Operation Northern Norway

The location


The geography of Norway is dominated by vast mountain ranges broken up by valleys and fjords. Less than 10% of the country's area is arable, and the rest is mountainous. Glaciers are the major cause for erosion, so terrain in Norwegian mountains consists of plateaus and lakes with peaks. These areas have abundant and diverse fauna and flora.

The altitude of the treeline is in reverse proportion to the latitude; in northern Finnmark, treeline is at sea level. The treeline is also lower near the coast and higher on the eastern part of the mountains.

The centre and eastern part of Finnmark is generally less mountainous than the land roud Troms and Tromsø, and has no glaciers despite of the subartic climate. The land east of Nordkapp is mostly below 300 m (980 ft) anddeclines in to the flatter Kola Peninsular. Troms county has surprising greenery for the latitude, and the inner waterways and fjords are lined with birch forests, and further inland there are extensive pine forests and highlands around the rivers Målselva and Reisaelva. Big islands like Senja, Kvaløya and Ringvassøya have green, forested interiors and a barren, mountainous coastline, with smaller islands offshore. The Lofoten Islands are the peaks of a mountain chain that jut out of the ocean as islands. From the mainland side it looks very barren and mountainus, but behind the violet-black peaks there are also coastal and interior flatlands with good grazing for sheep, partially on soil made from decayed seaweed.

The tundra covered northern coast of the Kola Penisular is steep and high with steep sea cliffs, while the southern coast is flat, covered by taiga. and has only a few hills and the western part of the peninsula is dominated by the Khibiny Mountains and the Lovozero Massif. The north is also effected by permafrost which  limits the growth of the trees resulting in landscape dominated by shrubs and grasses. The peninsula supports a small variety of mammals, and its rivers are an important habitat for the Atlantic salmon. The Kandalaksha Nature Reserve was established in the Kandalaksha Gulf to protect the population of Common Eider. The northern end of the Gulf Stream leads to unusually high temperatures in winter, but this also results in high winds due to the temperature variations between land and the Barents Sea.

Tromsø experiences a subarctic climate. About half of Finnmark is above the tree line and large parts of the other half is covered with small Downy birch. Tromsø has the mistaken reputation of accumulating a lot of snow in winter, but it is actually ice that mostly prevails in the area, especially in the first half of the winter. Tromsø's snowfall pattern is quite erratic and varies substantially between different winters. The Kola peninsular peninsula is covered by taiga in the south, an mix of tundra and trees in the east and only tundra in the north, where permafrost limits the growth of the trees resulting in landscape dominated by both shrubs and grasses. The Kandalaksha Nature Reserve was established to protect the population of Common Eider, is located in the Kandalaksha Gulf.

The top soil is thin because the last ice age removed the top sediment layer of the soil of the Kola Peninsula so the surface extremely rich in various ores and minerals, including apatites, nephelines, copper, nickel, iron ores, mica, kyanites, ceramic clay materials, as well as rare earth elements and non-ferrous ores. They are also deposits of construction materials such as granite, quartzite and limestone are also abundant. Diatomaceous earth deposits are common near lakes and are used to produce insulation. The vast apatite reserves were first exploited by the USSR in the 1920s, but this lead to a rapid and uncontrolled growth in industry, railways and population. It was heavily industrialized and militarized during the Cold War and is now ruined by nuclear waste and nickel smelting residues.

The USSR had taken the Rybachy Peninsula off of Finland after the Winter War of 1939–1940 and then clashed with them later in World War 2 (WW2) over it.

The whole The region is multi-cultural, housing not just Norwegians but also the indigenous Sami people, Norwegian Finns (known as Kvens, distinct from the "Forest Finns" of Southern Norway) and Russian populations (mostly in Kirkenes) on the Norwegen side, and Norwedgen, Russians, Finns, Sammi, Komi and Nennets on the Russian (ex-Soviet side).

