Comments on: Norway’s Traitor: The Story of Vidkun Quisling /vidkun-quisling/ All Things Norway, In English Mon, 13 Jan 2025 01:40:05 +0000 hourly 1 By: Karl Von Gaschler /vidkun-quisling/#comment-1025402 Mon, 13 Jan 2025 01:40:05 +0000 /?p=72727#comment-1025402 In reply to James Bussey.

That was a very well written, informative and nuanced piece. Thank you.

]]> By: Brian Johnston /vidkun-quisling/#comment-1013560 Mon, 25 Dec 2023 03:04:23 +0000 /?p=72727#comment-1013560 Quisling was pro Norway a nationalist and a patriot. He was not tried and executed. He was murdered.
Germany was sandwiched between a British Empire on one side who wanted them out as a trade competitor and the Bolsheviks in the East on the other side. Quisling understood exactly what was happening. ‘Nazi’ is an applied slur term.

]]> By: James Bussey /vidkun-quisling/#comment-1011460 Fri, 20 Oct 2023 13:12:30 +0000 /?p=72727#comment-1011460 Several thousand Norwegian men fought on the Russian Front in various Norwegian SS units on the Axis side in WWII; some four hundred Norwegian women enlisted in a nursing corps as well.
We who live in geographically isolated countries with strong armed forces such as the UK and USA don’t appreciate that those who live in central European countries have often had to make a choice between siding with one dominant empire or totalitarian regime or another: there’s no ‘Third Way’ in many cases.
The prime example of this is, of course, Finland – the only liberal democracy to fight on the Axis side in order to regain land under Soviet Russian occupation. Another factor in Finland’s choice is that a lot of her food came from Nazi-occupied Europe after 1940: much of the land taken by the Russians was used for agriculture.
One has to imagine the outlook of a young Norwegian after the defeat of the Allies in Norway in 1940, and their abandonment of that country: the Allies could have held North Norway and dominated the Norwegian Sea and later sea routes to Russia after their victory in the recapture of Narvik from General Dietl’s forces. It was the first successful allied seaborne operation to recapture occupied territory in WWII, driving the Germans up to the Swedish border.
Instead they withdrew in haste to redeploy to France to counter the German invasion which ended the ‘Phoney War.’ The Norwegian Royal Family also fled the country, which wouldn’t ease the feeling of abandonment some Norwegians might have felt – by contrast, the Danish King remained in place, but then he didn’t get time to make a choice in the matter.
At least Quisling did become the unelected head of state – someone to rally to or oppose, which might just be better than someone appointed by the Nazis….
When one looks into the personal stories of the Norwegians who supported the Quisling regime, and were willing to endure the harsh conditions of the Eastern Front and risk to their lives, one does understand the motivation a little better: Norwegian SS soldiers enlisted to fight only the Red Army and not the Western Allies, and generally signed up for six months of frontline service at a time – some of the officers had fought with the Finns in the 1939-40 Winter War, so they at least would have known what they were getting into. The Finns were supported in that war by the Norwegians, Swedes, British and French, amongst others, in their fight against the Soviet Union, which had allied themselves with Nazi Germany in order to occupy a third of Poland and the Baltic States for themselves.
One SS volunteer who also saw the Soviet Union as a greater threat to Norway than Nazi Germany was Per Nesbø, the father of the novelist Jo Nesbø, who joined a unit formed largely from Norwegian police officers, and served on the front besieging Leningrad. Jø Nesbo’s novel featuring Harry Hole ‘The Redbreast’ has several scenes set in WWII based upon his father’s experiences.
Another outcome of the occupation was the inevitable relationships formed between Norwegian women and German soldiers – Anna-Frid Lyngstad, the world famous ABBA vocalist, had a German father. He was repatriated to West Germany and disappeared; her mother, facing persecution in her home country as a ‘Tyskejente’ emigrated to Sweden when Anna-Frid was very young… for which we can all be thankful she learnt to sing there. I don’t think one can read anything new into their song lyrics because of this fact: I believe Benny & Björn wrote them all. In 1978, the West German pop music magazine Bravo tracked down her father in Germany and arranged a reunion in Sweden for them both… a real ‘fly on the wall’ occasion there!
Last time I was in Norway, Vi Menn magazine published an article about the accomplished pre-war Norwegian athlete Charles Hoff, who joined the Hird organisation – a high jumper who “Landet på feil side,” as the title of the article read. That magazine has published other articles about Norwegian collaborators in WWII, a side of the occupation story which has only started to be told in recent years. I visited Vemork power station in 2017, where there was in addition to the industrial and war history of Ryukan, an exhibition of photos and stories of the ‘Tyskejenter.’ Poor girls – there was no value in booking an appointment at the hairdresser’s salon after the 9th May 1945.
Norway had a thorough de-Nazification and rehabilitation programme after VE-Day. The worst offenders such as Vidkun Quisling were rightly executed, but these cases were relatively few in number. Norway is a Christian country, so follows the fine principle of Forgiveness and Redemption that Jesus taught us. Besides, they needed everyone to get the country back on its feet, especially rebuilding all the towns destroyed in the North.
Reading about these stories of people who supported Nazi Germany in WWII has made me appreciate even more those who did choose to join the resistance to occupation: in the darkest years of the war for the allies – between 1940 and 1942 – such resistance would have been an act of the most profound faith in eventual allied victory and liberation, especially in the face of German propaganda… I’m sure many young Norwegian men, ashamed of their country’s defeat in 1940, would have been encouraged to join the ‘Anti-Bolshevik Crusade’ by the posters depicting the Viking next to the Norwegian SS Legion soldier, if the Resistance hadn’t claimed their loyalty in time.
“Så vi vant vår rett!!” 🇳🇴✌️

]]> By: John K Leslie /vidkun-quisling/#comment-1005288 Fri, 24 Feb 2023 04:44:11 +0000 /?p=72727#comment-1005288 And now under the thumb of Washington, taking part in nefarious activities, such as blowing up undersea pipelines. Germany will not forget!

]]> By: Elizabeth Slepetz /vidkun-quisling/#comment-1004655 Tue, 10 Jan 2023 18:29:57 +0000 /?p=72727#comment-1004655 A very interesting read. I lived on Nesoya in the late 50’s as a teenager and was introduced from a neighbor to a partial history of her father’s involvement with Quisling. At the time, being a teenager, I didn’t understand the full impact. Such a sad time.

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