Friday, February 20, 1942. Action in the Pacific

Sarah Sundin's daily blog on the Second World War has an entire series of really interesting items in it for this day. Well worth reviewing,  which you can do here:

February 20, 1942: First US Eighth Air Force officers arrive in England. Japanese land on Portuguese East Timor and Dutch West Timor in the East Indies.

Among those items is Navy pilot Edward O'Hare being credited with shooting down five Japanese aircraft within six minutes on this day in 1942, a feat which secured him the Congressional Medial of Honor. 

The aircraft that O'Hare struck were Japanese Betty bombers headed towards the USS Lexington which was off of Bougainville.  In reality, O'Hare shot down only three aircraft, rather than the six he thought he had, or the five he was credited with,although he so disrupted their attack that he prevented it from being a success.  One of the stricken Japanese bombers did attempt to fly into the Lexington, so four were in fact lost during the raid.

The heroic O'Hare was killed in combat in November, 1943.

Sundin also reports that the first advance party of the U.S. 8th Air Force arrived in the United Kingdom.

The 8th, of course, would go on to figure enormously in the US strategic bombing campaign over Germany.

Sundin also notes that the vast majority of Norwegian teachers, on this day, refused an order to become fascists, leading to some of them enduing up in concentration camps.

The Battle of Badung Strait ended in a Japanese victory, with the Japanese navy driving off a much larger combined Allied task force.   

The Japanese landed forces on Portuguese Timor and took the airfield.  Portugal wasn't in the war and was now enduring its second Timorese occupation, as the British and Australians had occupied it first to prevent it from being attacked by the Japanese.  The Portuguese protested the occupation without success.

Portuguese Timor was in the midst of an interesting transition at the time.  The Portuguese government had just turned education over to the Catholic Church, and as a result, the educational fortunes of the population were improving.  During the Japanese occupation of Timor the distinction between Portuguese and Dutch Timor were ignored, fairly obviously, but the Portuguese reasserted their possession in 1945 and would maintain it until 1975.  The region was then invaded, following the political turmoil in Portugal of that period, by Indonesia, but in 2002 it gained independence.  It's own independence movement can trace its origin to the improved educational lot of the population that started in 1941.

The Japanese also attacked Koepang in Dutch Timor on the same day, logically enough as it was all one island. The action was unusual in that it featured Japanese paratroopers who landed to take an airfield, but who were successfully repulsed by Australian troops.  Japan did have paratroopers but they received little use during the war, and were in fact mostly only used in the early stages of the war in the Pacific.

German U-boats started raiding ships off of the Lesser Antilles.  The Italian submarine Torelli participated with them.

The Hakim of Bahrain, Hamad ibn Isa Al Khalifa, died on this day in 1942.  Under his administration, which commenced in 1932, oil exploration in the country commenced.  Bahrain was a British protectorate at the time, something that had come about as the ruling family needed outside support due to their unstable position in the country.

Satiurday, February 7, 1942. No more new cars.

 

Today In Wyoming's History: February 7: 1942  1942   The federal government ordered passenger car production stopped and converted to wartime purposes.

This has been mentioned here before, but the official order went down on this day.

This happened in the middle of a styling change, with newer model cars becoming increasingly streamlined.  The trend would pick up again right after the war.   Cars were, for a lack of a better way to put it, becoming more modern.

The US established the War Shipping Administration.

It's interesting that a lot of these acts occurred on weekends, showing that at this point the U.S. Government was basically working seven days a week.

As it was a Saturday, the Saturday magazines were out.  On the Saturday Evening Post Rockwell's Willie Gillis appeared, getting the attention of two young women while also trying to enjoy a plate of non Army food.

The Philadelphia Courier, in response to a letter to the editor by a black man wondering if he should bother to fight for the United States given racial prejudice in the country, launched the Double V Campaign, a campaign for victory abroad and racial justice at home.

The Afrika Korps halted its counteroffensive in Libya today due to logistical reasons, having retaken nearly all the ground that had been gained by the British in 1941 in a fraction of the time that it had taken them to do it.

Vidkun Quisling, the German installed dictator of Norway, abolished the Norwegian constitution.

A Soviet offensive to relieve Leningrad stalls out.

The FBI, aided by local sheriffs, raided "Japanese owned" farms in the Palos Verdes area for contraband and found none.

Sunday, February 1, 1942. US raids the Marshalls.

Douglas SBD-2 Dauntless dive bomber on the USS Enterprise.  Note the very early war US roundals that featured the red dot in the center, which was later removed out of fears that this would cause US aircraft to be mistaken for Japanese ones.

Twenty years after the terms of the Washington Naval Treaty were agreed to, which limited ships of various types, but not aircraft carriers, this occurred:

February 1, 1942: US ships and aircraft from carriers USS Enterprise and USS Yorktown strike the Marshall and Gilbert Islands in the first offensive action by the US in the war.

The raids were of no long term consequence, but did provide valuable experience to the US Navy.

Interesting how many of these events occurred on Sunday.

That item, of course, is from Sarah Sundin's blog on daily events of World War Two.

Also, from it, for this day:

German Navy starts using 4-rotor Enigma machines, throwing off Allied code-breaking for eleven months. Nazis form puppet government in Norway with Vidkun Quisling as prime minister. Blue Star Mothers of America is established in Flint, MI, for mothers of servicemen and women.

Quisling was an odd character who had served as Norwegian Defense Minister from 1931-33.  Oddly, his first attempt to seize power in a coup, coincident with the German invasion, failed as it was not supported by Germany.

Saturday, December 27, 1941. Vågsøy, Norway raided by Commandos. Australia turns towards the US.

Following up on yesterdays' diversionary raid on the Lofoten islands, British and Norwegian commandos raided the Vågsøy, Norway in Operation Archery.  The raid was the first combined arms raid conducted by the British.

