Hitler’s Pre-Emptive War: The Battle for Norway, 1940 (9 page)

The British Navy would not interfere with Norwegian operations to sweep the minefields; it would just lay a new field in a slightly different location. If the Norwegians challenged the British destroyers guarding the minefields, they were to be told that they were there on humanitarian grounds, to keep innocent ships from being sunk. Thereafter, they were to withdraw from Norwegian waters and leave the guard mission to the Norwegians.

It was planned initially that the cruiser
Birmingham
and two destroyers hunting for a German fishing fleet near the Lofoten Islands would cover the mining operation in Vestfjord. The final decision was to send the battle cruiser
Renown
, flagship of Vice Admiral W.J. Whitworth, as a show of force to discourage the Norwegians from trying to hinder the operation with their coastal defense ships
Norge
and
Eidsvold
.
Renown
, escorted by the destroyers
Greyhound
,
Glowworm
,
Heron
, and
Hyperion
, left Scapa Flow late in the afternoon of April 5. On their way to Vestfjord, they were joined by the eight destroyers that had departed Scapa Flow earlier the same day.

Nineteen submarines, including two French and one Polish, were directed to the Kattegat and Skagerrak on April 4. Their mission was to frustrate any German attempt to interfere with the British mining operations or the bringing of troops to Norway.

In readiness to protect the operation against German counter-measures were the 2nd Cruiser Squadron in Rosyth, consisting of two cruisers and 15 destroyers, and the 18th Cruiser Squadron in Scapa Flow, consisting of two heavy cruisers and five destroyers. Vice Admiral G. F. B. Edward-Collins commanded the 2nd, and Vice Admiral G. Layton commanded the 18th. The Home Fleet, commanded by Admiral Sir Charles Forbes, was also in Scapa Flow, ready for operations. It consisted of the battleships
Rodney
and
Valiant
, the battle cruiser
Repulse
, the cruiser
Sheffield
, and 10 destroyers.
³⁴

Admiral Sir Edward Evans was designated naval commander of the expedition against Narvik. He hoisted his flag on the cruiser
Aurora
in the Clyde on April 4. This ship, together with the cruiser
Penelope
, was ordered to escort a large troop transport that embarked troops on April 7. The ship took aboard one battalion of the 24th Guards Brigade, the First Scots Guards. The other two battalions of the brigade were on their way to the embarkation point on April 7. This force was scheduled to depart the Clyde early in the morning of April 8.

The orders for the operation were similar to those issued for
Plymouth
earlier. The main difference was that the force would advance to the Swedish border and await further instructions. However, if the opportunity presented itself, the force would continue on to the iron ore field at Gällivare.

Some confusing statements in the military order perplexed even Halifax. He noted that one paragraph stated that the Allied forces were to land only after agreement with the Norwegian government, while the next paragraph stated that they should tolerate some losses if the Norwegians opened fire. Ironside explained that this provision was included since it was possible that even if the Norwegians decided to cooperate, local military commanders might be confused or out of communications with their superiors. The parenthetical reference to the precondition of Norwegian cooperation was removed from the document.

Major General Pierce C. Mackesy, the designated ground-force commander for Narvik, explained to Halifax what was meant by the phrase that called for landings provided it could be done without serious fighting. The troops were to accomplish their missions by methods like those used against civilians: persuasion, pressure, rifle butts, and fists. The troops were expected to tolerate seeing some of their own shot before resorting to deadly force. Thereafter, it was permitted to use as much force as necessary to protect themselves.
³⁵

One battalion of the 146th Infantry Brigade, destined for Trondheim, was embarked on another transport on April 7. Two battalions of the 148th Infantry Brigade, to be landed in Bergen and Stavanger, were at the same time embarked on the cruisers
Devonshire
,
Berwick
,
York
, and
Glasgow
in Rosyth. Admiral J.H.D. Cunningham commanded this squadron. The force was scheduled to leave Rosyth early on April 8.

