The spirit of April 9th - a different occuption of Denmark in World War II

[Pedersen]

16th May – Arrival on Iceland

As the good ship Niels Iuel sailed into Reykjavík harbor on a sunny may morning, one could almost mistake this for being a happy occasion. A band was playing, a good crowd had turned out to cheer and wave their flags at King Christian, who returned their gesture by waving back.

For the past decades King Christian had visited Island a number of times. It had been during his time as king that Island had adopted the stance that it was an independent nation, and thus in 1918 the title King of Island had been established with Christian X. of Denmark being proclaimed Christian I. of Island. While some Icelanders argued for full independence from Denmark, Christian had worked hard to gain to the favor of the people in the hope of a less radical split.

As the ship was anchoring up, King Christian surveyed the scene. A number of ships had logged already, and a number of young men in Danish army uniform as well as British naval uniforms were present in the crowd. John Christmas-Møller, who he had now appointed prime minister, was also present in the crowd, having flown in by air.

Later in the day, after speeches had given and formalities were in order, he met with John Christmas-Møller and his Icelandic prime minister Hermann Jónasson and Sveinn Björnsson, whose titel of “minister to Denmark” made him the unofficial foreign minister of Iceland. Officially, Iceland and Denmark had one common foreign policy, and thus the Danish foreign minister was also the foreign minister for Iceland. In practice, however, Sveinn Björnsson, filled that role.

“I am happy to see you, my king, even if circumstances could be better,” began Hermann in fluent Danish, “I trust you will be staying a bit longer than usual, so we have started to make more permanent accommodations for you. We’ll even have a royal stable up and running for you, if you should wish to go riding.”

King Christian nodded, “thank you, prime minister Jónasson, I am most grateful for this, however, let me be clear, that I do not wish my presence here to distract, but to add to this one fact: that we are at war, and indeed at war with an enemy who occupies the largest parts of our territory. The British have made it quite clear that they expect us to do our part in controlling the waters around Iceland and preventing German attacks on British convoys. This is our first, and for the time being, our only priority. I understand that Prime minister Christmas-Møller has already discussed this matter with you.”

Sveinn leaned forward, “Indeed, he has, my king, and while all of these times will take time, nothing of what has to be done is impossible. However, if I may ask a question: today the Germans have begun to send news in Icelandic. They speak of a Dutch surrender. Is this true?”

King Christian looked at John Christmas-Møller, who nodded: “Apparently it is. I have followed this attack on the Netherlands, and it seems they have suffered much the same fate as we did in Denmark. As this broadcast indicates, the Germans have no intention of leaving us alone up here – now we have to prepare, so that we are not caught in a surprise attack a second time.”

 

[arctic warrior]

I know that there is only one of them, and Thorup gets to have it

Also, please recall that ITTL, we have an increased state of readiness since september 1939, due to a more activistic defence minister, so J-41 was not in storage, but in active duty

I thought so - I'm just going to look it up some more.
Going through what I have at home the Army Air Corps had cannon mounted on both J-41 and J-42 or at least one of them for evaluations; apparently though J-41 had been stricken from the list on 21. October 1938 and J-42 on 1. December 1939.

 

[Kitiem3000]

And there goes my country.

 

[Pesterfield]

A few times you've got Island instead of Iceland, typo or does it mean something?

What kind of navy did Iceland have, will they be able to do much to keep the German submarines under control?

 

[arctic warrior]

A few times you've got Island instead of Iceland, typo or does it mean something?

What kind of navy did Iceland have, will they be able to do much to keep the German submarines under control?

Its Island in Danish, Iceland in english; one and the same but prone to confusion on an englishspeaking/-writing site.

Iceland/Island didn't have a navy of its own; it didn't have any armed forces. Usually the Danish Navy would keep a fishery inspection ship in Icelandic waters to uphold rules and sovereignty.
There wasn't any armed forces apart from this ship in Iceland.
Upon occupation of Denmark the police set up a small unit for territorial guarding but the British occupation sidetracked this.

So no local resources for sub-hunting.

 

[arctic warrior]

I thought so - I'm just going to look it up some more.
Going through what I have at home the Army Air Corps had cannon mounted on both J-41 and J-42 or at least one of them for evaluations; apparently though J-41 had been stricken from the list on 21. October 1938 and J-42 on 1. December 1939.