British commandos in action on Operation Archery.

Fish oil was the material objective, but a broader goal was to cause the Germans to shift more manpower to Norway, where they'd accordingly reduce pressure on the Eastern Front. To that extent it was a success, as the Germans in fact moved 30,000 men into the Scandinavian country due to Hitler's fear that the British were preparing to invade Norway.  Ultimately the Germans would come to station 15 Divisions in Norway, where the 300,000 men were in fact fairly useless.

Operation Anklet, the diversionary raid, ended as the Germans were reacting with aircraft which that mission now lacked.

The first SOE operatives are dropped by the British into Denmark, but as the item below details, one was killed when his parachute didn't open:

Today in World War II History—December 27, 1941

Australian Prime Minister released this statement for publication.

That reddish veil which o'er the face

Of night-hag East is drawn ...

Flames new disaster for the race?

Or can it be the dawn? 

So wrote Bernard O'Dowd. I see 1942 as a year in which we shall know the answer. I would, however, that we provide the answer. We can and we will. Therefore I see 1942 as a year of immense change in Australian life. 

The Australian government's policy has been grounded on two facts. One is that the war with Japan is not a phase of the struggle with the Axis powers, but is a new war. The second is that Australia must go on a war footing. Those two facts involve two lines of action - one in the direction of external policy as to our dealings with Britain, the United States, Russia, the Netherlands East Indies and China in the higher direction of the war in the Pacific. 

The second is the reshaping, in fact the revolutionising, of the Australian way of life until a war footing is attained quickly, efficiently and withoutquestion. ... 

Now with equal realism, we take the view that, while the determination of military policy is the Soviet's business, we should be able to look forward with reason to aid from Russia against Japan. We look for a solid and impregnable barrier of the Democracies against the three Axis Powers, and we refuse to accept the dictum that the Pacific struggle must be treated as a subordinate segment of the general conflict. By that it is not meant that any one of the other theatres of war is of less importance than the Pacific, but that Australia asks for a concerted plan evoking the greatest strength at the Democracies' disposal, determined upon hurling Japan back. The Australian Government, therefore, regards the Pacific struggle as primarily one in which the United States and Australia must have the fullest say in the direction of the democracies' fighting plan. Without any inhibitions of any kind, I make it quite clear that Australia looks to America, free of any pangs as to our traditional links or kinship with the United Kingdom. 

We know the problems that the United Kingdom faces. We know the constant threat of invasion. We know the dangers of dispersal of strength, but we know too, that Australia can go and Britain can still hold on. ...  

Summed up, Australian external policy will be shaped toward obtaining Russian aid, and working out, with the United States, as the major factor, a plan of Pacific strategy, along with British, Chinese and Dutch forces. Australian internal policy has undergone striking changes in the past few weeks. These, and those that will inevitably come before 1942 is far advanced, have been prompted by several reasons. In the first place, the Commonwealth Government found it exceedingly difficult to bring Australian people to a realisation of what, after two years of war, our position had become. Even the entry of Japan, bringing a direct threat in our own waters, was met with a subconscious view that the Americans would deal with the short-sighted, underfed and fanatical Japanese. 

The announcement that no further appeals would be made to the Australian people, and the decisions that followed, were motivated by psychological factors. They had an arresting effect. They awakened the somewhat lackadaisical Australian mind the attitude that was imperative if we were to save ourselves, to enter an all-in effort in the only possible manner.

That experiment in psychology was eminently successful, and we commence 1942 with a better realisation, by a greater number of Australians, of what the war means than in the whole preceding two years.

The decisions were prompted by other reasons, all related to the necessity of getting onto a war footing, and the results so far achieved have been most heartening, especially in respect of production and conservation of stocks. I make it clear that the experiment undertaken was never intended as one to awaken Australian patriotism or sense of duty. Those qualities have been ever-present; but the response to leadership and direction had never been requested of the people, and desirable talents and untapped resources had lain dormant. Our task for 1942 is stern ... The position Australia faces internally far exceeds in potential and sweeping dangers anything that confronted us in 1914-1918.

The year 1942 will impose supreme tests. These range from resistance to invasion to deprivation of more and more amenities ...

Australians must realise that to place the nation on a war footing every citizen must place himself, his private and business affairs, his entire mode of living, on a war footing. The civilian way of life cannot be any less rigorous, can contribute no less than that which the fighting men have to follow. I demand that Australians everywhere realise that Australia is now inside the firing lines.

Australian governmental policy will be directed strictly on those lines. We have to regard our country and its 7,000,000 people as though we were a nation and a people with the enemy hammering at our frontier. Australians must be perpetually on guard; on guard against the possibility, at any hour without warning, of raid or invasion; on guard against spending money, or doing anything that cannot be justified; on guard against hampering by disputation or idle, irresponsible chatter, the decisions of the Government taken for the welfare of all.

All Australia is the stake in this war. All Australia must stand together to hold that stake. We face a powerful, ably led and unbelievably courageous foe. We must watch the enemy accordingly. We shall watch him accordingly.

The speech acknowledged that Australia was looking to the United States for support, rather than the United Kingdom, a major shift in its traditional allegiance to its mother country.

On the same day, the Japanese bombed the open city of Manila.  On the same day, US and Filipino forces withdrew to defensive line "D", the third of five pre-war designed lines of defense.

The US, as also detailed in the link above, commenced the rationing of rubber.  You can read more about that here:

“Make It Do—Tire Rationing in World War II”).

Friday, December 26, 1941. Churchill address Congress.

