Norwegian campaign
The Norwegian campaign (8 April – 10 June 1940) involved the attempt by Allied forces to defend northern Norway coupled with the resistance of the Norwegian military to the country's invasion by Nazi Germany in World War II.
This article is about the World War II campaign. For other uses, see List of wars involving Norway.
Planned as Operation Wilfred and Plan R 4, while the German attack was feared but had not yet happened, the battlecruiser HMS Renown set out from Scapa Flow for the Vestfjorden with twelve destroyers on 4 April. The Royal Navy and the Kriegsmarine met at the first and second naval battles of Narvik on 10 and 13 April, and British forces conducted the Åndalsnes landings on 13 April. The main strategic reason for Germany to invade Norway was to seize the port of Narvik and guarantee the delivery of iron ore needed for German steel production.[1]
The campaign was fought until 10 June 1940 and saw the escape of King Haakon VII and Crown Prince Olav to the United Kingdom. A British, French and Polish expeditionary force of 38,000 troops landed in the north. It had moderate success but made a rapid strategic retreat after the Battle of France began on 14 May. The Norwegian government then went into exile in London. The campaign ended with the occupation of the entirety of Norway by Germany but elements of the Norwegian military escaped and fought on overseas.
Background[edit]
Outbreak of the Second World War[edit]
Britain and France had signed military assistance treaties with Poland and two days after the German Invasion of Poland on 1 September 1939, both declared war on Nazi Germany. However, neither country mounted significant offensive operations and for several months there were no major engagements, and this period became known as the Phoney War or "Twilight War". Winston Churchill in particular wished to escalate the war into a more active phase, in contrast to Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain.[2]
During this time both sides wished to open secondary fronts. For the Allies, in particular the French, this was based on a desire to avoid repeating the trench warfare of the First World War, which had occurred on the Franco-German border.[2]
Following the outbreak of the Second World War, the Norwegian government had mobilized parts of the Norwegian Army and all but two of the Royal Norwegian Navy's warships. The Norwegian Army Air Service and the Royal Norwegian Navy Air Service were also called up to protect Norwegian neutrality from violations by the warring countries. The first such violations were the sinkings in Norwegian territorial waters of several British ships by German U-boats. In the following months, aircraft from all the belligerents violated Norwegian neutrality.[3]
Almost immediately after the outbreak of war, the British began pressuring the Norwegian government to provide them with the services of the Norwegian merchant navy, being in dire need of shipping to oppose the strength of Nazi forces. Following protracted negotiations between 25 September and 20 November 1939, the Norwegians agreed to charter 150 tankers, as well as other ships with a tonnage of 450,000 gross tons. The Norwegian government's concern for the country's supply lines played an important role in persuading them to accept the agreement.[4]
Value of Norway[edit]
Norway, although neutral, was considered strategically important for both sides for several reasons. First was the importance of iron ore from Sweden – upon which Germany depended – exported through the Norwegian port of Narvik. This route was especially important in the winter months when much of the Baltic Sea was frozen over.[5] Narvik became of greater significance to the British when it became apparent that Operation Catherine, a plan to gain control of the Baltic Sea, would not be realized.[6] Großadmiral Erich Raeder had pointed out several times in 1939 the danger to Germany of Britain seizing the initiative and launching its own invasion in Scandinavia, for if the powerful Royal Navy had bases at Bergen, Narvik and Trondheim, the North Sea would be virtually closed to Germany, and the Kriegsmarine would be at risk even in the Baltic.
