New Order (Nazism)

Plans for Great Britain

Throughout the 1930s, a primary German foreign policy objective was a military alliance with the United Kingdom. Despite adopting anti-British policies in 1939, German leadership maintained hope that the UK would eventually become a reliable ally. Hitler admired the British Empire and preferred its preservation as a world power, fearing its collapse would disproportionately benefit the United States and the Japanese Empire. German planners envisioned a defeated Britain fulfilling a role similar to the Austrian Empire after the 1866 Austro-Prussian War: excluded from continental affairs, but maintaining its colonies as a seafaring partner to secure White supremacy globally.^[26][27]

Historian William L. Shirer notes that German occupation plans included transferring British men aged 17 to 45 to the continent for slave labor. German soldiers were expected to impregnate British women to "Germanize" the population within two generations. The remaining civilians would be terrorized through hostage-taking and the imposition of the death penalty for minor acts of resistance. The UK was to be stripped of its financial, industrial, and cultural assets, with its manufacturing output redirected to support the Eastern Front.^[28] The Einsatzgruppen, led by Franz Six, were tasked with executing political, intellectual, and public figures who opposed Nazism. Furthermore, Otto Bräutigam of the Reich Ministry for the Occupied Eastern Territories later claimed that Heinrich Himmler intended for the Sicherheitsdienst to exterminate roughly 80% of the French and British populations following a German victory.^[29]

Contingent upon the invasion of Great Britain (Operation Sea Lion), Germany planned to invade neutral Ireland (Operation Green).^[30] By occupying northeastern France, Hitler intended to marginalize Britain and prevent future continental challenges. While evidence suggests the monarchy would have survived, Germany explored fragmenting the UK. Proposals included uniting Northern Ireland with the Republic of Ireland to secure support from the Irish Republican Army (which drafted Plan Kathleen),^[31][32] and establishing an independent, republican Scotland as a socialist-nationalist counterweight to capitalist England. Ultimately, neither Britain nor Ireland was invaded.^[33]

Plans for France

Nazi Germany viewed historical French belligerence—from the Thirty Years' War to the Treaty of Versailles—as a permanent threat. Anticipating a rapid conclusion to the western campaign, Hitler sought to turn France into a long-term vassal state so he could focus on his Ostpolitik. In May 1940, Hitler instructed Interior Ministry State Secretary Wilhelm Stuckart to draft proposals for a new western border. Stuckart's June 1940 memorandum proposed annexing territories in Eastern France that were historically part of the Holy Roman Empire, establishing a "Westraum" for the Reich. Short-term plans involved integrating Inner Rhineland border areas and the Ruhr with Alsace–Lorraine, Eupen-Malmedy, the Saarland, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, and northeastern France. Long-term ambitions included annexing Switzerland, Burgundy, and Savoy (stretching to the Mediterranean Sea, akin to historical Lotharingia) into the Gau Westmark.^[34][35][36]

To accomplish this, Germany occupied the Low Countries to strip France of its buffer states and natural borders along the Rhine. Germany then planned to annex Northern France (Nord and Pas-de-Calais) alongside the formal re-annexation of Alsace and Moselle. German strategists also prepared to colonize the Zone interdite in the Somme, Aisne, and Ardennes to establish a Germanic Thiois buffer zone (Project Burgund). The Armistice of 22 June 1940 formalized French economic subordination, established the collaborationist Vichy France regime, and created a military occupation zone to construct the Atlantic Wall.^[37][34] Germany also considered rewarding Italy with the occupation of Corsica, Nice, and Savoy. Broadly, the Latin nations (Portugal, Spain, and Italy) were to be reduced to total German dependency.^[38]

German planners sought to permanently integrate France into the New Order by exploiting reactionary and crypto-fascist collaborationist movements, such as the French Popular Party and the National Popular Rally. While Nazi ideologues generally distrusted traditionalist Catholic and aristocratic elements (viewing their values as incompatible with totalitarian Nazism), Hitler pragmatically supported movements like Action Française to destabilize the liberal French Third Republic.^[39] Germany ultimately hoped to co-opt Vichy France's Révolution nationale, purging its royalist and ultramontane elements to fully fascisize the state and utilize French cultural influence to spread fascism throughout Western civilization.^[40][41]

Hitler also supported separatist movements resentful of French centralism and coercive Francization. This strategy served to fragment the country and threaten French politicians with the prospect of permanent Balkanization. German authorities engaged with Breton nationalists, offering vague prospects of an independent Breton state to maintain leverage over Vichy France. Similar exploratory contacts were made with Basque nationalist leaders, such as Eugène Goyheneche, regarding a potential puppet state to exert pressure on both France and Spain.^[42][43]

Plans for Netherlands

Nazi Germany considered the Dutch people and the Walloons of the Benelux region racially assimilable.^[44] Initially, German authorities tolerated local fascist groups like the Vlaamsch Nationaal Verbond and Nederlandsche Unie, which sought a self-determining Greater Netherlands under Nazi patronage.^[45] Dutch fascists, led by Anton Mussert, envisioned a "Dietsland" (uniting the Netherlands and Flanders) that would operate as a maritime equal to Germany. Mussert argued that Dutch colonial expertise was vital for defending the colonial empire against British^[46] and Japanese rivals, proposing the reclamation of historical territories (such as the Dutch Cape Colony and New Netherland) to unite the Dutch Volk. Hitler offered non-committal responses regarding the Dutch East Indies to string along Dutch collaborators, while privately conceding the territory to Japan.^[47]