Winston Churchill addressed a joint session of Congress, the first British Prime Minister to do so.  He stated:

Members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives of the United States, I feel greatly honored that you should have thus invited me to enter the United States Senate Chamber and address the representatives of both branches of Congress. The fact that my American forebears have for so many generations played their part in the life of the United States, and that here I am, an Englishman, welcomed in your midst, makes this experience one of the most moving and thrilling in my life, which is already long and has not been entirely uneventful. I wish indeed that my mother, whose memory I cherish, across the vale of years, could have been here to see. By the way, I cannot help reflecting that if my father had been American and my mother British instead of the other way around, I might have got here on my own. In that case this would not have been the first time you would have heard my voice. In that case I should not have needed any invitation. But if I had it is hardly likely that it would have been unanimous. So perhaps things are better as they are.

I may confess, however, that I do not feel quite like a fish out of water in a legislative assembly where English is spoken. I am a child of the House of Commons. I was brought up in my father's house to believe in democracy. "Trust the people." That was his message. I used to see him cheered at meetings and in the streets by crowds of workingmen way back in those aristocratic Victorian days when as Disraeli said "the world was for the few, and for the very few."

Therefore I have been in full harmony all my life with the tides which have flowed on both sides of the Atlantic against privilege and monopoly and I have steered confidently towards the Gettysburg ideal of government of the people, by the people, for the people.

I owe my advancement entirely to the House of Commons, whose servant I am. In my country as in yours public men are proud to be the servants of the State and would be ashamed to be its masters. The House of Commons, if they thought the people wanted it, could, by a simple vote, remove me from my office. But I am not worrying about it at all,

As a matter of fact I am sure they will approve very highly of my journey here, for which I obtained the King's permission, in order to meet the President of the United States and to arrange with him for all that mapping out of our military plans and for all those intimate meetings of the high officers of the armed services in both countries which are indispensable for the successful prosecution of the war.

I should like to say first of all how much I have been impressed and encouraged by the breadth of view and sense of proportion which I have found in all quarters over here to which I have had access. Anyone who did not understand the size and solidarity of the foundations of the United States, might easily have expected to find an excited, disturbed, self-cantered atmosphere, with all minds fixed upon the novel, startling, and painful episodes of sudden war as they hit America. After all, the United States have been attacked and set upon by three most powerfully armed dictator states, the greatest military power in Europe, the greatest military power in Asia-Japan, Germany and Italy have all declared and are making war upon you, and the quarrel is opened which can only end in their overthrow or yours.

But here in Washington in these memorable days I have found an Olympian fortitude which, far from being based upon complacency, is only the mask of an inflexible purpose and the proof of a sure, well-grounded confidence in the final outcome. We in Britain had the same feeling in our darkest days. We too were sure that in the end all would be well.

You do not, I am certain, underrate the severity of the ordeal to which you and we have still to be subjected. The forces ranged against us are enormous. They are bitter, they are ruthless. The wicked men and their factions, who have launched their peoples on the path of war and conquest, know that they will be called to terrible account if they cannot beat down by force of arms the peoples they have assailed. They will stop at nothing. They have a vast accumulation of war weapons of all kinds. They have highly trained and disciplined armies, navies and air services. They have plans and designs which have long been contrived and matured. They will stop at nothing that violence or treachery can suggest.

It is quite true that on our side our resources in manpower and materials are far greater than theirs. But only a portion of your resources are as yet mobilized and developed, and we both of us have much to learn in the cruel art of war. We have therefore without doubt a time of tribulation before us. In this same time, some ground will be lost which it will be hard and costly to regain. Many disappointments and unpleasant surprises await us. Many of them will afflict us before the full marshalling of our latent and total power can be accomplished.

For the best part of twenty years the youth of Britain and America have been taught that war was evil, which is true, and that it would never come again, which has been proved false. For the best part of twenty years, the youth of Germany, of Japan and Italy, have been taught that aggressive war is the noblest duty of the citizen and that it should be begun as soon as the necessary weapons and organization have been made. We have performed the duties and tasks of peace. They have plotted and planned for war. This naturally has placed us, in Britain, and now places you in the United States at a disadvantage which only time, courage and untiring exertion can correct.

We have indeed to be thankful that so much time has been granted to us. If Germany had tried to invade the British Isles after the French collapse in June, 1940, and if Japan had declared war on the British Empire and the United States at about the same date, no one can say what disasters and agonies might not have been our lot. But now, at the end of December, 1941, our transformation from easy-going peace to total war efficiency has made very great progress.

The broad flow of munitions in Great Britain has already begun. Immense strides have been made in the conversion of American industry to military purposes. And now that the United States is at war, it is possible for orders to be given every day which in a year or eighteen months hence will produce results in war power beyond anything which has been seen or foreseen in the dictator states.

Provided that every effort is made, that nothing is kept back, that the whole manpower, brain power, virility, valor and civic virtue of the English-speaking world, with all its galaxy of loyal, friendly or associated communities and states-provided that is bent unremittingly to the simple but supreme task, I think it would be reasonable to hope that the end of 1942 will see us quite definitely in a better position than we are now. And that the year 1943 will enable us to assume the initiative upon an ample scale.

Some people may be startled or momentarily depressed when, like your President, I speak of a long and a hard war. Our peoples would rather know the truth, somber though it be. And after all, when we are doing the noblest work in the world, not only defending our hearths and homes, but the cause of freedom in every land, the question of whether deliverance comes in 1942 or 1943 or 1944, falls into its proper place in the grand proportions of human history. Sure I am that this day, now, we are the masters of our fate. That the task which has been set us is not above our strength. That its pangs and toils are not beyond our endurance. As long as we have faith in our cause, and an unconquerable willpower, salvation will not be denied us. In the words of the Psalmist: "He shall not be afraid of evil tidings. His heart is fixed, trusting in the Lord."

