Operation Zitronella
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Operation Zitronella (Operation Lemon Flavour), also known as (Operation
Sicily (man) it, Siciliana (woman) , population_note = , population_blank1_title = , population_blank1 = , demographics_type1 = Ethnicity , demographics1_footnotes = , demographi ...
), was an eight-hour
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...
raid on
Spitzbergen Svalbard ( , ), also known as Spitsbergen, or Spitzbergen, is a Norwegian archipelago in the Arctic Ocean. North of mainland Europe, it is about midway between the northern coast of Norway and the North Pole. The islands of the group range ...
, in the Svalbard Archipelago, on 8 September 1943. The
battleship A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of large caliber guns. It dominated naval warfare in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The term ''battleship'' came into use in the late 1880s to describe a type of ...
s (in its only offensive action) and , plus nine destroyers, sailed to the archipelago, bombarded Allied-occupied settlements in Isfjorden and covered a landing party. Six Norwegians were killed and 31 were taken prisoner; sixteen Germans were wounded, one dying of his wounds.


Background


Svalbard

The Svalbard Archipelago is in the
Arctic Ocean The Arctic Ocean is the smallest and shallowest of the world's five major oceans. It spans an area of approximately and is known as the coldest of all the oceans. The International Hydrographic Organization (IHO) recognizes it as an ocean, a ...
, from the
North Pole The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is the point in the Northern Hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets its surface. It is called the True North Pole to distinguish from the Mag ...
and a similar distance to
Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic country in Northern Europe, the mainland territory of which comprises the western and northernmost portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and t ...
to the south. The islands are mountainous, with permanently snow-covered peaks, some glaciated; there are occasional river terraces at the bottom of steep valleys and some coastal plains. In winter, the islands are covered in snow and the bays ice over. To the west, Spitzbergen Island has several large fiords along its west coast; Isfjorden being up to wide. The
Gulf Stream The Gulf Stream, together with its northern extension the North Atlantic Current, North Atlantic Drift, is a warm and swift Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic ocean current that originates in the Gulf of Mexico and flows through the Straits of Florida a ...
warms the waters and the sea is ice-free during the summer. In the 1940s, there were settlements at Longyearbyen (Longyear Town) and
Barentsburg Barentsburg (russian: Баренцбург) is the second-largest settlement in Svalbard, Norway, with about 455 inhabitants (). A coal mining town, the settlement is almost entirely made up of ethnic Russians and Ukrainians. History Rijpsburg ...
, in inlets along the south shore of Isfjorden, in Kings Bay (Quade Hock) further north along the coast and in
Van Mijenfjorden Van Mijenfjorden is the third-longest fjord in Norway's Svalbard archipelago. It lies in the southern portion of Spitsbergen island, south of Nordenskiöld Land and north of Nathorst Land. The fjord is long, being separated from Bellsund further ...
to the south. The settlements attracted colonists from many places; the treaty of 1920 neutralised the islands and recognised the mineral and fishing rights of the participating countries. Before 1939, the population consisted of about mostly Norwegian and Soviet workers in the mining industry.
Drift mines Drift mining is either the mining of an ore deposit by underground methods, or the working of coal seams accessed by adits driven into the surface outcrop of the coal bed. A drift mine is an underground mine in which the entry or access is above ...
were linked to the shore by overhead cable tracks or rails and coal dumped over the winter was collected by ship after the summer thaw. By 1939 production was about a year, split between Norway and the
USSR The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen nationa ...
.