There's lots of talk on the internet of the Danish cannon mounted D-XXIs.
Having recieved the relevant articles of Flyvehistorisk Tidsskrift 1983 no 1 and 2 this seems to be it:
J-41 and J-42 were delivered from Fokker, Netherlands with BA Mercury VI S engines later to have Mercury VIII engines. On pics the Mercury VI S are visibly different to the other engines due to valve bulges on the cowling.
J-41 was withdrawn from service in September 1938 to be used for Danish conversions; J-42 was used for experimental mounting of cannon but also withdrawn from service December 1939.

Accoding to "IV Rekognosceringstype Fokker G1" the cannon armament consisted of one 20mm under one wing and one 23mm under the other to evaluate the types. Even though the 23mm packed substantially more punch due to carrying almost three times as much HE as the 20mm the latter was settled upon and probably ordered but not recieved prior to occupation!
DISA had problems developing the cannon gondolas.

On April 9. 1940 2. (Jutland) squadron had nine operational D-XXIs but J-41 or J-42 wasn't among these as they had engines removed and were undergoing conversion at the Air Corps work shop which wasn't finished until June and July 1940.
The seven operational planes were only armed with two 8mm machineguns in the fuselage.
The non-operational planes were missing the fuel-tank and rear-wheel respectively.

So sorry you can't have a cannon armed Fokker D-XXI except in you decide to mount the experimental armament which to seems somewhat out of place given the time frame; the Army Air Corps would be quite busy readying the aircraft ship off ground-crew for the dispersion air-fields etc. Not much time for fiddling around with some experimental gear locked up for the past six months.
BTW the small airfield outside Esbjerg was occupied by a battery of AA-guns but had housed one squadron of fighterplanes during the 1938 manouevres which the Germans apparently believed it would here too so they send off aircraft to attack it. As you probably know the AA-battery barked back claiming one kill and then limbered up for moving up north.

 

[Pedersen]

“the lesser evil” - August 1940

New update coming here - have been busy with work, but we are off again

 

[Pedersen]

“the lesser evil” - August 1940

The Danish election of 1940 was a confusing affair to say the least. Between a new king, and the appointment of the new Munch government, then two of the four main parties, the Liberals and the Conservatives, had their current leadership in exile and calling for the election to be boycotted.

In the Conservative party, the internal effort to withdraw the party from the election almost succeeded, but in late June an extraordinary general assembly in the party elected the former chairman of their youth organization, Jack Westergaard, as the new chairman, and he worked diligently to make sure that the party was represented in the coming elections, basically restaffing the party with his internal allies from the youth movement, Konservativ Ungdom, which effectively limited the party to fielding candidates in the larger cities.

The Liberals, Venstre, had a similar back and forth, but with much less drama. When it was clear that the election was going to happen, Knud Kristensen, gave his tacit support for Edvard Sørensen to be elected chairman and participate in the election. With the exception of the 20 or so sitting PMs who had fled to Iceland with King Christian, the Liberal party was in full election mode.

The Socialdemocrates also had a change of leadership. While Stauning was recovering, he was not inclined to support the current government and simply opted not to stand for reelection for parliment. Vilhelm Buhl was elected as the new head of the party and enjoyed solid support, but many people saw Staunings decision not to run again as his way of supporting the calls for a boycott of the election that were coming from London and Reykjavik.

The Socialliberals, det radikale venstre, decided to keep Hans Jeppesen, as their chairman. While Munch had emerged as the appointed prime minister of the new king (and backed by the German occupation forces) as well as the leader of the parliamentary faction, then he featured very unprominently in the election campaign of the party, where he was portraited as the leader of a national unity government, which the socialliberals of cause supported, but as a socialliberal himself.

At every election debate, the elefant in the room was the German occupation. Since the surrender order had been given, the occupation had been peaceful, and the German commanders seemed to go out of their way to appease the Danish authorities, even allowing traditional election rallies to go forward.

While there was much criticism of the surrender as such, then the subsequent surrender of France and the Benelux countries – as well as the ultimate victory in Norway – had convinced many that it had been the only sensible option to take, and thought it was never spoken out loud, then in a war that Germany seemed to be winning, it seemed better to be on the winning side.

