History

The Nordics and the First World War

Field-Of-Poppies

As the world marks the centenary of the Armistice,  what role did the Nordic nations play?


Norway

Officially neutral as a new nation, but very much aligned to the Allies.


Sweden

Maintained its longstanding neutrality (since the Napoleonic era), but when Russia collapsed into civil war, it took the opportunity to briefly occupy the Finnish Åland Islands. Relied on trade with both powers, so lack of German trade at the end of the war meant some food shortages.


Denmark

Neutral, with its population forbidden to support either side even in private. However, like many neutral countries, it continued to trade with Germany.


Finland

Distant realm of the Russian Empire, so aligned to the Allies. When the war ended, Finland descended into Civil War between Bolshevik Reds and liberal Whites.


Iceland

Then part of Denmark, so neutral.


Leave a Reply

Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in:

WordPress.com Logo

You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Log Out /  Change )

Facebook photo

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Log Out /  Change )

Connecting to %s