WI Sweden interveens in WW2 during the final days

[mattep74]

What if Sweden decided to join the allies in WW2 and sent the "policemen" that the norwegians were called into Norway and then sent a corps to invade Germany.

Lets say the day before the Red Army was to launch the attack over the Oder a Swedish corps land at Stralsund. How was do the Germans surrender to the Swedish troops when the Red Army launches its assult?

Or is this considered ASB?

[Dan]

I'd say plausable in terms of arming and returning Norwegians to fight for Norway and possibly arming and returning Finns to fight in Finland against the Germans, mainly to gaurd against Soviet predations against Sweden.
Sending troops to fight against Germany though is likely to be ASB.

[seraphim74]

Does Sweden has ability to land a whole corps in Germany? First, they would have needed to have said corps, at least 2 divisions, well armed and trained to WW2 standards, which wasn't that easy - I don't know much about Sweish Army at the time but AFAICR they lacked experienced and heavy weapons, especially tanks and anti-tanks weapons. Second, Sweden would need air superiority - very debatable, they had a decent number of them but the quality wasn't so good, not to mention they allegedly had problems with fuel. Third, Sweden would need to mobilize a significant number of cargo ships to carry their soldiers - not so easy to, I think, especially considering that Baltic Sea was full of mines, German E-boats and Soviet submarines.
And fourth, most important, IMHO, why would Sweden have wanted to do it? They managed to stay safely away from the most devastating war in human history and suddenly they decide to jouin? Sure, risk is relatively small, Germany is practically down, but there is absolutely no gain for Sweden. So they loose some (or rather quite a lot) of soldeirs for...what exactly?
And as far as Norway goes - Germans had 400 000 soldiers there! Sure, most of them were second rank and auxiliary, but the very number is discouraging.

[Orry]

How about landing in Courland at the beginning of May and deporting the German civilians and wounded to internment / POW camps in south Sweden?

[AdA]

Originally Posted by seraphim74

Does Sweden has ability to land a whole corps in Germany? First, they would have needed to have said corps, at least 2 divisions, well armed and trained to WW2 standards, which wasn't that easy - I don't know much about Sweish Army at the time but AFAICR they lacked experienced and heavy weapons, especially tanks and anti-tanks weapons. Second, Sweden would need air superiority - very debatable, they had a decent number of them but the quality wasn't so good, not to mention they allegedly had problems with fuel. Third, Sweden would need to mobilize a significant number of cargo ships to carry their soldiers - not so easy to, I think, especially considering that Baltic Sea was full of mines, German E-boats and Soviet submarines.
And fourth, most important, IMHO, why would Sweden have wanted to do it? They managed to stay safely away from the most devastating war in human history and suddenly they decide to jouin? Sure, risk is relatively small, Germany is practically down, but there is absolutely no gain for Sweden. So they loose some (or rather quite a lot) of soldeirs for...what exactly?
And as far as Norway goes - Germans had 400 000 soldiers there! Sure, most of them were second rank and auxiliary, but the very number is discouraging.

The troops they had. They would have to cross waters that were full of escaping Germans in all sorts of ships being chased by soviet subs, so the Soviets would have to be on the play to avoid Red on Blue incidents.
The OTL SWE forces were primarily geared for defence, but under the 1945 circumstances could possibly engage the German Forces in Norway with help from the Finns.
But this would go very much against national policy, so I'd say ASB on political grounds.

[seraphim74]

Originally posted by Orry

How about landing in Courland at the beginning of May and deporting the German civilians and wounded to internment / POW camps in south Sweden?

The Soviets might have had something to say to that. Would Sweden dare to mess with USSR just to save some German civilians? Soviet Navy and especially Air Force would have attacked German ships. Soviets didn't care if a German was a civilian or not.

Originally posted by AdA

The troops they had. They would have to cross waters that were full of escaping Germans in all sorts of ships being chased by soviet subs, so the Soviets would have to be on the play to avoid Red on Blue incidents.
The OTL SWE forces were primarily geared for defence, but under the 1945 circumstances could possibly engage the German Forces in Norway with help from the Finns.

