WI: Germany loses the Norwegian Campaign

I don't wish to sound insulting. But I have found in the past that many Finns are extremely committed to the idea that the Continuation War was absolutely the Right Idea; that renewed Soviet attack was absolutely inevitable.

The Continuation War might not have been the Right Idea, but there is strong indication that it seemed to the Finnish leaders like that at the time - which is really all that matters to the discussion, isn't it? Current Finnish attitudes, real or imagined, hardly have bearing on what politicians and soldiers would have done in 1940 or 1941.

There is also a lot of circumstantial evidence to the claim that the USSR would have attacked Finland again in around 1942 had Hitler kept to his bargain with Stalin over the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty. All other areas specifically mentioned as Soviet sphere of influence were annexed by the USSR by 1941, and before Barbarossa the Soviet government did heavily lobby for "Soviet rights" in Finland, even at high level in Berlin.


1) Germany has already betrayed Finland once; the Soviet attack in 1939 was with German permission and assistance. (Mussolini wanted to send arms to Finland out of anti-Bolshevik sentiment; Germany prevented it.

During the Winter War Germany did not "betray" Finland because it had no obligation to support the Finns. The hostile neutrality of Germany raised doubts in Finland, but no really anti-German sentiments.


2) Germany has no food to spare. Nor oil. Britain has a lot more of both.

Still IOTL in 1941-1944 Germany supplied Finland with most of the resources the Finns needed and that would have otherwise been unobtainable.


3) Germany can't send significant forces to Finland until it controls the Baltic states. Germany can ship arms and other goods until the war starts, but then Finland is on her own until Germany wins that victory. (OTL there was communication via the Arctic and Sweden.)

Much of the German troops that would be based in Lapland IOTL came to Finland on ships before the start of Barbarossa, via Vaasa, Oulu and other Western Finnish ports. If Germany does take the Baltic states, transport ships can get to Finland during the war along the Baltic coast and across the Gulf of Finland and/or the Archipelago Sea, protected by the Kriegsmarine and the Finnish Navy.


4) Britain can pretty much force Sweden to cut off all connection to Finland. Britain can shut off all Swedish overseas commerce and food and oil imports, with minimal cost to itself.

Which might well make Finland more rather than less dependent on Germany as the supplier of the imports the Finns so sorely need.


Except that the former greatly increases the chance of the latter. Finland, AFAIK, never wanted to be an Axis ally. The Western Allies recognized this. Finland was not denounced in American and British propaganda. The U.S. never declared war on Finland.

Nor, AIUI, did Finland enter the war with expectation of a general Axis victory. Thus Finland expected at some point to extract itself from the war and its Axis ties, presumably with support from Britain and the U.S.

But if Britain must make war against Finland, Finland's position becomes vastly more difficult. Britain will justify war against Finland by emphatically denouncing Finland's alliance with Germany, and also approve Soviet war against Finland (which Britain will participate in). This will tend to retroactively justify the Winter War, and eliminate any possible British objection to Soviet total conquest of Finland.

This increases the stakes: if Finland joins in, and Germany doesn't smash the USSR, Finland will lose all.

But if Finland stays out, and Germany does win decisively, Finland can still move unopposed into its old territories when the Red Army collapses, and Britain is not likely to object. If Finland shelters thousands of Jewish and other refugees from fallen Leningrad...

My conclusion: if Norway is in Allied hands, Finland remains neutral. I don't expect any Finns to agree, but that's the moose's problem.

Finland made a deal with the Germans IOTL because the Finnish government thought it was the best bet to both 1) to safeguard Finnish independence against a new Soviet attack and possible occupation and annexation and 2) to regain all or some of the territories lost in 1940. Wanting to join the Axis as such or any actual support to Hitler's goals (apart from an understandable wish that the USSR would be beaten) had little to do with the Finnish goals.

At the most basic level, the Finns believed that a Soviet attack would be more or less imminent under the cover of the wider war, and the occupation and annexation of the Baltic states seemed to reinforce that belief. It was as if "staying out of it" was already a lost option as 1940 progressed towards late summer, it was rather that one had to choose how to survive a war that was a foregone conclusion.

