Europe where Germany used starvation as a military weapon. Japan did not use starvation as a deliberate policy, but the breakdown of its transportation and distribution systems led to famine and starvation conditions among its soldiers on many Pacific islands.^[40] Bose (1990) studies the three great Asian famines that took place during the war: Bengal in India, Honan in China, and Tonkin in Vietnam. In each famine at least two million people died. They all occurred in densely populated provinces where the subsistence foundations of agriculture was failing under the weight of demographic and market pressures. In each cases famine played a role in undermining the legitimacy of the state and the preexisting social structure.^[41]

References

Notes

^ Staff. Biological Weapons Program website of GlobalSecurity.org cites Peter Williams and David Wallace, Unit 731: Japan’s Secret Biological Warfare in World War II (New York: Free Press, 1989). and a number of UTLa most of which are no longer active
^ Chóngqìng. Blog site. This needs to be clarified - in terms of number of air raids this is true (5,000) - but not in terms of tonnage - probably < 10,000 tons.
^ Rod Kedward, Occupied France: Collaboration And Resistance 1940-1944 (1991), 96pp, is a short overview.
^ Matthew Cobb, The Resistance: The French Fight against the Nazis (2009)
^ Julian Jackson, France: The Dark Years, 1940–1944 (2003)
^ Hanna Diamond, Women and the Second World War in France, 1939-1948: Choices and Constraints (1999)
^ E. M. Collingham , The Taste of War: World War Two and the Battle for Food (2011)
^ Kenneth Mouré, "Food Rationing and the Black Market in France (1940–1944)," French History, June 2010, Vol. 24 Issue 2, p 272-3
^ Mouré, "Food Rationing and the Black Market in France (1940–1944)" pp 262-282,
^ C. Banning, C. "Food Shortage and Public Health, First Half of 1945," Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science Vol. 245, The Netherlands during German Occupation (May, 1946), pp. 93-110 in JSTOR
^ Gutman (1998)
^ Davies (2004)
^ p.70, Bishop
^ Postan (1952), Chapter 4.
^ Hancock, British War Economy online p 353
^ Titmuss (1950)
^ Brian Barton, "The Belfast Blitz: April–May 1941," History Ireland, May 1997, Vol. 5 Issue 3, pp 52-57
^ Robson S. Davison, "The Belfast Blitz," Irish Sword: Journal of the Military History Society of Ireland, Summer 1985, Vol. 16 Issue 63, pp 65-83
^ Boyd Black, "A Triumph of Voluntarism? Industrial Relations and Strikes in Northern Ireland in World War Two," Labour History Review, April 2005, Vol. 70 Issue 1, pp 5-25
^ Pierson, Ruth Roach. (1986). “They’re Still Women After All,” The Second World War and Canadian Womanhood. Ontario: McClelland & Stewart Inc. 9.
^ Gavin Long, The Six Years War (1973) p. 474.
^ Frank Crowley, ed. A New History Of Australia (1977) pp 459-503
^ Geoffrey Bolton, The Oxford History of Australia: Volume 5: 1942-1995. The Middle Way (2005)
^ Eli Daniel Potts and A. Potts, Yanks Down Under, 1941-1945: The American Impact on Australia (1986)
^ Gordon, Leonard A., Review of Prosperity and Misery in Modern Bengal: The Famine of 1943-1944 by Greenough, Paul R., The American Historical Review, Vol. 88, No. 4 (Oct., 1983), p. 1051 [1]
^ Mark Rutherford, Prelude to the final solution
^ Richard Lukas, The Other Holocaust
^ Jan Gross, Polish Society Under German Occupation
^ Roland, Charles G (1992). "Scenes of Hunger and Starvation". Courage Under Siege. New York: Oxford University Press. pp. 99–104. ISBN 978-0195062854. {{cite book}}: |access-date= requires |url= (help); External link in |chapterurl= (help); Unknown parameter |chapterurl= ignored (|chapter-url= suggested) (help); Unknown parameter |site= ignored (help); Unknown parameter |subtitle= ignored (help)
^ "Odot" (PDF). Jerusalem: Yad Vashem.
^ Czesław Madajczyk "Polityka III Rzeszy w okupowanej Polsce" Państwowe Wydawnictwo Naukowe, Warszawa 1970, p.226 volume 2
^ Walter Felscher (1997-01-27). "Recycling and rationing in wartime Germany". Memories of the 1940's mailing list archive. Retrieved 2006-09-28. {{cite web}}: External link in |publisher= (help)
^ Thomas R. H. Havens, Valley of Darkness: The Japanese People and World War Two (1978) p 108
^ Havens, pp 135-37
^ Havens, pp 145, 154 161-3, 167
^ Collingham. The Taste of War (2011) pp 228-47
^ Havens, 125
^ Cohen, (1949) Japan's Economy in War and Reconstruction p 368-9
^ John Dower, "Lessons from Iwo Jima," Perspectives (Sept 2007) 45#6 pp 54-56 at [2]
^ Collinham (2011)
^ Sugata Bose, "Starvation amidst Plenty: The Making of Famine in Bengal, Honan and Tonkin, 1942-45," Modern Asian Studies, July 1990, Vol. 24 Issue 4, pp 699-727 in JSTOR

