10 ms·

Iceland played an unexpected and crucial role in the Second World War

67 points by Thevet 5y ago

zerkten 5y ago
I look forward to reading this. The person who stepped into the place of my grandfather (both died young) was stationed in Iceland and later Burma. I didn't realise this until I was a lot older and I think he would have probably told people he hadn't traveled much.
duxup 5y ago
Good read, although for anyone with a sense of geography it seems hardly "unexpected".
protomyth 5y ago
Admiral Gallery wrote about his time in Iceland during WWII commanding the US base and it's sub hunting PBYs in the book "Clear the Decks". He did focus a bit on the humor so the serious parts sneak up on you. He did write some fiction afterwards.
fiftyacorn 5y ago
I think there is being unaware the British were coming, and being "unaware". It was pretty inevitable they would be invaded due to the strategic position
- soneil 5y ago
  I did ask an Icelander about this. We were on one of those walking tours, and the topic came up - and I have to admit I was almost entirely unaware of this. (As a brit who travels, the topic is a familiar unfamiliarity, if that makes sense.) I was aware of the famous greenland-iceland-uk "gap", but less aware that they were technically unwilling participants. His take on it was that they knew fine well they were going to be invaded by someone, due to their position. This GIUK gap was very strategic in creating a border between the North Sea (which Germany has a coast on) and the Atlantic (which they didn't until Vichy France). So while we weren't invited, we weren't unexpected, and being invaded by the brits was seen as a least-worst option.
publicola1990 5y ago
What about Ireland? How did Ireland's stance during the war, shape its policies post war?
- dmurray 5y ago
  Ireland was officially neutral but unofficially pro-British. Ireland shared military and meteorological intelligence with London and allowed British warplanes to use Irish airspace. German pilots were interned while British ones were returned home. After the war, and up to the 21st century, Ireland courted foreign investment and was rewarded by being favourably looked upon by Britain and especially the US. Ireland received some limited Marshall Plan aid, but was frozen out of the United Nations for a few years (probably by the Soviets). I would say Irish foreign policy is still shaped in the same way. The military doesn't participate in foreign wars, outside some UN peacekeeping missions. But US-aligned forces are generally welcome, even on torture missions, and Ireland officially supports the US stance on Israel despite occasionally wringing its hands at the plight of the Palestinians, who the Irish people tend to sympathise with.
  - soneil 5y ago
    My favourite trivia on this topic is an interesting take on neutrality. POWs - generally shipwrecked sailors or downed airmen - were treated pretty well. Which makes sense, they weren't POWs as we'd usually think of them, but just that Ireland wasn't handing combatants back. As part of being treated pretty well, they were allowed out on day release, and able to cycle in to town. Well, you can cycle to the UK (NI) from the freestate, but you can't cycle to Germany ..
  - rkachowski 5y ago
    My grandfather was a British pilot interned in an Irish camp during WW2. They weren't allowed to return home / escape (they'd be sent back after crossing the sea), but they were given "day passes" to leave the camp pretty much every day. Despite officially being a prisoner he had a motorcycle in a nearby town and there are quite a few photos of him riding around. Before he died he was consulted by some producers for a (pretty bad) movie based on the subject - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brylcreem_Boys https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brylcreem_Boys
publicola1990 5y ago
"A number was burned into every citizen’s brain: six million. Over the course of the Second World War, that’s how many Jews the Nazis had executed. Some had managed to flee, many of them to the British-controlled territory, Mandatory Palestine, and they were now fighting for a Jewish homeland in the Levant." As per estimates Nazis executed more Slavs than Jews, yet it seemed etched in narratives like this as a Jewish tragedy, whereas in actuality it was a broader holocaust, including massive numbers of Slavs and political opponents like Communists.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- nanna 5y ago
  > Nazis executed more Slavs than Jews True if you include Slavs who died on the battlefield, revisionist myth if not, one designed to deflect the culpability of Slavs in countries like Lithuania, Latvia and Poland for the Holocaust. Slavs were despised by the Nazis, but not as much as Jews. Or Roma and Sinti, for that matter, who in proportion to their population size faired even worse. Socialists, Communists, Anarchists, gays, lesbians, prostitutes, autists and people with down's syndrome were also targeted by the Nazi genocide. But there was no Final Solution for the Slavs - not at least until the Nazis were done with the others first.
  - chewz 5y ago
    > True if you include Slavs who died on the battlefield This isn’t true. Out of six milions Poles who perished during WW2 most were non-combatants. Largest causualties in single battle (Budziszyn) costed Polish c.a. 50 thousand soldiers. And there were not that many battles for Polish armies… Yes the persecution of Slavs were more random but numbers far larger.. Around 6 million Polish citizens perished during World War II: about one fifth of the pre-war population.[1] Most were civilian victims of the war crimes and crimes against humanity during the occupation by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.[] [] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties_of_Poland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties_of_Pol... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Slavic_sentiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Slavic_sentiment „All Poles will disappear from the world,” Heinrich Himmler said, It is essential that the great German people should consider it as its major task to destroy all Poles.” [] [] https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/non-jewish-victims-of-the-holocaust https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/non-jewish-victims-of-t...
nanna 5y ago
Only half way through and while it's a good read, the author does seem to neglect to mention that Iceland eagerly deported fleeing Jewish refugees back to Nazi occupied countries, and demanded that America stop sending over black servicemen. Icelanders may not have been up to the mythical standards of purity envisaged by the Nazis, but that doesn't mean there wasn't an overlap with their sense of racial superiority.
- detritus 5y ago
  Why is a preference for homogeneity always equated with a sense of superiority? I'm not defending their actions - and perhaps they did indeed feel some misguided sense of superiority - but perhaps just as equally, they did not and simply preferred to be with their own?
  - praestigiare 5y ago
    A preference for homogeneity is a great euphemism for racism. It sounds almost neutral.
    - detritus 5y ago
      I was specifically trying to be neutral to make a point about the choice of language used in the person I was responding to, yes. I'm not advocating the thought, I just find it curious how polarised and absolutist such discussions get (as, very quickly, in the responses here) when the shoe is on one foot, versus - say, the shoes worn by tribes and cultures we in the West deem worthy of paternalist protection. *shrug
  - nanna 5y ago
    If they simply wanted to be 'with their own' they would have rejected American servicemen with equal disdain. An Italian American is no more Nordic than an African American.
    - detritus 5y ago
      I presumed a subtler gradient in whatever confused muddle of thinking went on, literally and figuratively. Humans are nothing if not highly flawed and somewhat tribal.
refurb 5y ago
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Iceland https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Iceland The invasion of Iceland (codenamed Operation Fork) by the Royal Navy and Royal Marines occurred on 10 May 1940, during World War II. The invasion took place because the British government feared that Iceland would be used by the Germans, who had recently overrun Denmark, which was in personal union with Iceland and which had previously been largely responsible for Iceland's foreign policy. The Government of Iceland issued a protest, charging that its neutrality had been "flagrantly violated" and "its independence infringed".[1]*
cafard 5y ago
The literary critic Frank Kermode spent a while in Iceland during WW II Royal Navy service. His memoir Not Entitled gives an interesting picture of his time there.