Second World War

During the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
, the Svalbard Archipelago was the scene of several military operations. In August 1941, British, Canadian and Free Norwegian Forces landed on Spitzbergen during Operation Gauntlet to destroy the coal industry, associated equipment and stores. No attempt was made to establish a garrison and the civilian population was evacuated.
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
set up manned meteorological stations in the
Arctic The Arctic ( or ) is a polar regions of Earth, polar region located at the northernmost part of Earth. The Arctic consists of the Arctic Ocean, adjacent seas, and parts of Canada (Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut), Danish Realm (Greenla ...
to improve weather forecasts, vital for the warfare against
Allied An alliance is a relationship among people, groups, or states that have joined together for mutual benefit or to achieve some common purpose, whether or not explicit agreement has been worked out among them. Members of an alliance are called ...
convoys from the UK to the USSR. Dr
Erich Etienne Dr. Erich W. Etienne (24 February 191523 July 1942) was a German geophysicist, polar explorer and pilot. Early life Erich Etienne was born in Leipzig and studied geophysics in Leipzig and Exeter before going to the University of Oxford on a R ...
, a former Polar explorer, commanded an operation to install a manned station on the islands. Advent Bay ( Adventfjorden) was chosen for its broad valley, a safer approach and landing ground for aircraft. The subsoil of alluvial gravel was acceptable for an airstrip and the south-eastern orientation of the high ground did not impede wireless communication with Banak in Norway; the settlement of Longyearbyen was close by. The site received the code-name (from Banak and Spitzbergen Öya) and ferry flights of men, equipment and supplies began on 25 September. The British followed events from Bletchley Park through
Ultra adopted by British military intelligence in June 1941 for wartime signals intelligence obtained by breaking high-level encrypted enemy radio and teleprinter communications at the Government Code and Cypher School (GC&CS) at Bletchley Park. '' ...
and four British minesweepers were diverted to investigate and reached Isfjorden on 19 October. A 5 aircraft crew spotted the ships and the thirty men at Adventfjorden quickly were flown to safety by the aircraft and two
Junkers Ju 52 The Junkers Ju 52/3m (nicknamed ''Tante Ju'' ("Aunt Ju") and ''Iron Annie'') is a transport aircraft that was designed and manufactured by German aviation company Junkers. Development of the Ju 52 commenced during 1930, headed by German Aeros ...
transport aircraft. Adventfjorden was deserted when the British arrived but some code books were recovered; the Germans returned once the ships had departed. Dr Albrecht Moll and three men arrived to spend the winter of 1941–1942 transmitting weather reports. On 29 October 1941,
Hans Knoespel Hans may refer to: __NOTOC__ People * Hans (name), a masculine given name * Hans Raj Hans, Indian singer and politician ** Navraj Hans, Indian singer, actor, entrepreneur, cricket player and performer, son of Hans Raj Hans ** Yuvraj Hans, Punjabi ...
and five weathermen were installed by the at Signehamna, a small bay on
Lilliehöökfjorden Lilliehöökfjorden is a 14 kilometer long fjord branch of Krossfjorden in Albert I Land at the northwestern side of Spitsbergen, Svalbard. The fjord is named after Gustaf Bertil Lilliehöök. Lilliehöökfjorden is separated from Möllerfjord ...
, a branch of
Krossfjorden Krossfjorden (English: Cross Fjord) is a 30 km long fjord on the west coast of Spitsbergen, which is the largest and only permanently populated island of the Svalbard archipelago in Norway. To the north, the fjord branches into Lillehöö ...
in the north-western Spitzbergen. An automatic weather station () with a thermometer, barometer, transmitter and batteries arrived at Banak, to be flown to and the Moll party brought back. It took until 12 May for favourable weather and a Heinkel He 111 and a
Junkers Ju 88 The Junkers Ju 88 is a German World War II ''Luftwaffe'' twin-engined multirole combat aircraft. Junkers Aircraft and Motor Works (JFM) designed the plane in the mid-1930s as a so-called ''Schnellbomber'' ("fast bomber") that would be too fast ...
were sent with supplies and the technicians to install the . In April 1942,
Operation Fritham Operation Fritham (30 April – 14 May 1942) was an Allied military operation during the Second World War to secure the coal mines on Spitsbergen, the main island of the Svalbard Archipelago, from the North Pole and about the same distance fr ...
the landing of a Norwegian force at Barentsburg to occupy the islands. The operation met with disaster but by the summer of 1943, the later Allied
Operation Gearbox Operation Gearbox (30 June – 17 September 1942) was a joint Norwegian and British operation to occupy the Arctic island of Spitsbergen during the Second World War. It superseded Operation Fritham, an expedition in May, to secure the coal mines ...
and
Operation Gearbox II Operation Gearbox II (17 September 1942 – 7 September 1943) was a Norwegian and British operation during the Second World War on the Arctic island of Spitsbergen in the Svalbard Archipelago. Operation Fritham, the first attempt to establish ...
secured control of the islands.


Prelude


The decided to evacuate the weather station during the summer of 1942, since the ice-free season made it vulnerable to Allied attack. The submarine (K
Siegfried Strelow Siegfried is a German-language male given name, composed from the Germanic elements ''sig'' "victory" and ''frithu'' "protection, peace". The German name has the Old Norse cognate ''Sigfriðr, Sigfrøðr'', which gives rise to Swedish ''Sigfrid' ...
) was ordered to recover the six men. On 23 August 1942, Strelow took aboard the party at Ebeltofthamna in Krossfjorden on the Mitra peninsula, without Allied interference and arrived at Narvik on 31 August. After the replacement of (Grand Admiral)
Erich Raeder Erich Johann Albert Raeder (24 April 1876 – 6 November 1960) was a German admiral who played a major role in the naval history of World War II. Raeder attained the highest possible naval rank, that of grand admiral, in 1939, becoming the f ...
by
Karl Dönitz Karl Dönitz (sometimes spelled Doenitz; ; 16 September 1891 24 December 1980) was a German admiral who briefly succeeded Adolf Hitler as head of state in May 1945, holding the position until the dissolution of the Flensburg Government follo ...
in January 1943, command arrangements in northern waters were changed. The posts of Flag Officer Northern Waters at Narvik was merged with Group North, which brought the commander of the German ships at Alte Fjord under the command of
Otto Schniewind Otto Schniewind (14 December 1887 – 26 March 1964) was a German General Admiral during World War II. He was a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross of Nazi Germany. Career Schniewind entered the Kaiserliche Marine in 1907 as a cad ...
at Kiel. Dönitz persuaded Hitler not to scrap the surface fleet and made plans to demonstrate the value of the ships and raise the morale of the crews.