So they had men. How well were those soldiers equipped and armed, how good was their training? They would have had to meet some hardened in battle German veterans.
And Soviets wouldn't have allowed Sweden to pass to Germany. Why should they? Just to get 2-3 divisions more?
Now, sending Swedish troops to Norway. I doubt if Sweden could have fielded an army capable of defeating 400 000 German soldiers in very hard terrain. Sure, most of those Germans were second rate troops, but quite a lot of them were not. They might allowed Swedish troops to come after German surrender, but before that they would have fought, IMHO.

Originally posted by AdA

But this would go very much against national policy, so I'd say ASB on political grounds.

Absolutely

[AdA]

Small arms, first class.
Heavy weapons, first class, you might have heard of Bofors...
Tanks, a few hundreds, including the 282 M42 tanks produced in 1944 and close to 400 light tanks.
Aircraft, by 1944 they had the Saab B17, B18, and FFVS J22. The J21 was about to enter service. It, like the B18B had DB605 engines.
They lacked the Heavy tanks and heavy antitank weapons to engage 1945 top level mechanised forces and would have problems if they faced a German counter attack in Germany, but would be up to the task of assisting in the liberation of Norway.
It would, I repeat, be a very unlikely thing for them to do...

[AdA]

http://www-solar.mcs.st-and.ac.uk/~aaron/sweeds.html

Good info here. I might be rushing it, but arguably the best neutral Army of WW2. The Swiss was more light infantry intensive, and the Turkish was bigger, but not likely to be of the same quality.

[von Adler]

Sweden had no capability of a naval landing at this time.

There were plans drawn up to attack the Germans in Denmark and Norway if they would not surrender, including a plan to land on Bornholm before the Soviets could do it.

The Bornholm plan was torpedoed (no pun intended) by Fabian Tamm, by constantly repeating the words "How do we get ashore?" in all and any planning meeting or written exchange - Sweden had absolutely NO landing naval crafts. The haphazard plan called for fishing boats and tugs to land troops, in a plan similar to Seelöwe - completely idiotic, and the commander of the navy knew it.

The invasion of Norway, however, was a much more realistic plan, as was crossing into Själland from Scania, since artillery in Scania could protect the crossing.

The Swedish army at the time included 10 infantry divisions, 3 armoured brigades (of 181 tanks each), 1 motorised brigade, 1 bicycle brigade and a local defence force quite competent. All were very well trained and pretty well equipped - there's also 1 Danish infantry brigade (called police, but trained and equipped like regular infantry) and 3 Norwegian.

The army is well trained and very well adapted to fighting and moving through Swedish terrain.

[AdA]

They would make an interesting addition to operation unthinkable...

[stevep]

Guys

One other possibility that might have been of interest to Sweden, but could have caused a hell of an alliance mess. What if they send forces east to occupy Finland? [With Finnish agreement].

If the Finns withdraw to the pre-Winter War border and surrender to the Swedes, who have formally joined the allies and possibly also sent forces into Norway what does Stalin do? What does the western allies do if Stalin attacks Sweden?

Steve

[Cook]

When they surrendered in May 1945, the German garrison in Norway was 400,000 strong. How large was the Swedish army?

[von Adler]

As for the Finnish idea, the Germans have 200 000 men in northern Finland that will have to be dealt with.

The Swedish army was about 600 000 men strong, with another 120 000 men in the Home Guard. About 270 000 of those were in the line army rather than the local defence units. Local defence had no operational or strategic mobility and was supposed to man the many fortified lines and emplaced artillery that had been buillt 1936-1945.

However, one should not over-estimate the German forces in Norway either. The 180 000 of the 20. Gebirgs-Armee that had retreated from Finland were of good quality, if a little light on artillery and with no armour. The rest were stationary garrison formations, Luftwaffe ground personell, Kriegsmarine border and administraive personell and other non-frontline units. What artillery there were was built into bunkers and pointed to the sea - if it was available, there were no prime movers to move them (and very few horses, etc).

The so-called Panzer-division 'Norwegen' had a newly raised Panzergrenadiere regiment - without trucks, two battalions of captured French tanks (from 1940) a total of 55 tanks and a single motorised battery of 10,5 leFH16 - ww1 vintage howitzers.