Not all the tidings will be evil. On the contrary, mighty strokes of war have already been dealt against the enemy-the glorious defense of their native soil by the Russian armies and people; wounds have been inflicted upon the Nazi tyranny and system which have bitten deep and will fester and inflame not only in the Nazi body but in the Nazi mind. The boastful Mussolini has crumpled already. He is now but a lackey and a serf, the merest utensil of his master's will. He has inflicted great suffering and wrong upon his own industrious people. He has been stripped of all his African empire. Abyssinia has been liberated. Our Armies of the East, which were so weak and ill-equipped at the moment of French desertion, now control all the regions from Teheran to Bengazi, and from Aleppo and Cyprus to the sources of the Nile.

For many months we devoted ourselves to preparing to take the offensive in Libya. The very considerable battle which has been proceeding there the last six weeks in the desert, has been most fiercely fought on both sides. Owing to the difficulties of supply upon the desert flank, we were never able to bring numerically equal forces to bear upon the enemy. Therefore we had to rely upon superiority in the numbers and qualities of tanks and aircraft, British and American. For the first time, aided by these-for the first time we have fought the enemy with equal weapons. For the first time we have made the Hun feel the sharp edge of those tools with which he has enslaved Europe. The armed forces of the enemy in Cyrenaica amounted to about 150,000 men, of whom a third were Germans. General Auchinleck set out to destroy totally that armed force, and I have every reason to believe that his aim will be fully accomplished. I am so glad to be able to place before you, members of the Senate and of the House of Representatives, at this moment when you are entering the war, the proof that with proper weapons and proper organization, we are able to beat the life out of the savage Nazi.

What Hitlerism is suffering in Libya is only a sample and a foretaste of what we have got to give him and his accomplices wherever this war should lead us in every quarter of the Globe.

There are good tidings also from blue water. The lifeline of supplies which joins our two nations across the ocean, without which all would fail,-that lifeline is flowing steadily and freely in spite of all that the enemy can do. It is a fact that the British Empire, which many thought eighteen months ago was broken and ruined, is now incomparably stronger and is growing stronger with every month.

Lastly, if you will forgive me for saying it, to me the best tidings of all-the United States, united as never before, has drawn the sword for freedom and cast away the scabbard.

All these tremendous facts have led the subjugated peoples of Europe to lift up their heads again in hope. They have put aside forever the shameful temptation of resigning themselves to the conqueror's will. Hope has returned to the hearts of scores of millions of men and women, and with that hope there burns the flame of anger against the brutal, corrupt invader. And still more fiercely burn the fires of hatred and contempt for the filthy Quislings whom he has suborned.

In a dozen famous ancient states, now prostrate under the Nazi yoke, the masses of the people, all classes and creeds, await the hour of liberation when they too will once again be able to play their part and strike their blows like men. That hour will strike. And its solemn peal will proclaim that night is past and that the dawn has come.

The onslaught upon us, so long and so secretly planned by Japan, has presented both our countries with grievous problems for which we could not be fully prepared. If people ask me, as they have a right to ask me in England, "Why is it that you have not got an ample equipment of modern aircraft and army weapons of all kinds in Malaya and in the East Indies?"-I can only point to the victory General Auchinleck has gained in the Libyan campaign. Had we diverted and dispersed our gradually-growing resources between Libya and Malaya, we should have been found wanting in both theaters.

If the United States has been found at a disadvantage at various points in the Pacific Ocean, we know well that that is to no small extent because of the aid which you have been giving to us in munitions for the defense of the British Isles and for the Libyan campaign, and above all because of your help in the Battle of the Atlantic, upon which all depends and which has in consequence been successfully and prosperously maintained.

Of course, it would have been much better, I freely admit, if we had had enough resources of all kinds to be at full strength at all threatened points. But considering how slowly and reluctantly we brought ourselves to large-scale preparations, and how long these preparations take, we had no right to expect to be in such a fortunate position.

The choice of how to dispose of our hitherto limited resources had to be made by Britain in time of war, and by the United States in time of peace. And I believe that history will pronounce that upon the whole, and it is upon the whole that these matters must be judged, that the choice made was right. Now that we are together, now that we are linked in a righteous comrade-ship of arms, now that our two considerable nations, each in perfect unity, have joined all their life-energies in a common resolve-a new scene opens upon which a steady light will glow and brighten.

Many people have been astonished that Japan should in a single day have plunged into war against the United States and the British Empire. We all wonder why, if this dark design with its laborious and intricate preparations had been so long filling their secret minds, they did not choose our moment of weakness eighteen months ago. Viewed quite dispassionately, in spite of the losses we have suffered and the further punishment we shall have to take, it certainly appears an irrational act. It is of course only prudent to assume that they have made very careful calculations and think they see their way through. Nevertheless, there may be another explanation.

We know that for many years past the policy of Japan has been dominated by secret societies of subalterns and junior officers of the army and navy, who have enforced their will upon successive Japanese cabinets and parliaments by the assassination of any Japanese statesmen who opposed or who did not sufficiently further their aggressive policy. It may be that these societies, dazzled and dizzy with their own schemes of aggression and the prospect of early victories, have forced their country-against its better judgment-into war. They have certainly embarked upon a very considerable undertaking.

After the outrages they have committed upon us at Pearl Harbor, in the Pacific Islands, in the Philippines, in Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, they must now know that the stakes for which they have decided to play are mortal. When we look at the resources of the United States and the British Empire compared to those of Japan; when we remember those of China, which have so long valiantly withstood invasion and tyranny-and when also we observe the Russian menace which hangs over Japan-it becomes still more difficult to reconcile Japanese action with prudence or even with sanity. What kind of a people do they think we are? Is it possible that they do not realize that we shall never cease to persevere against them until they have been taught a lesson which they and the world will never forget?

