American Reacts What Did Sweden Do in World War 2? | Scandinavia's Neutral Power 1939-1945

[@generaladvance5812]

If any Swedes read this, cheers for the assist with the Bismarck. Much appreciated.

[@melkor3496]

I’m glad we helped

[@1991beachboy]

It was sent from the big pre electronic radio station of Grimeton outside Varberg. The only one left of it's kind in the world. It transmits long range waves, that can still be heard each year in every country in europe and on the east coast of the US. Pretty amazing how strong pre electronic devices were.

[@citizenkane4831]

@@1991beachboy It was Ericsson who cracked the encription code

[@0men916]

@@melkor3496 me too

[@swedishjulia]

Love from Sweden 🇸🇪❤️

[@peppermintcrush5794]

Sweden is a small country and I believe that the government did what they had to do to keep Sweden and it people safe. That's what governments are supposed to do. And by doing that Sweden could operate against the nazis as well. Under the radar. Because of the neutralitet.

[@TheJonasbz]

Not everybody understands that, specially a lot of swedes who not would exist today if sweden would have gone to war againt germany. Its just stupid

[@aardvark5730]

It wasn’t really our war anyway. Loads of countries were neutral in the beginning of the war and only became involved because they were attacked. The US included.

[@TheJonasbz]

@@aardvark5730 Somehow people tend to forget that so they can accuse sweden for being better of being neutral

[@TheJonasbz]

@68K And get whiped of the map? Whats the point? Sweden did what every country exept for UK and france did, they declared themself neutral, sweden, together with Spain and Switzerland was just better than other countrys of it, must have somthing with the S to do. Strange that it always Sweden that some people go nuts over in this matter, no one argues about spain and Switzerland, at least the last one got more people amd money than sweden who at that point was a poor county with a army that was more or less a joke

[@TheJonasbz]

@68K Ok, poeple often say sweden should have been in the war

[@falukropp2000]

About the mobilization confusion in 1940: Sweden, Norway, Denmark and Finland had a neutrality pact set up just before the war broke out. We won't meddle with any possible conflicts, we will stay neutral, if one of us is attacked the other will assist if called upon. President Roosevelt of the then neutral USA strongly expressed his approval of this northen neutrality pact. Then Soviet demanded a defence cooperation with Finland and the Baltic states (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) and the right to build bases at their shores. The Baltics said 'ok' as they had no option but Finland resisted. Then Soviet attacked Finland. Sweden assisted by sending half of it's airforce, rifles, bullets, artillery and grenades etc to Finland, and rally for volunteers to go to Finland and fight (8240 volunteered, initially making up 10% of the Finnish army). It's hard to find anything about what Denmark and Norway did at this moment in Nov. 1939. Germany's high command had decided, thanks to Admiral Dönitz convincing the others, to stay out of Scandinavia as our neutrality pact granted that we would not be any trouble to the German forces. But then in early 1940, Norway and Sweden were approached by Churchill asking for permission to move 50,000 men from the Norwegian coast, across Sweden over to Finland, for eventual assist if 'things got worse'. It was obvious, maybe even openly discussed that this troop movement were in fact an operation to occupy the Swedish ore mines and the norwegian ore harbour in Narvik, thereby starving out Germany from access to iron ore, as it was one of their two main sources for ore (the other one Alsace/Lorraine, French territory and as Germany was at war with France it was inaccessible at the moment). Neither Norway or Sweden liked the idea of voluntary occupation more than Finland did when Soviet asked for it, so we turned the suggestion down. Churchill decided to occupy northern Norway and Sweden by force instead. The German high command got the news and decided to beat the allies to it. Denmark and Norway were occupied by the Germans, thereby creating a lock over Skagerrak strait and making the Baltic sea in control of Germany, at the very moment the British invasion expedition were at sea, just 6 hours from Norwegian coast they had to turn back as the Germans had taken them by surprise. Denmark and Norway surrendered to the invincible German blitz, some british commando troops in the north kept fighting in Norway as they were cut off from their lines as the british invasion were cancelled. Denmark and Norway saw it pointless to ask Finland and Sweden for help as they were exhausted of resources after the Soviet attack on Finland. Now, Germany tells Sweden, as we are surrounded by German occupied territory, that we have to cooperate, 'or else'. They demand for instance that the telephone lines Norway-Germany crossing over Sweden remains open to them. We comply but tap everything they say and very soon break their cipher key, and send everything we hear to the allies. Here comes the part about mobilization, we are told not to make a fuzz and mobilize, 'or else'. Soviet and Germany are kind of allies at this moment, long before operation Barbarossa in 1941 so therefore, Sweden should retract from their own borders. So Sweden need to mobilize but isn't allowed. At this point we have the mandatory military service system still working (ended in about 2000) and every swedish male is trained as a soldier. The government mobilize 'secretly' by sending out a personal letter telling each mobilized soldier where to go and when. That way, we mobilized sort of 'under cover' without stirring up the Germans.