However, Germany's long-term goal was the complete annexation of the Low Countries into the Reich, later accelerated by the 1944 creation of Reichsgau Flandern and Reichsgau Wallonien. German administrators implemented Flamenpolitik—promoting Germanist groups like DeVlag and the National Socialist Movement of the Netherlands to dissolve distinct national identities.^[48][45][49] The Nazis viewed the Dutch and Flemish people merely as regional variants of the German race speaking a German dialect. In the New Order, the Low Countries were expected to provide settlers for the Lebensraum in Eastern Europe. The SS argued that the era of maritime colonialism was obsolete, insisting that valuable Dutch "Aryan" blood should be used to colonize Soviet territory rather than mixing with populations in the tropics.^[50][51]

Adolf Hitler also reportedly considered establishing a "Burgundian Free State" in 1943, as relayed to Heinrich Himmler's personal physician, Felix Kersten. This proposed state, modeled on the medieval Burgundian State and governed by the SS under Léon Degrelle, would have encompassed Picardy, Artois, Hainault, Champagne, Luxembourg, Lorraine, Franche-Comté, Burgundy, Dauphiné, and Provence. Hitler considered making either Rheims or Troyes the capital of this Lotharingian state. Himmler envisioned Burgundy as a model state, allegedly telling Kersten that France, due to its perceived degeneracy, would be stripped of its unjustly annexed territories and reduced to a minor state known merely as "Gaul."^[52][53]

Plans for Northern Europe

Nazi philosophers held the Nordic countries in high esteem, categorizing their populations as "racially suitable" Aryans due to their shared Germanic heritage. The Nazis viewed the Viking expansion as a historical model and considered Scandinavians racially purer than Southern Germans, as they were free from the perceived miscegenation promoted by the Habsburg monarchy, the House of Wittelsbach, and the Catholic Church. Consequently, Nordic populations were slated for relatively lenient treatment under occupation, though resistance was met with strict suppression.^[54][55] The Germanic SS was tasked with cultivating a pro-Germanic elite to facilitate the region's eventual absorption into the Reich. Local fascist movements, such as the National Socialist Workers' Party of Denmark and the National Socialist Workers' Party (Sweden), proposed a Nazi-sponsored Scandinavian alliance akin to the Kalmar Union to serve as a bulwark against Soviet expansionism. However, the Nazis expected these movements to renounce historical imperial ambitions (such as the Swedish Empire), intending instead to turn the Baltic Sea into a "Germanic Lake." This friction alienated some Nordic fascists, who advocated for a polycentric international fascism rather than strict subservience to the Rome-Berlin Axis. In response, Germany prepared to leverage Norwegian nationalist and anti-Swedish sentiment to pressure Denmark and Sweden into compliance.^[56]

Plans for Norway

In occupied Norway, Germany initially sought to negotiate with the government of Haakon VII. They ultimately established the Quisling regime—a puppet state nominally led by Norwegian fascist Vidkun Quisling—while actual authority remained with the Reichskommissariat Norwegen under Josef Terboven. Although the Nazis occasionally signaled that Norway might eventually regain nominal independence as a northern province, they treated Quisling's movement primarily as an occupying tool.^[63][64] The Germanic SS considered supporting Norwegian irredentist claims to the Faroes, Orkney, Shetland, the Outer Hebrides, Iceland, and potentially Greenland, contingent upon Norwegian military contributions and Danish compliance.^[65] Additional expansionist proposals included claiming polar territories to counter British and Russian Arctic interests, establishing an eastern territory (Austrveg) in the Kola Peninsula, and annexing Swedish provinces (Jämtland, Härjedalen, and Bohuslän) if Sweden joined the Allies.^[66][67] Furthermore, Germany planned to construct Nordsternref>"Trials of German Major War Criminals: Volume 2". 26 January 2013. Archived from the original on 26 January 2013. Retrieved 28 October 2024.</ref>, a heavily fortified, German-populated naval city in Norway to project power across the North Atlantic. Regarding Sweden, Germany maintained contingency plans for invasion throughout the war. Long-term goals included integrating Sweden into the Germanic Reich, empowering the National Socialist Workers' Party (Sweden), and extending the Holocaust by establishing concentration camps in Sjöbo and Stora Karlsö.^[68]

Plans for the Iberian Peninsula

During the early years of the war, Spanish dictator Francisco Franco contemplated joining the Axis powers. In exchange, Falangist leaders presented numerous territorial claims to Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini. On June 16, 1940, Franco laid claim to the French Basque Country, Catalan-speaking Roussillon, Cerdagne, and Andorra. Spain also sought to annex Gibraltar from the United Kingdom for its strategic value, and called for the reunification of Morocco as a Spanish protectorate. Further demands included the annexation of the Oran district from French Algeria and the expansion of Spanish Guinea into French Cameroon. This latter project conflicted with Hitler's intention to reclaim German Cameroon. Additionally, Spain pursued a federation with Portugal based on historical ties like the Iberian Union. However, Hitler showed little interest in Franco's extensive irredentist demands, preferring to avoid the economic burden of supporting Spain and recognizing that Spanish ambitions clashed with Germany's need to cooperate with Vichy France. Hitler made only vague promises regarding French Morocco and Salazarist Portugal, instead pressing Franco to allow the Wehrmacht into the Iberian Peninsula if the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance was activated. Franco refused, fearing German betrayal and attempting to convince Hitler that Spain could achieve these conquests independently—a proposition German leadership dismissed due to their low estimation of Spanish military capabilities.^[75]