67 points by Thevet 5y ago

I look forward to reading this. The person who stepped into the place of my grandfather (both died young) was stationed in Iceland and later Burma. I didn't realise this until I was a lot older and I think he would have probably told people he hadn't traveled much.

duxup 5y ago

Good read, although for anyone with a sense of geography it seems hardly "unexpected".

protomyth 5y ago

Admiral Gallery wrote about his time in Iceland during WWII commanding the US base and it's sub hunting PBYs in the book "Clear the Decks". He did focus a bit on the humor so the serious parts sneak up on you. He did write some fiction afterwards.

fiftyacorn 5y ago

I think there is being unaware the British were coming, and being "unaware". It was pretty inevitable they would be invaded due to the strategic position

soneil 5y ago
I did ask an Icelander about this. We were on one of those walking tours, and the topic came up - and I have to admit I was almost entirely unaware of this. (As a brit who travels, the topic is a familiar unfamiliarity, if that makes sense.) I was aware of the famous greenland-iceland-uk "gap", but less aware that they were technically unwilling participants. His take on it was that they knew fine well they were going to be invaded by someone, due to their position. This GIUK gap was very strategic in creating a border between the North Sea (which Germany has a coast on) and the Atlantic (which they didn't until Vichy France). So while we weren't invited, we weren't unexpected, and being invaded by the brits was seen as a least-worst option.

publicola1990 5y ago

What about Ireland? How did Ireland's stance during the war, shape its policies post war?

dmurray 5y ago
Ireland was officially neutral but unofficially pro-British. Ireland shared military and meteorological intelligence with London and allowed British warplanes to use Irish airspace. German pilots were interned while British ones were returned home. After the war, and up to the 21st century, Ireland courted foreign investment and was rewarded by being favourably looked upon by Britain and especially the US. Ireland received some limited Marshall Plan aid, but was frozen out of the United Nations for a few years (probably by the Soviets). I would say Irish foreign policy is still shaped in the same way. The military doesn't participate in foreign wars, outside some UN peacekeeping missions. But US-aligned forces are generally welcome, even on torture missions, and Ireland officially supports the US stance on Israel despite occasionally wringing its hands at the plight of the Palestinians, who the Irish people tend to sympathise with.
- soneil 5y ago
  My favourite trivia on this topic is an interesting take on neutrality. POWs - generally shipwrecked sailors or downed airmen - were treated pretty well. Which makes sense, they weren't POWs as we'd usually think of them, but just that Ireland wasn't handing combatants back. As part of being treated pretty well, they were allowed out on day release, and able to cycle in to town. Well, you can cycle to the UK (NI) from the freestate, but you can't cycle to Germany ..
- rkachowski 5y ago
  My grandfather was a British pilot interned in an Irish camp during WW2. They weren't allowed to return home / escape (they'd be sent back after crossing the sea), but they were given "day passes" to leave the camp pretty much every day. Despite officially being a prisoner he had a motorcycle in a nearby town and there are quite a few photos of him riding around. Before he died he was consulted by some producers for a (pretty bad) movie based on the subject - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brylcreem_Boys https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Brylcreem_Boys

