page_title: Battles of Narvik
section_title: Aftermath
hierarchical_section_title: Battles of Narvik / Aftermath
caption_attribution_description: For documentary purposes the German Federal Archive often retained the original image captions, which may be erroneous, biased, obsolete or politically extreme. Lazarettschiff "Wilhelm Gustloff" Scherl Bilderdienst Aktion in Norwegen: Lazarettschiff "Wilhelm Gustloff" bringt verwundete Narvikkämpfer nach der Heimat. Freudig lachend Sieht dieser verwundeten Narvikkämpfer, dessen Brust das EK I und EK II schmücken, seiner baldigen Genesung in der Heimat entgegen. PK: Augst; Juli 1940
context_page_description: The Battles of Narvik were fought from 9 April to 8 June 1940 as a naval battle in the Ofotfjord and as a land battle in the mountains surrounding the north Norwegian city of Narvik as part of the Norwegian Campaign of the Second World War.
  The two naval battles in the Ofotfjord on 10 April and 13 April were fought between the British Royal Navy and Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine, while the two-month land campaign was fought between Norwegian, French, British, and Polish troops against German mountain troops, shipwrecked Kriegsmarine sailors and German paratroopers from the 7th Air Division. Although defeated at sea off Narvik, losing control of the town of Narvik and being pushed back towards the Swedish border, the Germans eventually prevailed because of the Allied evacuation from Norway in June 1940 following the Battle of France.
  Narvik provided an ice-free harbour in the North Atlantic for iron ore transported by the railway from Kiruna in Sweden. Both sides in the war had an interest in securing this iron supply for themselves and denying it to the enemy, setting the stage for one of the biggest battles since the Invasion of Poland.
context_section_description: The Allied offensive started slowly; unlike the Germans, they did not have a clear operational objective in Norway and did not conduct their operations with as much vigour. The British had drafted plans to land in Narvik before the German invasion; troops and supplies had been loaded onto ships when they executed their mining operation on 8 April. These had been hastily unloaded when German ships were spotted northbound because the British thought that the German ships were trying to break into the Atlantic to avoid being trapped in German ports and wanted all their ships available to intercept the German fleet. The confusion dogged the troops for weeks, men and equipment were shipped to Norway separately without clear landing sites and orders were changed while en route. It was as if the Allies were confused by the many small and large fjords and bays and could not decide where it would be best to start; British, French and Polish units rapidly relieved each other which added to the lack of local knowledge.
  The cold and snow was a common enemy for all troops at Narvik but most of the Allies were poorly prepared for it. The Norwegians were the only ones fully equipped with skis and able to use them. The British tried skis but their troops were largely untrained and supply was scarce. German sailors faced the same problems, even within the Gebirgsjäger (mountain troops) and French mountain specialists, only a few units were equipped with skis and the Polish mountain brigade had no mountain training.
  Most troops were untested in battle. The Gebirgsjäger had participated in the invasion of Poland and some of the troops that had been air dropped over Bjørnfjell had fought in the Netherlands. Some of the French Foreign Legionnaires came directly from fighting in North Africa and most of the Polish officers and many of the soldiers had participated in the defence of Poland, some even in the Spanish Civil War and were highly motivated.
  The Allies had sea and air superiority until the very last stage of the operation, but did not take full advantage. The Germans lost the naval battle, but achieved the main goal of their operation: the successful Operation Weserübung and occupation of Norway. Around Narvik, German naval losses were high: they lost 10 destroyers (50 percent of their entire destroyer force), one submarine, and several support ships. In exchange, they sank two Allied destroyers and damaged several others. The reason for this defeat lay in the German plans, which made it impossible for the destroyers to retire quickly, even if they had had adequate supplies. This was compounded by the design of German destroyers: despite their relatively large size and armament, they had inadequate fuel and ammunition storage. The British forces achieved an indisputable local naval victory but were unprepared to follow it up with any land operation. This allowed the Germans to consolidate their foothold in Norway and made the subsequent Allied counter-invasion more difficult.
caption: German soldiers wounded at Narvik being transported back to Germany on the Wilhelm Gustloff in July 1940
exif: {}