Abstract: During great military conflicts or periods of economic embargo, countries and regions experience acute shortages of clothes, footwear, food, fuel etc. In this context, smuggling occurs in border areas. During the Second World War, smuggling escalated in Banat, at the border between Romania and Yugoslavia, which was under German occupation. Besides the smaller and greater smugglers, some of them belonging to the German army, Romanian border guards were also involved in this phenomenon.