Wars and ConflictsΒ permalink
neutrality of sweden/switzerland.
This discussion has been closed.
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Message 1.Β
Posted by cyclohogbob (U14593962) on Friday, 1st October 2010
why did the nazis march into norway,denmark,but not sweden or switzerland.
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Message 2
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 1st October 2010
cyclobob
There would have been little point in going into Switzerand, and its defensive capability had been long established- the Vatican and the French Court before the Revolution did not have Swiss Guards for nothing.
In fact it is much too simplistic to just dismiss Hitler as a mad man. What finally did for the Germans in the IWW was the British blockade, hence the most important sea battle of the war was the Battle of Jutland in which the Germans tried to destroy the grip of the British Battle fleet at the mouth of the Baltic Sea. As things were going bad on the Western Front in late 1918 the German Fleet was ordered out for a rematch- and mutinied. This was the real start of Hitler's "stab in the back" in which the front line soldier was let down by people "back home".
With Denmark and Norway captured the Germans would be better placed to combat the naval blockade that was Britain's great weapon since the eighteenth century. Norway of course offered inumerable fjords where German submarines could be based, and the north of Norway had important supplies of iron ore. Once those iron ore fields were seized the ore could be transported by train through neutral Sweden and brought across the Baltic to Germany- or to occupied Poland.
Invading Sweden would have achieved little apart from raising unnecessary problems with the USSR.
Cass -
Message 3
Posted by Nielsen3 (U14417619) on Friday, 1st October 2010
Further on Cass'
The original German plans only mentioned occupying vital (to Germany that was) airfields in Denmark. For reasons I at the moment don't recall the plans were latter amended.
Do remember, please, that the various aircraft of 70 years ago did not have the same abilities as todays. -
Message 4
Posted by Grumpyfred (U2228930) on Friday, 1st October 2010
It could have also led to both Sweden and Norway being liberated by the USSR, and then occupied until the fall of the Warsaw Pact.
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Message 5
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Friday, 1st October 2010
I recall reading in Harry Butcher's "My Three Years with Eisenhower" of Stalin sending a direct communique to Ike suggesting the latter try a flanking attack through Switzerland (Butcher didn't mention whether or not JS cited Suvorov.) Ike had to diplomatically point out the undesirability of such a move.
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Message 6
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 1st October 2010
White Camry
I think we have to remember that Stalin seems to have never moved out of the SU all his life, apart from the Potsdam Conference.
Lenin could have told him about Switzerland.
Cass -
Message 7
Posted by White Camry (U2321601) on Friday, 1st October 2010
CASSEROLEON
I think we have to remember that Stalin seems to have never moved out of the SU all his life, apart from the Potsdam Conference.
Lenin could have told him about Switzerland.Β
And the Tehran Conference. But I agree; the general third-hand impression I got from Butcher's account was that Stalin knew nothing of Swiss geography. -
Message 8
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 1st October 2010
White Camry
Thanks for that... I could not immediately recall the third one (=Yalta) --that Churchill had to go to via Egypt..
As for his education was it not at a Georgian Seminary- I am not sure how much geography comes into doctrine.
Cass -
Message 9
Posted by stalti (U14278018) on Friday, 1st October 2010
apparently the swiss had a fantastic defensive capability - all bridges were mined and ready for demolition so getting in there was a task that was too much bother for the results achieved -
ie they were neutral and harmless and were no way going to interfere in anyones war plans
i did an engineering apprenticeship and my tutors play on it was that the swiss were the manufacturers of all precision equipment - ie slip gauges - and invading them would destroy this source of vital equipment
st -
Message 10
Posted by Vizzer aka U_numbers (U2011621) on Friday, 1st October 2010
I think we have to remember that Stalin seems to have never moved out of the SU all his life, apart from the Potsdam Conference.
Lenin could have told him about Switzerland.Β And the Tehran Conference.Β
Stalin spent the first 44 years of his life living before the Soviet Union even existed.