[@adam.maqavoy]

#historical Awareness Huh...! ~ Not with Finland *NO.*

[@falukropp2000]

@@adam.maqavoy Oh yes

[@falukropp2000]

The three Polish submarines (Sęp, Ryś and Żbik) had no harbour to return to as Germany invaded Poland. They were at sea, damaged from battle with the german fleet, one of them taking in water, and couldn't go home so they went to Sweden, seeking for refuge. Then Sweden formally captured them as they were "foreign intruders", repaired the subs and moved them to a safe place in lake Mälaren, built an internation camp for the crews next to their subs but in reality it was more like a holiday camp, the POW's could come and go as they like, many of them took jobs on the outside of the camp as farmhands or tree loggers and took part of daily life in the nearby smalltown. Many of them even got married to swedish women during their internation time. After the war, Sweden returned the subs to Poland, 75 men of the total 169 stayed in Sweden, the rest went to USA or home to Poland. It happened several times during ww1 and ww2 that ships or fighter or bomber planes in distress came to Sweden to become detained like this. During ww1 it was german ships, during ww2 it was planes from both sides, mostly allies, that needed a place for emergency landing. German pilots could go home to Germany but there were no safe passage out of Sweden for allied pilots so they were officially interned, I guess in similar ways as the polish submarine crews.

[@davidmartin5316]

I didnt see an aswer about the swedish mobilization so I can explain somewhat how the swedish system works in troops. We dont have a large standing army and that was the part that they talked about that was on the finnish border, what we do have is a reservist system where our troops are called upon when needed and when not they have their civilian lives. when mobilizing we have a reservist force that is quite large and this was what hitler wanted to avoid, the mobilization in this time would have gone out on the radio and the reservists would have heard it and reported for duty, but instead of doing it this way to not piss off the Germans they movilized each soldier one by one via personal letters and that way we were able to mobilize our troops without raising any alarms with the germans.

[@citizenkane4831]

My father have talked about when he saw the nazi troops passing through here in Sweden. Where he grew up they usualy stopped and took a break. Depending if the was going to Norway or Finland. When they stopped there. There where occasionally such tention in the air due to the protest that was held (if they knew the german trains were coming) by the socialist´s side. There where also some who cheered them on when the arrived. They belonged to a small group that was in favor of the german´s. But with an exception for the nazis. Folk´s in general thought it was a big scandel they had to put up with the germans transports during WW2. But one could also see why they did what they did during WW2 from a historical point of view. Sweden has always at war with russia. And there are still today looked at as the number one enemy to Sweden. The suspiciusnes against Russia is deep rooted, since the 30 year war and the battle at Poltava. To the last one, in the beginning of 1800 he mentioned in the video. There has been so many controverses/conflicts between russia and sweden after WW2 in peace time. Stranded submarines with nukes close to a strategic marinebase and other stuff like flying drones over stategic military places and drones survaing when swedish soldiers are training. So the relationship with russia is very deeply frosted and has been so since the 1700

[@kristoffer-2614]