The commanders of the forces for Trondheim and Bergen had some special instructions. The landings were to take place only after German “hostile actions,” unless the Norwegians extended an invitation. If the force destined for Bergen was unable to land, it should try to do so in Trondheim. If that also proved impossible, the forces were to return to Great Britain. Cooperation with Norwegian military forces was important, but this should not divert the Allies from their primary goals.

A British brigade of three battalions was held back as a reserve, to be transported to Narvik as soon as the 24th Brigade had occupied that city. A French force of about 14,000 men was also destined for Narvik. However, its first part, a combined alpine brigade of six battalions, was not scheduled to sail from France until eight days after the first British troops had sailed.

The Allied operations in Norway were underway. Their origins can be traced to the political leadership in both Great Britain and France. While the ideas were Churchill’s, he had the wholehearted support at the highest levels in the French government (Reynaud and Daladier). Chamberlain and Halifax gave their reluctant support only after the storm of criticism that broke out following their failure to take timely action to help the Finns. It is important to keep the strategic credentials of these policy makers in mind. Kersaudy has commented, “With the exception of Winston Churchill, the War Cabinet ministers had not the slightest notion of strategy, and they knew it; as for Churchill’s notions, they were highly imperfect—and he did not know it.”
³⁶
The British naval leadership supported the operation because it held out promise for action that could cripple the German Navy, prevent the latter from improving its strategic position, and strengthen the naval blockade. The other services in Britain were much less enthusiastic, particularly the air force. They were concerned about the diversion of scarce resources away from the main theater of operations in France.

There is no doubt that what the Allies contemplated constituted aggression; but any clear-cut interpretation becomes muddled because of almost simultaneous German action. Similarity of intent should not be inferred because of the coincidental timing of the operations. Moulton draws the distinction by writing that the German intent was to occupy the capital and country, while the Allies were involved in a small naval operation to mine the territorial waters with a small military force in British ports in case of a German reaction. While this sounds reasonable, we have seen that the naval forces were not small; the military force designed to occupy the main population centers on the coast was small because it was all that was immediately available, and that this force was to sail before or simultaneously with the mining operation. The fact that they did not sail as scheduled was due to a British Admiralty decision that all ships were needed for naval action when it became aware that the Germans were at sea.

G
ERMAN
P
LANS
: B
OLD
, I
MAGINATIVE, AND
R
ECKLESS

“The operation in itself is contrary to all principles in the theory of naval warfare.”

S
TATEMENT TO
H
ITLER BY
G
ENERAL
A
DMIRAL
E
RIC
R
AEDER ON
M
ARCH
9, 1940.

Norway in German Strategic Planning

When World War II began, Germany had no plans to invade Norway. In a conversation with Count Ciano, the Italian Foreign Minister, on August 12, 1939, Hitler stated that he was convinced none of the belligerents would attack the Scandinavian countries, and that these countries would not join in an attack on Germany. There are no reasons to doubt the sincerity of this statement, and it is confirmed in a directive on October 9, 1939.

At the outset of war in 1939, Hitler considered it advantageous to have a neutral Scandinavia. The same views also prevailed initially among the staff of the German Armed Forces Headquarters (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, or OKW). The members of the OKW considered it foolish to initiate an attack on Norway unless the British and French tried to spread the war to that area. They viewed a campaign in Norway as a risky drain on troops and resources from the main front in the west.

When the idea of invading Norway began to take shape, it did not originate with Hitler, but from members of the German Navy. In fact, he needed considerable persuasion before accepting what some considered a necessity. Eventually, he became convinced of the need for a preemptive strike to forestall a British move against Norway. Liddell-Hart wrote that “Hitler, despite all his unscrupulousness, would have preferred to keep Norway neutral, and did not plan to invade her until he was provoked to do so by palpable signs that the Allies were planning a hostile move in that quarter.”
¹

German war planners considered Norway of great importance to Germany in a prolonged war. However, since initially they did not anticipate a long war, Norway’s role was reduced to keeping sea traffic flowing without interference from the enemy for a relatively short period. The OKW strategic plan for the war was simple. The main attack would be directed against France and, after an expected victory, Britain would be presented with a generous peace offer that the political leadership felt confident would be accepted.