During that time that time he visited (among other places) Sweden in 1906, Denmark, Germany and England in 1907, Cracow (at that time in Habsburg Silesia) in 1912 and Austria in 1913. -
Message 11
Posted by Sambista (U4068266) on Friday, 1st October 2010
You got the iron ore bit completely the wrong way round. The ore fields were, and are, in Sweden, around LuleΓ¥ (in the north of the country) but, when the Baltic froze in the winters, the product had to be shipped via Norway, specifically Narvik.
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Message 12
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 1st October 2010
Vizzer and Urnungal
Thanks for corrections
Cass
PS- Further to Switzerland my Swiss brother-in-law is now too old to do his annual military service but I think that it was for at least 20 years that he had to spend a couple of weeks a year getting re-trained and finding out about the latest defensive measures to survive a nuclear holocaust.. Obviously all very hush hush, but he works in a global engineering company and was always really impressed. -
Message 13
Posted by Pete- Weatherman (U14670985) on Tuesday, 2nd November 2010
Denmark was never officaly invaded it was occupied for its own protection, and it never became a part of the Axis forces or officaly lose it neutral status. it was not untill the end of the war that any action relley took place. No one was fooled by the occupation and a large resistance force did spring up. As the allies got closer to Berlin the Danes were going to be rounded up and inprisoned there for freeing up German troops to fight on the home frount. But the Shell house raid took care of that by destroying most of the Gestapo intel and there for leveing a resistance force at there backs.
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Message 14
Posted by Eliza (U14650257) on Wednesday, 3rd November 2010
Isn't it always useful to have a couple of neutral states around, so that there can be an avenue for potential communication between warring parties, to act as a go-between?
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Message 15
Posted by TimTrack (U1730472) on Wednesday, 3rd November 2010
Isn't it always useful to have a couple of neutral states around, so that there can be an avenue for potential communication between warring parties, to act as a go-between?Β
Yes.
Also, Switzerland, not being under allied sanction, was useful for various dodgy Nazi financial transactions. -
Message 16
Posted by dmatt47 (U13073434) on Friday, 5th November 2010
Sweden and Switzerland, like Spain, were useful not only to the Nazis but also to the Allies, the prison escapees (eg Colditz) often ended up there and it was an area where information on your enemy's plans might be found. Norway of course, at a later date, became important for the Heavy Water supplies in Telemark for the atomic bomb. Sweden is of course next to Finland which was fighting for a long-time against Germany's ally the Soviet Union.
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Message 17
Posted by CASSEROLEON (U11049737) on Friday, 5th November 2010
Re Sweden I watched a fascinating programme on Arte while in France on the subject of Himmler's personal doctor.. He was a Finn who had built up a very high-class clientele pre-1939 that included European royalty.. He had studied some Buddhist techniques in Tibet and managed to relieve chronic pain through hands on methods.. Himmler was almost chronicly crippled with stomach pains, and this Doctor could relieve them almost miraculously.. Once the War was in full-swing Himmler insisted that he travel everywhere with him.. But as the war progressed he exploited his position of power to extract favours from this man who had such powers of life and death.. Initially Himmler balked at letting him have any Jews. But eventually an influential Jew from New York was flown in to have a conference with Himmler from Sweden, and Himmler agreed to let the Red Cross fly thousands of Jews out through Sweden.
The doctor's son was one of the people interviewed for the programme. His father was investigated as a possible Nazi sympathiser after the war, but was able to prove that he had merely acted as a physician-- and had exploited Himmler's dependence on him to save tens of thousands of lives- out through Sweden.
Cass -
Message 18
Posted by Mutatis_Mutandis (U8620894) on Saturday, 6th November 2010
It really was Switzerland's usefulness as an intermediary and a financial center that kept it out of the war. Yes, the country had a notoriously difficult terrain and had done its best to build up it defenses, but remember that the Wehrmacht operated successfully enough in Norway and in the Balkans, where the difficulties of terrain and supplies were often as bad, if not worse. After the occupation of Vichy France in 1942, Switzerland found itself completely surrounded by the axis powers.
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