I’m seeing some people in the comments kind-of bashing Sweden for doing what they did so i’d like to counter that a bit. We did trade with nazi Germany and let them transport troops through our territory but Sweden also helped many Jews and colaborated with the Polish resistance and the allies and helped them. Folke Bernadotte’s (cousin to former king Gustaf VI Adolf) humanitarian efforts through the so called White Busses helped a lot of refugees and Swedish diplomat/bubissnessman Raoul Wallenberg helped countless of Hungarian Jews and was designated one of the Righteaous Among the Nations by Israel. And basically all of Denmarks jews surrvived thanks to Sweden who took them in after they fled from the advancing germans across Öresund, as mentioned in the video. It is true that Sweden did many good and bad things in WW2. We helped the Nazis but we also helped Jews and other refugees and we also helped the allies in their fight against Nazi Germany so i dont personally think one should call Sweden ”pro-nazi” or ”anti-nazi”. We where neutral and none-beligerent and acted accordingly. The gouvernment only did what was best for Sweden and it’s citizens.

[@davidhughes4089]

Yet the allies sacrificed for others. How many British, American, French, Dutch, Belgians, Russians and so on fell to liberate people they never met? How can self interest be seen as a virtue, I suppose that tells you everything you need to know about Swedish culture.

[@kristoffer-2614]

@@davidhughes4089 Seems you missed the part in the video about the Swedish volunteers in the winther war. Swedes who, just like the British, French and Americans, helped and fought for the freedom of peoples they had never met before. Swedish soldiers who died for our Eastern brother-nation Finland and aided them against the imperialist Sovjets.

[@davidhughes4089]

@@kristoffer-2614 33 dead, 10 missing is your countries sacrifice? 28 Swedes died fighting in the waffen SS so what's your point? One hundred times that number died on d day alone facing weapons no doubt partly made using your steel, Sweden lost what, one school class? The French and the Dutch knew how to deal with collaborators, I'll leave it at that.

[@SteamboatW]

@@davidhughes4089 Yeah, the americans and the soviets didn't trade with Germany up until 1941. Oh, no. ... and none of the allies turned jewish refugees away at the border. No, the Dutch and the Americans just went to war because they were angelic good totally without self interest. The Dutch, The Greeks and the Belgians didn't of course want to liberate their own countries, oh, no, they just sacrificed themselves out if loyalty to the heroic British... Maybe the Dutch and Belgians on the easter front werw the guys that really fought for an ideal and not out of self interest. Is thats why the British abandoned the Poles and the Cossacks? If their only goal was to fight for others and not their own people, why didn't they declare war on the Soviet union? They invaded Poland too. Why did the violate neutral countries? If the British hadn't planned on occupying Norway, then Hitler might have no reason to do it first. Then Sweden woldn't have just one trading partner left to get food and fuel to stop the Swedish people from starving or freezing to death. But of course... you want to see people commit suicide just for your own entertainment. Double standard anyone?

[@richardscales9560]

When you're stuck between a rock and a hard place you have to make some hard decisions. I don't envy Sweden's position in ww2

[@Haderittan]

Swedish prince Folke Bernadotte arranged with the Red Cross white buses to get prisoners to Sweden from the camps. Some of them were Roma but as soon as they had recovered they had to leave Sweden because Roma ppl were not allowed to immigrate to Sweden between 1914-1954. You can read more about them here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Buses In my work with old ppl I have met several who survived the Holocaust. Sadly many who came to Sweden couldn't live with their awful memories and killed themselves. I remember one woman who always showed me and picture of her daughter when I visited her. It was all she had left and how she got it or got to keep it Idk. Her daughter was around 5 when she was sent to the chambers.

[@loevet2]

Very interesting. In school we didn´t learn much about the second World War. Politicians and reporters only talk about what we did wrong in the war. But I know that we did right too. My father´s father fought in Finland. My mother´s father was posted somewhere at the boorder, so my mother spent 5 years in her grandmother´s care (her mother was dead). My mother remembered the norwegian refugees that was hidden at their farm. Norwegians came over the boorder every day and got help from ordinary people in Sweden.

