Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia The Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia ( ; ) was the majority ethnic - Czech protectorate which Nazi Germany established in the central parts of Bohemia , Moravia and Czech Silesia in what is today the Czech Republic . It was established on 15 March 1939 by a proclamation of Adolf Hitler from the Prague Castle , following the establishment of the independent Slovak Republic on 14 March 1939 . Bohemia and Moravia were autonomous Nazi - administered territories which the German government considered part of the Greater German Reich . The state ' s existence came to an end with the surrender of Germany to the Allies in 1945 . History . The Sudetenland , located on the Czechoslovak border with Germany and Austria proper , with its majority of ethnic German inhabitants , had been incorporated directly into the Reich on 10 October 1938 , when Czechoslovakia was forced to accept the terms of the Munich Agreement . Five months later , when the Slovak Diet declared the independence of Slovakia , Hitler summoned Czechoslovak President Emil Hácha to Berlin and intimidated him into accepting the German occupation of the Czech rump state and its reorganisation as a German protectorate . Hácha remained as technical head of state with the title of State President , but was rendered all but powerless . Real power was vested in the Reichsprotektor , who served as Hitler ' s personal representative . To appease outraged international opinion , Hitler appointed former foreign minister Konstantin von Neurath to the post . German officials manned departments analogous to cabinet ministries , while small German control offices were established locally . The SS assumed police authority ; Reichsführer - SS and Reich police chief Heinrich Himmler named the former Sudeten German leader Karl Hermann Frank the protectorate ' s police chief and ranking SS officer . Jews were dismissed from the civil service and placed outside of the legal system . Political parties and trade unions were banned , and the press and radio were subjected to harsh censorship . Many Communist Party leaders fled to the Soviet Union . The population of the protectorate was mobilized for labor that would aid the German war effort , and special offices were organized to supervise the management of industries important to that effort . Czechs were drafted to work in coal mines , the iron and steel industry , and armaments production ; some young people were sent to Germany . Consumer goods production , much diminished , was largely directed toward supplying the German armed forces . The protectorate ' s population was subjected to strict rationing . German rule was moderate — at least by Nazi standards — during the first months of the occupation . The Czech government and political system , reorganized by Hácha , continued in formal existence . Gestapo activities were directed mainly against Czech politicians and the intelligentsia . The eventual goal of the German state under Nazi leadership was to eradicate Czech nationality through assimilation and deportation , and the extermination of the Czech intelligentsia ; the intellectual elites and middle class made up a considerable number of the 200 , 000 people who passed through concentration camps and the 250 , 000 who died during German occupation . Under Generalplan Ost , it was assumed that around 50 % of Czechs would be fit for Germanization . The Czech intellectual elites were to be removed not only from Czech territories but from Europe completely . The authors of Generalplan Ost believed it would be best if they emigrated overseas , as even in Siberia they were considered a threat to German rule . Just like Jews , Poles , Serbs , and several other nations , Czechs were considered to be untermenschen by the Nazi state . The Czechs demonstrated against the occupation on 28 October 1939 , the 21st anniversary of Czechoslovak independence . The death on 15 November 1939 of a medical student , Jan Opletal , who had been wounded in the October violence , precipitated widespread student demonstrations , and the Reich retaliated . Politicians were arrested en masse , as were an estimated 1 , 800 students and teachers . On 17 November , all universities and colleges in the protectorate were closed , nine student leaders were executed , and 1 , 200 were sent to concentration camp in Sachsenhausen within Nazi Germany ; further arrests and executions of Czech students and professors were made later during the occupation . ( " See also Czech resistance to Nazi occupation " ) During World War II , Hitler decided that Neurath wasn ' t treating the Czechs harshly enough and adopted a more radical policy in the protectorate . On 29 September 1941 , Hitler appointed SS hardliner Reinhard Heydrich as Deputy Reichsprotektor . At the same time , Neurath was relieved of his day - to - day duties , so for all intents and purposes Heydrich replaced Neurath as Reichsprotektor . Under Heydrich ' s authority Prime Minister Alois Eliáš was arrested ( and later executed ) , the Czech government was reorganized , and all Czech cultural organizations were closed . The Gestapo indulged in arrests and executions . 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 . On 4 June 1942 , Heydrich died after being wounded by an assassin in Operation Anthropoid . Following directives issued by , Heydrich ' s successor , SS - Oberstgruppenführer Kurt Daluege , ordered mass arrests , executions and the obliteration of the villages of Lidice and Ležáky . In 1943 the German war effort was accelerated . Under the authority of Karl Hermann Frank , German minister of state for Bohemia and Moravia , some 400 , 000 Czechs were used as forced labor by the German Reich . Within the protectorate , all non - war - related industry was prohibited . Most of the Czech population obeyed quietly up until the final months preceding the end of the war , when thousands were involved in the resistance movement . For the Czechs of the Protectorate Bohemia and Moravia , German occupation was a period of brutal oppression . Czech losses resulting from political persecution and deaths in concentration camps totalled between 36 , 000 and 55 , 000 . The Jewish population of Bohemia and Moravia ( 118 , 000 according to the 1930 census ) was virtually annihilated , with over 75 , 000 murdered . Of the 92 , 199 people classified as Jews by German authorities in the Protectorate as of 1939 , 78 , 154 perished in Holocaust , or 84 . 