Destination Casablanca

Description

In the summer of 1940, following France's surrender to Germany, Casablanca went from exotic travel destination for European playboys and princesses to a city of strategic military consequence. Under the rule of the Nazis' puppet regime and General Charles Nogues, the city was overrun with Nazi agents. Bartenders, shopkeepers, taxi drivers, street urchins, beautiful women, and disgruntled bureaucrats made up a network of spies overseen by Theodore Auer, the head of the Moroccan Gestapo. Meanwhile, Jewish refugees from Europe like the Freud family and stylish ballerina Eugenia Edwardova flooded the city, hoping the Vichy regime would grant them exit visas to the United States. The city's ports and relative security from the tumult in Europe and other theaters in North Africa made it a desirable asset. The black market for valuable consumable goods like coffee and sugar was rampant, and Winston Churchill and Franklin Delano Roosevelt plotted to capture the city over...