"Collaborators" have many different motives. Some of them were genuinely loyal to the Nazis; some were just trying to survive in conditions where they could barely survive; others collaborated on espionage jobs to give the country the last glimmer of life. But what kind of people are "collaborators"?
In the early stages of the war, could government officials who had decided to cooperate with the Germans in the occupied territories be considered collaborators, or would they simply compromise temporarily to ensure that they could achieve the best arrangements to help their country achieve the ultimate victory? Factory owners may allow their factories to produce goods for the Germans, while also earning themselves some money and preventing themselves from being sent to Germany as slave laborers. Local governors or police officers in rural areas had no choice but to obey the orders of the Germans.
Almost every country has indigenous fascists and anti-Semites who willingly owe allegiance to the Nazi Party because they even believe that their actions are patriotic. In the Netherlands, for example, the Anton Massett Party had more than 50,000 members, but they did not really gain the germans' trust and give them any power to exercise their jobs. In Poland, there should be the least number of collaborators and traitors, but even there another form of collaborator may be seen. Since 1944, many poles who support communism have helped the Soviets consolidate their grip, but are seen by most of their compatriots as "collaborators and traitors."
In the eyes of most people, putting on the Uniform of the German Army and fighting for the Germans is, of course, an act of collaboration with the enemy. But in fact, many of the people on the list of the Nazi Party's armed elite and the Waffen-SS were born outside Germany. They included German minorities recruited from abroad, the Germans, as well as many foreigners, such as Norwegians and Danes. In the later stages of the war, the net was cast farther away, and many Ukrainians, Croats, Latvians, Estonians, and other groups of people were admitted to it. As a result, almost half of the Waffen-SS soldiers were not native Germans.
A large number of Soviet citizens eventually had to serve the German Army, sometimes even supporting the Germans in battle. By 1942, many German troops had a considerable number of support personnel, most of them from Russia. Many of these people were prisoners of previous wars, and the reason why they "collaborated" with the enemy to serve the Germans was firstly to get out of poverty and to prevent being killed by the Germans. At first, they mainly acted as support work outside the battle, such as drivers, cooks, etc., but later, they also began to join the battle. In normandy in 1944, the German Army Corps was usually equipped with a "Battalion of the Orient", composed of these people, some of whom had a good record in battle.
Other units, formed by the Germans, tried to exploit the anti-Soviet sentiment. These people included Cossacks, Armenians, etc., who often participated in operations in anti-guerrilla battles. Russians like this are also involved. In the Bryansk region, a "Russian National Liberation Army" was also established. One of the more famous is the "Kaminsky" brigade, which was once known for its ferocity.
In 1942, the Germans captured a senior officer of the Red Army, General Andreevich Vlasov, and asked him to form a large anti-Stalin Russian force. But in the end, only two division-level units were formed, but they did not play a real role. And in the last days of the war, these forces even directly betrayed Germany and joined the Czech resistance against Germany.
The fate of collaborators whose identities were exposed after the war was often tragic. Millions of Soviet citizens were transferred from the Western Allies to the Soviet institutions. A significant number of them were sent to gulag concentration camps, while Vlasov and his subordinate officers and men were all executed.