Panzer-division 'Norwegen' was placed at Narvik together with the 20. Gebirgsarmee. There were a single understrength infantry division in the south as the only mobile German formation. One should also keep in mind that the German troops in Norway had bled their best and brightest away for frontline formations for years. Much of the men in Norway were considered second or third rate recruits, or men that had shown a significant lack of enthusuasm and initiative.

[seraphim74]

Well, it seems I seriously underestimated Swedish armed forces of 1940s. So perhaps they might have had a chance to liberate at least part of Norway (if not whole country). However I still think that had Germans decided to fight for real, the Swedish army would have had very serious problems:
- they could not have sent all of their army, so they might send, let's say, 400 000. Even only against 180 000 of the German veterans of 20. Gebirgsarmee that is not good, even if we count Swedish armour.
- terrain seriously favours the defender
- Germans are much more experienced (again, I count only 20. Gebirgsarmee).

But it still a purely theoretic discussion. Sweden had no reason to join the war - significant losses for no gain.

[von Adler]

One can just isolate the 20. Gebirgsarmee. There's no roads between Trondheim and Narvik. Just take Mo i Rana and the 20. Gebirgsarmee is isolated.

It is not possible to attack anything of value in Sweden from Narvik - you have to go all the way to Kiruna to find anything of value, which I seriously doubt the Germans have the capability to do.

As I said before, OTL Sweden planned to intervene in Norway if the Germans there did not surrender, hopefully in unison with an Anglo-American force (the Brits had the 60. (Light) Division, the Free Norwegian Brigade and the 52. (Lowland) Division earmarked for Norway (although the 52. was put into combat around Antwerpen late 1944 and the 60. was never fully raised) and trained and equipped for mountain warfare. I could imagine an American force made up of some of the marines on Iceland added to it.

[superkuf]

IOTL it would be impossible, as von Adler points out. Sweden didn't have any amphibious capacity or training for such operations. The impact of 3 swedish divisions would be small compared to what the Red Army was bringing to battle.

Also, Sweden was happy to stay out of the war. The german garrisons in Denmark and Norway would surrender when Germany did, sparing danes and norwegians bloody and destructive battles.

But in a larger perspective it could be possible. If Sweden 1943-44 made a secret alliance with the WAllies it could building a small LCS/LCT fleet with help from the US - enough to make the trip Scania-Germany. The WAllies could also base a lot of their short ranged fighter/attack planes in Sweden. A landing in February could be useful in distracting the Germans.

But this would demand a very good POD. Earlier public knowledge of the Holocaust? Agressive demands from the Soviets on Sweden?

[DrakonFin]

Originally Posted by superkuf

But in a larger perspective it could be possible. If Sweden 1943-44 made a secret alliance with the WAllies it could building a small LCS/LCT fleet with help from the US - enough to make the trip Scania-Germany. The WAllies could also base a lot of their short ranged fighter/attack planes in Sweden. A landing in February could be useful in distracting the Germans.

But this would demand a very good POD. Earlier public knowledge of the Holocaust? Agressive demands from the Soviets on Sweden?

For a true sucker punch of the Germans, cobble together a plan to bring Sweden in to the war on the Allied side at the same time as Finland makes peace with the Soviets and changes sides.

If the Finns were sure that they would be supported by food, provisions and Western troops from Sweden against the Germans still in the country, they just might be swayed to change sides sometime earlier in 1944. Making peace with the Soviets was at least theoretically on the table since 1943, but the problem was with fighting the still strong Germans and being essentially at the mercy of the Soviets in regards to food and supplies in that situation. Bringing Sweden along would change that drastically.

Of course it would be hard to make the Finnish government accept peace with anything significantly less than the 1920 borders at this point, so this kind of a deal could be brought down by Stalin even if the Western Allies and Sweden would play ball. However, if letting Finland off lightly means the the Red Army can start a much stronger than OTL general offensive on the Eastern Front as soon as possible in the spring of 1944 and the situation in the Nordic sphere and on the Baltic has been drastically altered in the USSR's favour in a matter of weeks, Stalin might well go for that.

[AdA]

This is plausible only in the context of a Wallie plan to roll back the predicted Iron Courtain. Kill Roosevelt earlier and have Churchill get Truman into full Red Scare mode. Finland turned, Sweden joins in, the wallies use Sweeden as a jumpimg point for an Amphibian Secondary Attack on their drive to Berlim...