Controlling Norway would also be a strategic asset in the Battle of the Atlantic. The capture of ports would create gaps in the blockade of Germany, giving access to the Atlantic Ocean.[1] These ports would allow Germany to use its sea power effectively against the Allies.[7] Control of Norwegian air bases would allow German reconnaissance aircraft to operate far into the North Atlantic, while German U-boats and surface ships operating out of Norwegian naval bases would be able to break the British blockade line across the North Sea and attack convoys heading to Great Britain.[2][8]
Initial plans[edit]
Allied plans[edit]
With the end of the Winter War, the Allies determined that any occupation of Norway or Sweden would likely do more harm than good, possibly driving the neutral countries into an alliance with Germany. However, the new French prime minister, Paul Reynaud, took a more aggressive stance than his predecessor and wanted some form of action taken against Germany.[11] Churchill was a strong agitator for action in Scandinavia because he wanted to cut Germany off from Sweden and push the Scandinavian countries to side with the United Kingdom. This initially involved a 1939 plan to penetrate the Baltic with a naval force. This was soon changed to a plan involving the mining of Norwegian waters to stop iron ore shipments from Narvik and provoke Germany into attacking Norway, where it could be defeated by the Royal Navy.[18]
It was agreed to utilize Churchill's naval mining plan, Operation Wilfred, designed to remove the sanctuary of the Leads and force transport ships into international waters, where the Royal Navy could engage and destroy them. Accompanying this would be Plan R 4, an operation where, upon almost certain German counteraction to Operation Wilfred, the Allies would then proceed to occupy Narvik, Trondheim, Bergen, and Stavanger. The planners hoped that the operation would not provoke the Norwegians to resist the Allies with armed force.[19]
The Allies disagreed over the additional Operation Royal Marine, where mines would also be placed in the Rhine River. While the British supported this operation, the French vetoed it for three months since they also depended on the Rhine and feared German air raids on their aircraft and munitions factories.[20] Because of this delay, Operation Wilfred, originally scheduled for 5 April, was delayed until 8 April when the British agreed to undertake the Norwegian operations separately from those on the continent.[11]
Analysis[edit]
The operation as planned was a decisive victory for Germany. Both Denmark and Norway were occupied. Surprise was almost complete, particularly in Denmark.[114]
At sea the invasion proved a temporary setback. For the Kriegsmarine the campaign led to heavy losses, leaving the Kriegsmarine with a surface force of one heavy cruiser, two light cruisers and four destroyers operational. This left the navy weakened during the summer months when Hitler was pursuing plans for an invasion of Britain.[1][114]
The greatest cost of the campaign on land came in the need to keep most of the invasion troops in Norway for occupation duties away from the fronts. On the whole, the campaign was successful with great benefits for the victor.[1][120]
Through the Norwegian government's Nortraship system, the Allies also gained the services of the Norwegian merchant navy, the fourth largest in the world. The 1,028-ship strong Nortraship was established on 22 April at a government meeting at Stuguflåten in Romsdal. The Nortraship fleet consisted of some 85% of the pre-war Norwegian merchant fleet, the remaining 15% having been in Norway when the Germans invaded and been unable to escape. The Nortraship vessels were crewed by 27,000 sailors. In total 43 free Norwegian ships were sunk during the Norwegian Campaign, while another 29 were interned by the neutral Swedes.[16][121][122][123] Nortraship gave the Norwegian government-in-exile economic independence and a basis for continued resistance from abroad.[123]
The Allies achieved a partial success at Narvik. The Germans had destroyed much of the port facilities there before their loss of the city on 28 May.[1] Shipping from the port was stopped for a period of six months, although the Allies had believed it would be out of operation for a year.[124]
The German occupation of Norway was to prove a thorn in the side of the Allies during the next few years. Bombers based at Sola had a round trip of about 920 km to Rattray Head in north-east Scotland, instead of a round trip of about 1,400 km from the nearest airfield on German soil (the island of Sylt), while the east of Scotland and coastal shipping suffered from bombing raids, most from Norway, until 1943. After the fall of Norway, Scotland (especially the fleet bases at Scapa Flow and Rosyth) were seen as much more vulnerable to a diversionary assault by air- and sea-borne troops. German commerce raiders used Norway as a staging base to reach the North Atlantic. After Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941, air bases in Norway were also used to interdict the Allied Arctic convoys there, inflicting painful losses to shipping.[1]