Members of the Senate, and members of the House of Representatives, I will turn for one moment more from the turmoil and convulsions of the present to the broader spaces of the future. Here we are together, facing a group of mighty foes who seek our ruin. Here we are together, defending all that to free men is dear. Twice in a single generation the catastrophe of world war has fallen upon us. Twice in our lifetime has the long arm of fate reached out across the oceans to bring the United States into the forefront of the battle.

If we had kept together after the last war, if we had taken common measures for our safety, this renewal of the curse need never have fallen upon us. Do we not owe it to ourselves, to our children, to tormented mankind, to make sure that these catastrophes do not engulf us for the third time?

It has been proved that pestilences may break out in the Old World which carry their destructive ravages into the New World, from which, once they are afoot, the New World can not escape. Duty and prudence alike command first that the germ-centers of hatred and revenge should be constantly and vigilantly served and treated in good time, and that an adequate organization should be set up to make sure that the pestilence can be controlled at its earliest beginnings, before it spreads and rages throughout the entire earth.

Five or six years ago it would have been easy, without shedding a drop of blood, for the United States and Great Britain to have insisted on the fulfilment of the disarmament clauses of the treaties which Germany signed after the Great War. And that also would have been the opportunity for assuring to the Germans those materials-those raw materials-which we declared in the Atlantic Charter should not be denied to any nation, victor or vanquished. The chance has passed, it is gone. Prodigious hammer-strokes have been needed to bring us together today.

If you will allow me to use other language, I will say that he must indeed have a blind soul who cannot see that some great purpose and design is being worked out here below of which we have the honor to be the faithful servants. It is not given to us to peer into the mysteries of the future. Still, I avow my hope and faith, sure and inviolate, that in the days to come the British and American peoples will, for their own safety and for the good of all, walk together in majesty, in justice and in peace.

MacArthur declared Manila an open city.

British commandos landed in the Lofeten Islands in Operation Anklet.  The raid was successful in its own right, although it was actually a diversion for a raid to take place the following day.

A German offensive that would run into May was commenced on the Kerch Peninsula in Crimea.

Closer to home

Both of my parents would have had this as a day off from school, but for my mother's parents it would also have been the holiday of Boxing Day.

Thursday September 11, 1941. The Buskø Affair.

The USCG Northland stopped the Norwegian sealer SS Buskø off of the coast of Greenland, impounded the ship, and arrested the crew.

Northland under sail, which was not the way it typically sailed.

Stopping a Norwegian ship?

Well, yes. . . 

Ownership of Greenland had been contested between the Scandinavian countries of Denmark and Norway prior to World War Two, with its status as a Danish possession finally resolved by way of a decision of the International Court of Justice in 1933.  After German occupation, the Quisling administration in Norway saw an opportunity to reverse this situation and sought to take advantage of German sponsorship and the fact that the Royal Navy was precluding Norwegian ships from resupplying small Norwegian hunting, meteorological, and radio stations that remained on Greenland. The Quisling government was urged in this direction by Adolf Hoel, a geologist with nationalist leanings, and Gustav Smedal, a lawyer with the same.

 In 1941, with German permission, the Norwegian government outfitted a party to essentially reclaim Norwegian control of Greenland, led by a Norwegian arctic explorer who had led a prior Norwegian expedition in 1931 for the same purpose.  Complicating it further, the Royal Navy's actions were putting Norwegian parties on Greenland in desperate straights, as they were not getting resupplied.

Just before the expedition set out, the Germans insisted that a radio operator, by the unlikely name of Jacob (Iacob) Bradley, but made part of the expedition with the purpose of setting up a German radio station.  The ship's captain protested the action as this crossed over a line in their view. While the mission of the ship was somewhat ambiguous, it was still Norwegian, up until that point.

Bradley, moreover, was a Norwegian Nazi, with ties to the Nazi organization in Norway that predated the war, although he'd ironically separated from it formally prior to the German invasion.

German insistence meant that Bradley was incorporated into the party against the ship's wishes.  He was dropped off at one of the Norwegian camps on September 2, but oddly didn't begin to broadcast anything.  He may never have set up the radio equipment.  The Norwegian trappers he was placed with refused to help him assemble his equipment, for that matter, apparently voting on his mission with inaction.

Several months prior Danish government had signed a treaty with the US seeking to have the US protect Greenland during the war.   This was well within the US's traditional Monroe Doctrine set of prerogatives.  

Upon reaching Greenland's water, Danish communities immediately noticed the ship and reported it to American authorities.  On this date in 1941 the USCG Northland raided it.  Bradley's camp was also raided, and his equipment destroyed. The ship was towed to Boston Harbor.

Bradley was arrested in the United States and held until 1947.  After the war he did not return to Norway until 1979, at which point the statute of limitations had expired on potential treason charges.  He was buried in a Jewish cemetery at the time of his death, as ironically his wife was Jewish.

Hallvard Devold, the Norwegian leader of the 1931 and 1941 expeditions, was turned over to the British who held him until the end of the war, upon which he returned to Norway.  Norwegian authorities did not prosecute him.  Hoel denied all knowledge of the Germans having co-opted the expedition, but he paid for his sympathy with Quisling by losing his academic and institutional positions after the war.

The SS Buskø was released by the United States in 1942 and leased by the Norwegian government in exile to the United States. After the war she was refitted, and already in 1941, upon her being seized by the Coast Guard, her condition had been noted as very dilapidated.  She sank in a terrible storm in 1950 which took several ships in sealing grounds, claiming their crews as well.

More on these events can be read here:

“A cursed affair”—how a Norwegian expedition to Greenland became the USA’s first maritime capture in World War II

Today in World War II History—September 12, 1941

Also involving the Quisling government, on this day that body banned the Boy Scouts and compelled its members to join the Nasjonal Samling's youth leagues, the equivalent of the Hitler Youth in Norway.