publicola1990 5y ago

"A number was burned into every citizen’s brain: six million. Over the course of the Second World War, that’s how many Jews the Nazis had executed. Some had managed to flee, many of them to the British-controlled territory, Mandatory Palestine, and they were now fighting for a Jewish homeland in the Levant." As per estimates Nazis executed more Slavs than Jews, yet it seemed etched in narratives like this as a Jewish tragedy, whereas in actuality it was a broader holocaust, including massive numbers of Slavs and political opponents like Communists.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
nanna 5y ago
> Nazis executed more Slavs than Jews True if you include Slavs who died on the battlefield, revisionist myth if not, one designed to deflect the culpability of Slavs in countries like Lithuania, Latvia and Poland for the Holocaust. Slavs were despised by the Nazis, but not as much as Jews. Or Roma and Sinti, for that matter, who in proportion to their population size faired even worse. Socialists, Communists, Anarchists, gays, lesbians, prostitutes, autists and people with down's syndrome were also targeted by the Nazi genocide. But there was no Final Solution for the Slavs - not at least until the Nazis were done with the others first.
- chewz 5y ago
  > True if you include Slavs who died on the battlefield This isn’t true. Out of six milions Poles who perished during WW2 most were non-combatants. Largest causualties in single battle (Budziszyn) costed Polish c.a. 50 thousand soldiers. And there were not that many battles for Polish armies… Yes the persecution of Slavs were more random but numbers far larger.. Around 6 million Polish citizens perished during World War II: about one fifth of the pre-war population.[1] Most were civilian victims of the war crimes and crimes against humanity during the occupation by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union.[] [] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties_of_Poland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_War_II_casualties_of_Pol... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunger_Plan https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Slavic_sentiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-Slavic_sentiment „All Poles will disappear from the world,” Heinrich Himmler said, It is essential that the great German people should consider it as its major task to destroy all Poles.” [] [] https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/non-jewish-victims-of-the-holocaust https://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/non-jewish-victims-of-t...

nanna 5y ago

Only half way through and while it's a good read, the author does seem to neglect to mention that Iceland eagerly deported fleeing Jewish refugees back to Nazi occupied countries, and demanded that America stop sending over black servicemen. Icelanders may not have been up to the mythical standards of purity envisaged by the Nazis, but that doesn't mean there wasn't an overlap with their sense of racial superiority.

detritus 5y ago
Why is a preference for homogeneity always equated with a sense of superiority? I'm not defending their actions - and perhaps they did indeed feel some misguided sense of superiority - but perhaps just as equally, they did not and simply preferred to be with their own?
- praestigiare 5y ago
  A preference for homogeneity is a great euphemism for racism. It sounds almost neutral.
  - detritus 5y ago
    I was specifically trying to be neutral to make a point about the choice of language used in the person I was responding to, yes. I'm not advocating the thought, I just find it curious how polarised and absolutist such discussions get (as, very quickly, in the responses here) when the shoe is on one foot, versus - say, the shoes worn by tribes and cultures we in the West deem worthy of paternalist protection. *shrug
- nanna 5y ago
  If they simply wanted to be 'with their own' they would have rejected American servicemen with equal disdain. An Italian American is no more Nordic than an African American.
  - detritus 5y ago
    I presumed a subtler gradient in whatever confused muddle of thinking went on, literally and figuratively. Humans are nothing if not highly flawed and somewhat tribal.

refurb 5y ago

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Iceland https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Iceland The invasion of Iceland (codenamed Operation Fork) by the Royal Navy and Royal Marines occurred on 10 May 1940, during World War II. The invasion took place because the British government feared that Iceland would be used by the Germans, who had recently overrun Denmark, which was in personal union with Iceland and which had previously been largely responsible for Iceland's foreign policy. The Government of Iceland issued a protest, charging that its neutrality had been "flagrantly violated" and "its independence infringed".[1]*

cafard 5y ago

The literary critic Frank Kermode spent a while in Iceland during WW II Royal Navy service. His memoir Not Entitled gives an interesting picture of his time there.