Smile and wave until the threat has walked on by and only then start calling him names uh?
Don't take this as mudslinging as the leaders of a country should always protect their people and the Swedish leaders did this but I've always wondered if we, the Dutch, just had let the Germans have their way and pass through our country. Would we be forever reminded as collaborateurs? At least my city wouldn't have been bombed back to the stone age.
No offense taken. Though I think the name-calling starts when you've yourself found a big enough stick.
The Swedish problem was rather that they were never faced with an outright demand for submission, just incessant requests for a little bit of this and a little bit of that and the problem of vexing the great neighbour to the south, north, east and west if they didn't comply.
I would have been easier for them is all had been laid on the line. As it were they could hardly declare in favour of Nazi Germany, since Sweden was deeply democratic, and there was never a clear threat in front of which they might have justified folding.
You can't really make a grand gesture of throwing national independance away for the principle of the thing over something like a German request to be allowed transit of their ships through Swedish national water under Swedish escort, to give an example of the kind of concessions made.
Or rather I suppose you could, but the Swedish leaders during the war considered the effects worse than keeping their heads down, making the concessions they though necessary, and hoping for better days.
The iron ore exported after all bought German coal to keep the Swedish armaments industries going. If you cut the ore asap, you risk a German attack to ensure the supply, and you rid yourself of the industry that in time might give Sweden the kind of teeth necessary to tell the Germans to take a hike with some confidence you wouldn't get instantly creamed.
It's like Ernst Günther, the Swedish Foreign Sec. (Soc. Dem.) had it; every day he was nauseated by the concession made towards Nazi Germany, but the possible prize for not doing it was so high he felt he had little choice. The biggest problem was never knowing what German demands were necessary to comply with, and when you could refuse. There was never a good answer to that, so they incessantly worried about either having gone to far and provoked Germany, or having caved too easily.
