Visitor
(8/4/01 11:24:33 pm)
Reply Swedens extradion in 1945-46
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Seven month after the wars end I read that Sweden extradited allmost 3000 German Soldiers to the USSR.
This is also known as the "Baltic
Extradition"of war refugees and against all logical thinking.WHY?
Btw; More than half of them perished and never returned.
Marcus Wendel
Webmaster
Posts: 380
(8/4/01 11:46:45 pm)
Reply
ezSupporter
Re: Swedens extradion in 1945-46
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Landser,
The soldiers in questions where people from the Baltic states who had fought against the USSR and the reason was of course to please the USSR.
/Marcus
Martin M
Visitor
(8/5/01 3:19:20 pm)
Reply Correction
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Hi,
I must make a correction here, as Landser asks there were a hugh extradition of German soldiers that was imprisoned in Sweden to the USSR. Several German soldiers found their way to Sweden during or direct after the war. Those were imprisoned in several different camps all over Sweden. When they later received the message that they would be handed over to the Russians, many tried (Several succeeded) to committ suicide. On this day, called "Black Monday" thousands of soldiers were sent to USSR, many of them never came back.
There is an excellent book on this topic called "Schutzlos in Schweden" (~Defensles in Sweden) written by the author Enar Runsteen. I think this book only is available in German, even though it's a swedish author.
This history is something we seldom or never hear about, mostly it's about the Baltic extradition as Marcus wrote about. This part of the Swedish history is more or less "forgotten". I've not read or heard any politician in Sweden asking for excuase for this, neither to the veterans or the families who maybe never saw their husbands again.
Martin M.
daft
Member
Posts: 26
(8/5/01 3:38:07 pm)
Reply Re: Correction
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I've never heard of it, but it doesn't supprise me the least. The Swedish neutrality was questionable indeed.
Landser
Visitor
(8/5/01 4:00:10 pm)
Reply Neutrality?
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<<<The Swedish neutrality was questionable indeed.>>>
Come to think of it were there
similar incidents from other so=
called "Neutral" countries like
Switzerland,Lichtenstein etc..
I know south-american countries
were put under the gun to extradite.
Thanx
daft
Member
Posts: 29
(8/5/01 4:07:51 pm)
Reply Re: Neutrality?
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But on the other hand, Sweden and Switzerland lived under the gun all the time during the war. Germany relied heavily on the Swedish Iron-ore for it's wartime industrial output. The South-Americans didn't have the threat of potential invasion hanging over them. But I still don't comply with Swedens selective neutrality during the war.
Landser
Visitor
(8/5/01 5:29:58 pm)
Reply Neutrality
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daft
One can say then that the Neutrals were the biggest war profitiers!
PS Even bigger than Schindler!
Martin M
Visitor
(8/5/01 6:32:19 pm)
Reply More information
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Hi again,
I want to add following to my last reply:
The camps were:
Kronobergshed (Outside Växjö)
Sövdeborg and Klostersågen (Lund)
Vägershult
Bökeberg
Ränneslätt
Backamo (Outside Uddevalla, I've been there myself and have seen the camp today)
Grunnebo
Lingen (On island Gotland)
Rinkaby (Outside Kristanstad)
Around 2500 German soldiers were imprisoned and later extraided to USSR.
Also almost unknown is that several German soldiers and Abwehr agents were imprisoned at Fortress Kalmar (Kalmar fästning) as the prisons in Norway were full. Here they sat before the was brought back to Norway and put before the court. It shall be noticed that those soldiers wasn't the most "colorful" one's, those like high SS-Officers etc were held in Norway.
The book "Schutzlos in Schweden" can be bought from:
Ruth Gerig Verlag
Forellenweg 25
D-61462 Königstein/Taunus
Deutschland (Germany)
Tel: 06174 - 220 31
Fax: 06174 - 250 03
ISBN: 3-928275-58-5
Best
Martin
daft
Member
Posts: 33
(8/5/01 8:03:02 pm)
Reply Re: More information
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I thought the last one was Rinkeby. That would have been pretty ironic wouldn't it.
Marcus Wendel
Webmaster
Posts: 383
(8/5/01 8:17:51 pm)
Reply
ezSupporter
Re: Correction
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Martin,
Thanks for those corrections, I will try and get my hands on that book.
/Marcus
jn25b
Veteran Member
Posts: 127
(8/6/01 6:09:41 am)
Reply Re: Neutrality
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Nations have a right to be neutral. And as neutrals the governments of Sweden and Switzerland were elected to look out for the best interests of the Swedes and the Swiss, and not for Universal Justice and the Brotherhood of Man. They did a really good job governing their countries. They kept their young men alive and built up their national industrial bases.
Only a few of the Swiss served as mercenaries, mostly, so far as I've read, as engineers in the multiple-gun flak emplacements, where they showed outstanding capability. All of these, by the way, managed to make it back to Switzerland ahead of the Russians and the American armies.
Baltic
Visitor
(8/6/01 1:27:44 pm)
Reply Nothing to excuse
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I have never understood why Sweden should have anything to excuse in this case. The men came as soldiers in German uniforms - to extradite them to the area where they last served was simply to follow international law.
