The twentieth century has been credited with introducing the world to total war. World War II was one of the most devastating wars that affected almost all the major nations in the world. A vital part of financing the war machines of each country was the ability to pay for it all. Under the circumstances, gold and silver were quite useful to the nation that obtained large amounts of either, and the means to convert it all into monetary credits. Between 1938 and 1945, Nazi Germany met the aforementioned requirements easily, as Hitler looted the central and commercial banks of occupied Europe. Nazi gold is still being heavily debated among the world powers, for to this date, not all of it has been recovered or restored. Most of the mystery surrounding the topic is slowly being cleared away. Today, Holocaust victims and heirs are still clamoring for justice and total compensation for all that they lost. Thus, the gold story really has two parts that fit together: the gold that the Nazis looted and used during their wartime occupation of Europe, and the long, complicated restitution of this same gold by the Western Allies after the war had ended. Thanks to the continuous efforts of the Allied countries, restoring all of Germany’s stolen assets to their rightful owners has become more than a possibility; it has become a reality. Much of Europe was ravaged by Hitler’s troops during the early parts of World War II. Many smaller countries that were annexed by Germany’s war machine, including Austria, Czechoslovakia, Luxembourg, Belgium, and Italy, had no choice but to relinquish the gold stored within their vaults to Nazi Germany’s Central Bank (Smith 163). Once the Reichsbank, as it was called, had placed the insignia of Nazi Germany upon each piece of gold, it was either shipped off to be stored within the banks of numerous other nations, or was hidden deep within abandoned mines and caves (Smith...
