Britain sent 38,000 troops to Norway to stop the Germans — got expelled within weeks, but the humiliation toppled Chamberlain and put Churchill in power.
On April 9, 1940, Germany launched simultaneous invasions of Denmark and Norway. Denmark surrendered within six hours — the fastest capitulation of any country in the entire war. Norway, supported by Britain and France, would resist for two months.
The German cruiser Blücher was sunk in the Oslofjord by an 89-year-old coastal fortress armed with cannon and torpedoes, delaying the capture of Oslo long enough for Norway's king, government, and gold reserves to escape into the interior. It was one of the most consequential artillery salvos of the war.
Britain and France sent 38,000 troops to Norway in a campaign that briefly recaptured the strategic port of Narvik. But the collapse of France in May 1940 forced a complete evacuation — the Allies simply couldn't sustain two simultaneous crises at opposite ends of Europe.
The Norwegian Campaign destroyed Neville Chamberlain's government. A devastating House of Commons debate saw members of his own Conservative Party turn against him. Leo Amery quoted Cromwell at the front bench: 'In the name of God, go.' Chamberlain resigned two days later.
Winston Churchill, who as First Lord of the Admiralty had actually overseen the failed Norwegian intervention, emerged from the crisis as Prime Minister on May 10, 1940 — the same day Germany launched its invasion of France. History handed him the hardest job at the hardest moment.
Norway's collaborationist leader Vidkun Quisling gave the English language a new word. 'Quisling' entered dictionaries across the Allied world as a permanent synonym for a traitor who collaborates with an occupying power — a word still in use today.