A German spokesman, on this day, declared that President Roosevelt "wanted war" while an Italian one declared that American actions required Axis ships to attack American naval vessels on sight.

The White House noted that there was a lot of similarity between Charles Lindbergh's recent comments in Des Moines, Iowa, and Nazi propaganda.  Lindbergh's recent remarks had been very poorly received by the American public.

And the Horsa glider, the large British gilder for airborne operations, flew for the first time.

British newspapers ran an interesting cartoon depicting Hitler's advance in Russia against Napoleon's, which had started within two days of each other in 1812 and 1941 respectively.

It noted that by this time in 1812, Napoleon had advanced further towards Moscow than Hitler, but it did also note that the French Empire (whose troops at that time included large numbers of conscripted Germans) had advanced with a single thrust rather than along a 1200-mile front, as Hitler's troops were doing.

Wednesday September 3, 1941. The first use of Zyklon B.

The Germans first used Zyklon B to murder human beings with the first victims being 600 Soviet POWS and 250 sick Polish POWs held at Auschwitz.

The Soviets began the process of expelling Volga Germans to Siberia.

The espionage trial for the fourteen members of the Duquesne Spy Ring who had not confessed to the crime (nineteen had) commenced on this day in 1941.  The German effort was the largest spy bust in U.S. history, although it was dwarfed by the Soviet efforts that had commenced in the 1920s and which ran through the end of the Cold War.

Most of the spies were predictably German or Austrian immigrants, but there are some surprises.  A few were not of German ancestry.  One who was, was a Jewish German immigrant who served as a honey pot and appears to have suffered from a psychological condition giving rise to her use.  One was a Russian immigrant.  The spy ring had a Japanese liaison, as well as a German one, demonstrating a very early connection between Imperial Japan and Nazi Germany.

More on all of this here:

Today in World War II History—September 3, 1941

Operation Gauntlet, an Allied raid on Spitsbergen concluded.  It had met with no German resistance.

German radio station on Spitsbergen being blown down.

The local population was evacuated, German installations destroyed, and mining equipment from the high Arctic mines also destroyed.

Saturday August 2, 1941. Silk Threads.

As the Today In World War Two History blog informs us, on this day in history the U.S. Office of Production Management restricted sales of silk to the United States government and also restricted the sales of rayon and steel. All were vital war materials, with the spider produced silk and synthetic rayon critical for parachutes.

Silk threads made from wartime salvaged silk.

This brings up one of the common tropes of the 1940s, that being GI's trading cigarettes and nylons for dates.  It shows up in movies all the time.  The interesting thing now, of course, is that "nylons" are pretty much a think of the past, I think.

This must reflect a change in the standards of dress. When women wore skirts or dresses nearly daily, nylons were a way of smoothing out the appearance of their legs for formal occasions.  Now, as women dress like this much less often, they seem to have gone by the wayside.  

I don't know the history of nylons or their predecessor silk stockings, but I wonder if the current situation isn't a return to an earlier standard. Even when women wear skirts now, I don't think they wear nylons very often.  They were likely a pain and their disappearance, for the most part, probably isn't missed much.

Silk was missed along with nylon for its civilian clothing use. Wool and cotton were the big fabrics of the era, but silk was common in some things, such as wedding dresses.  The trop of a parachute being taken for fabric for a wedding dress is another common one from the era.

On the same day, the U.S. extended Lend Lease to the Soviet Union.  

It would take some time for U.S. military products to reach the Soviet Union, but by the end of the war a massive amount of war material of all types was provided to the USSR.  We've dealt with this elsewhere, but the Red Army would not have been the same fighting force it was in the second half of the war without U.S. and British materials.  The Soviets received materials in every category, and its motorization can be largely attributed to Detroit.

Studebaker trucks on their way to the Soviet Union, traveling through Iran, 1943.

The United Kingdom called upon Iran and Afghanistan to expel German citizens.

The British were concerned about German advances in the Caucasus. It was theorized by the British that if the Germans continued to advance as they were, they'd end up taking the area to the north of Iraq and effectively be able to encircle, at some point, the British in the Middle East, although this may frankly have been a bit of over extended speculation.

Iran had declared itself neutral in the war but it was somewhat hostile to the British for traditional reasons.  It refused the British request.

Afghanistan, which actually had been flirting with the Germans, complied with the request and backed off its previous positions, which were geared towards trying to expand its territory and gain access to the sea. 

The Germans confiscated Norwegian radios.

Wednesday July 30, 1941. Making up and futile raids.

Execution of the agreement between the Polish government in exile and the USSR, with Winston Churchill in attendance.

On this day in 1941 the Polish government in exile and the Soviet Union entered into a treaty abrogating the results of the Soviet Union's participation with Nazi Germany in the September 1939 invasion of Poland and making them allies. The agreement also provided that the USSR would cause a Polish military unit to be formed in its territory.

Polish-Soviet Union Agreements : July 30, 1941

Moscow, July 30, 1941

1. The Government of the U.S.S.R. recognizes the Soviet-German treaties of 1939 as to territorial changes in Poland as having lost their validity. The Polish Government declares Poland is not bound by any agreement with any third power which is directed against the U.S.S.R.

2. Diplomatic relations will be restored between the two governments upon the signing of this agreement, and an immediate exchange of Ambassadors will be arranged.

3. The two governments mutually agree to render one to another aid and support of all kinds in the present war against Hitlerite Germany.

4. The Government of the U.S.S.R. expresses its consent to the formation on territory of the U.S.S.R. of a Polish Army under a commander appointed by the Polish Government in agreement with the Soviet Government, the Polish Army on territory of the U.S.S.R. being subordinated in an operational sense to the Supreme Command of the U.S.S.R., in which the Polish Army will be represented. All details as to command, organization and employment of this force will be settled in a subsequent agreement.

