World War II
From 1933 r. wages and industrial and agricultural production began to rise. Nevertheless, Norway was shaken by strikes and industrial disputes. At the same time, the ideas of fascism began to spread in Europe. W 1933 r. former Defense Minister Vidkun Quisling founded the Norwegian Fascist Party, National Assembly.
9 April 1940 r. Germany attacked Norway. King Hakon and the royal family left for Great Britain. Meanwhile, British troops, French, Polish and Norwegian fought back enemy attacks.
The first victory of the Allied forces during World War II did not take place until the end of May, when the British Navy recaptured Narvik and regained control of a strategic port, used to transport iron ore (tooth. also chapter Nordland). Meanwhile, Britain found itself in a difficult situation and soldiers were ordered to leave Norway to its own fate. 9 On June, Narvik fell into German hands again.
In February 1942 r. The Germans established a puppet government in Oslo, headed by Vidkun Quisling. Resistance forces, on the other hand, continuously sabotaged the German military regime.
One of the greatest successes in the fight against the enemy was the famous commando action, who in February 1943 r. attacked the heavy water factory in Vemork, near Rjukan, in Telemark (the production of heavy water was part of the German atomic bomb program. Weapons were smuggled into the western part of Norway from the Shetland Islands, and Shetland fishermen have taken part in a variety of bold actions, to help the resistance movement. British commandos inflicted losses on Germany in the battles of Maloy and Svolvaer.
The Germans retaliated against the civilian population. It was killed during the occupation 10 500 Norwegians (including approx. 6000 soldiers and sailors). Among the civilian casualties there were 630 Norwegian Jews, sent to concentration camps in Central Europe.
Polish prisoners of war also died in Norway, Serbian and Russian, forced to slave labor at construction sites. Many of them died from cold and malnutrition. Due to the large number of victims among the workers building the Arctic highway, running through Saltfjellet, it was called blodveinen (bloody road). Finnmark was also seriously damaged during the war, many of the inhabitants of that district were killed. The Germans built submarine bases in Altafjorden and other places, which they used to attack convoys bound for Murmansk and Arkhangelsk in Russia, to prevent the Russians from supplying weapons.
Trying to delay the occupation of Finland by the Russians, German troops used the scorched earth tactic: the northern part of Norway was completely destroyed, the fields were burnt, Forests, towns and villages. Shortly after the liberation of Norway, Quisling was shot by a firing squad, and other collaborators went to prison. In the fall 1945 r. the soviet army withdrew from arctic Norway.
Even though in the post-war elections (X 1945) the communist party did quite well, she never found herself in the government. Norway was not part of the Soviet satellite countries, so its section of the border with Russia, although small, it was like an iron curtain. The rationing of the core articles ended in 1952 r. At the end of the years 40. and at the beginning 50. intensive work was carried out to restore the northern part of the country from the war damage. Dilapidated city fragments were rebuilt all over Norway, burned in 1940 r or before the capitulation of the Germans, Half of the tonnage of the merchant and whaling fleet was rebuilt.
W 1946 r. Norway became a founding member of the United Nations. State, remembering the close vicinity of the USSR, joined NATO in 1949 r. After the creation of the Nordic Council in 1952 r. close relations have been established with other Scandinavian countries.