In the early weeks of the election campaign, the traditional parties tried to campaign on traditional domestic issues, but this was blasted to bits, when a speech delivered by the priest Kaj Munk was printed in the Berlinske Tidende, where he effectively argued that traditional parties, given their split between exile and participation, had failed in their role to provide national unity and urged all to get behind the minor nationalist party Dansk Samling. The speech was widely quoted and eventual reprinted in all major newspapers, and after that national unity became the focal point of the election, with each parties presenting its case for which it would be the best to guarantee it.

The election, when it eventually came, was an orderly affair. Participation dropped from 79,2 % in the 1939 to 60,5 %, but the protests and violence that some had feared also failed to materialize.

• Party, Leader, Votes, Percent, Seats, Change
• Socialdemokratiet (A), Vilhelm Buhl, 336.964, 25%, 33, -31
• Det Konservative Folkeparti (C), Jack G. Westergaard, 115.872, 9%, 11, -15
• Venstre (D) Edvard Sørensen, 206.850, 15%, 20, -10
• Det Radikale Venstre (B), Hans Jeppesen, 125.191, 9%, 12, -2
• Dansk Samling (R), Arne Sørensen, 263.367, 20%, 26, +22
• DNSAP (N), Frits Clausen, 92.879, 7%, 9, +6
• Danmarks Retsforbund (E) , P. Gregersen, 82.323, 6%, 8, +5
• Bondepartiet (F), Valdemar Thomsen, 124.572, 9%, 12, +8
• Slesvigsk Parti (S), Hans Schmidt, 12.016, 1%, 1, 0
• Danmarks Kommunistiske Parti, Aksel Larsen, 140.093, 9%, 14, 11

The big winners of the election was Dansk Samling, which gained 22 new seats in addition to their 4 old seats, and the Peasants Party, which won 4 seats in Western Jutland on the fact alone that the Liberal party, Venstre, had failed to field candidates there, but also made a good showing elsewhere, going to 12 seats from its old 4, and the Danish Communist Party which captured 14 seats, holding half of the districts in Copenhagen.

The Danish Nazi party also gained 6 new seats, bringing it up to 9 seats, but in a personal setback for Frits Clausen, they failed to capture any of the 103 districts proper, but gained all of their mandates from the 45 “balancing seats” that had been added with the last reform of the constitution.

The big losers were the Conservatives, who only held upon 11 seats, primarily from the Copenhagen area, and the Socialdemocrates, which went down to 33 seats. Still Jack Westergaard argued that he had in effect founded a new Conservative party, “et nyt Højre” and therefore he should not be compared to the old 26 seats that the party had once held. Within the Socialdemocrats, the result was also described as “better than feared” by Buhl. Given that the party had campaigned extensively on Staunings person in the past 4 elections, it had always been expected that his retirement would cause some level of decline, and after all the Socialdemocrates remained the largest party in the country.

The Socialliberals, Det Radikale Venstre, came out of the election losing only 2 of their 14 seats, and thought Munch himself was one of those not reelected, his unity government of the Socialdemocrates, Conservatives, Liberals and his own Socialliberals still commanded a slim majority of 77 seats out of the 148 seats.

Munchs joy over this, however, was shortlived, as the first demand from the new leader of the “Ny Højre”, as Jack Westergaard was called the Conservative Party now, was that Dansk Samling as well as potentially Retsforbundet and Bondepartiet be included in the unity government. Munch refused this on the grounds, that he feared that he could not justify including these two parties in a unity government without also including the Nazi party and the Communist, which had also gained seats in the election.

Westergaard promptly withdrew his party from the unity government, and the government was only saved losing its vote in parliament by the intervention of Retsforbundet, who promised to support the government, but had no demands to enter it.

 

[arctic warrior]

Quite interesting update. I would expect Stauning not running to have a greater effect on the turnout but 60% seems ok.
There would probably be lots of sidestepping once the result is in on how to form government which you do show.

I'm not so sure about government in exile sitting at Rejkjavik, Iceland; London or Paris would be the obvious choices with London as no 1. Who knows what the Brits will be doing about the Faeroe Islands or Iceland if there isn't highlevel Danish government members in place to restrain actions.
I would surely expect the Brits to be as highhanded as OTL in their treatment of the Danes; at least let the King reside at his cousins.
Even if Iceland is a Kingdom its a backwater and far from the allied epicenter!