[superkuf]

Originally Posted by AdA

This is plausible only in the context of a Wallie plan to roll back the predicted Iron Courtain. Kill Roosevelt earlier and have Churchill get Truman into full Red Scare mode. Finland turned, Sweden joins in, the wallies use Sweeden as a jumpimg point for an Amphibian Secondary Attack on their drive to Berlim...

A dead FDR before the election of 1944 would mean Wallace as US president. And since the planning for a invasion through Sweden would take months there is simply not time to do it after the election.

Potential scenario: Sweden is hit harder by WW2. Swedish Communists (maybe with help from Soviet agents) attacks either the swedish military or german transports through Sweden, causing general paranoia and fear regarding the Soviets after WW2. Add some news regarding Holocaust - maybe have Kurt Gerstein reach a sympathic Swedish journalist. Germany becomes more irritated regarding Sweden due the communist attacks and newspaper articles. Therefore Sweden is more ready to discuss its neutral stance.

Churchill reintroduces his idea of peripheral operations - but instead of Greece or Norway he suggests acting with Sweden. Promising WAllied airforce, radar, coal and general know-how Sweden does, in deepest secrecy, join in early 1944. Swedish shipbuilders starts to build Higgins boats, the airfields are expanded to recieve far more planes, technical personal (radar operators etc) are sent to England for training and Swedish troops starts to train for amphibious assults. For general infantery support a recoilless rifle, the Carl Gustav, is rushed into production.

In august 1944, when Overlord and Bagration have taxed Germanys force to maxium, Sweden attacks. WAllied airborne troops are landed in support and large WAllied airforces are rebased to Sweden. Minesweepers, under heavy air cover, starts sweeping the sealanes into western Sweden (a must to get shipborne supply going) at the same time that German airfields in Norway and Denmark are attacked by both SAS and by air.

Sweden also advances, slowly and carefully, into southern Norway to remove the threat to Sweden and the german airbases. The rest of Norway is ignored, apart from dropping propaganda / psycological warfare letters over the germans, encouraging them to surrender.

The Swedish invasion is mainly a distraction. They advance and dig in, relying on superior firepower and air support to hold of the Germans. The Baltic becomes a "sea of death" with Mosquitoes hunting anything with a swastika. German supply to Kurland collapses, the submarines loses their training area.

Results: WW2 ends earlier. Is there an Ardennes offensive at all? Sweden joins NATO after the war? What happens to Finland?

But it is a very unlikely scenario. For example, Sweden would have to get a huge minesweeping and shore clearing capacity that it never had. How fortifyed was the German Baltic sea coast by 1944?

[DrakonFin]

Originally Posted by superkuf

Results: WW2 ends earlier. Is there an Ardennes offensive at all? Sweden joins NATO after the war? What happens to Finland?

If Finland is kept in the dark about the Swedish joining the war, it is likely that the peace between Finland and the USSR will follow pretty much on schedule - late August or early September.

There might be some changes in the Lapland War - perhaps cooperation between Finnish and Swedish troops in Lapland and naval units on the Baltic. The Germans might also pull out of Finland earlier due to trouble in Norway and on the Baltic.

Post-war, the Soviets will be alarmed by Sweden getting closer to the West. So while the Finno-Soviet peace treaty might well be pretty similar to the OTL one, Stalin will lean more heavily on the Finns to make them part of the Communist camp. At the same time, it is conceivable both the WAllies and Sweden will be more active in working towards Finland becoming part of the West, especially if Sweden goes *NATO. It does make for tumultuous late 40s and 50s in Finnish politics.

Of course if both Finland and the USSR know about the Swedish plans well before August 1944, the late events of the Continuation War and the eventual peace deal might be unpredictably different from the OTL. It is pretty certain the Finns and the Swedes don't want to fight each other, so it would be pretty understandable for all involved that the Finno-Soviet peace would precede the Swedish DOW on Germany, if just by hours, as that would avoid several difficulties. Secret cooperation between Finland and Sweden might lead into Finland playing a "double agent" in the Axis for a few months in the summer of 1944, a logical continuation of the OTL Finnish late war policies like President Ryti's double cross of the German leadership.