Franz Friedrich Böhme was an Army officer who served in succession with the Austro-Hungarian Army, the Austrian Army and the German Wehrmacht. He rose to the rank of general during World War II, serving as Commander of the XVIII Mountain Corps, Hitler's Plenipotentiary Commanding General in the Balkans, and commander-in-chief in German-occupied Norway during World War II. After the war, Böhme was transferred to U.S. custody as a defendant in the Hostages Trial on charges of having massacred thousands of Serbian civilians. He committed suicide in prison.

The occupation of Norway by Nazi Germany during the Second World War began on 9 April 1940 after Operation Weserübung. Conventional armed resistance to the German invasion ended on 10 June 1940, and Nazi Germany controlled Norway until the capitulation of German forces in Europe on 8 May 1945. Throughout this period, a pro-German government named Den nasjonale regjering ruled Norway, while the Norwegian king Haakon VII and the prewar government escaped to London, where they formed a government in exile. Civil rule was effectively assumed by the Reichskommissariat Norwegen, which acted in collaboration with the pro-German puppet government. This period of military occupation is, in Norway, referred to as the "war years", "occupation period" or simply "the war".