German leadership rejected the concept of an independent Greater Catalonia—as proposed by Spanish anarchists—viewing it as a traditional French buffer state that would secure French power in the Mediterranean. Conversely, the Axis powers favored a Greater Spain to strategically encircle France. The Nazis hoped to elevate Spain to counter French influence, forcing Spain to align permanently with the Italo-German coalition.^[76] Ultimately, however, Hitler intended to maintain Spain as a dependent client state. He confessed to General Franz Halder that his strategy was "to promise the Spanish anything they wanted, regardless of whether the promise could be fulfilled," aiming to limit Spanish empowerment to what strictly served German interests. Diplomat Eberhard von Stohrer summarized this dynamic: "Spain cannot expect us to provide them with a new colonial empire through our victories and receive nothing in return."^[75]

In the summer of 1940, Hitler considered occupying the Portuguese territories of the Azores, Cape Verde, and Madeira, as well as the Spanish Canary Islands, to deny the British a staging ground in the Atlantic. In September, Hitler offered Spanish Foreign Minister Ramón Serrano Súñer control of French Morocco in exchange for transferring one of the Canary Islands to German usage. Later that month, Serrano Súñer met with German Foreign Minister Joachim von Ribbentrop in Berlin to discuss Spain's potential entry into the war. The two diplomats quickly developed a mutual animosity. Ribbentrop informed Serrano Súñer that in return for military and economic aid—and allowing the return of Gibraltar—Germany required the annexation of at least one Canary Island, extraterritorial naval and air bases in Spanish Guinea and Spanish Morocco, and an economic treaty granting German companies control over Spanish mines. Serrano Súñer was reportedly shocked by these demands, which would have effectively reduced Spain to an economic colony and satellite state.^[77]

Following Spain's refusal to enter the war at the Meeting at Hendaye and the reinforcement of the Iberian Pact ensuring Portuguese neutrality, Germany planned to invade both nations under Operation Felix. The Iberian Peninsula was to be integrated into the Atlantic Wall, with coastal cities and islands seized for German naval facilities. Portugal would also be forced to cede Portuguese Mozambique and Portuguese Angola to Germany's Mittelafrika project. This strategic shift was accompanied by growing anti-Hispanic sentiment among German leadership. Hitler labeled the Spanish and Portuguese as opportunists for delaying their entry until Great Britain was defeated, viewing this hesitation as evidence of the "Latin race's" inferiority compared to the "Germanic race." Consequently, German military advisors concluded that Spain's internal deterioration made it a useless political partner, determining that Germany should seize its essential objectives, such as Gibraltar, without Spanish participation.^[75]

Plans for Italian Sphere in Mediterranean Europe

Initially focused on Northern Europe and Eastern Europe, Nazi Germany's short-term interest in the Mediterranean World was primarily military, aiming to prevent an Allied invasion through Fascist Italy or Yugoslavia. Although Hitler personally respected Benito Mussolini, Nazi leadership generally viewed Italians as racially inferior and ideologically impure. Consequently, the Pact of Steel functioned more as a marriage of convenience than a partnership of equals. The two regimes harbored mutual distrust regarding their respective spheres of influence, with Italy viewing Germany as a threat to its interests in Central Europe and the Balkans.^[78][79] Radical adherents of the Volksgemeinschaft anticipated a future conflict with Italy over the Tyrolean Question, which they viewed as an opportunity to subordinate Italy and establish the Third Reich as the sole successor to the Roman Empire. Nazi racial theorists justified this by claiming the patrician elite of the Roman Empire were actually of Aryan descent. Conversely, Italian fascists often viewed Germanic peoples as uncultured barbarians, arguing that the "Italian Race" derived its superiority from its Roman cultural legacy rather than strict biological purity.^[80]

German contempt for Latin Europe was evident during the Meeting at Hendaye and the subsequent Montoire and Saint-Florentin meetings, where Vichy France was consolidated as a subordinate client state and a source of slave labor. Despite Pétain's offers of closer collaboration, Nazi leadership prevented the restoration of French sovereignty, intending to exploit the French economy permanently. In response to German dominance, Mussolini and Franco promoted the formation of a Latin Bloc—a "Rome-Madrid axis" incorporating Vichy France. While nominally aligned with the Axis goal of expelling the British from the Mediterranean basin (targeting Gibraltar, Malta, and Cyprus), the Bloc also served to balance power against German hegemony.^[81] In 1941, Fascist Romania proposed expanding the alliance to the Black Sea, and António de Oliveira Salazar expressed interest in incorporating Portugal. Vichy diplomats even attempted to recruit Vatican City to legitimize the Bloc through Catholic social teaching, though Pope Pius XII refused to endorse the overtly totalitarian and anti-Semitic regimes. Nazi Germany viewed these pan-Latin maneuverings with intense suspicion, actively working to undermine the project's viability.^[82]

