White Rose movement public memorial, Munich. Adam Jones/Wikimedia commons. Public domain. In his 2016 book Nonviolent Resistance to the Nazis George Paxton, a Trustee of the Gandhi Foundation, sets out what is effectively secret history in a culture that reveres the violent struggle against Nazi Germany – Dunkirk and Churchill being the latest films that focus on the military campaign.
Ian Sinclair (IS): What was the scale of the nonviolent resistance to the Nazis in occupied Europe? What were some of the methods used?
George Paxton (GP): The extent of nonviolent resistance used against the occupiers varied from country to country with the most active probably being Norway, Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands. The attitude of the Nazis to Eastern Europe, which they wanted to clear of its population in order to settle Germans, meant that the resistance was different in nature.