The Soviet's operation


The main sea route from the Kola Peninsula to the Atlantic Sea was along the Norwegian coast. It formed the access route to the coastal areas of the United States and the Western European countries, as well as a direct route to Iceland and Greenland. Both those islands had both tiny populations and a major NATO base on them, leading to them becoming prime targets of the USSR. The ultimate Soviet and now Russian goal was the probable "Soviet military interest zone" in the Norwegian Sea around Norway, Sptzbergen, S.E. Greenland, Iceland, the Shetlands and the Faero Islands. This area would be quickly filled up with Soviet ships and sub on various hostile duties.

The USSR was scared of an attack aimed at the Kola Peninsular which had the only ice-free Soviet military harbours in the region. They served the Soviet (now Russian) Northern Fleet, with seven naval bases, several shipyards, 200 mostly nuclear armed and/or powered submarines, many air bases and several related factories producing military equipment. About 75% of the Soviet Navy’s nuclear force was based here and many Russian nuclear vessels still are, but much less than in Soviet times.

The Soviet nickel mining town of Nikel (Russian: Ни́кель; Finnish: Kolosjoki) is a town in the Pechengsky District of Murmansk Oblast, Russia, located on the shores of Lake Kuets-Yarvi 196 kilometers (122 mi) northwest of Murmansk and 7 kilometers (4.3 mi) from the Norwegian border. Population: 12,756 (2010 Census); 16,534 (2002 Census); 21,838 (1989 Census); 18,000 (1973) It was founded by Finland in the early 1930's and taken over by the Russians in the Winter War. It is situated over a massive nickel reserve.

Domination of the Greenland, Barnet's and Norwegian Seas was seen as crucial to winning the war in Europe. Securing the control of Norway's northern ports would also significantly expand the number of ports the Soviets had in the region. Adolph Hitler twigged this when He invaded Norway and Denmark in WW2, since Germany had a repetitively small coastline back then, and it became smaller still with the loss of East Prussia in 1945.

The Soviet's Northern Fleet was established as part of the Soviet Navy in 1937 and operated more than 200 submarines ranging from diesel-electric attack (SS) to nuclear-powered ballistic missile (SSBN) classes during the Soviet Era. A civilian Northern Fleet also existed prior to the Second World War and the Historic, pre-Bolshevik mixed civil/military Northern Fleet was in operation there from ~1707 to 1918 All these Northern Fleets had their HQs located at Severomorsk and their main ports at Murmansk.

The Northern Fleet had its main Cold War base is Severomorsk with 6 more naval bases at Polyarnyy, Olenya Bay, Gadzhiyevo (Yagelnaya/Sayda), Vidyayevo (Ura Bay and Ara Bay), Bolshaya Lopatka (Litsa Guba), and Gremikha. Arktika nuclear-powered icebreakers are based at Murmansk. Shipyards are located in Murmansk, Severodvinsk, Roslyakovo, Polyarnyy, Nerpa, and Malaya Lopatka. Spent fuel storage sites include Murmansk, Gremikha, Severodvinsk and Andreyeva Bay. They are all in and about the Kola Peninsula region of north western Russia.

The plan was presumably current until the early 1960s when nuclear arms complicated the situation greatly, although it could still be of use in a non-nuclear war or a limited targets nuclear war.

After the fall of northern Norway, was completed the GIUK gap would be open to a hostile Soviet take over, eventually leading to the Soviet invasion of Iceland would then probably have occurred.

Norway's counter plan
Norway was prepared for all-out war in case of a Soviet invasion. Never again did they want an invasion like that of 9 April 1940, when the Germans surprised an unprepared Norwegian nation. This was one of the reasons they were one of NATO's founding nations.

The Norwegian government was planning to  give up on the the northern region of Finnmark in the event of an invasion by the Soviet Union in order to buy time to organise a decisive counterstrike.