[@henrikg1388]

Unlike USA/UK, Sweden wasn't communist collaborators anyway. Besides, it was also the only nation to give some seriously help to Finland when they were attacked by the USSR.

[@glamscum]

Pretty good video, it did not mention the extensive spynetwork in sweden thou, just like portugal was a hub for spies of all sides during ww2.

[@ratyjoona]

Finland wanted to stay neutral but didn't have a chance.

[@TheJonasbz]

More or less all countrys exept for UK and france was neutral, but that did not stop the nazis, sweden was just a little more lucky

[@ratyjoona]

@@TheJonasbz Finland wasn't really borhered by Nazis but by the Soviet Union, in 1939. And no, Spain was at least friendly with hitler. Italy was allied.

[@TheJonasbz]

@@ratyjoona Yes? Finland was on Germanys side but what choise did they have? Spain was officialty neutral but compared to Sweden, they did not have to be as friendly to the germans as they where, but being fascists its easy to understand

[@ratyjoona]

@@TheJonasbz Exactly. Finland didn't have too much of a choice, at least not at early stages of WW2.

[@kmeanxneth]

only two countries helped finland to fight Soviet. swedes and Nazis

[@xpld5017]

My grandfather who fought in North Africa and Italy never forgave Sweden for staying neutral and considered them to be cowardly and immoral. I don't think he knew the full story however, considering the work Sweden did to save Jewish refugees

[@matswinberg5045]

I know Finns who never forgave the U.K for declaring war on Finland and helping the Soviets with material. Finns died protecting their country by Western Allied war materiel...

[@secularnevrosis]

@@matswinberg5045 I'm Swedish. Usually you get flak from Norwegians about WW2. 'Why did you not join the war?' I ask them 'Did you? You were invaded. You would have done what you could to remain neutral.' My grandfather fought in Finland, among many other swedes. Many swedes have relatives in Finland. And Suomi got the worst deal. They had to fight the Russians, that were sided with the allies. And then were exempt from the Marshall Plan because of this. Luckily enough Sweden was in a position to do something for the finnish people after the war.

[@1991beachboy]

Did he also knew we sent secret intel under the germans eyes? One of the most crucial being the location of the Bismarck. Also sent a lot of intel to the allies and polish resistance during the lenght of the war. Helped train norwegians who fled from norway after it was defeated to take back their homeland. All while telling the germans that they trained them as police officers to "keep an eye out on the refugees". Germany didn't get any wiser and we could keep doing it. There was a plan to take back Norway and Denmark as well towards the end but got cancelled. Cowardly? Maybe. Immoral? How does one stay moral during a 6 years war? Seeing how many refugees we helped, i like to say we did allright.

[@0men916]

Here is an interesting fact. Early on in WW2 not only Sweden, but also Denmark and Norway where neutrual. And tried so to be so until the very last minute before being invaded. Denmark was overrunned in a matter of hours. Not even then, niether Sweden or Norway officially mobilized for war. Hoping The Germans will stop at Denmark. Well as we know They did not. They took Norway. So the Norwegians or Danes was not more ,so to speak, brave than the swedes. All three countries was no match what so ever for the German Army. And all played the only, and same, card they had. The neutral card. Denmark and Norway lost. Sweden won. btw.... late in the war there was the so called white busses. Lead by the swedish diplomate Folke Bernadotte. A man saving jews inside germany it self and many more people from Scandinavia and some others too. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_Buses . AND.. there was also the Swede Raul Wallenberg a business man, "diplomat" etc with Balls of hardened steel. A true mega hero. He saved so many jews fom getting to concentration camps etc by personally handing out so called protection passports . In the war end The Russian took him. And he was never to be seen again. Raul Wallenberg have streets and schools named after him in many places in the world. And and high recognisions in many countries. eg in USA Reagan, making Raul Wallenberg the second honorary American citizen in history after Winston Churchill by an Act of Congress. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raoul_Wallenberg

[@crimsontwilight4501]

This. The video mostly went over when Sweden and its government did, but that misses out on a lot of things, such as the White Busses.