8 percent Many Jews emigrated after 1939 ; 8 , 000 survived at Terezín concentration camp ( which was used for propaganda purpose as showpiece ) . Several thousand Jews managed to live in freedom or in hiding throughout the occupation . The extermination of the Romani population was so thorough that the Bohemian Romani language became totally extinct . Romani internees were sent to the Lety and Hodonín concentration camps before being transferred to Auschwitz - Birkenau for gassing . The vast majority of Romani in the Czech Republic today are actually descended from migrants from Slovakia who moved there during the post - war years in Czechoslovakia . Politics . After the establishment of the Protectorate all political parties were outlawed , with the exception of the National Union ( Národní souručenství ) . This local Czech Fascist party was led by a ruling Presidium until 1942 , after which a Vůdce ( Leader ) for the party was appointed . German government . Ultimate authority within the Protectorate was held by the Reich Protector ( " Reichsprotektor " ) , the area ' s senior Nazi administrator , whose task it was to represent the " interests " of the German state . The office and title were held by a variety of persons during the Protectorate ' s existence . In succession these were : Konstantin von Neurath , former Foreign Minister of Nazi Germany , Minister without Portfolio until 1943 . He was removed from office after Hitler ' s dissatisfaction with his " soft policies " in 1941 , although he still held the title until his official resignation in 1943 . Reinhard Heydrich , chief of the " SS - Reichssicherheitshauptamt " ( Reich Main Security Office ) or RSHA . He was officially only a deputy to Neurath , but in reality was granted supreme authority over the entire state apparatus of the Protectorate . Kurt Daluege , Chief of the " Ordnungspolizei " ( Order Police ) or Orpo , in the Interior Ministry , who was also officially a deputy Reich Protector . Wilhelm Frick , former Minister of the Interior . Next to the Reich Protector there was also a political office of State Secretary ( from 1943 known as the State Minister to the Reich Protector ) who handled most of the internal security . From 1939 to 1945 this person was Karl Hermann Frank the senior SS and Police Leader in the Protectorate . A " paper command " of the Allgemeine - SS , with no operational authority , was also established known as the SS - Oberabschnitt Böhmen - Mähren . Czech government . The Czech State President ( Státní Prezident ) under the period of German rule from 1939 to 1945 was Emil Hácha ( 1872 – 1945 ) , who had been the President of the Second Czechoslovak Republic since November 1938 . Rudolf Beran ( 1887 – 1954 ) initially still held the office of Minister President ( Předseda vlády ) after the German take - over . He was soon 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 . Because of his contacts with the Czechoslovak Government - in - Exile Eliáš was sentenced to death , with the execution carried out on 19 June 1942 shortly after Heydrich ' s own death . From 19 January 1942 the government was led by Jaroslav Krejčí , and from January to May 1945 by Richard Bienert , the former police chief of Prague . When the official dissolution of the Protectorate was proclaimed after the Liberation of Prague a radio call was issued for Bienert ' s arrest . This resulted in his conviction to a three - year prison term in 1947 , during which he died in 1949 . 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 . The area ' s foreign policy and military defence were under the exclusive control of the German government . The former foreign minister of Czechoslovakia František Chvalkovský became a Minister without Portfolio and permanent representative of the Czech administration in Berlin . The most prominent Czech politicians in the Protectorate included : Population . The area of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia contained about 7 , 380 , 000 inhabitants in 1940 . 225 , 000 ( 3 . 3 % ) of these were of German origin , while the rest were mainly ethnic Czechs as well as some Slovaks , particularly near the border with Slovakia . The protectorate was projected to become ethnically totally German . 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 . This consisted mainly of industrial workers and farmers . The undesirable half contained also the intelligentsia , whom the Nazis viewed as ungermanizable and potential dangerous instigators of Czech nationalism . Some 9 , 000 Volksdeutsche from Bukovina , Dobruja , South Tyrol , Bessarabia , Sudetenland and the Altreich were settled in the protectorate during the war . The goal was to create a German settlement belt from Prague to Sudetenland , and to turn the surroundings of Olomouc ( Olmütz ) , České Budějovice ( Budweis ) , Brno ( Brünn ) and the area near the Slovak border into German enclaves . Further integration of the protectorate into the Reich was carried out by the employment of German apprentices , by transferring German evacuee children into schools located in the protectorate , and by authorizing marriages between Germans and " assimilable " Czechs . Germanizable Czechs were allowed to join the Reich Labour Service and to be admitted to German universities . Administrative subdivisions . Protectorate Districts . For administrative purposes the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia was divided into two Lands ; Böhmen ( Bohemia ) and Mähren ( Moravia ) . Each of these was further subdivided into " Oberlandratsbezirke " , each comprising a number of " Bezirke " . NSDAP Districts . For party administrative purposes the Nazi Party extended its Gau - system to Bohemia and Moravia when the Protectorate was established . 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 Third Reich era . Seeking to extend their own powerbase and to facilitate the area ' s " Aryanization " the Gauleiter s of the surrounding districts continually agitated for the liquidation of the Protectorate and its direct incorporation into the German Reich . Hitler stated as late as 1943 that the issue was still to be decisively settled .