The German attack on Norway and sinking of the KMS Blucher

[Art]

The Norwegians weren't really benign when it came to collaboration with the NAZIs. Any Norwegian who had served in the NAZI military, especially those who served in the SS (SS Divisions Nordland and Viking) were subject to criminal prosecution. After some serious debate, the Norwegian government in exile re instituted the death penalty for collaborators in 1941. Pursuant to that law 25 Norwegian collaborators were tried, sentenced to death and shot under what is called in Norway "The Lawful Purge" between 1945 and 1948. In addition about 20 NAZI officials operating in Norway were prosecuted for war crimes and executed.

[bdm]

Thank You for posting great reading with pictures

[blackhawknj]

Shortly after the German occupation the 1935 ban on political uniforms was rescinded, Quisling and his followers started appearing in uniforms often based on German originals, while it boosted their egos it marked them as turncoats in their countrymen's eyes. Quisling had long been dismissed as a member of the Lunatic Fringe, at his trial in 1945 he was subject to very intense psychological and physical examination, even those who opposed him felt he was clinically insane.

[JohnPeeff]

The other side of the coin, a lot of Norwegians joined the Wehrmacht and there were a lot of children fathered by German soldiers. A complicated situation. A unit that fought to the last defending Berlin was the SS Wiking Div composed of Norwegians and Danes.

[blackhawknj]

The Waffen-SS Charlemagne Division also fought to the bitter end defending the Fuehrerbunker.
An excellent book covering WWII in Norway and Denmark is The Bitter Years by Richard Treptow.
General Eduard Dietl, commander of German forces in Norway, issued several messages reminding his troops that only German girls were suitable marriage partners for them.
From what I have read collaborationism was rarely more than 5% of the population in Western and Northern Europe.

[barretcreek]

A Norwegian unit attached to the U.N. 'peace keepers' in Yugoslavia was attacked by a group of whoevers. Serious mistake.

[jon_norstog]

There was a kind of Brownshirt type organization called the Hird, had about 8,000 men and 1,500 women, who threw their weight around during the occupation. Most of the new police the Nazis organized were Hird, I think. They actively recruited Norwegians for the Wehrmacht, SS and Kriegsmarin as well and a fair number of men signed up. A lot of doctors and nurses went to work at German clinics and hospitals.

There was no way to punish everyone who deserved it, so they tried to get the worst. Corporate collaborators mostly got off scot free. But memory is longer than life in that country - my grandmother was really down on Germany and the Catholic Church, near as I can tell because of the counter-reformation and the 30-years' war.

jn

[blackhawknj]

I read an account by one Norwegian, joined the Waffen-SS, he said he came home on leave-and was ostracized. Then again, few of them came home. The Belgian Fascist leader and collaborator Leon Degrelle joined the Walloon Legion-a Wehrmacht unit-in August, 1941, of the original 800 only Degrelle and two others came back. The French General Leclerc encountered some prisoners from the Waffen-SS Charlemagne Division on May 8, 1945, he asked one of them why he was wearing a German uniform to which he arrogantly asked why Leclerc was wearing a US uniform. Not smart....
Quisling saw himself as the "Fuehrer" of Norway but the Germans gave him the title of "Minister President" which in German parlance is the head of a Land-state government, equivalent to a governor.