5. This agreement will come into force immediately upon signature and without ratification. The present agreement is drawn up in two copies, in the Russian and Polish languages. Both texts have equal force.

The Soviet Government grants amnesty to all Polish citizens now detained on Soviet territory either as prisoners of war or on other sufficient grounds, as from the resumption of diplomatic relations.

The Soviets did indeed allow for the formation of Polish military units under this agreement, although in 1942 they were evacuated to the west through Iran. They were fairly sizable in number, with over 70,000 men at the time.  Following evacuation, they came under overall British control and were part of the Polish forces armed and equipped by the United Kingdom.

Following that, additional Polish formation were created under the leadership of Polish communists. These forces were outside the control of the Polish government in exile.

On the same day, the Royal Navy launched a Quixotic raid on the European far north, hitting Kirkenes in Norway and Petsamo in Finland by air.

The raid was not a success and frankly fit into the category of odd British efforts of a show the flag nature that were not always well thought out. The leader of the two carrier raid doubted the concept himself and his doubts proved correct.  Conducted in the high Arctic summer, the long day precluded surprise and the overall results have been termed a "disaster".

The German 6th Army commenced an assault on Kiev.

Hitler issued  his Directive No. 34 on the fact of increased Soviet resistance to the invasion of the Soviet Union.  Just days prior he was planning for the whole thing to wrap up.

May 21, 1941. SS Robin Moor Sunk, O'ooham Resist

The SS Robin Moor was sunk by the German submarine U-69 even though German U-boats at the time had been instructed not to sink ships in certain areas in order not to provoke the United States into entering the war prior to the invasion of the Soviet Union.  The Robin Moor was flying U.S. colors and was identified as a neutral ship prior to being sunk.  The Germans allowed the crew of the unescorted ship, on its way to Mozambique, to evacuate before it was sunk.  The ships departure had been apparently revealed to the Germans by a U.S. spy in the United States.  The motivation of the U-boat's commander has been questioned, given as he was operating contrary to orders.

The sinking resulted in some controversy, but the materials it was carrying could have been regarded as war materials even though the ship itself was not engaged in supplying the British forces.

The German government ordered the United States to remove its diplomats from Paris by June 10.  The French government at the time was of course headquartered in Vichy.

On the same day the Royal Navy prevented seaborne German forces from landing on Crete, but the destroyer HMS Juno was sunk by the Italian air force.

The Soviet Union's Central Committee War Section met, resulting in an argument between Stalin and the head of Soviet intelligence, the latter who maintained the Germans were about to invade the USSR.  The argument resulted in that latter figure being arrested and shot.  Amazingly Stalin didn't suffer the same fate when it was soon learned how wrong he was.

A theater strike commenced in Norway over the revocation of working permits for six actors who refused to perform in German controlled radio.  The strike was not a success and ultimately ended with the Germans taking full control of Norwegian theaters.

A dispute with Native American O'ooham leader Pia Machita ended in Arizona with his arrest for inciting his people to avoid conscription.  He and his followers had been on the run since the prior October for resisting the draft, at which time they had been raided by Federal authorities.

The O'ooham band that Pia Machita was part of was very small but was uniquely active in its views on the authority of  the United States.  He did not recognize the Gadsen Purchase and his band refused to assimilate.  While they were small in numbers, the US government feared that their resistance to conscription would spread to other tribes.

March 4, 1941. Lighting the fish oil. Operation Claymore

On this day in 1941, the British raided the Norwegian Lofoten Islands in a uniformly successful operation, taking over 200 German prisoners, suffering only one (self inflicted accidental) casualty, and destroying stocks of fish oil, which is actually more important for a variety of reasons than might be imagined.

British commandos watching fish oil burning, which is probably horribly stenchy.

Canada ordered the registration of Japanese Canadians who had obtained age 16.

More on both of these items can be found here.

Today in World War II History—March 4, 1941

Commando Raid on the Lofoten Islands

May 8, 1945. Victory In Europe. Seventy Five Years Ago Today.

The mission of this Allied force was fulfilled at 0241, local time, May 7th, 1945.

Dwight Eisenhower.

The official surrender, however, came today.

Today In Wyoming's History: May 8:

May 8

1945    The German surrender becomes official.  President Harry S. Truman announced in a radio address that World War II had ended in Europe.  End of the Prague uprising.  Hundreds of Algerian civilians are killed by French Army soldiers in the Sétif massacre, ushering in what would ultimately become the French Algerian War.  In day two of rioting, 10,000 servicemen in Halifax Nova Scotia loot and vandalize downtown Halifax during VE-Day celebrations.

February 9, 1920. Knowles and Spiker Say Yes, Hoover Says No, Senate Reconsiders, Riots In Kentucky and Treaties On the Far North

Monday February 9, 1920 saw Guy Spiker marry Emily Knowles, seemingly resolving the drama over the illicit, and as the paper notes illegal, relationship between Pearly Spiker and Miss Knowles and the fate of their son.  Time would prove that settlement less certain.

Another settlement that would prove to be uncertain was that reflected in the Treaty of Versailles, which the U.S. Senate was agreeing to take a second look at.

Railroaders were threatening to go on strike again in the U.S. and the National Guard stopped an attempted lynch mob in Kentucky through the use of violent force, showing that the events of the Red Summer of 1919 weren't quite fully behind the country yet, and wouldn't be for some time.

Herbert Hoover, whose name had been circulated as a potential Republican candidate for President in the 1920 race declined to run.  A person has to wonder if he later wished he had run in 1920, instead of eight years later when he did.

Elsewhere, the landmark treaty regarding the joint use of the Arctic island of Svalbard, a Norwegian territorial possession but used by several nations for hunting and economic activities, was signed by those principally interested in the island.

Greenland?

