Anticipating a swift victory over Britain, the occupying German forces initially experimented by using a moderate approach to the non-Jewish population, supported by local collaborators.
However, the situation grew gradually worse and ended in near-starvation for both occupiers and occupied in the winter of β Armed resistance by islanders to the German occupation was nearly non-existent, though there were a number of British forces raids on the islands.
Many islanders were employed by the Germans, and Germany imported thousands of forced labourers to build extensive defensive works. Island leaders maintained some authority, independence, and autonomy from the German occupiers. Unlike in the UK, conscription did not exist, but a number of people travelled to Britain to join up as volunteers. The horticulture and tourist trades continued as before; the British government relaxed travel restrictions between the UK and the Channel Islands in March , allowing tourists from the UK to take morale-boosting holidays in the traditional island resorts.
Let no one be mistaken; it is not mere territorial conquest that our enemies are seeking. It is the overthrow, complete and final, of this Empire and of everything for which it stands, and after that the conquest of the world. And if their will prevails they will bring to its accomplishment all the hatred and cruelty which they have already displayed.
On 11 June , as part of the British war effort in the Battle of France , a long-range Royal Air Force aerial sortie carried out by 36 Whitley bombers against the Italian cities of Turin and Genoa departed from airfields in Jersey and Guernsey, as part of Operation Haddock.
