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War Room XX: Battle of Stromvaer, 1940 is out for Patrons! (Patreon)

Published:
2025-02-14 20:01:18
Imported:
2026-06
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  • 422020154.mp4

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And phew! Took a bit longer than anticipated, but it's all sorted now. The last War Room episode came out at the start of November so although the first Foiling Fustian mission is ready to go, I wanted to get this released.

There are a few caveats- first, the maps are not 100% accurate. I copied the actual battle trace from a German map and it doesn't line up perfectly with the narrative, but it's a reasonable visualisation.

Second, my sincere apologies to any Norwegians who have to suffer through my pronunciation and the general public if they have to listen to me trying to say 'Weserubung'.

It's not a complex battle. If you wanted to be mean, you could perhaps object to it being referred to as a battle at all... maybe more of a skirmish. Or a chase in which two gangly teenagers run away from a grumpy old man.

But with that out of the way and Foiling Fustian Mission One in the pipe, we're ready back on track!

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Comments

Ben Kerry

Arrrgh! Finally!

Nicholas Shaler

Ever since the painful experiences of Guadalcanal, USMC/USN doctrine has been to control the world's oceans and to land where they please, which has no required finesse or subtlety. The German invasion of Norway was pure brilliance in the face of superior forces.

Ben Kerry

Yeah, kind of a miracle that they pulled this off. On the other hand in the long term the occupation of Norway forces the Germans to garrison the entire coastline.

Ben Kerry

And like much of the "Blitzkrieg", Germans got lucky. It could end up like WW1 all over again

GLG

Very interesting analysis of this naval battle and its operational/strategic impact. The German Navy seems to have had a better understanding of operational art than their army. My pond is the Pacific so it's always a treat when pieces on Atlantic and Mediterranean naval actions show up. I've always felt that the naval actions of WWII(possibly WWI too) provide a lot of insight into the operational level. The Russian Civil War with its railway war on limited assets and resources was the framework for Soviet operational art, but for the US it was the Pacific naval campaigns. You determine your tactical steps based on the intended direction of your operational leap, then put together all the logistical requirements needed including your plan B/C/D necessities. Execute whatever preparatory assets that can improve success prior, and then you immediately anticipate what follow-up operations will likely require and start putting that together. Then you kick off the operation. It never ends until the last operation and the last battle.

Ben Kerry

OK, the American concept of "Operational Art" may be actually a fabrication of the reforms of 1980s. According to the book "On Operations", neither German or Soviets have actually treated "Operations" as a separate level of war

GLG

There has most definitely been an operational level in warfare and it's been around since probably the 19th century on. The mass and inertia of million man armies require it. Hence, it's been a staple of the military hierarchy up until about now. Can million man armies still go to war with the current weapon systems available? Add in the communications systems out now, as well as the surveillance systems? Would existing troop densities just insure a massive slaughter in the end? Another sort of WWI finale? Maybe, I don't know. Put two sides with that sort of top tier equipment and I would be concerned about the aftermath. I haven't read Friedman's book, but I should to be fair. I do know that given the direction of warfare, troop densities are going to have to drop further than they are. There's just too much KABOOM on the battlefield now, and with communications/surveillance being what it is, less troops on the ground is do-able. SOF's role in a low troop density environment will only increase too. And maybe that's why Friedman's making those claims. I can see that as well. Less troops, instantaneous comms and recon. Everything will tend to lower and so the need to address the operational level may be few and far between. It will always be there though, dependent on scale of combatants and theater. So for WWII, yes, there was definitely an operational level.

UsuallyHaplessVideos

Has to be said that Weserubung pretty much slots into a very small window where modern warships were big and fast enough to pull it off but ISR had yet to overcome the fog of war. Not convinced it would work as well today.

UsuallyHaplessVideos

To be fair, 'Operations' and 'Operational Art' can mean different things at different times to different people. Some element of it has always been present. Frankly, the levels of war are a bit of rabbit hole.

Nicholas Shaler

Agreed. Trying that in contested waters would get all the ships spotted by satellite or drone or AWACS and sunk from beyond the horizon missiles.

GLG

For sure. Operational Art has a place at just about any level of war. It's a way of conducting military actions that promote strategic objectives and is efficient, effective and interdependent.

Ray L

I knew about the naval engagements of the Norway invasion, but only in piecemeal fashion. I hadn’t recognized the Big Picture … that gaining Norway cost the Germans about 30-40% of their surface navy strength. The Germans suffered another big cost of the combined naval and air-landed infantry assault on Norway: 150 Ju-52 transports were lost of the 552 the Luftwaffe started the war with.

UsuallyHaplessVideos

Yep. Was it worth it? Maybe, maybe not. Probably a lot more worth it if France hadn't unexpectedly disintegrated