Plans for the Balkans

Nazi Germany initially intended to concede the Eastern Mediterranean and the Balkans to the Italian sphere of influence, prioritizing the upcoming Nazi-Soviet War. However, following political upheaval in Yugoslavia, Hitler intervened directly, backing Croatian nationalists to partition the state and neutralize perceived Serbian Anglophilia. This intervention angered Mussolini, who viewed the Adriatic Sea as an exclusive Italian domain. To appease Italy, Germany facilitated Italian annexations in Slovenia, Dalmatia,^[83][84] and Montenegro. The crowning of Prince Aimone of the House of Savoy as the nominal king of the Independent State of Croatia seemingly confirmed Italian primacy over the Southern Slavic peoples. Additionally, Germany and Italy rewarded allied regional movements, granting territorial concessions to Albanian nationalists, Bulgaria, and Hungary.^[85]

Greece was similarly expected to fall under Italian protectorship. Axis plans involved partitioning the Hellenic State, transferring Chameria (Thesprotia) to Albania, and granting Vardar Macedonia and parts of Western Thrace to Bulgaria.^[86] Italy sought to annex the Ionian Islands, Crete, and the Sporades. Axis authorities planned forced population transfers and cultural assimilation campaigns to secure these new borders, while encouraging minority groups like the Pomaks and Aromanians to form localized client states (such as the Principality of Pindus).^[87][88] Additionally, SS officer Walter Blume proposed the "Chaos Thesis"—a policy of executing the Greek political elite to render the country leaderless and easily controlled—though diplomat Hermann Neubacher successfully opposed the measure, arguing that retaining an anti-communist leadership was necessary to manage partisan resistance.^[89]

Following the outbreak of the Italian Civil War and the Armistice of Cassibile, the Nazis moved to absorb the Italian sphere of influence into the German Reich. German plans involved reducing the Italian Social Republic to a puppet state and annexing strategic territories directly. The Operational Zone of the Adriatic Littoral (including Istria) was slated for annexation to the Reichsgau of Carinthia, while the Operational Zone of the Alpine Foothills was to join Reichsgau Tirol-Vorarlberg. In the long term, Nazi strategists envisioned conquering Northern Italy to restore historical German imperial borders, utilizing the ethnic complexity of the Adriatic region to promote segmentation and establish German cultural supremacy over the Balkans.^[90][91][92]

Establishment of German domination in Southeast Europe

Prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union, German hegemony in Southeast Europe was established through a network of client states (Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, and Croatia) and direct military occupations in Serbia and Greece. To secure permanent control over the Danube basin, Hitler planned to establish fortified military bases in Thessaloniki and Belgrade (proposed to be renamed Prinz-Eugen-Stadt). In 1941, SS Brigade Chief Wilhelm Stuckart drafted a memorandum proposing the creation of a South German Buffer State, variously referred to as Prinz-Eugen-Gau or Reichsgau Banat comprising ethnic Germans from the Banat. This autonomous territory would ensure German supremacy over the regional economy and facilitate further resettlement of ethnic Germans.^[93][94][95]

Even without direct annexation, the remaining Southeast European states would have operated as deeply dependent satellites within the German economic orbit, akin to World War I-era Mitteleuropa concepts.^{[citation needed]} To solidify regional control, Hungarian fascist leader Ferenc Szálasi proposed a "Carpathian-Danubian federation," a system of con-nationalism designed to accommodate non-Hungarian minorities under a unified fascist framework to counter Yugoslav Partisans. Nazi officials considered supporting this federation, viewing it as a mechanism to exploit local ethnic conflicts, mediate disputes, and maintain a pliant buffer state against Soviet influence.^[96]

Plans for Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine

Rosenberg sought to eliminate the Russian state to permanently neutralize "Greater Russiandom" (Großrussentum) and pan-Slavism. To achieve this, Nazi officials proposed exploiting ethnic divisions through divide and conquer strategies. In March 1942, anthropologist Otto Reche advocated replacing the concept of Russia with medieval Slavic ethnicities like the Vyatichs and Severians.Burleigh, Michael (1988). Germany turns eastwards: a study of Ostforschung in the Third Reich, 8:1991. CUP Archive. pp. 224–227. ISBN 0-521-35120-0.</ref> This was to be solved by exploiting ethnic centrifugal forces and limiting the influence of "Greater Russiandom" (Großrussentum) by promoting segmentation in the manner of divide and conquer.^[104]

Rosenberg perceived Belarusians as the "least dangerous" Eastern people, intending to use Belarus as a dumping ground for undesirable demographics and eventually convert the territory into a nature reserve. In 1940, Himmler similarly proposed splintering Eastern European populations into localized ethnic groups (such as Gorals, Lemkos, and Kashubians) while assimilating any "racially valuable" individuals into Germany. In April 1942, Erhard Wetzel of the NSDAP Office of Racial Policy detailed plans to divide Reichskommissariat Moskowien into loosely tied districts to undermine Russian national cohesion. Additionally, Himmler considered exporting the Jehovah's Witnesses faith to the occupied East, believing their pacifism would foster submissiveness, despite the ongoing persecution of the group within Germany.^{[citation needed]}

