of the 28th, the Naval Chief of Staff Fregattenkapitän Schulte-Mönting told the Swedish naval attaché in Berlin Kommendörkapten Anders Forshell over dinner that the political and military development in the north was ‘highly disturbing’. Germany feared Allied interventions on the Norwegian coast, in particular against Narvik, and with the Russians now having concluded the campaign in Finland, there was no knowing what they would do next. An ‘Anglo-Russian race’ for Narvik could not be accepted, and Germany would have to initiate countermeasures should this appear to become reality. A pre-emptive strike was far better than a belated reaction. The challenge according to Schulte-Mönting was where to strike and when.106
The plans for Operation Weserübung were formally approved by Hitler on the afternoon of 1 April after a five-hour, detailed review of the operation in the Reichskanzlei, starting at 13:00 with ‘breakfast’. Von Falkenhorst and all senior navy, army and Luftwaffe commanders involved in the operation were present and Hitler talked to each one of the officers. According to von Falkenhorst, ‘He cross-examined every man, who had to explain very precisely the nature of his task. He even discussed with the ship commanders whether they would land their men on the right or on the left side of a given objective. He left nothing to chance; it was his idea, it was his plan, it was his war.’ Satisfied with what he heard, the Führer ended the meeting with a commanding appeal, underlining the importance of the operation for the conduct of the war.107
The following day, 2 April, Hitler asked for assurance by Raeder, Göring, Keitel and von Falkenhorst that all preparations were completed and neither ice nor weather could create adverse conditions. This they all confirmed. Hitler then asked Oberst Erich Buschenhagen, Chief of Staff for Group XXI, as the corps had temporarily been renamed, what would be the latest possible date to cancel the operation. The baffled Buschenhagen, who had worked day and night for five weeks preparing the operation, had not given this much thought, but after some deliberation answered ‘Wesertag minus five’. The operation could be cancelled or postponed without risk until five days before the designated day of the invasion; after that, wheels would be rolling and the number of involved personnel with knowledge of what was happening would rise sharply.108 Hitler gave the answer some consideration and decided the invasion should commence at 05:15, German time, on 9 April. The first supply ships would be at sea within less than forty-eight hours. At 19:17 on 2 April a signal was sent from the SKL to Groups East and West, C-in-C U-boats and C-in-C Fleet: ‘Wesertag ist der 9. April.’109 A note was made in the SKL War Diary:
With the order from the Führer . . ., Weserübung has been initiated, commencing one of the boldest operations in the history of modern warfare. Its implementation has become necessary in order to defend vital German interests and supply of raw materials, which the enemy is attempting to sever . . . The outcome of the venture will to a large degree depend on the quality and the readiness of the naval forces as well as the determination of the individual officers in command. The landing operation will predominantly take place in an area where England rather than Germany has naval supremacy. Surprising the enemy . . . is important for success, and will depend on the extent to which, in the coming days, secrecy can be maintained . . .
And on 5 April:
The at times limited operational options of the German sea and air forces will improve significantly through an occupation of southern Norway. Germany now has the capacity to implement such an incursion swiftly. The basis for the operation will obviously be the loss of Norwegian neutrality to England and the total inability of the Norwegians to resist this loss.110
Acting Commander-in-Chief for Group West Generaladmiral Rolf Carls wrote in his war diary on 6 April as he was handing the command of the group back to Generaladmiral Alfred Saalwächter, returning to his own command in Group East:
The significance of this operation is not only to secure the ore supplies and to sever British trade with Norway, but to include the whole of Scandinavia in the German power-sphere . . . The British have to a large extent influenced the timing of the operation. A massive attempt from their side to forestall our seizing of the Norwegian harbours is to be expected . . . The risks associated with this task for the deployed surface units of the navy are well known to the SKL as well as to the Führer; [Raeder] has seen to that, in the same way as all group commanders have been made aware that the success of this operation, contrary to conventional, operative considerations, is based on secrecy, surprise, lack of Norwegian opposition and ruthless use of force to overcome all difficulties.111
The multiple set of motives behind Operation Weserübung is evident. Quisling set the scenario of a British intervention in Norway firmly on the agenda of the OKW in December 1939 and the decision to launch the operation matured over time, pushed by Raeder and Rosenberg and fuelled by a number of seemingly minor incidents. Gradually the question changed from if it should be initiated to when. After the Altmark incident, there was hardly any question other than when. Whether German intentions were aggressive or defensive has been argued at length since 1940. In fact it was both, or rather a complicated, multidimensional combination of several factors, some of which had aggressive and strategic rationale, independent of Allied dispositions, some defensive and tactical, intended to forestall perceived Allied intentions. Berlin had no direct knowledge of Operation Wilfred, but the German intelligence organisation Abwehr could partly decipher British naval codes and during the winter the build-up of an expeditionary force to Finland was duly registered. In addition, French and British press reported freely on plans for Scandinavia and both Churchill and Reynaud were rather loose-lipped about their intensions.112
In the war diary of the SKL, there is a note on 4 April, stating that in spite of official British assurances that no operations in the north are being planned, the SKL believe there is and conclude that ‘a race between England and Germany towards Scandinavia’ has developed.113
A Hundred Incidents
IN 1941, THE US minister to Norway, Florence Harriman, wrote: ‘Hindsight is all we seem to have. But it is fantastic that none of the things which happened in the week preceding the fatal daybreak of April 9th awakened us to danger. A hundred incidents should have prepared us. Instead we were transfixed, still watching the war in Finland.’1
Indeed, the almost uniform inability to see and understand the warning signals, which were abundantly available in spite of tight security, is one of the great enigmas of Weserübung. Not only were the signals overlooked in Oslo, but equally so in London, Paris and Copenhagen. Swedish authorities in Stockholm realised what was going on, but did nothing.
In the early pre-electronic part of the war, identification of relevant information in the flow of often contradictory signals arriving was demanding. All the more so, as even the ‘right’ signals were rarely unambiguous and could, more often than not, justify several rational interpretations. Thus, the psychological concept of cognitive priming must be accounted for, where the appreciation of new information is influenced by the receiver’s expectations and beliefs. Something that confirms an existing point of view is far more readily accepted than something pointing in an unfamiliar direction. This was certainly true for Norway in 1940.
Intelligence consists of four elements: acquisition, analysis, interpretation and distribution. If one is missing or weak, the others become meaningless. The Norwegian government of 1940 did not have any individuals or groups with access to all available intelligence material and tasked with assessing the threats to neutrality. The ministers would have to do this themselves, in addition to their many other tasks, without professional military analysis or management systems. Foreign Minister Koht in particular worked alone. He had a personal
