Why didn't the Danish army fight the Nazis?

Answer 1

As stated in the novel, in Number the Stars by Lois Lowry AND in real life, Denmark did not fight because they had a small army, and the King Christian X KNEW their army would be crushed if they tried.

Answer 2

As most other western European countries Denmark during the 1930's experienced a political pressure to spend resources on the budding welfare state rather than on armament (compare Churchill's 'While England slept'). This means that Denmark who had led a successful armed neutrality policy during WWI, found itself in a weak position when WWII broke out. In spite of promises from the Prime minister to the Parliament that Denmark would fight any invader, the army was not mobilized - and when the invasion became imminent, the politicians were afraid that a mobilisation exactly would constitute a pretext for Germany to attack. The result was that even though intelligence reports on April 8 1940 - the eve of the April 9 invasion - clearly warned that German troops were moving towards the Danish-German border, the soldiers were told to go to bed (!) - rather than digging themselves down and prepare for war. In conclusion the war was lost long before the invasion actually took place, and the relatively few soldiers at the border were sacrificed on the morning of April 9, since they had to fight completely unprepared with light weapons - the fighting lasted only 4 - 5 hours, and just served to prove to the international community that Denmark was in principle resisting the invasion, but in reality the politicians had accepted it as unavoidable. This is the short version of the beginning of the German occupation which has been described as 5 years of Absurd theatre - an occupation that both the invader and the invaded pretend hadn't taken place: The Danish government only stepped down after 3 years occupation. Part of the population was shocked and humiliated, while others bought the official cover story (for internal use only), that Denmark was not really occupied in the traditional sense, but just subject to German's 'protection' under serious protest. The issue is still basis of heated debates among Danes on all levels, with especially the two then-ruling parties Social Demokrats and Radical left (which in spite of the name is slightly right of center, and nnot redical at all) getting a lot of flak, which is only partly justified since their defense policy had widespread support back in the mid 30's.

Answer 3

Danish spies had forewarned the Royal Danish King afew days earlier, that the germans would invade and break their oath on the peace treaty.

Christian X denied deploying or preparing defensive positions as he did not want to give provocation for their actions.

we capitulated in exchange for retaining political independence, and as the goverment never were disolved (despite several attempts) Denmark stayed neutral saved nearly all jews within its borders, and managed to show they didn't sympatise with Hitler neither by destroying railroads (resulting in nazi troops for d-day never arrived.)

note:

the danish goverment sank its own navy

203 nazi soldiers versus 16 danes Kia during the 2 hour symbolic fighting

Answer 4

he thought that 1 man that got shot lead to the war of the world...he thought was rediculas