MARK BRANAGAN/GETTY German Military Intelligence secretly compiled a dossier on Britain

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German Military Intelligence secretly compiled a dossier on Britain years before the Fuhrer stood ready to invade in 1940. They were horrified by the “catastrophic” state of cities that German troops would have to garrison and how the population lived. England’s “Homes of Misery” were under clouds of smog and left filthy by women lacking the hygiene standards of a German hausfrau.

Military High Command in Berlin wrote: “English industrial towns are typified by the cloud of smoke constantly lying over them. “England’s working-class quarters contain lines of identical houses that could not be smaller. “Hardly any of the old industrial towns have been spared the ‘slum problem’.” Hitler’s experts believed a flaw in the national character was as much to blame as a lack of town planning.

GETTY The Bodleian Library has translated the dossier into English and edited it into one volume

They wrote: “They inhabit slums with poor sanitary conditions, filth, and at times morbid forms of social existence, in a state of poor health and in some cases long-term malnutrition. “Some of these negative developments must be put down not to undeserved poverty but wholly or in part to insufficient competence in domestic matters, specifically among women. "The most striking feature displayed by the more disagreeable sections of this class include a lack of personal ambition, indifference to the demands of community and nation, and interests that stop with sport and frivolity.”

GETTY Hitler's experts were horrified by the 'catastrophic' state of cities in England

The middle class had a considerably more comfortable life-style but lower level of education than in Germany. A Nazi assessment of racial purity identified only one minority to keep an eye on – the independence-seeking Welsh. Intelligence officers noted: “Unlike the bright English they are dark and small in stature. Even though they have largely abandoned their language, they have still retained a reasonably strong awareness of their distinctive heritage and culture.”

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