 The White House Retweeted

Donald J. Trump‏Verified account @realDonaldTrump 15h15 hours ago

Denmark is a very special country with incredible people, but based on Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen’s comments, that she would have no interest in discussing the purchase of Greenland, I will be postponing our meeting scheduled in two weeks for another time....

43,699 replies19,488 retweets94,918 likes

Show this thread

What on earth?

There is a point at which the news becomes so surreal, you just can't quite grasp that something is really in the news.  The bizarre news on the President making sounds on purchasing Greenland is news of that type.  The New York Times, no friend of President Trump's headlined an article on this in this fashion:

Trump, Greenland, Denmark. Is This Real Life?

Or a Peter Sellers movie?

Whatever a person thinks of Trump, or the New York Times, the Times pretty much nailed it.  It feels sort of like something out of The Mouse That Roared, or something like that. It's really hard to grasp what's going on here and a person has to suspect its some sort of odd news cycle diversion.

The story started off with what seemed like a joke and then evolved into something that just seemed like innocent ignorance, combined with a discount of the original suggestion.  But now its escalated to cancelling a state visit with the Danish Prime Minister, Mette Frederiksen, who made it plain that purchasing the Danish possession was not going to be discussed.  Trump has since referred to Frederiksen as "nasty".

The irony there is that while Frederiksen is a Danish Social Democrat, she's a populist conservative on the European scale.  As Prime Minister she's opposed liberal immigration into Denmark, supported confiscation of items from refugees, and supported banning the burka.  She's critical of globalism and has made open comments about Islam being a barrier to integration in Denmark in a way that no American politician would dare.

In other words, Trump and Frederiksen should get along fine.*

Instead, we now have the American populist President insulting the Danish populist Prime Minister over Greenland.

I'm quite certain that 100% of the leadership in the President's party, as well as probably 98% of the people who work in the Administration, have the same reaction. Greenland?

The United States isn't going to buy Greenland.  Denmark isn't going to "sell" Greenland.  Greenland is self administering and if it has a change of status of any type, and it could, it would become an independent nation, something that it more or less would like to do, and which with its independent status, it more or less nearly is.  In my view, that's what it should be, which is not to say that its really actively asking to be that.

The flag of Greenland

Moreover, there was never an era when the US was going to "buy" Greenland.  If the country ever had any interest in doing that, it would have been about the same time as we fought the War of 1812.

88% of the residents of Greenland are Inuit.  Culturally, that places Greenland a lot closer to northern Canada, which isn't purposing to annex it, than it does to the United States.  If Greenland, however, was to join a North American nation, it'd be Canada. . . not the United States.

Greenland has belonged, in one fashion or another, to Scandinavian countries since 986 when it was first settled by Norwegians and Icelanders.  At that time, all Scandinavians, while not unified in rule, were close in culture and the distinction between a Norwegian, Swede or Dane was more theoretical than real.   Hitting Greenland during the Medieval Climatic Optimum, Scandinavians successfully colonized the coastal areas and a Christian Scandinavian population lived there all the way into the 1400s.  At the same time Greenland was also inhabited by the Dorset Paleo Indian culture, which also disappeared from the region around 1500.

The 15th and 16th Centuries were not kind.

As the Dorsets declined the Thule came in. They're an Inuit people and they make up the vast majority of Greelanders today, as noted.  The Danes came back in as early as 1605 when they started a dedicated effort to relocate the Scandinavian communities of Greenland which they had never forgotten, unaware that those colonies had been abandoned.  Still, a 200 year long recollection that they had been there is impressive.

Denmark and Norway shared a joint monarchy during this period which dissolved in 1814.  Norway went into a sort of unhappy union with Sweden shortly thereafter, but it maintained a fair degree of independence until Norway formally left that union in the early 20th Century.  All the way until 1933 Norway, however claimed unoccupied areas of Greenland until that claim was extinguished in favor of Denmark that year.

The first real substantial contact with the United States came in World War Two, during which the U.S. occupied Greenland as Denmark was occupied by Germany.  Greenland basically became self administering during this period but the experience did open up what had been a highly isolated society due to the American presence.  It pushed for self administration after the war but did not achieve it until 1979, in part, and 2009, in full.

It's pulled out of the European Community, which shows how self governing it is.

After World War Two the United States did maintain a military presence in the form of Thule Air Force Base, which was opened in 1943 and is still in use.  The US actually offered to buy Greenland at that time, offering Denmark $100,000,000 in 1946.  As Greenland was much less independent than it is now, perhaps this is not surprising.  The US had actually pondering buying it once before, in 1867, when Congress put an end to the idea.

In 1867 and 1946, of course, the situation was much different than it is now, in 2019.  Greenland for all practical purposes is independent in everything but name.  Greenland has full internal autonomy but does not administer its own foreign affairs.  With the 2009 arrangement, however, granting fully sovereignty over resources to Greenland, it's assumed that independence is on the horizon.  Greenland still maintains a close association with Denmark, and Danes make up a significant portion of the 12% of the population that's not Thule, but the end of Danish rule is coming.

The beginning of American ownership is not and its a really odd thought that anyone bothered to ask the Danes to sell something that they basically are giving back to the people who live there.  The Danes have never shown any interest in giving up Greenland to another country and remarkably reestablished contact with Greenland after a 200 year absence in the first place.  They contested Norway's claim to an unoccupied portion of it. They've been very clear in their views.

So what brought this about is really a mystery.  To Americans, it's probably just one more distraction, but if you are Greenlandic or Danish, it's no doubt insulting.  And now the insult for the Danes has been compounded.  And for what reason?

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*Which may be trivializing the seriousness of her views.  She's also a strong opponent of legal prostitution in Scandinavia.  Frederiksen is Prime Minister, it should be noted, as head of a minority party in coalition with parties of the left.