German plans

The
battleship A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of large caliber guns. It dominated naval warfare in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. The term ''battleship'' came into use in the late 1880s to describe a type of ...
s ( (KzS) Hans Karl Meyer) and (KzS Friedrich Hüffmeier) and nine destroyers of the 4th (KzS Rolf Johannesson), 5th (KzS Max-Eckart Wolff) and 6th (KzS Friedrich Kothe) destroyer flotillas, with the
Narvik class destroyer The Type 1936A destroyers, also known as the ''Z23'' class, were a group of fifteen destroyers built for the Nazi Germany's ''Kriegsmarine'' from 1938 to 1943. They were known to the Allies as the Narvik class. In common with other German destroye ...
s: Z27, Z29, Z30,
Z31 The Nissan 300ZX is a sports car that was produced across two different generations. As with all other versions of the Z, the 300ZX was sold within the Japanese domestic market under the name Fairlady Z. It was sold in Japan from 1983 to 2000 a ...
, Z33, and , , and , embarked a
battalion A battalion is a military unit, typically consisting of 300 to 1,200 soldiers commanded by a lieutenant colonel, and subdivided into a number of companies (usually each commanded by a major or a captain). In some countries, battalions are ...
of the 349th Grenadier Regiment, 230th Infantry Division. The ships sailed for Svalbard on 6 September. led , with , and providing an anti-submarine screen ahead, , Z27 and Z30 to starboard and Z29, Z31 and Z33 to port, as the ships sailed past Stjernsundet. By on 7 September, the force was half way to Bear Island. During the evening a message was received that a British reconnaissance aircraft had flown over Alte Fjord at when the ships were only from Svalbard, with the British fifty hours away, even at full speed.


Action

At on 8 September, and the 5th and 6th Destroyer Flotillas landed troops in Advent bay, while and the 4th flotilla sailed to Barentsburg, flying a white ensign as a ruse. Just before the ships opened fire, a wireless message from Grønfjord was intercepted by the ships that three cruisers and seven destroyers had arrived; began to jam the frequency but could not tell if the message was blocked. At a reply from Reykjavik suggested that the message had been received and silenced the transmitter with shells from its main armament. Supported by the gunfire of the eight 15-inch guns of at Barentsburg (fifty-two 15-inch and eighty-two 5.9-inch rounds) and the nine 11-inch guns of at Longyearbyen, against the two 3-inch guns of the defenders, the destroyers landed the battalion of fortress troops. The Norwegian guns were put out of action and coal heaps, supplies of food, water and electricity generators were destroyed. When Z29, Z31 and Z33 manoeuvred into Grønfjord, to land troops at Barentsburg, they sailed in front of and the gunners of the two
Bofors 40 mm gun Bofors 40 mm gun is a name or designation given to two models of 40 mm calibre anti-aircraft guns designed and developed by the Swedish company Bofors: *Bofors 40 mm L/60 gun - developed in the 1930s, widely used in World War II and into the 1990s ...
s took advantage and fired about at the destroyers, which moved aside to give a clear field of fire. Z29 and Z33 were both damaged, with Z33 having to be taken in tow. A broadside of twelve shells silenced the Bofors guns. fired its main guns at a coal mine at Heerodden and set it on fire. A message from Z29 led to sail further into Grønfjord, fire another twenty shells and at Johannesson reported that the troops had landed as planned. The surviving Norwegians fled into the hinterland, using a blazing coal dump for cover as the landing party seized the installations at Barentsburg. Kummetz was apprehensive about the wireless message sent by the Norwegians, in case the Home Fleet was already at sea and wanted the infantry back on board his ships by had sailed further into Isfjorden to Longyearbyen and reported by that the Norwegians had been overrun and at , the infantry commander, Colonel Wendte, reported that the demolitions would be complete by After a methodical bombardment, the German ships re-embarked the landing party and their prisoners by and put to sea, firing another eight shells at ammunition and fuel dumps outside Barentsburg. Recovering the last of the floatplanes caused a delay to until and then the German ships left at The Norwegians repaired their wireless and got off a sighting report, which led to the
Home Fleet The Home Fleet was a fleet of the Royal Navy that operated from the United Kingdom's territorial waters from 1902 with intervals until 1967. In 1967, it was merged with the Mediterranean Fleet creating the new Western Fleet. Before the First ...
sailing from Scapa Flow but too late to intercept the German ships, which reached port on 9 September.