One of the 1,000 Soviet air planes intercepted were by Norwegian fighters outside the coast of Norway every year in the 1960s to 1980s. In 1972 over 1,500 Soviet aircraft were intercepted and escorted out of NATO airspace by NATO's Nordic Air Policing Unit. Many flew over Bodø. Soviet Backfire bombers armed with a nuclear capable cruise missiles flew over the region in later years.

Bodø, Bardufoss, Andenes, Frøy, Tromsø, Lakselv and Kirkenes were all targets. The attack would involve a massive land, sea and air assault. Some northern locations in northern Finland like Kittilä municipality would be taken by airborne troops to help encircle the Norwegian province of Finnmark if the Fins had refused to co-operate with the Soviets.

Finnmark had been was devastate by the retreating German in 1945 and rebuilding was not completed, so at a meeting in 1951 between army chiefs and the defence, the famed resistance World War 2 hero Jens Christian Hauge, proposed to devastate and abandon Finnmark in such an event in order to make the forward march of the Soviets more difficult.

The army’s troops would then be mobilise en mass in the neighbouring county of Troms, joined by allied soldiers trained to fight in Norwegian conditions, and attempt to hold off the Soviet invaders there as NATO came to there aid.

The plan was presumably current until the early 1960s when nuclear arms complicated the situation greatly, although it could still be of use in a non-nuclear war or a limited targets nuclear war.

After the fall of northern Norway, was completed the GIUK gap would be open to a hostile Soviet take over, eventually leading to the Soviet invasion of Iceland would then probably have occurred.

The forces


It would have involved an all out assault by the Soviet forces in the Kola Peninsular and Karelia. They would have hrown everything at it in order to see of any htreats to there bases in the Kola Peninsular.

Whilst Norway did not want to initiate such a conflict it would have fallen back and abandoned Finnmark. Later they would have launched an all out attack to liberate it with NATO help. The military war games like Exercise Teamwork '88 was run to address these issues.

A secret underground base was built in Lyngen during 1996.

Bunkers
Battle ready Norwegian forces were built up and kept prepared at bases in Bardufoss, Setermoen and Skjold, all part of the Troms region, along with a series of coastal defences, radio eaves dropping systems and radar arrays to monitor air and sea movements.

The satellite signal interception station at Fauske (Fauske II), Norway was vital in giving the British intelligence information regarding Argentinian fleet locations during the 1982 Falklands War.

Stuff like military equipment, arms, supplies and fuel were spread all over the country, often hidden in civilian buildings such as cottages, garages, storage buildings and alike. The Frøy defence line was a strong infantry line built between 1950 and 1990.

A secret underground base was biult in Lyngen during 1996.

Also see

 * Operation Square Leg (1980) and Exercise Hard Rock (1982)
 * Germany's Fulda Gap
 * Swedish pseudo-neutrality
 * Seven days to the River Rhine (1979)
 * French nuclear plans and the Force de Dissuasion
 * The Swiss National Redoubt (1880-2010)
 * North German Plain
 * The southern Danube route
 * Soviet/NATO invasion of Finland
 * The week of war policy
 * Operation Gladio
 * Nicaraguan Civil War
 * Korean Demilitarized Zone
 * Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie
 * Greece, Turkey and southern Italy
 * Finnish pseudo-neutrality

Links

 * 1) http://coldwarsites.net/country/norway/
 * 2) http://coldwarsites.net/country/sweden/
 * 3) http://www.newsinenglish.no/2011/02/04/cold-war-defense-included-plans-to-sacrifice-finnmark/
 * 4) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Finnmark
 * 5) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kola_Peninsula
 * 6) http://www.visittromso.no/en/
 * 7) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troms%C3%B8
 * 8) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rybachy_Peninsula
 * 9) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikel
 * 10) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Events_leading_to_the_Falklands_War
 * 11) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Falklands_War
 * 12) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mountain_ranges_of_Norway
 * 13) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_Naval_Aviation
 * 14) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Fleet