Economic Relations Between the First Slovak Republic and the Nazi Germany in 1939-1945

The establishment of the First Slovak Republic on 14 March 1939 was caused mainly by the changing geopolitical situation in Central Europe and Adolf Hitler's effort to split Czechoslovakia. Thus, once the First Slovak Republic had been established, Nazi Germany started to make attempts to obtain maximum control over the Slovak economy. The Slovak economy was supposed to fully support German army operations with supplies of raw materials needed. Germany's strong pressure on the Slovak economy was obvious throughout the existence of the First Slovak Republic. Slovak economists were trying to avoid it at least partially. Their attempts to establish relative independence, however, ended definitively in October 1944, after the repression of the Slovak National Uprising, when the Slovak economy got under Germany's direct control.