[@GPA_Karting]

Cool video man, I enjoyed this one🤙

[@markmorris7123]

Watch "know your ally Britain". Really old 30 min documentary.

[@bjornflintberg3809]

Gustav V was 6'3" and a really good tennis player :).

[@domabitofacountrybumpkin.8327]

Request, Dan Snows norman walks, Battle of Hastings, secrets of the 1066 conquest. Channel- Medieval History Documentaries. Thanks Dominic.

[@anthonyferris8912]

Sweden was between a rock and a hard place…..Lucky Ireland had by far the easiest neutral stance……..It consisted of having a rabid Nazi as ambassador in Berlin, ostracising and punishing some 70,000 southern Irish volunteers who joined the British to fight Nazi Germany and a President who gave his country’s condolences on hearing of the death of Hitler………….and thengot a shed load of Marshal Aid at the end of the war without ever being in the conflict.😅

[@glastonbury4304]

You should do a reaçtion on "The Repair Shop", best Series on British TV at the moment, all about restoring history in families by renovating prized possessions of families with lots of history, can be quite emotional, but so lovely 💕

[@Soulvex]

I think you'd like this mate "A Northern US Accent from the 18th to the 21st Centuries" by Simon Roper

[@edvinedvin24andersson19]

big reason to not aktualy invade was that we have amasing steal and that we whud destroy our mins rader then giv them to the enemi.

[@nanotek7393]

Not coal, we had lots of iron

[@heidijaneskallio790]

As Sweden decided to "give away" Finland in 1809 not to fight, you can not say they did not have choices. #longtermconsequenses #pleasedontcallthemneutralorcourageous #insulttoinjury

[@carpetclimber4027]

They lost the war, what are you talking about?

[@unojayc]

All it takes for thee triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing.

[@lampshadeslic]

Uploaded on my Bday and I'm from Sweden

[@Osquar]

TIKs video about Sweden during WW2 is extremely immensive and goes through most of it.

[@TheApilas]

There is some faulty facts in the original vid..

[@superted6960]

Much of Sweden's iron ore exports to Germany were routed through Norway, where they could be shipped down the coast, because the Baltic froze in winter. This is why the Germans occupied Norway to protect these supplies. The Germans didn't have the manpower to occupy Sweden without prejudicing their Russian campaign. It took 400,000 troops to hold down Norway. It's believed that had the Germans been successful in Russia then they would have diverted troops to occupy Sweden. Never happened obviously. Churchill was highly critical of Sweden's lack of resistance to the German war machine. The Germans more or less got what they wanted from the Swedes without having to go through the business of conquering them.

[@gonace]

It's not really that simple

[@Haderittan]

Our neighbors hid Jews during the war here in Sweden.

[@majasand4989]

im from sweden and the truth is that germany and sweden had worked with echother for centuries and so germany didint attack sweden; and so instead of war sweden gave germany minirals, gold, and silver beacuse there was so much of that in the swedish grounds and mountens. and did you know that in the late 1700 , sweden and russia had a big war beacuse the people of sweden wanted more power and ofcourse russia won but they only took a small bit of finland and then they let us be

[@janesansome8393]

Did as they were told whilst millions of soldiers from other countries gave their lives defending their countries

[@torbjornkvist]

There is so much BS in this video that it's not even worth looking at.

[@adam.maqavoy]

WRONG - Sweden is Part of the 3 NordicNations, Not ( misconseption ) - #scandinavium / #finland is independt - Not Part of-The; *Scandinavium.*

[@skogstjuven]

Swedish seeman hahahaha

[@phwbooth]

The Swedes would not allow the Norwegian royal family to seek asylum there.

[@davidhughes4089]

They're cowards - what did they think would have happened had Germany been successful? How do you see your neighbours fall, the export of the Danish Jews, and do nothing?

