Operation Weserubung 1940 - Solitaire

[warspite1]

So that's Turn 1 for the Germans (all other units move for the first time on the 9th).

And so we now look at the British/French and Norwegians on the 8th April (Allied Turn 1). I don't know if this will work but as something different, instead of looking at sector by sector, we'll look at this in chronological order.

[warspite1]

Operation Weserubung - pre-Turn 1 (Allied)
3rd-7th April 1940

It's easy with hindsight to blame people for what they could have or should have done in times past - but in doing so consideration should be given for what the circumstances were, what was known and when? what were the alternatives? and what were the reasons for the action actually taken?

Sadly - even taking all these factors into account - the actions of the Admiralty and the politicians in the days leading up to 9th April 1940 do not paint the key figures in a good light.

As has been said, the Allied intervention in Norway assumed the Germans would react - the plan assumed this to be the case. Yet the necessary preparations for their own reaction to the German response were not made. Now of course it could be argued that the British did not think the Kriegsmarine capable of any large-scale reaction - but then such an assumption flies in the face of the politicians thought process when getting involved in Norway as well as being insufficiently alive to what an enemy may do.

But there was still plenty of time to put this oversight right. On the morning of 7th April, elements of the German fleet were identified by British aircraft off Horns Reef and further reports of enemy ships at sea followed. But an Admiralty intelligence report was received in the early afternoon by Admiral Forbes, CinC of the Home Fleet. It's worth repeating the wording here:

Recent reports suggest a German expedition is being prepared. Hitler is reported from Copenhagen to have ordered unostentatious movement by one division in 10 ships by night to land at Narvik with simultaneous occupation of Jutland. Sweden to be left alone. Moderates said to be opposing the plan. Date given for arrival at Narvik was 8th April. All these reports are of doubtful value and may well be only a further move in the war of nerves [my italics].

The part in italics appears to have been the dominant factor in Forbes' thinking in the next crucial phase.

At 1:25pm an RAF force attacked the German ships of MG 1+2 but achieved no hits and to compound matters - the report of the attack (and the composition of the German force) did not reach Forbes until 5:27pm. In response the Home Fleet were ordered to raise steam and left Scapa Flow at around 8:15pm. The Admiralty were becoming increasingly aware, as the day moved on and snippets of intelligence and rumour were coming in from all manner of sources, that the Germans may be planning something in Norway but the Home Fleet headed northeast to cut off a German breakout into the Atlantic.....

[warspite1]

Operation Weserubung - Turn 1 (Allied)
8th April 1940

I queried before why the game starts on 8th April - this question seems even more pertinent when looking at the Allied forces. All forces appear to be locked and immovable. So unless I've missed something there is nothing to be done here from a game perspective.

The key incidents of the 8th are:

The loss of the Glowworm

HMS Glowworm was one of a four-strong destroyer screen for HMS Renown when the latter was ordered to cover the mine-laying operation south of Vestfjord. On the 7th April she became detached from the rest of the group to search for a sailor lost overboard. In the early hours of the 8th April she was seeking to rejoin the battlecruiser when she came upon an unidentified vessel.

Glowworm asked "what ship?" and was given the answer "Swedish destroyer Goteborg". The enemy turned away and headed north. The ship was the destroyer Hans Ludemann that had become separated from her companions in the storm and was trying to catch up. The German captain, Hans-Joachim Gadow, wanted to attack but was ordered to remember his mission (his ship was packed with troops remember) and sail away.

Glowworm then came up the destroyer Bernd von Arnim - also alone. Lt-Commander Gerard Roope gave chase and although no hits were scored, the more seaworthy British vessel was gaining as the German destroyer struggled in the high seas. But Vice-Admiral Gunther Lutjens, aboard Gneisenau, had already picked up the presence of the British ship from transmissions from Ludemann and had ordered the heavy cruiser Admiral Hipper to sort out the problem.

The little destroyer was no match for the 8-inch gunned cruiser and after a brief battle - during which the destroyer rammed Hipper, ripping off part of her armour plate, destroying a torpedo mount and tearing a hole in the ship that allowed 500 tons of water in before being plugged - the destroyer was sunk, taking with her all but 40 of her crew including Roope who was later awarded the Victoria Cross for his actions that morning. The time was now 10:24hrs. To his credit the German captain, Hellmuth Heye, ordered Hipper to stay on the scene for some considerable time picking up survivors.

The Sinking of the Rio de Janeiro and Stedlingen

The Polish submarine Orzel was part of the 2nd Submarine Flotilla and was on patrol in the Skagerrak. She came across a merchant ship on the morning of the 8th April. The ship, Rio de Janeiro, was one of the merchant vessels supporting the invasion forces and was on her way to Bergen loaded with over 300 troops together with guns, vehicles, horses and sundry provisions.