Nazi leadership also discussed replacing the Cyrillic script with the German alphabet and giving Russian cities Germanized names (e.g., renaming Novgorod to Holmgard). In 1942, the Interior Ministry issued semantic guidelines aimed at erasing Russian imperial identity.^[105] The term "Russia" was restricted to the pre-1917 Russian Empire, while the subsequent Soviet period was labeled "Bolshevik chaos." Historical terms like Little Russia (Ukraine) and Russian Asia (Siberia) were banned as expressions of "Muscovite imperialism." Similarly, the term "Tatars" was replaced with specific regional identifiers like "Idel-Uralian" and "Azerbaijanis" to diminish broader Russian linguistic influence.^[106]

Plans for Baltic Region

Nazi anthropologists viewed the Baltic peoples (Estonians, Latvians, and Lithuanians) as largely assimilable.^[107] The long-term goal was their Germanization, inspired by the historical Ostsiedlung, with the region ultimately incorporated into the Greater Germanic Reich. Initially, the territory was to be named Reichskommissariat Baltenland, but the inclusion of West Belarus led to the adoption of Reichskommissariat Ostland to avoid signaling impending autonomy to local nationalists. During the occupation, German authorities initially tolerated but subsequently suppressed nationalist groups like the Lithuanian Activist Front and the Latvian diplomatic service. The region was divided into four Generalbezirke ruled by German civil administrators, who actively repressed both Soviet partisans and Baltic independence movements.^{[citation needed]}

Plans for the Caucasus

Conquering the Caucasus was a priority due to its vital oil reserves^[108] (particularly in Baku) and its strategic value for projecting power into the Greater Middle East and linking with the Japanese Empire. To secure the region, Germany was willing to offer concessions to anti-Russian populations, such as the Chechens and Azerbaijanis. These concessions included potential autonomous units within the Reichskommissariat Kaukasien^[109] or the establishment of client states to avoid antagonizing neighboring Turkey and Iran. German leadership made vague promises to Armenian nationalists regarding a restored Greater Armenia to counter Russian resistance. However, Hitler distrusted the Armenians and preferred an alliance with Kemalist Turkey.^[110][111] Following the Battle of Stalingrad, Armenian support for the Axis waned, and German plans relegated Armenia to minor administrative districts.^[112] Fascist Italy sought to establish a restored Georgian Monarchy as an Italian protectorate to project power into the Black Sea.^[113] While Nazi Germany permitted Georgian representation in its administrative cabinets, Hitler remained skeptical of their Aryan status. While Hitler considered granting Pahlavi Iran administrative control over the region (retaining German military and economic rights to Baku's oil), most Nazi leaders sought direct annexation. Proposals for a National Committee of Azerbaijan were largely rejected until 1945, when a nominal state was recognized to mobilize the Ostlegionen against the Soviets.^[114]

Plans for the establishment of an African colonial dominion

Hitler intended to divide Africa into three broad regions: the northern third would be assigned to Italy, the central part would fall under German rule (restoring the Mittelafrika project), and the southern sector would be controlled by a pro-Nazi Afrikaner state. In a 1933 meeting with Heinrich Schnee, president of the German Colonial Society, Hitler expressed support for Germans in former colonies like Togoland and Kamerun.

"As for our overseas colonies, we have by no means abandoned colonial aspirations... There are many things that Germany must get from the colonies, and we need colonies as much as any other country."

^[121]

Nazi Germany sought to regain its former colonies to satisfy nationalist demands, gain international prestige, and secure economic resources. Beginning in 1935, the return of these colonies became a frequent topic of negotiation with the British government. In 1938, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain offered a redistribution of Central Africa under an international administration, which Hitler rejected, insisting on the direct return of Germany's original colonies without compensation. To prepare for anticipated colonial acquisitions, the NSDAP Office of Colonial Policy (KPA) opened a training center in 1938 to educate future colonial administrators. In 1939, Hitler commissioned Franz Ritter von Epp to re-establish the Reich Colonial Office. Further institutions, such as a Colonial Police Office and a Technical School of Foreign Trade, were established between 1941 and 1942 to prepare for the management of the African territories.^[122][123]

Concerning the partition of the African colonies from the Allied Powers that were defeated on the Fall of France, it was expected that it would be a territory bigger than the former German colonial empire. In that ideal, Franz Halder told directly to Hitler himself (on July 13, 1940) that: "The French and Belgian Congo will be claimed for us." Also, when a fast victory against British Empire was a possibility, Joachim von Ribbentrop traveled to Italy in September 1940 with the mission to start negotiations about the division of Africa after a victorious end to the war against Great Britain. According to those conversations, was agreed that all of Central and Southern Africa would go to the German sphere of influence, while West and North Africa to Italy's one, with the exception of Greater Morocco, which was considered to be given to Francoist Spain or restored as an independent nation to serve as a buffer state.^[123]

Plans for North Africa

Nazi Germany conceded primacy in North and East Africa to Italy to fulfill Mussolini's imperial ambitions, allowing for a contiguous empire from Tunisia to Greater Somalia. The Italian Foreign Ministry envisioned establishing an independent Egypt under Italian influence and a joint Italian-Egyptian condominium over the Sinai Peninsula and Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. This aimed to appease Arab nationalists and position Italy as the "Protector of Islam." The "New Order" also planned to impose strict racial segregation across Italian colonies, forbidding interracial relationships to preserve "racial prestige." Regarding French African colonies, Hitler refused to make official promises to Spain or Italy during the war to avoid alienating Vichy France. However, at the Meeting at Hendaye, Hitler secretly promised Francisco Franco territories in French West Africa if Spain entered the war. Hitler remained ambiguous to prevent angering Mussolini or Pétain, while secretly harboring ambitions to seize Equatorial Guinea and the Canary Islands for Germany. Ultimately, Axis plans for North Africa prioritized strategic German and Italian interests over the emancipation of local populations.^[124][125]

