It lies on the outskirts of the European theater, and its position far to the north held little
value for the empires of central Europe, and yet, just like everyone else, Norway still
had a part to play in the Great War.
I’m Indy Neidell; welcome to a Great War special episode about Norway and the First
World War.
For most of the century before the war, Norway was a part of Sweden.
It was given to Sweden as a spoil of war in 1814 since Denmark-Norway had been allied
with Napoleon, who lost.
Norway had tried to declare its independence, but a small war between Sweden and Norway
in 1814 ended that, and it would then exist within Sweden and answer to the Swedish King.
It did have its own Parliament though, and its own armed forces.
Norway eventually wanted to control its own foreign affairs, and in 1896, when they tried
to establish their own consulate services, Sweden threatened a military invasion.
Norway did finally declare independence June 7th, 1905, which happened mostly peacefully.
There was a fear of war between the two and both sides partially mobilized, but Sweden
recognized Norwegian independence October 26, 1905.
Post independence, Foreign Minister Jörgen Lövland stated Norway’s foreign policy,
“a wish to be left alone in order to get on with building a new nation”.
It would be absolute neutrality, and the government thought its geographic location sufficient
to avoid being dragged into European wars.
But even though Norway had no allies, it had a close relationship with Britain via trade.
It also didn’t hurt that Norwegian Queen Maud was British King George V’s sister.
Norway was poorly prepared politically to handle an international crisis at the outbreak
of the war.
And the war came as a great shock.
In February 1914, during a hearing on defense spending, Prime Minister Gunnar Knudsen had
even famously said, “Why should we invest everything in our defense forces?
What is it that is looming?
That would be interesting to know.
As of now, the political sky, on the international stage, is free of clouds, which has not been
the case for many years”.
And then the largest war to that point in history began five months later.
Norway declared its neutrality at the start.
Actually, Norway did so twice, and then in December the Scandinavian Kings got together
to do it again.
Norway had expanded and modernized its armed forces for years, in case of war with Sweden.
The navy had gotten new coastal defense ships, torpedo boats, and submarines.
The coastline was fortified with big guns protecting harbors and cities.
The fortress island Oskarsborg, outside of Oslo, was known as the Gibraltar of the north.
It had minefields, an underwater battery, and even a hidden torpedo battery.
But when it became apparent that there would be no war with the Swedes, the armed forces
were economically neglected and fell behind other nations.
But the coastal forces were mobilized in 1914 to prevent the warring nations from using
Norwegian coastal waters.
In November, the German cruiser SS Berlin entered Trondheim harbor.
They said they had an engine malfunction and could not return to international waters.
A Danish coastal defense ship entered the harbor the next day and the Berlin and its
crew were interned for the duration of the war.
This was what Norway feared on a larger scale - Britain or Germany using Norwegian harbors
and fjords as bases, but both of them figured that a harbor or two was not worth bringing
Norway into the war on the opposite side, well Sweden and Denmark as well since they
all said they would stick together.
Thing is, Norway has vast natural resources and as a neutral nation could trade with both
sides.
In 1914 it had the 4th largest merchant fleet in the world, and the largest per capita.
And Norwegian merchants put their lives on the line if the money was worth it, sailing
mined waters, through Entente blockades, and facing German unrestricted submarines.
International demand for the fleet led to a financial boom.
In 1914, it cost 5 crowns to transport a ton of goods across the North Sea; by 1917 it
was 260 crowns.
That’s a 5,500% increase.
This wealth did come at a cost, 889 Norwegian ships were sunk during the war, taking the
lives of 2,000 Norwegian sailors.
The government did, though, issue war insurance for all merchants.
The civilian population had panicked at the war’s beginning, emptying markets and banks
of food and money.
Rationing wasn’t begun until 1918, though, and when commodity prices began rising, fixed
prices were enforced and exports of foodstuffs were regulated.
They even prohibited using potatoes and grain to make alcohol.
Thing is, that economic boom in the merchant didn’t affect everybody and widened the
gulf between rich and poor.
This led to huge demonstrations, including one in 1917 when 300,000 people - an eighth
of the entire population - took to the streets, and there was talk of revolution, inspired
by events in Russia.
Also in 1917, Britain declared a coal embargo on Norway, claiming that Norway had not fulfilled
the obligations of its trade agreements.
This directly concerned the export of fish and pyrite - for explosives - to Germany.
Norway stopped it and the embargo was lifted.
Also, to help the Norwegian fleet against German unrestricted submarine warfare, the
government had a charter system with the British that let unarmed Norwegian merchants sail
in safer waters in British service, and armed entente ships in hostile waters in Norwegian
service.
Norwegian ships also joined Entente convoys.
This effectively entwined the Norwegian and Entente fleets and would be known as the secret
tonnage agreement.
If the Central Powers had found out about it, you could say goodbye to Norwegian neutrality.
There was one glaring weakness in the British blockade of Germany, the Norwegian gap.
Britain mined the North Sea, but those mines stopped short of Norway’s coastal waters.
German subs would sneak in to the high seas using those waters.
Huge pressure was put on Norway by the Entente to close the gap, but that didn’t happen
until the fall of 1918 when 775 mines were laid to block those waters.
It looked on the surface like Norway would benefit from the war.
A neutral nation with expanding trade and a market desperate for its merchandise?
The real cost, though, was not apparent until the war’s end.
First of all, neutrality was expensive to maintain, with constant mobilization and equipment
maintenance.
The government controlled the purchase of goods and fixed prices caused problems of
their own.
And government insured shipping was really expensive.
There were errors and ignorance so that the government believed its finances were in order.
It turned out that there was actually a massive debt, accumulated during the war.
And when international prices began to fall back to normal levels postwar, prices for
Norwegian goods plummeted.
So, many famers and fisherman who had invested in costly equipment now had large personal
debts.
And many municipalities had electrified the cities of the nation during the war by building
expensive hydroelectric plants.
When it came time to pay the bills, the income was not sufficient and a majority of those
municipalities went bankrupt.
The nation building had a rocky start.
But Norway had managed to remain neutral for the duration of the war, which was a feat,
and thus managed to avoid the staggering loss of life that befell the other nations fighting
the war, so for all the economic woes that came postwar, in that respect at least, Norway
could count itself lucky.