Sources

Cohen, Jerome (1949). Japan's Economy in War and Reconstruction. University of Minnesota Press. online version.
Collingham, E. M. The Taste of War: World War Two and the Battle for Food (2011), broad survey of most countries
Davies, Norman (2004). Rising '44: The Battle for Warsaw. Vikiing. ISBN 0-67003284-0.
Gutman, Israel (1994). Resistance: The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. Houghton Mifflin. ISBN 978-039560199-0.
Hancock, W. K. and Gowing, M.M. (1949). British War Economy: History of the Second World War: United Kingdom Civil Series. London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on-line at: British War Economy.
Harrison, Mark (1988). "Resource Mobilization for World War II: The U.S.A., UK, USSR and Germany, 1938-1945". In: Economic History Review, (1988): pp 171–92.
Postan, Michael (1952). British War Production: History of the Second World War: United Kingdom Civil Series. London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on-line at: British War Production.
Titmuss, Richard M. (1950). Problems of Social Policy: 'History of the Second World War: United Kingdom Civil Series. London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on-line at: Problems of Social Policy.

Bibliography

General

Beck, Earl R. The European Home Fronts, 1939-1945 Harlan Davidson, 1993, brief
Costello, John. Love, Sex, and War: Changing Values, 1939-1945 1985. US title: Virtue under Fire: How World War II Changed Our Social and Sexual Attitudes
Collingham, E. M. The Taste of War: World War Two and the Battle for Food (2011)
Dear, I.C.B. and M.R.D. Foot, eds. The Oxford Companion to World War II (1995), detailed articles on every country
Harrison, Mark. "Resource Mobilization for World War II: The U.S.A., UK, USSR and Germany, 1938-1945". Economic History Review (1988): 171-92.
Higonnet, Margaret R., et al., eds. Behind the Lines: Gender and the Two World Wars Yale UP, 1987.
Hitchcock, William I. The Bitter Road to Freedom: The Human Cost of Allied Victory in World War II Europe (2009)
Loyd, E. Lee, ed.; World War II in Europe, Africa, and the Americas, with General Sources: A Handbook of Literature and Research Greenwood Press. 1997. 525pp bibliographic guide
Loyd, E. Lee, ed.; World War II in Asia and the Pacific and the War's aftermath, with General Themes: A Handbook of Literature and Research Greenwood Press, 1998
Marwick, Arthur. War and Social Change in the Twentieth Century: A Comparative Study of Britain, France, Germany, Russia, and the United States 1974.
Mazower, Mark. Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe (2009)
Milward, Alan. War, Economy and Society 1977 covers homefront of major participants
Noakes, Jeremy ed., The Civilian in War: The Home Front in Europe, Japan and the U.S.A. in World War II Exeter, UK: University of Exeter, 1992.
Wright, Gordon. The Ordeal of Total War 1968., covers all of Europe
Yust, Walter, ed. 10 Eventful Years: 1937-1946 4 vol. Encyclopedia Britannica, 1947. Highly detailed encyclopedia of events in every country.
WWII Homefront - Collection of color photographs of the homefront during World War II

Australia and New Zealand

S.J. Butlin and C.B. Schedvin, War Economy 1942–1945, Australian War Memorial, Canberra, 1997
Darian-Smith, Kate. On the Home Front: Melbourne in Wartime, 1939-1945. Australia: Oxford UP, 1990.
Saunders, Kay. War on the Homefront: State Intervention in Queensland, 1938-1948 (1993)
The Home Front Volume I by Nancy M. Taylor NZ official history (1986)
The Home Front Volume II by Nancy M. Taylor NZ official history (1986)
Political and External Affairs by Frederick Lloyd Whitfeld (1958) NZ official history

Britain

Brivati, Brian, and Harriet Jones, ed. What Difference Did the War Make? The Impact of the Second World War on British Institutions and Culture. Leicester UP; 1993.
Calder, Angus . The People's War: Britain 1939-45 (1969)
Corelli, Barnett. The Audit of War: The Illusion and Reality of Britain as a Great Nation. 1986.
Hancock, W. K. and Gowing, M.M. (1949) British War Economy (official History of the Second World War). London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on line at: British War Economy.
Hancock, W. K. (1951) Statistical Digest of the War (official History of the Second World War). London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on line at: Statistical Digest of the War.
Harris, Carol (2000). Women at War 1939-1945: The Home Front. Thrupp: Sutton Publishing Limited. ISBN 0-7509-2536-1.
Marwick, Arthur (1976). The Home Front: The British and the Second World War. .
Postan, Michael (1952) British War Production (official History of the Second World War). London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on line at: British War Production.
Rose, Sonya O. (2003) Which People's War?: National Identity and Citizenship in Wartime Britain 1939-1945
Titmuss, Richard M. (1950) Problems of Social Policy. (official History of the Second World War). London: HMSO and Longmans, Green & Co. Available on line at: Problems of Social Policy official history