"Hitler's colonial ambitions for a vast Central African empire with bases in the Canary Islands and Spanish Morocco as staging posts were more important to him than good relations with Franco"

Plans for Central Africa

In 1940, the Kriegsmarine produced a detailed plan for a German colonial empire in sub-Saharan Africa, extending from the Atlantic Ocean to the Indian Ocean. This proposed domain would fulfill the territorial goal of Mittelafrika, providing a base for German pre-eminence on the continent. Unlike Eastern Europe, these areas were not intended for extensive German settlement; rather, they were to be economically exploited for natural resources and labor. Under the "Reich Colonial Law" of 1940, these territories would be economically integrated into the Reich. Strict racial segregation was to be enforced, classifying the population into "Germans" (citizens), "Natives" (wards of the state), and "Strangers." Nazi plans included a paternalistic approach to keep African populations under strict state control while exploiting their workforce. The proposed territory included all pre-1914 German colonies, alongside substantial portions of French, Belgian, and British holdings, such as the French Congo, Belgian Congo, Nigeria, Gold Coast, and Zanzibar. The plan also envisioned a string of fortified naval and air bases spanning the Atlantic coastline from Norway to the Belgian Congo.^[126]

Plans for Southern Africa

Prior to the war, Nazi organizations had established a strong presence among German Namibians in South West Africa, prompting the South African government to ban them in 1934. Following a hypothetical victory over the United Kingdom, the Nazis hoped to establish a pro-Axis Afrikaner government in the Union of South Africa.^[127] In early 1940, Foreign Minister Ribbentrop communicated with sympathetic South African leaders, informing them that Germany intended to reclaim German South West Africa.^[121] In exchange, South Africa was to be compensated with the British protectorates of Swaziland, Basutoland, and Bechuanaland, as well as the colony of Southern Rhodesia.^[128]

Division of Asia between the Axis powers

During the early stages of World War II, Joachim von Ribbentrop and Friedrich-Werner Graf von der Schulenburg promoted the German–Soviet Axis talks to temporarily include the Soviet Union in the Axis powers. This proposed Eurasian Kontinentalblock aimed to dismantle the global dominance of the British Empire and the United States. By diverting Soviet ambitions toward the Middle East and the Indian subcontinent, Germany hoped to distract Joseph Stalin from European affairs, avoid a two-front war, and secure the Western Front.^[129][130] Japanese Foreign Minister Yōsuke Matsuoka supported dividing the world into four continental blocs led by Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, the United States, and the Soviet Union. However, conflicting interests quickly emerged. Soviet-Japanese border disputes in Asia, alongside Soviet-German disagreements over Turkey and control of the Bosporus Straits, ultimately frustrated Hitler. These tensions led to the launch of Operation Barbarossa and the exclusion of the Soviets from the New Order.^[131]

"After the conquest of England, the British Empire would be apportioned as a gigantic world-wide estate in bankruptcy of forty million square kilometres. In this bankrupt estate there would be for Russia access to the ice-free and really open ocean. Thus far, a minority of forty-five million Englishmen had ruled six hundred million inhabitants of the British Empire. He was about to crush this minority.... Under these circumstances there arose world-wide perspectives.... All the countries which could possibly be interested in the bankrupt estate would have to stop all controversies among themselves and concern themselves exclusively with the partition of the British Empire. This applied to Germany, France, Italy, Russia and Japan."

In 1942, Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan held a secret diplomatic conference to divide Asia along the Yenisey River, extending to the borders of China, the Soviet Union, Afghanistan, and British India. Although the German Foreign Office and the Kriegsmarine rejected ambassador Hiroshi Ōshima's initial draft because it allocated India to Japan and limited naval operations in the Indian Ocean, Hitler found it acceptable and signed the treaty on 18 January 1942. This rigid demarcation proved detrimental to Axis strategic cooperation; crossing the boundary line required tedious prior consultation, making joint offensives against British positions in the Middle East impossible.^[133] Japanese operations against Allied shipping lines during the Indian Ocean raid had been highly successful along with the attack against Ceylon, but these were not followed due to the non-existent German-Japanese strategic cooperation.^[134] The Germans vigorously maintained watch on the demarcation line and objected to any Japanese incursion to the "German sphere" of the Axis-divided world.^[134] Thus the Japanese were forced to cancel a planned massive attack against Madagascar, as the island had been delegated to Germany in the treaty.^[134]

Concession of Oceania to Japan

Germany intended to temporarily sell its former Pacific colonies (German New Guinea and German Samoa) to Japan to strengthen the Tripartite Pact. Initial plans to re-annex German Samoa through the Samoan branch of the Nazi Party were rejected by the Nazi leadership, as the branch relied heavily on mixed-race settlers rather than white Germans. Nazi Germany also briefly asserted claims over the uninhabited British Henderson Island during the German attacks on Nauru, causing minor diplomatic friction with Japan. Regarding Australia and New Zealand, Hitler and Joseph Goebbels believed these territories would soon be colonized by Japan, showing no interest in retaining them for Germany.^[135][136]

