Hitler’s Pre-Emptive War: The Battle for Norway, 1940 by Henrik Lunde (the reader ebook .TXT) 📕

envelopment threatened to cut their line of retreat. The southern German envelopment was within 400 meters of cutting the Norwegian route of withdrawal but they managed to slip through since visibility was severely reduced by a heavy snowfall.

The fighting around Gratangen Tourist Station was a minor engagement with light casualties. The Norwegians had no losses while the Germans had two killed and three wounded. However, this small engagement had a substantial impact on future operations. It gave the Norwegians another 24 hours to organize and prepare. The Germans noted the stiffening resistance and realized that any attempt to push past Oalgge Pass with the limited forces at their disposal would be very hazardous as their flanks became increasingly exposed.

Forseth’s company reached Lapphaugen about 2100 hours on April 12 where it linked up with a platoon from Co 5 and a mountain howitzer from Battery 8. Captain Forseth received a report from brigade at 0430 hours on April 13 that a large German force was advancing on Fossbakken from Vassdal. Forseth considered it possible that this was the same force reported at 0100 by a security patrol but he was unable to confirm this by reconnaissance since it was dark and near blizzard conditions. There were no Norwegian forces at the important road junction at Fossbakken and Captain Forseth decided to withdraw from Lapphaugen and occupy the road junction before the Germans captured it.

Lapphaugen and the mountain pass immediately to the west (Oalgge) are located along the most elevated part of the road leading north from Gratangen—Route 50. Faulty intelligence caused Forseth’s company to abandon this excellent defensive position, an important objective in the German plans. Forseth’s men had operated continually for 72 hours in severe weather and it was beginning to tell. The exhausted troops were beginning to hallucinate, heavy fire was opened several times during the night at imaginary targets, and one soldier was killed by friendly fire. The company was finally relieved by the 2/15th Inf on April 14 but remained attached to that battalion until April 30.

By April 14 the Germans had not managed to secure the railroad to the Swedish border. The capture of Narvik would lose its value unless this was achieved. The German northern thrust had reached a point about 30 kilometers north of Bjerkvik against stiffening Norwegian resistance. They were still 30 and 57 kilometers respectively from their objectives at Setermoen and Bardufoss.

The Second Naval Battle

The Admiralty, operating on the assumption that there could be one or possibly two German cruisers and five to six destroyers in Narvik, decided on April 12 to launch a far heavier attack on those forces. Forbes’ main force was concentrated south of the Lofoten Islands, knowing that the German battleships had returned safely to Germany. The Admiralty ordered Forbes “to clean up enemy naval forces and batteries in Narvik by using a battleship heavily escorted by destroyers, with synchronized dive-bombing attacks from Furious.”6 No mention was made about landing forces to capture the city.

The detailed order issued by Admiral Forbes also makes no mention of a landing in Narvik although Forbes knew that the recapture of that city was a high British priority. It was to be purely a naval operation, a continuation of the action begun on April 10. The decision to send in a battleship may not have been taken so lightly had the British known that five German submarines were present in the area. Some writers point out that it would have made more sense to delay the operation until a suitable landing force could take advantage of the naval bombardment to capture the town. The same critics maintain that it made little sense to risk a battleship in these restricted waters solely to eliminate the German destroyers since they could be bottled up until a landing force was available.

However, the problems associated with carrying out immediate landing operations were more difficult to overcome than the critics would lead us to believe. First, the troops headed for Harstad were not ready to make a landing on a hostile shore and it would take weeks before they were operational. Second, the inter-service coordination and cooperation was entirely lacking and the service component commanders were responding to uncoordinated orders and directives. Admiral Cork and General Mackesy were still operating independently.

In the meantime, the British launched air attacks against Narvik. Nine British aircraft from the carrier Furious conducted a bombing raid on Narvik between 1800 and 1900 hours on April 12. They launched from the carrier in bad weather while the ship was 150 miles from Narvik. The British were apparently impressed with the German dive-bombing of their fleet in the North Sea and decided to try this method after the failure of torpedo attacks in Trondheim. The slow double-decker Swordfish aircraft were unsuitable and their crews untrained for this type attack. Despite releasing some bombs from an altitude of only 400 feet, the German destroyers were not hit. The captured Norwegian patrol vessel Senja was sunk and another captured Norwegian patrol boat, Michael Sars, was damaged and sank the following day. The British pilots reported intense and accurate antiaircraft fire and two aircraft were lost in the attack. A third aircraft was lost in the night landing on the aircraft carrier.

A second wave of nine British aircraft from the Furious ran into a snowstorm and forced to return to the carrier. The attack did slow the repairs on Erich Koellner and prevented it from taking up its floating battery position that day. U64 arrived in Narvik in the evening of April 12 and reported hectic British naval activity in the Vestfjord.

German naval intelligence again proved to be excellent, but it was not much help to the trapped German destroyers. By listening to British radio signals, the Germans concluded that the British would attack in the afternoon of April 13. Two messages from Naval Command West to Commander Bey at 0044 hours and 0900 hours on April 13 gave a rather accurate order of battle for