Aftermath


Analysis

was a qualified success; it brought no lasting benefit, since the Allies quickly re-occupied Spitzbergen island. On 19 October, the cruiser arrived at Barentsburg with relief and reinforcements for the Norwegian garrison.
Samuel Eliot Morison Samuel Eliot Morison (July 9, 1887 – May 15, 1976) was an American historian noted for his works of maritime history and American history that were both authoritative and popular. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1912, and ta ...
, the official historian of the US Navy, described as a political move on the part of the , to show Hitler that the German surface fleet had some value. Morison judged the effort disproportionate to the results, suggesting that the same ends could have been achieved more simply. In 2013, Niklas Zetterling and Michael Tamelander called the operation insignificant, apart from useful training for the crews.


Casualties

Sixteen German sailors were wounded, one dying of his wounds and six Norwegians were killed. Captain Morten Bredsdorff and 30 prisoners were sent to
Oflag XXI-C Oflag XXI-C was a German Army World War II prisoner-of-war camp for officers ('' Offizierlager'') located in Ostrzeszów in German-occupied Poland. It held mostly Norwegian officers arrested in 1942 and 1943, but also Dutch, Italian, Serbian an ...
in Schildberg in the annexed , joining officers interned there. A German Leading Seaman from a destroyer was court-martialed and sentenced to death for cowardice (he had hidden on his ship rather than accompanying troops to the shore) and was executed on the quarterdeck of . This episode, along with a dispute over medal allocation, when the crew of received only 160
Iron Cross The Iron Cross (german: link=no, Eisernes Kreuz, , abbreviated EK) was a military decoration in the Kingdom of Prussia, and later in the German Empire (1871–1918) and Nazi Germany (1933–1945). King Frederick William III of Prussia est ...
es against 400 for the crew of , exacerbated an already bad relationship between the crews.


Subsequent operations

Under cover of the attack, the installed a weather station on Hopen Island. (Isolated for months after the Nazi German surrender in May 1945, the airmen on Hopen Island gave themselves up in September 1945 to the captain of a Norwegian fishing boat.) A British–Soviet attack on and in Alta Fjord was being prepared when the ships had sailed for Svalbard. A Catalina flying boat of 190 Squadron, based at Sullom Voe in
Scotland Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the ...
, was ordered to reconnoitre Isfjorden and took off at The crew was to fly to Svalbard, then south to a point off the Norwegian coast, turning east to make landfall at Murmansk. If the German ships were sighted, the Catalina crew were to shadow the ships until shot down or the prudent limit of endurance (PLE) was reached, then fly to Grasnaya on the Kola Inlet. The Catalina was filled with fuel and left behind its depth charges, flew to Sorkapp, then navigated up the west coast to Isfjorden and searched for signs of life around Cape Linhe, Barenstburg, Green Harbour, Grumantby and Longyearbyen, taking photographs and finding only destroyed buildings and smoke from the fires started by the Germans. (The aviators heard later that a survivor in the hills heard them and ran to the shore but was not seen.) The Catalina was flown towards Norway along the expected track of the German ships, assuming that they were making for Alta Fjord. Some oil was seen on the sea and a Ju 88 was spotted high up flying the other way but no ships. The Catalina landed as planned and the crew were told the flight was in support of
Operation Source Operation Source was a series of attacks to neutralise the heavy German warships – ''Tirpitz'', ''Scharnhorst'' and ''Lützow'' – based in northern Norway, using X-class midget submarines. The attacks took place in September 1943 at Kaa ...
, an
X-Craft The X class was a World War II midget submarine class built for the Royal Navy during 1943–44. It was substantially larger than the original Chariot manned torpedo. Known individually as X-Craft, the vessels were designed to be towed to thei ...
(midget submarine) attack against the ships; their reconnaissance photos were to be flown to Britain for briefing material.


See also

*
Arctic Ocean operations of World War II The Arctic Circle defining the " midnight sun" encompasses the Atlantic Ocean from the northern edge of Iceland to the Bering Strait in the Pacific Ocean. Military activity in this area between 1939 and 1945 is often consideredRear Admiral S ...


References


Bibliography

* * * * * * * * * * * * *


Further reading

*


External links


Operation Zitronella


{{DEFAULTSORT:Zitronella, Operation 1943 in Norway Arctic naval operations of World War II Battles of World War II involving Germany Naval battles of World War II involving Germany Zitronella Battles and operations of World War II involving Norway History of Svalbard Military in the Arctic Z September 1943 events