Concerning the other Europeans territories in Oceania, like Australia and New Zealand were designated as future Japanese territories, although Hitler lamented his belief that the Aryan race would disappear from those regions.^[137] He nevertheless made it clear to his officials that "the descendants of the convicts in Australia" were not Germany's concern and that their lands would be colonised by Japanese settlers in the immediate future, an opinion also shared by Joseph Goebbels, who expressed his conviction in his diary that the Japanese had always desired "the fifth continent" for emigration purposes.^{[138][better source needed]} Hitler loathed New Zealanders as a "lower form of human being".^[139] At a speech given on 15 July 1925 – his only recorded lengthy discussion on New Zealand – he argued that New Zealanders lived in trees and "clambered around on all fours" having not yet learned to walk upright.^[140] The speech was later reprinted as a pamphlet.^[139] Historian Norman Rich stated that it can be assumed that Hitler would have attempted to recruit the Anglo-Saxons of these two countries as colonists for the conquered east; some of the English were to share the same fate.^[137][141]

Plans for the Far East

Nazi Germany's Far East policy initially favored the Republic of China as a strategic partner against the Soviet Union. German military and economic support, facilitated by figures like Hans von Seeckt and Alexander von Falkenhausen, continued during the early Nazi era. However, following the outbreak of the Second Sino-Japanese War and the formation of the Second United Front between Chinese Nationalists and Communists, German leadership felt betrayed. Championed by Joachim von Ribbentrop, Germany shifted its allegiance to the Empire of Japan, culminating in the Tripartite Pact.^[142] This agreement conceded East Asia and Southeast Asia to the Japanese Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere, prioritizing a militarily and economically superior ally over previous colonial ambitions.^[143][144]

Plans for Tibet and Indosphere

German interest in Tibet was largely driven by the 1938–1939 German expedition to Tibet, led by Ernst Schäfer. The proposed Operation Tibet aimed to instigate anti-British rebellions in the region following a hypothetical Axis victory in the Soviet Union.^[145][146] Similarly, the 1939 Japanese expedition to Tibet sought to draw the 14th Dalai Lama into Japan's sphere of influence to establish a Pan-Buddhist alliance against Western and Soviet powers. Both Axis nations ultimately failed to establish a strong foothold in the region.^{[147][148][149]}

Plans for the Indian Subcontinent

Hitler held disparaging views of the Indian independence movement, considering Indians racially inferior to the British. During the early stages of the war, he favored maintaining British control over the Indian subcontinent to prevent a Soviet takeover. Following the invasion of the Soviet Union, the German High Command drafted contingency plans to threaten British India through Afghanistan, primarily to force British capitulation. Although Indian nationalist Subhas Chandra Bose sought Axis support for an Indian government-in-exile, Hitler remained skeptical of India's readiness for rebellion. Ultimately, in 1942, the Axis powers agreed to divide the subcontinent, allocating the western portion to Germany and the remainder to Japan.^[150][151] Although India wasn't considered in the early designs for the Greater East Asia Co-Prosperity Sphere in 1940, the Japanese developed plans based in pan-Asianists experts in Indology like Okawa Shumei, who argued that India was the "source" of Asian spirituality and Metaphysics which made Asia distinctively Asian (giving their systems of logic and epistemology in opposition to Western philosophy), so Japan was to be the "shield" of such Orientalist spiritual order against the Abrahamic world. This great steem to India was complemented in the fact that the historical inspiration for Japanese artistic expressions was traced to India's spiritual ideals as the birthplace of The Buddha, which was enough fundament to believe in a debt of the Japanese people to the Indic civilisation (which was viewed with a level of respect not afforded to Western nations). Therefore, in the Greater East Asia Joint Declaration of 1943, India (represented by Bose's provisional government) was treated as an independent ally, not a subordinate puppet state like Manchukuo, and so was expected to be a friendly and independent partner in the New Order, not a colonial subject of the Japanese Empire (which would en in the Indo-Burma border), but an Empire of its own in the Greater India, with an equal status and under a strategic alliance based in Buddhist kingship (although still Japan having a preeminence, wanting to have a relationship with India like the one between Italy and Germany). In the long term such Indo-Japanese alliance would expel the British from their remnants colonies in Asia by cutting off the British naval supremacy in the Western Indian Ocean and meeting up with Italo-Germans in the Middle East (with the potential help of Arab nationalists and Pahlavi Iran) to finally crush Western imperialism in Asia after the hypothetical success of the Kuroshima Western Strategy and Nazi Operation Orient.^[152][153]

Plans for the Islamic World

Axis plans for the Islamic world aimed to foment uprisings across North Africa and the Middle East to undermine British and French influence.^{[154][155][156][157]} Nazi Germany supported Arab nationalism, aligning with figures like Amin al-Husseini, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, to counter Allied forces and advance the Final Solution in the region. Fascist Italy sought a dominant sphere of influence in the Eastern Mediterranean, proposing protectorates over Syria, Lebanon, and Egypt. In the Persian sphere, Nazi Germany cultivated strong economic and political ties with Pahlavi Iran, exploiting the concept of shared Aryan heritage. Germany envisioned a modernized, independent Iran serving as a bulwark against Soviet and British interests. Operations were also planned to instigate Pashtun rebellions among the 15 million ethnic Pashtuns in Afghanistan and the Tribal Areas to threaten British India, though these efforts yielded minimal success.^[158]

