War |
Neutrality In World War II
German Plane On Attack Its a funny thing about World War II. It was not really a world war. Even in Europe there were countries that remained neutral. You have to wonder how this could be with the war swirling all around them. You would have thought that a country had to take sides in order to try and survive and yet that was not the case at all. If we look at Europe we see that Switzerland, Spain, Portugal and Sweden remained neutral for at least most of the war. Turkey, Ireland and Argentina were also in the same boat. A report by Stuart Eisenstat in 1998 showed that the Germans used Swiss banks to convert gold and they used some of this cash to buy minerals from some of the other neutral countries. Would the Germans have eventually taken over those neutral countries if they were winners, I think so and in some cases had even drawn up plans to do so, but no one can be sure. There was one thing that was sure, the Nazi party considered all non arian people to be inferior, so that is why I think that most of these countries would have been in serious trouble, even though it served the Nazi cause at the time to keep the status quo. Spain is one of the more interesting cases. The Spanish Civil War was a coup d'état against the Spanish Republic. It was led by a group of Spanish generals. It began in 1936 and ended in 1939. President manuel Azaña was overthrown and the dictator General Francisco Franco rose to power. Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy had supported the rebels, along with Portugal, while the Soviet Union and Mexico had supported the republic. While the U.S. was neutral in this rebellion, many large U.S. corporations supported the rebels also. Some think that the support of the U.S. corporations, along with the U.S. government looking the other way, while they provided this support to the rebels was the reason that Spain remained neutral in World War II, even though they had been supported by the Axis powers. In a strange footnote to Spanish neutrality, Franco allowed Spanish volunteers, known as the Blue Division, to join the German army, only to fight the communists on the eastern front.
The Eastern Front Switzerland had remained a neutral in both world wars. It was an armed neutral. While it did not actively take part in any fighting on either side, it was the capital of intrigue, espionage and commerce. Refugees repeatedly ran to Switzerland to escape the horrors of war. Some had escaped from the Germans and others military trying to get back to their units after either evading capture or escaping. The Germans had actually drawn up plans for the invasion of Switzerland. The plan was called Operation Tannenbaum and yet they never implemented it. It is said that as the war progressed, the Germans had their hands so full that they lost all intention of invading this small country. The Swiss Nazi party tried to get Switzerland to join up with Germany such as Austria did, but to no avail. From time to time the Swiss press would criticize the German military. The Swiss were ready to fight from the Alps and make Germany pay dearly if they invaded. At the start of the war Switzerland was able to mobilize the entire country in three days. The Swiss were bombed by the allies by mistake and ordered fighter attacks on belligerent U.S. aircraft. The problem was that Switzerland was surrounded by Axis countries and one of their villages was mistaken for a nearby German village. Sweden had the official policy of neutrality during and after World War II. The country had been neutral for over 100 years since the Napoleonic Wars. And held a policy of nonbelligence in the conflict between Finland and the Soviet Union. Sweden decided to build up her military in 1942, in case an invasion came. During the war Sweden sold munitions to both sides and gave concessions to both sides. They allowed the German army to use their railways to transport weapons and soldiers. They trained a police force for use in Denmark and Norway after the Nazis were defeated there. Clearly they were appeasing both sides. The Swedes never took sides except for opposing the Soviet Union, which they despised. Sweden took in almost all of the 8,000 Jews that lived in Denmark. When the Danes heard that the Germans were going to deport the Jews to Germany, they hurriedly transported all but 450 of then to Sweden. Sweden sent large amounts of iron ore to the Germans, who requested it. This was no doubt to keep the Germans from invading.
US Navy Plane On Attack Argentina is a strange case. I say this because it had several different governments during World War II. Some were supposed to be conservative and some were military juntas. Many of the elite in Argentina wanted the country to side with the allies. What I think was unusual was that the military wanted Argentina to remain neutral. They thought that if it did, there was a lot of money to be made. The military was right, Argentina did make a lot of money selling food to both sides. Argentina did not remain neutral, but this was more of a show than anything else, as they waited to declare war on Germany until March 27, 1945, when the conflict was almost at an end. Volunteers from Argentina were opposed to being neutral and joined the British, South African and Canadian Air Forces. About 4,000 Argentine volunteers fought on the side of the allies. Turkey was another country that was neutral until about 7 months before the war officially ended against Germany. I think that it is important to remember that Turkey had fought against some of the very same allies in World War I, that it was now being asked to join, which did not make the decision any easier. They also declared war on Japan and this gave them the right to qualify for membership in the United Nations. Churchill had asked Turkey to come into the war on the side of the allies, while Roosevelt had asked them only to remain neutral. During World War II, Portugal was under a dictator. He was António de Oliveira Salazar. His government was similar to the Spanish Government run by Franco. He declared neutrality in 1939 to avoid military actions by either side on Portuguese territory. Germany got to the Pyrenees and this put pressure on Portugal. Germany wanted tungsten from Portugal, but Salazar stood in their way which infuriated Germany. They sank a Portuguese merchant ship to show their anger. When this did not bring results they sank a second one. Salazar then felt that he had no choice and began to sell tungsten to the Germans. In 1943 the British asked to use the Azores for air force and naval bases and Salazar agreed. At this point the allies promised to protect Portugal and said they would render all possible assistance to Portugal in case of invasion. Many Jews fled to Portugal during the war and found a safe haven. Some Portuguese territories such as Timor were invaded by the Japanese, who were not able to conquer it due to the fact that Dutch and Australian forces had fought a guerrilla campaign against them, but up to 70,000 civilians lost their lives. Ireland was the only member of the British Commonwealth that remained neutral in World War II. A total of about 52,000 men from both parts of Ireland joined the British forces. They let the British over fly the island and exported food and labor to Britain. Hot pursuit of U-boats took place from time to time in Irish waters. The Irish government imprisoned both members of the Allied powers as well as members of the Axis powers. They routinely gave weather and shipping reports to the Allies and often looked the other way as Allied prisoners "escaped". The Irish knew that they didn't have the resources to protect their island and felt that neutrality was the only way to go. Irish shipping was attacked by both sides and the Germans bombed Dublin and County Carlow by mistake. The Germans mined the Irish waters. The British had an operation called Plan W where they would reoccupy Ireland and the Irish also feared an invasion from Germany. They were sort of between the rock and the hard place. Other countries that remained neutral in World War II were Andorra, Liechtenstein and Vatican City |
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