Orzel's captain, Jan Grudzinski surfaced and challenged the ship to identify herself. Kapitan Voight on board Rio de Janeiro turned and headed for shore. After a warning shot she stopped and played for time while her wireless operator tried to send a signal. The signal was jammed and Grudzinski ordered a torpedo to be fired. A couple of Norwegian vessels came to the merchantman's assistance but Orzel, which had dived after the first torpedo, re-surfaced and sent a second torpedo into the hapless German vessel. She quickly sank and survivors were taken by the Norwegians to Kristiansand. Amazingly, despite being told by some Germans that they were on their way to Bergen to assist the Norwegians from attack by the British, the Norwegian response was to do nothing.... Apparently no report was received by the Admiralty and they only became aware later on - but little thought appears to have been given as to the significance of the sinking.

Later that day the British submarine Trident (Lt-Commander Seale) came upon the Stedlingen, an 8,000 tanker loaded with aviation fuel that was bound for Sola-Stavanger airfield. She two tried to run initially but stopped after warning shots were fired. Seale gave the crew 5 minutes to evacuate after which he said he would torpedo the ship. Stedlingen was duly despatched to the bottom of the sea and the German survivors picked up once again by Norwegian vessels.

The Home Fleet

'Fuhrer weather' was alive and well in the early part of the Norwegian Campaign. Having been spotted by Coastal Command aircraft on the 7th April the appalling weather allowed the German naval forces to remain largely undetected the following day.

Fearing a breakout into the Atlantic the British cancelled R4 and deployed their fleet to guard against such an eventuality. What difference the landing of these troops would have made will never be known, but it would certainly have made the German task more difficult in so far as establishing themselves ashore was concerned.

But the British had plenty of ships at sea at that time and could still have made life difficult. Unbeknown the British the 2nd Cruiser Squadron was at one point just 60 miles away from the ships of Group III, but the squadron was ordered to head north to join the rest of the Home Fleet...

[warspite1]

Operation Weserubung - Turn 1 (Allied)
8th April 1940

[Leave Space here in case I need to add additional points re action of the 8th April by either British or Norwegians].

[warspite1]

Operation Weserubung - Turn 1 (German)
9th April 1940

Marine Gruppe 1 - Narvik

The Norwegians have the two coastal defence ships, Eidsvold and Norge in Ofotfjord and I don't know to the extent to which in the game the German destroyers would be able to sink the ships (as per real life) and indeed to what extent any firing back would deplete the embarked troops.

For the purposes of the game therefore I think I will enter the fjord with Scharnhorst and Gneisenau to ensure the attack doesn't end before it starts.

Real life: 03:10hrs 9 of the 10 the German destroyers enter Ofotfjord (Giese was some way behind).

[John T_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: warspite1
Norwegian Army

During the years leading up to the Second World War the Norwegians did not use a divisional organisation as it existed in most armies around the world either. Instead, Norway was divided into six military districts, and each district was responsible for fielding a "division" in time of war.

A very short (and from memory) historical explanation:
In 1907 the Division was fielding a division in wartime and had a territorial responsibility in war and peace.

1927 the army where cut by 2/3 so each Division retained its territorial responsibility and most one brigade. (two divs still had two two brigades)

1933 -the Minister of Defence, Vidkun Quisling (at that time Agrarian party) made the at that time sensible decision to make ends meet,
that 16 battalions ( two in each brigade) would be prioritized. The rest of the army had to do with leftovers.

1938 -The would be commander in Chief describes the Norwegian army as "Europe's worst equipped and least trained army" in a speech.

ORIGINAL: warspite1
As can be seen, the Norwegian Divisions were not truly divisions and the component parts sometimes operated at huge distances from each other.

The operating unit where the brigade, division was just a regional command.

ORIGINAL: warspite1
By the time of the German invasion the mobilisation was far from complete. Note: I've used the term battalion in places but I think this is incorrect given the size of the units involved.

Norwegian army had some units in refresher training as part of "neutrality watch" the 8:th of April.
And thus spread out to cover a larger area rather than in any way being combat ready.
As no refresher training where held between 1922 and 1938, it was much training to make up for.

The Mobilization order on the morning of the 9:th called for a "silent mobilzation",
call up by letter of the four brigades around Oslo and supporting troops.

In the far North such limitations was correctly seen as an error, and they started full mobilization immediate.
but in the area between Narvik and Oslo the confusion reigned during the first couple of days.



See forward to the AAR to continue!

Cheers
/John

[larryfulkerson]

That was very interesting John. You got any more to tell? I love hearing
details like this. Rob won't mind.