[@SteamboatW]

No, thats not entirely true. It was only the king and the crown prince. They were military, and the Swedes would have had to intern them according to international law. They were never refused entry.

[@SteamboatW]

@@davidhughes4089 Easy for you to sit cosy and demand that an entire nation shouid commit suicide 70 years ago just for your own ego. The Danish jews btw. was mostly shipped to Sweden, and received there. Other Norwegian and Danish pow, jews and other civilians were collected from concentration camps by the Swedish red cross led by Folke Bernadotte, who was later assassinated by other jews in Palestine.

[@FemaleSniper86]

@@davidhughes4089 "They're cowards - what did they think would have happened had Germany been successful? How do you see your neighbours fall, the export of the Danish Jews, and do nothing?" Excuse me, but you know we in Sweden took in most if not al lof the Danish jews, right? We helped them. We didn't send any jews to concentrationcamps, and we didn't invite Germany with a handshape to take over our country. If you hate Sweden so much, stop watching videos about Sweden - since you obviously don't care about the proof the videos has to give you. You aren't learning, you are just barfing out stupidities. Be gone, young boy, back to school.

[@secularnevrosis]

@@davidhughes4089 Oh well. You do understand that officially taking in military personnel, like the king, is a deceleration of war? The Russians grew tired of the "unofficial" help the Finns got and bombed Sweden. As a warning. And the Norwegians, Danes and the Finns didn't choose to go to war...They were invaded. There is a difference!

[@mikakoivunen3456]

If im not mistaken, swedish war success was based on swedes using norwegians and finnish to do their fighting for them, but then again, they were rules by swedes.

[@davidhughes4089]

First they came for the Communists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Communist Then they came for the Socialists And I did not speak out Because I was not a Socialist Then they came for the trade unionists And I did not speak out Because I was not a trade unionist Then they came for the Jews And I did not speak out Because I was not a Jew Then they came for me And there was no one left To speak out for me -said no Swedish citizen ever, just whistle and cash cheques while other die

[@SteamboatW]

Swedes died. On the high seas, shipping goods for the allies. Fighting for Finland and murdered by Russians and Germans for not doing enough for them. When the Swedes stopped the german transits, the Germans almost choked the Swedes foid supply, started sinking Swedish shipping and started to shoot down their civilian aircraft. So, yes, people died. Even Swedes. But that doesn't matter for you Swede haters. You just wanted all Swedes to die... Men women and children... Well, what did you do to stop the nazis? What dovyou do now to stop tge modetn nazis, except wishing death and destruction over people who just tried to survive more than 70 years ago? ... and you're talking cowardice? You disgust me.

[@generaladvance5812]

That's very easy to say. My country enjoys collosal geographical advantages the Swedes could only dream of. They did what they needed to do to survive.

[@matswinberg5045]

You sir, are an ignoramus which my and others earlier posts show.

[@FemaleSniper86]

@@generaladvance5812 There's no point talking to David about that because he clearly made up his mind. Being a swede I try not to be biased, but I can only imagine the difficulty of defending a country as long - yes, sweden is a long ass freakin country!) with the few men they had... They would have had to expect attacks from the sea, from denmark and norway since they were under occupation, from russia if finland fell (and we did help finland during the war, we sent more than half of all our planes, tanks, ammo, weapons e.t.c. plus the 8K volunteers and the other 8K volunteers who joined the allies - comparing this to the total of 180 people volunteering for the SS, I think the numbers speaks for itself). My grandfathers were soldiers protecting swedish lines. One was a footsoldier and another was a sailor, protecting our shores. So saying we did nothing or were bending over backwards for Germany is a wild statement from people who does not understand. We could perhaps have doen more to not just obey some of the german commands, but that is easy to say when trying to not get occupied.

[@anthonyferris8912]

@@FemaleSniper86 It’s impossible for todays ‘armchair generals’ to compriheand the gut wrenching moral and political decisions that most of those democratic war time leaders had to make…………That’s why we have imbecile posters putting people like Churchill, for all his faults, on the same moral equivalence as Hitler and Stalin.