 

[Pedersen]

JCM will be spending most of his time in London, old King Christian, however, is a very proud man, who will go for his chance to gain the loyalty of the icelanders.

 

[Pedersen]

London calling - September 1940

John Christmas-Møller sad down in front of the radiospeaker. He had only been given some 5 minutes, and he wanted to make them count, thus he began:

"It is with a feeling of seriousness and also – if I am allowed to use such great words about myself – of great importance – at least to myself – that I this afternoon go on the radio – in those few minutes that can be allowed – to speak with my countrymen who are still at home. Let me at once state that for me we are a turning point, where a very important decision must be taken, if not by the people as a whole, then by many of you in your own homes."

"Did you hear the radio last Thursday? A speech was given by the British Secretary of State for Air, Sir Archibald Sinclair, and then by the Danish so called prime minister Munch. It was as fire and water, like night and day. And we free Danes do not judge, but we shall speak our mind. We may even understand why Mr. Munch speaks as he does. After all, we know under which circumstances he and those with him are forced to labor under."

"Here in London, I have learned a phrase, which is commonly used, when guests at a restaurant, passengers in a bus, customers in a shop and such like grow impatient and start to complain; it is simply with the phrase: “You see, there is a war on” – and these words, unfortunately, are as true in our fair kingdom as it is in this great metropolis, from where I am currently speaking."

"You see, there is a war on."

"This are we all prone to forget, for many of us live as if there was no war, but only a situation with minor irritations and complains on food, fuel and cloth."

"No, there is a war on, and what war indeed."

"This is the largest and the most important war in world history. For this war is not a fight about interests, but of ideas. It is the decision on whether the world shall be governed by a master race theory with all others as slaves to be ruled, or by the enlighten viewpoint, held by the British Empire, that all peoples should be equal. This war is not a war between nations, but it is – in my deeply held convictions – a war between good and evil, between truth and lies, between right and wrong."

"The German goals with this war is very different from its aims in 1864, 1870 and even 1914. The goal of the German war machine is nothing less than the total destruction of all other nations, and there we will see those in our own country, who are trying to become Germans, to become part of the industrial Junckers."

"But you see, my dear listeners, in such a struggle there is nothing called neutrality. I have always hated this word, for it holds something shallow in itself, being neither hot nor cold. But I admit, when conflicts were simply about interests and not about ideas, then perhaps this word, neutrality, could hold some kind of meaning."

"But today it doesn’t."

"And we all know, that we Danes in our own homes, where we can still speak freely, often speak our hatred for the Germans, the Junckers, the master race and all the hateful ideology that comes south of our borders, as do all free people. We all know, that both the administration in Copenhagen and his majesty, Kind Christians government in Reykjavik, share a common desire to, as fast as god will allow it, to see this Hitlerism and Nazism be defeated. But where we might disagree, is that we free Danes hold that no sacrifice is too great to allow future generations to live under human conditions."

"Here it is of no use to make demands on others. It is not enough that we admire the British people for its heroic defiance of Germany. It is not enough that we praise those brave brothers and sisters that have eloped the occupied areas to join the fight."

"Active action from each and every one of us is required!"

"And here, Sir Archibald Sinclair, made a clear point: You can either be for or against. There is no longer any middle ground, any neutrality. We Danes, who are loyal to the true king, must have but one aim, What will hurt Germany, what will benefit the allies?"

"Since our arrival in London, we have placed the free Danish Forces under the British-led High Command, and now I must ask you, every one of my countrymen, to do the same and join me in following the directions of the Allied High Command"

"Denmark and we Danes must take our part. When a train in Odense is sabotaged, this leads to complications in the airfields from where bombers towards England are launched. A harbor that is rendered inoperable puts extra strain on the transport network and may allow delays in the German troops landing in Africa. Damages and delays, these are our weapons against the Germans."

"Do your duty and remind yourself that there is truth in these words, which we have sung so many times before:"

"Kæmp for alt, hvad Du har kært,
dø om saa det gælder,
da er Livet ej saa svært,
Døden ikke heller."


[Fight for all, you hold dear,
Die if that is needed
Then live is not so hard
And death itself neither]