[John T_MatrixForum]

ORIGINAL: warspite1


I queried before why the game starts on 8th April - this question seems even more pertinent when looking at the Allied forces. All forces appear to be locked and immovable. So unless I've missed something there is nothing to be done here from a game perspective.

The thing is that Weserübung where impossible, that's why it did work.

If Royal Navy where free to move at start and the Allied player knows the victory conditions he just places Royal Navy outside the Norwegian ports, sinks the invasion force and the game ends on GT 2.

The German setup gives you as a player some choices to depart from the historical,
in earlier versions this was even more open but it seems it did not work from game perspective.


Cheers

[Olorin]

Regarding Marine Gruppe 3, what class does the GTS prefix represents?

Wikipedia says it's a Gas Turbine Ship, but on the Weserubung article, Bremse is described as "artillery training ship", whatever that is.

Edit: Also, depot ship? I assume in WitP this would be AE?

[ChuckBerger]

Bremse and Brummer were two training vessels constructed by Germany in the late 1930s. They were officially classified as "Artillerieschulschiffe", which is some translated as "artillery training ship" but better translated as "gunnery training ship" (GTS), bearing in mind we're talking about training naval gunnery crew. (German doesn't distinguish as English does between naval guns and terrestrial artillery.)

However, both also had a secondary wartime role as minelayers, and also used in practice as all-purpose auxilliaries. Brummer was sunk by submarine HMS Starlet while escorting a convoy to Norway on April 14, 1940. Bremse managed to survive Weserubung, but was also sunk while on convoy escort duty in Norwegian waters by British cruisers in September 1941.

The term "Depot ship" is something else, a general term used for ships used for storage, resupply and maintenance generally. Sometimes used interchangeably with "tender". Carl Peters was officially classed as a "Flottentender" (Flotilla tender), with the role of being the "mothership" for a flotilla of S-Boats.

[MikeJ19]

Neat stuff, getting a history lesson here. Thanks for sharing

[Leandros]

A little supplementary info: The Norwegian Army also had three independent battalions - Alta battalion, Varanger battalion, both in Finnmark, the northern-most county, and the
Royal Guards battalion stationed in Oslo.

The Army did not normally operate in regiments (or brigades). Battalions were normally the case. The two Norwegian "brigades" on the Narvik front each consisted of two infantry battalions. The third brigade I know of was the Vestland-Brigade, a unit of approx. 3.000 soldiers rushed over from the West Coast (Bergen/Voss) to reinforce the "East". They did a good job.

Do I see anything on the coastal fortresses? These were quite numerous and relatively powerful but only manned with approx. 1/3rd of their proper complements (ref. Königsberg, Emden, Brummer and Blucher). They were hampered by the vacillations (ROE status) of the Norwegian military and political leadership.

TB Albatros and an R-boat was actually sunk by Olav Trygvason operating inside the (main) naval base of Horten.

Four German planes were shot down by Norwegian Gladiators (the only Norwegian fighter squadron) over Fornebu airport, Oslo, on April 9th.
The Navy had quite a few patrol planes, among them 6 He115.

The four light (new) destroyers (berthed in the Östfold County) never went into action. They were captured by the Germans and served through the war with the Kriegsmarine. The same could be said about the submarines, even if several were at sea.

I have at times fondled with the idea of making a scenario where the Norwegian defense (the Army did have 118.000 men in its rolls) was fully mobilized, the Air Force having received the 50 Hawk 75 fighters and 24 dive bombers on order, coastal fortresses properly manned with the minefields activated and the navy having received all the He115 (12) and the Northrop NPB-3s. The Norwegian Navy was quite proficient with air-launched torpedoes, they made their own, even sold a few hundred to the Germans, but never got the chance to use them. The torpedoes that sank the Blucher had been fired approx. a hundred times for training purposes. The torpedo battery can still be seen at the old Oscarsborg fortress in the Oslofjord.

Three of the most active Norwegian battalions in Northern Norway had recently done three months with neutrality watch and did fairly well against the German troops. Particularly in out-laying fields and mountain terrain. Except for that all Norwegian army units, the Royal Guards excepted, were grossly under-trained.

Fred


P.S.: Do not forget the German M35 minesweeper (Type 35). These were handy vessels and did an excellent job later in the
Channel escort service. One (M1 - part of the Kristiansand group) remained in Norway after the others had gone back, under
the pretext of technical problems. The captain, Bartels, was a pronounced Nazi and was adamant not to miss the party. He
stayed for the duration in Southern Norway and became a PIA for the Norwegian defenders inside the fjords, they gave M1 the
name The Red Pimpernel. She was everywhere. When the fighting was over Bartels had assembled more than 30 captured enemy ships
which he escorted to Stavanger. He published a book in Germany about this in 1941. I have it. His stories conform with
those found in Norwegian reports.