Invasion of Sweden

[oscar]

Have you seen any plans for the invasion of Sweden?

[Phil D.]

I sincerly hope I'm not mistaken, but I don't think Germany ever had plans to invade Sweden, at least as long as it stayed neutral. It's just what I thought.

Phil

[Martin Månsson]

As far as I know Germany had no plans to invade Sweden, at least no detailed plans. England however planned to invade the iron ore fields in northern Sweden and I think that Churchill wrote about those plans in his memoirs. England wanted to assist Finland in the Winter War 1939 and asked Norway and Sweden for permission to go over both territories to come to Finland, if this had been agreed upon, England was to occupy the iron ore fields at the same time to prevent Sweden shipping iron ore to Germany.

Best
Martin

[varjag]

Oscar - since it is the purpose of General Staffs to prepare for 'all contingencies' I am certain somewhere deeply buried in the archives of the OKH - there is also a, at least a sketchy plan - on how to occupy Sweden. It's just that because it never happened nobody took much interest - but I'll bet my bottom dollar - that there WAS such a plan.

[Tapani K.]

There was an article in the Command Magazine some years ago on the German plan to invade Sweden. IIRC it was indeed a contingency plan and had only a very limited chance of success.

regards,
Tapani K.

[Hanski]

As far as I know Germany had no plans to invade Sweden, at least no detailed plans. England however planned to invade the iron ore fields in northern Sweden and I think that Churchill wrote about those plans in his memoirs. England wanted to assist Finland in the Winter War 1939 and asked Norway and Sweden for permission to go over both territories to come to Finland, if this had been agreed upon, England was to occupy the iron ore fields at the same time to prevent Sweden shipping iron ore to Germany.

Just like Martin mentioned, this was the plan which gave some hope to Finland in the uneven struggle against the USSR in the Winter War 1939-40, and besides the unexpectedly successful Finnish military defence, the prospect of Western Powers getting involved was a threatening scenario to Stalin. Therefore, he gave up his original aim of conquering Finland, and settled for less, despite the humiliation for the Red Army that the Finns had arranged.

In Finland, there was realism enough to see that the Swedish iron ore was the real motive for this plan, and occupying the mines would have been more important for the British than joining the war on Finland's side. When the casualties had severely depleted the Finnish ranks, instead of continuing the desperate fighting the Finnish Government made peace after 105 days of war, without taking further risks to see whether or not Churchill meant business. In hindsight, it was the only sensible thing to do then.

Maybe the German III Reich was fully satisfied with Sweden's policy 1941-44 as long the iron ore was in supply and the German troops in Norway could use Swedish territory for transit, so Hitler would not have really gained anything by attempts at occupying Sweden. For the Allies, it was out of the question after Germany had occupied Denmark and Norway.

By the way, how late during the war was the last shipment of iron from Sweden to Germany?

[daveh]

Tarnstrom Handbook of Armed Forces Scandinavia 1983 p127
has a map showing suggested German routes of advance into Sweden to be used in case of an Allies invasion of Norway. The idea was to take Sweden as a base for continued operations in Scandinavia.

Plan 1942

Operation I: Drive from area of Trondheim to Ostersund: Forces 702 reserve infantry division and a company of Hotchkiss H39 under XXXIII Korps. Designed to control communications to northern Sweden.

Operation II:Through the Jamtlands gap past Lake Siljan to Stockholm; Forces 181 and 196 infantry division under XXXIII.

Infantry of LXX Korps (214, 280 infantry and 710 reserve infantry divisions were to advance down the Klaralven valley of Varmland to Lake Van and Lake Malar.

The 25th panzer division (20 Pz II, 40 Pz 735 f, 15, Pz S 739)f and the partly motorized 69 infantry division were to advance rapidly along the Jamtlands gap to Stockholm.

[Johnny]

I think I read something in a book by a swedish author named Bosse Schon (Schön) that there were plans for building a KZ camp outside of Sjobo (Sjöbo) in the south of Sweden should an invasion accour. They had even stocked up timber ad other building materials at the site. I'm not 100% sure about this though and I have no idea if the initiative came from abroad or from swedish facists. In the vicinity is Helsingborg which was a notoriously facist-influenced city at the time. Anyway it seems once again Swedish neutrality has been somewhat overrated.

[Shake-Speer]

Bosse Schön is infamous for writing bullshit. Even though I haven’t read the books myself I have read I few reviews and they contain a lot of flaws. Most of the text is copied from other books, and his prime witness, a Swedish SS volunteer guarding Treblinka actually spent the whole war in a Swedish nuthouse. Furthermore he accused Sveriges Socionomers Riksförbund (SSR) for being Nazis because of their abbreviation and claimed that the beer Falcon, brewed in Falkenberg, had a nazi eagle as logotype.

[Johnny]

Do you have any sources to back that up? In that case I would be interested.

[Shake-Speer]

Well i read i review in Nerikes Allehanda about one of his books. See if you can find it. Or do a google search.

But i can give you one link:

http://www.aftonbladet.se/nyheter/0001/ ... linka.html

[Shake-Speer]

I found the review from Nerikes Allehanda. PM me your mail adress since it's too big to post here.

[Johnny]

Hmm you're right seems like Bosse has a problem with checking facts before writing them down. What's really disturbing is that I couldn't find anything to correct the statement in his followup book " Där järnkorsen växer" (Where the iron-crosses grow <-- taken from The Cross of Iron 1977?). I saw his assistant Hübbinet's book just listing hundred of suspected nazi-sympahtizers.. that must have been a best seller!! swedish state television news called it historical pornography.

[Shake-Speer]

Hmm you're right seems like Bosse has a problem with checking facts before writing them down. What's really disturbing is that I couldn't find anything to correct the statement in his followup book " Där järnkorsen växer" (Where the iron-crosses grow <-- taken from The Cross of Iron 1977?). I saw his assistant Hübbinet's book just listing hundred of suspected nazi-sympahtizers.. that must have been a best seller!! swedish state television news called it historical pornography.

Both Schön and Hübinette are well-known left-wing extremists and anarchists which makes it hard to trust their books. Would anyone trust a book about Swedish communists written by a fascist? Probably not, which makes it strange that everyone is cheering Schön’s and Hübinette’s books.

I'll mail you the articles soon.

[Daniel L]

Shake-Speer, I don't mind you criticizing authors but please spare us the ranting.

Best regards/ Daniel