"the Turks can achieve independence only with the assistance of the Axis countries, and therefore turkestanis consider themselves their soldiers and are ready to fulfill any task"

Plans for North America

Before securing control of Europe, the Nazi leadership aimed to keep the United States out of the war. In a 1941 interview with Life, Hitler dismissed a German invasion of the Western Hemisphere as "fantastic" as an invasion of the moon.^[159] U.S. pro-Nazi movements, such as the German American Bund, played no role in Hitler's plans and received no German support after 1935.^[160]

However, However, Nazi propagandists attempted to exploit domestic tensions by circulating fictitious reports that Berlin recognized Native Americans, such as the Sioux, as "Aryans." Inspired in part by Hitler's fondness for Karl May's Western novels, the Nazis hoped to incite an uprising among Native Americans to undermine the Roosevelt administration, though these propaganda efforts yielded no practical results.^[161]

Aware of the Nazi threat, U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt explicitly condemned the "New Order" in a March 1941 speech, describing it as a system "imposed by conquest, and based on slavery." Hitler held U.S. society in contempt, stating that the United States (which he consistently referred to as the "American Union") was "half Judaised, and the other half Negrified". Hitler held U.S. society in contempt, dismissing it as racially impure, and had outlined the inevitability of a future German-American conflict for global hegemony in his 1928 unpublished Zweites Buch. Anticipating this "battle of the continents," Hitler planned a massive expansion of the Kriegsmarine under Plan Z to project power across the Atlantic. He also considered occupying the Azores, Cape Verde, Madeira, and the Canary Islands to secure naval and air bases, which would serve as staging grounds for the Amerikabomber project to strike North American cities.^[162] Historian Gerhard L. Weinberg stated that this super-fleet was intended against the Western Hemisphere.^[162]

The actual physical conquest of the United States was unlikely, however,^[163] and the future disposition of U.S. territories remained cloudy in Hitler's mind.^[164] He perceived the anticipated battle with that country, at least under his own rule, to be a sort of "battle of the continents"—possibly along the lines of then-contemporary U.S. thought, such as the opening text from the second film in Frank Capra's Why We Fight series, illustrating one U.S. viewpoint of what Hitler could have thought on such matters while viewing the crowds at the 1934 Nuremberg rally^[165]—with a Nazi-dominated Old World fighting for global dominance against the New World, in which Germany would attain leadership of the world rather than establish direct control over it.^[166] Further decisions down the line were left up to future generations of German rulers.

Canada featured minimally in Nazi geopolitical planning. Hitler grouped Canada with the United States, viewing both as materialistic and decadent, and expected the U.S. to annex Canada following the anticipated collapse of the British Empire. Consequently, Nazi policy toward Canada was largely improvised. However, Vichy France sought to establish a sphere of influence among Franco-Canadians in Quebec by promoting the Révolution nationale. While the Catholic Church and the broader Quebécois public largely rejected these overtures, a fringe of Franco-Canadian fascist secret societies maintained minor contacts with Vichy France and Nazi Germany, hoping for Axis support to achieve an independent Quebec.^[167][168]

Plans for Central America and Caribbean

Axis plans for Central America and the Caribbean were largely unformulated. While both Germany (via Operation Pelikan) and Japan recognized the strategic value of the Panama Canal,^{[169][170][171]} either developed comprehensive administrative policies for the region. Japan harbored preliminary ambitions to establish a "Government-General of Central America" to dismantle the Monroe Doctrine and control the Pacific Rim, while anticipating that the Caribbean would fall to Italian or German colonialism. Taking advantage of German indifference toward Latin America, Francoist Spain sought to revive its historical influence in Spanish America through the Servicio Exterior de Falange. The U.S. State Department viewed this pan-Hispanic outreach—which found some sympathy among right-wing factions in Mexico and Argentina—as a proxy effort by the Axis powers to challenge American hegemony in the Western Hemisphere.^[172]

Plans for the economic domination of South America

While Fascist Italy sought to cultivate a "Latin Axis" in South America by appealing to shared cultural heritage and the large Italian diaspora, Hitler and the Nazi leadership showed little interest in the continent outside of economic exploitation and warnings against "racial mixing."^[173][174]

Between 1933 and 1941, Germany's primary geopolitical goal in South America—particularly in the ABC countries (Argentina, Brazil, and Chile)—was to expand trade at the expense of the Western Powers, anticipating that a German-dominated Europe would eventually displace the United States as the continent's principal trading partner.^[175]

To support its economic aims, the Reich attempted to mobilize German immigrant communities in South America, operating espionage networks and supporting local fascist movements such as the Integralists and the National Socialist Movement of Chile.^[176][177] Rumors of Axis-backed coups were widespread. In October 1941, U.S. President Roosevelt publicly claimed to possess a secret German map dividing South America into five Nazi-dominated vassal states; this map was later revealed to be a forgery produced by British Security Coordination to sway U.S. public opinion.^{[178][179][180]} Similarly, the Argentine and Chilean governments investigated alleged Nazi plots to annex Patagonia and orchestrate paramilitary uprisings, though many of these claims were fueled by wartime hysteria or fabricated by Allied intelligence.^[181][182] While long-term territorial designs on South America remained speculative, Nazi Germany actively invested in covert operations, including Operation Bolívar, to secure its intelligence and economic footholds.^[183]