The navy’s reason for pushing to secure Norway may be traced back to that service’s experience in World War I, when the large German fleet failed to reach the open sea. The isolated ships that did reach open waters had to cross the dangerous North Sea before they could pierce the British blockade. Many German naval officers saw their only hope for useful service during World War II to be contingent on the German Navy acquiring bases in locations that would avoid or complicate British blockades.

Vice Admiral Wolfgang Wegener wrote a book about this subject in 1929 titled
Die Seestrategie des Weltkriges
. This book was well known in the German Navy and it influenced the strategic thinking of many of its key officers in the late 1930s. Wegener argued that the primary mission of the German Navy in any future conflict was to keep the sea lanes open for German merchant shipping, and that this could not be accomplished from German or Danish harbors. Wegener saw two possible solutions. One was to capture bases on the French coast. The other involved the seizure of bases in Norway. Although he does not directly say so, Wegener appears to view the acquisition of bases in Norway as the easier of the two solutions. This was natural since he was writing based on the experience of World War I, when the German army failed to reach the French coast. With respect to bases in Norway, he wrote, “England would then be unable to sustain a blockade line from the Shetlands to Norway but would be forced to withdraw to approximately a Shetlands-Faeroes-Iceland line. However, this line was a net with very wide meshes.”
²

Wegener concluded that, while it would be difficult for the British to defend the new line because of its proximity to German bases in Norway, the only way to eliminate the possibility of a blockade was to seize the Faeroes or the Shetland Islands. This would eliminate the dangers of a blockade and would place the German Navy in a position to interdict British supply routes, an objective that could not be achieved from bases in Norway. Wegener judged the seizure of the Faeroes or the Shetland Islands as beyond German capabilities, and this in turn reduced the value of bases in Norway.

Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, the commander-in-chief of the German Navy, did not have a large fleet at his disposal in 1939, but his surface raiders and submarines faced the same obstacles as those Wegener had pointed out ten years earlier. Furthermore, the German Navy had not given up on its plans to play a significant role among the armed services. Hitler approved the navy’s plans for a gigantic fleet rearmament, the so-called
Z-plan
, in January 1939.
³
Hitler not only approved the rearmament program but ordered that it should begin immediately and should take priority over other needs, including the rearmament requirements of the other services. It is therefore not surprising that the German Navy, at an early date, turned its attention to the possibility of extending its operational range. The naval officers did not share the optimism of their army and air force counterparts that the war would be short and that bases would soon be available on the French coast. They were also deeply skeptical about the English government accepting a peace offer after a French defeat.

There was no unanimity of views in the German Navy on either the desirability of establishing bases in a Norway, or the service’s ability to do so. However, new support for Wegener’s ideas surfaced in the late 1930s when some of the officers who favored his approach to naval strategy began to occupy key positions and the question of bases assumed increasing importance in operational planning. There is little doubt that Raeder, too, although not a follower of Wegener, was favorably disposed to his ideas. Gemzell points to convincing similarities between the reasoning contained in a briefing Raeder gave Hitler and others on February 3, 1937 and what Wegener wrote almost a decade earlier.

The similarities in views between Wegener and Raeder have been challenged in a recent article in the Naval War College Review. Commander Hansen describes how Wegener and Raeder, who came into the navy together and were close friends, drifted apart and became bitter enemies.
⁴
Hansen maintains that the two saw the importance of Norway in different ways. For Wegener, bases in Norway represented a “gate to the Atlantic,” while Raeder was more concerned with “the absolute necessity to the German war effort of Swedish iron ore
.”
However, Raeder’s preoccupation with the iron ore issue was closely tied to his desire for a large fleet, which could challenge the British Navy in ways very similar to those put forward by Wegener. When Raeder warned that the loss of Swedish iron ore would quickly destroy the German armament industry, he was also perhaps worried about what such a loss would do to the naval construction program.