Landser
Visitor
(8/6/01 1:54:57 pm)
Reply Extradition
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Baltic
With your logic and international law, why did'n Sweden then extradite allied soldiers and Norwegens after their fall to Germany?
As far as the Geneva Convention states,Neutrals do not HAVE to extradite if they grant assylum.
daft
Member
Posts: 36
(8/6/01 3:25:30 pm)
Reply Re: Extradition
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I think we have different definitions of neutrality. It's not very neutral to allow over 2 000 000 german soldiers travel through Sweden. It' not very neutral to have supply depots storing various items in Luleå(?) for the Wehrmacht. It's not very neutral to allow the americans to set up an airbase in northern Sweden. It was a great way of keeping Sweden out of the war, but there wasn't much neutrality in it.
Baltic
Visitor
(8/7/01 3:04:01 pm)
Reply Extradiction
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The extradiction of the German(baltic) soldiers took place AFTER, not during the war, and the soldiers were part of an army that had in fact surrenderd to the winning powers - in this case the Soviet Union.
They arrived as soldiers in uniforms and were therefor treated as such. Civilian refugees were not sent back.
Brittish/Norweigian and German soldiers that crossed the border during operation Weserübung and the fighting that followed was interned in Sweden until the end of the war, as was russian soldiers that came across the baltic or from Finland.
Yes, alot can be said about Swedens neutrality. I guess she did what she had to in order to survive, and I dont think she could (in 1940-41)have done any big difference to the allied war effort by refusing Germany to use the railroads and take the war that most certainly would have followed. America was also neutral until Germany declared war on her and the lend-lease operation wern´t very neutral either, or was it?!
daft
Member
Posts: 38
(8/7/01 3:47:11 pm)
Reply Re: Extradiction
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A missunderstanding again.
I wasn't refering to the extradiction, but to Swedens neutrality as a whole DURING the war. Sorry for being unclear. I agree that Sweden did the right thing staying out of the conflict, but I disagree when someone say that we were neutral. We weren't. We were TRYING to be neutral in a time when some seriuos bending of the rules had to be made in order to stay out of the conflict. Sweden didn't take part in any combat, but we did make a, albeit small, contribution to both the axis and the allies by allowing, for example troop movements and such. Perfectly valid and justiified in my opinion, but not very neutral. Henric 'daft' Edwards
POW
Member
Posts: 11
(8/8/01 8:28:37 pm)
Reply Re: More information/Martin M
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Did you made some pictures in Backamo? I would be thrilled to see how it looks today. I have some old pictures from camp Backamo , camp at Kalmar, camp Ränneslätt, camp Grunnebo and of the memorial east of Växjö/Sm°aland
I have different information about the location of the camps. What is your source?
POW
Member
Posts: 12
(8/8/01 8:38:18 pm)
Reply Re: Nothing to excuse
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53 internees were transported from Sweden to Poland. Why they were transported to Poland, if they were shipped with the "Kuban" or with the "Kronprinsessan Ingrid" can not be answered because the Swedish gouverment refuse a insight into the documents of the war-archives in Stockholm relating that topic.
Strange if you have "nothing to excuse" isn't it?
Martin M
Visitor
(8/9/01 9:16:35 am)
Reply Photos from Backamo
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Hi POW,
I'm afraid that I didn't took any photos of Backamo as it looks today. However that won't be that difficult to make as I live not far from the place. The "reloading central" for prisoners to Backamo were just outside of Vänersborg, I used to live there and have seen that place as well. No I didn't took any photos from that place either !! Shame on me. However this can be arranged as well.
My major source is the book I've written about "Schutzlos in Schweden" by Enar Runsteen. I know there is a little about the camp in Backamo in the regimental chronicle of I 17 to wich the trainingcamp (What it really was) belonged. I think it's available in my local bookstore. It's not a very spread book as it deals with local history.
You can contact me off board if you want: nibelungen_se@yahoo.se
Best
Martin
POW
Member
Posts: 13
(8/9/01 11:19:55 am)
Reply Re: Photos from Backamo
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Thank you for your email adress Martin - i'll contact you.
Here are further sources:
Barkenthin, Hans-Helmut: Camp der falschen Hoffnung | German, 1959
Ehrensvärd, Carl August: I tjänst. Händelser och människor frän min bana | Swedish, 1965
Freivalds, Per Olov: Legionera. En roman om balutlämnigen | Swedish, 1968
Interneringläger 1945. Backamo, Underredaktion av Överste Gunnar Smedmark med värdefulla bidrag av regementsläkare Holdo Fredriksson.... | Swedish, 1963
Kiesov, Hermann: Das Schicksal der deutschen Militärinternierten in Schweden | erman, 1946
Kiesov, Ingolf: Björan och upphörande av militärinternering samt svensk praxis mot vissa tyska styrkor | Swedish, 1963
Merveldt; Klemens Graf von: Aufzeichnungen über meine Internierung in Schweden | German, 1958
Mildenberger, Helmut: Heimweh hinter Stacheldraht | German 1951
Olsson, Axel: Asylrätt och humanism | Swedish 1947
Quensel, Nils: Minnesbilder | Swedish 1973
Roth, Rudolf: Wehe dem Besiegten | German 1953