ITTL as well as IOTL Finland will in 1940-41 choose the options that seem to best satisfy the two basic needs of the Finns at the time. Survival is paramount: getting weapons and food and a strong ally against Stalin. If the Allies are victorious in Norway and supportive of Finnish pleas for help, as well as able to make good on any promises of concrete help in an expedited schedule, Finland would likely choose that option. Many of the key Finnish leaders like Ryti and Mannerheim were Anglophiles, after all.

But if the Allied help gets delayed because of such things as shifting military priorities and the Swedish dragging their feet because of some quintessentially Swedish aspirations to neutrality (or ass-covering), and if in 1940 the tide seems to turn in favour of the Germans when France gets knocked out of the war like IOTL, it is not impossible that the Finnish government would listen to the voice of Berlin instead, misguided as that might be. Finland would need concrete help and it would need it now: if the Allies can't even protect themselves, how could they protect their new, expendable protege sitting right next door to Stalin's evil empire? During the Winter War the Allies could not send serious help as fast as the Finns would have needed it - if it seems this will repeat itself even now, when the Soviet armies have even better starting positions to break the Finnish defence once and for all, well...

The Finnish government would not have the benefit of hindsight to know which side will win; it could only look at who would be plausibly able and willing to help it in a concrete way. Finland will not go out of its way to deliberately piss off the British, but neither would it shy away from going against London's wishes if it seems survival requires that - as indeed evidenced by the OTL choices of the Finnish government.

It might well come down to a choice like this: join the righteous British, now (it seems) alone and vulnerable, and be ready to receive only a relative trickle of real help while having to forget most if not all aspirations of regaining the lost territories. Or join the unsavoury Germans, now the masters of the continent, offering reasonable amounts of real help soonish and a promise of support in getting Karelia back.

I'd say it is not at all guaranteed beyond a reasonable doubt that the Finns would choose the first option.
 
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But as this would happen after the Winter War ended and Finland and the USSR are now at peace, for the time being, it would have to include either a out-of-the-blue British DOW against the USSR or then a Soviet attack on a Finland that is explicitly under a British/Allied umbrella. Both are unlikely turns of events in mid-to-late 1940 and become less likely still in 1941 if Barbarossa comes about on schedule.

Oops. Totally misremembered my timeline there.
 
The Continuation War might not have been the Right Idea, but it there is strong indication that is seemed to the Finnish leaders like that at the time - which is really all that matters to the discussion, isn't it? Current Finnish attitudes, real or imagined, hardly have bearing on what politicians and soldiers would have done in 1940 or 1941.

There is also a lot of circumstantial evidence to the claim that the USSR would have attacked Finland again in around 1942 had Hitler kept to his bargain with Stalin over the Molotov-Ribbentrop Treaty. All other areas specifically mentioned as Soviet sphere of influence were annexed by the USSR by 1941, and before Barbarossa the Soviet government did heavily lobby for "Soviet rights" in Finland, even at high level in Berlin.

When reading about the period between the Winter War and the Continuation War, it's quite easy to see why the Finnish leadership did as it did. Soviets were really pressing their demands during that time. There were also few crises during that time when Finns thought that a new attack was coming. And it's not like the idea was very impossible. Molotov had after-all asked Hitler about a new war against Finland when he visited Berlin in November 1940.

Finland made a deal with the Germans IOTL because the Finnish government thought it was the best bet to both 1) to safeguard Finnish independence against a new Soviet attack and possible occupation and annexation and 2) to regain all or some of the territories lost in 1940. Wanting to join the Axis as such or any actual support to Hitler's goals (apart from an understandable wish that the USSR would be beaten) had little to do with the Finnish goals.

It's good to remember that quite many Finns believed that WW2 would end similarly than the WW1: Germany wins in Russia but still loses to the Western Allies. From a Finnish perspective that's a quite attractive idea.
 
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