World War II Famines

In Bengal, the crisis developed after Japan captured Burma in 1942 and cut off a major source of imported rice. A cyclone struck the Bengal coast that October, destroying crops, food stocks and homes. Rice prices then rose rapidly as wartime demand increased and traders held stocks back from an unstable market. By the middle of 1943, many agricultural labourers and poorer urban families could no longer afford enough food.

British preparations for a possible Japanese invasion had already altered local transport and grain supplies. Boats were removed or requisitioned from vulnerable coastal districts, while rice stocks were moved or purchased under denial measures intended to prevent them falling into Japanese hands. Provincial attempts to control prices and secure grain failed to stop the rise. Requests for larger imports followed as the famine worsened, drawing the Government of India, the India Office and the War Cabinet into repeated arguments over grain and shipping.

Greece entered occupation with much of its economy dependent on imported food. Axis requisitioning removed agricultural produce and transport, while the Allied blockade sharply reduced overseas supplies. Prices rose, the drachma collapsed and food disappeared from legal markets. During the winter of 1941–42, hunger became severe in Athens, Piraeus and other urban centres. Relief improved after neutral-supervised shipments were allowed through the blockade, although shortages continued through the occupation.

The western Netherlands descended into famine during the final winter of the war. On 17 September 1944, the Dutch government-in-exile called a railway strike in support of the Allied advance. German authorities responded by restricting food and fuel transport into the western provinces. The embargo was lifted in November, but railway traffic remained crippled, fuel was scarce and the front had divided the country. Barges and road transport also became increasingly difficult to operate. By early 1945, rations in the western cities had fallen to levels that could no longer sustain the population.

In northern Vietnam, poor harvests in 1944 were followed by typhoons, heavy rainfall and flooding that damaged the autumn rice crop. Japanese forces continued to requisition food and other resources while French colonial officials administered much of the countryside until March 1945. Railways and coastal shipping between the rice-producing south and the north were increasingly disrupted as the war intensified. By the spring of 1945, entire districts were experiencing severe hunger, and deaths reached their peak in March and April.

In Bengal, the boat-denial programme was introduced while British authorities feared a Japanese landing on the coast. Tens of thousands of boats were removed, requisitioned, destroyed or registered for control. The policy affected fishing, trade and the movement of rice through a region where rivers and small craft were central to everyday transport.

The provincial government also attempted to buy grain and restrain prices. Neither effort restored stability. Rice continued to become more expensive as the famine spread, and people without land or stored food were hit first. By the time large-scale relief expanded later in 1943, starvation and disease were already widespread.

Shipping became another source of dispute. Officials in India pressed for grain imports as domestic supplies deteriorated. London faced competing wartime demands for merchant shipping and initially allocated less grain than Indian authorities requested. The argument continued after Archibald Wavell became Viceroy in October 1943 and pressed for greater imports and stronger relief measures.

In the Netherlands, German restrictions after the railway strike interrupted supplies at the beginning of a difficult autumn. Their formal removal in November did not restore the transport network. The strike continued, coal and fuel remained scarce, and military operations prevented normal movement between the agricultural north and east and the densely populated western cities.

In Vietnam, requisitioning continued as harvests deteriorated. Rice existed in larger quantities in the south, but moving it north became increasingly difficult. Rail lines were damaged, coastal shipping was disrupted and military demands took priority. The famine intensified as local reserves disappeared.

Bengal's rivers were its roads. Small boats carried rice between villages, markets and larger towns across the delta. The denial programme removed many of those craft from coastal districts during 1942. A parliamentary answer two years later recorded about 26,000 boats removed from the denial area and another 40,000 registered under the original order. When food supplies tightened in 1943, parts of this local transport network were already operating under wartime restrictions.

Greece depended on overseas relief once domestic supplies and normal imports collapsed. Neutral vessels eventually brought grain and other food through the Allied blockade under negotiated supervision. These shipments became especially important for Athens and other cities that could no longer feed themselves from nearby agricultural districts.

In the western Netherlands, the railway strike was followed by shortages of coal, fuel and vehicles. Barges froze during the severe winter and roads became increasingly difficult to use. By April 1945, the food crisis was so severe that Allied and German authorities negotiated emergency relief. Allied aircraft began dropping food over occupied territory while truck and sea deliveries were arranged.

Vietnam's north-south divide became increasingly dangerous during 1944 and 1945. The Mekong delta still produced large quantities of rice, while famine spread through northern provinces. Damaged railways, disrupted coastal shipping and wartime controls prevented enough of that rice from reaching the areas where people were starving.

Most modern studies place excess deaths during the Bengal famine at roughly 2.1 to 3 million. Many people died from malaria, cholera and other diseases after prolonged hunger weakened their bodies, which makes any count based only on recorded starvation deaths far too narrow.

In Greece, about 100,000 deaths are commonly associated with hunger and cold during the catastrophic winter of 1941–42. Estimates of 250,000 to 300,000 refer to a broader period and include mortality linked to malnutrition, disease and deprivation during the occupation.

The Dutch Hunger Winter caused around 20,000 deaths, although estimates vary according to the period and causes included. Starvation, cold and illnesses aggravated by malnutrition all contributed during the final months before liberation.

Northern Vietnam is much harder to count. Estimates range from roughly 600,000 to 2 million deaths, with figures around one million frequently used in later scholarship. Civil registration had already been weak in many rural districts, and war, displacement and the collapse of administration left large gaps in the surviving record.

The Bengal debate cannot be represented responsibly by one author. India Office and War Cabinet records have been read differently by historians including Cormac Ó Gráda and Madhusree Mukerjee, and the official Famine Inquiry Commission remains an essential contemporary record. This page therefore separates documented decisions from disputed claims about how much weight each decision carried.

For Greece, International Committee of the Red Cross records distinguish the catastrophic first winter from the regular neutral-supervised relief system that was operating by September 1942. NIOD material documents both the German transport restrictions after the September 1944 Dutch railway strike and the Hunger Winter that followed even after the food embargo was lifted. For Vietnam, recent scholarship on the Red River Delta and wartime food supply places the decisive harvest and flood shock in autumn 1944 and the peak mortality in March–April 1945, while preserving a wide range for the total death toll.