“On the 9th of April, 1940 at 4.20 hours the German Minister appeared at the private residence of the Danish Minister for Foreign Affairs accompanied by the Air Attache of the Legation. The appointment had been made by a telephone call from the German Legation to the Secretary-General of the Ministry for Foreign Affairs at 4.00 o’clock the same morning. The Minister said at once that Germany had positive proof that Great Britain intended to occupy bases in Denmark and Norway. Germany had to safeguard Denmark against this. For this reason German soldiers were now crossing the frontier and landing at various points in Zealand including the port of Copenhagen; in a short time German bombers would be over Copenhagen; their orders were not to bomb until further notice. It was now up to the Danes to prevent resistance as any resistance would have the most terrible consequences. Germany would guarantee Denmark’s territorial integrity and political independence. Germany would not interfere with the internal government of Denmark, but wanted only to make sure of the neutrality of the country. For this purpose the presence of the German Wehrmacht in Denmark was required during the war.
“The Minister for Foreign Affairs declared in reply that the allegation concerning British plans to occupy Denmark was completely without foundation; there was no possibility of anything like that. The Minister for Foreign Affairs protested against the violation of Denmark’s neutrality which according to the German Minister’s statement was in progress. The Minister for Foreign Affairs declared further that he could not give a reply to the demands, which had to be submitted to the King and the Prime Minister, and further observed that the German Minister knew, as everybody else, that the Danish armed forces had orders to oppose violations of Denmark’s neutrality so that fighting presumably already took place. In reply the German Minister expressed that the matter was very urgent, not least to avoid air bombardment.” (D-628)
What happened thereafter is described in a dispatch from the British Minister in Copenhagen to the British Foreign Secretary (D-627). That dispatch reads:
“The actual events of the 9th April have been pieced together by members of my staff from actual eye-witnesses or from reliable information subsequently received and are given below. Early in the morning towards 5 o’clock three small German transports steamed into the approach to Copenhagen harbor, whilst a number of airplanes circled overhead. The northern battery, guarding the harbor approach, fired a warning shot at these planes when it was seen that they carried German markings. Apart from this, the Danes offered no further resistance, and the German vessels fastened alongside the quays in the Free Harbor. Some of these airplanes proceeded to drop leaflets over the town urging the population to keep calm and cooperate with the Germans. I enclose a specimen of this leaflet, which is written in a bastard Norwegian-Danish, a curiously un-German disregard of detail, together with a translation. Approximately 800 soldiers landed with full equipment, and marched to Kastellet, the old fortress of Copenhagen and now a barracks. The door was locked, so the Germans promptly burst it open with explosives and rounded up all the Danish soldiers within, together with the womenfolk employed in the mess. The garrison offered no resistance, and it appears that they were taken completely by surprise. One officer tried to escape in a motor car, but his chauffeur was shot before they could get away. He died in hospital two days later. After seizing the barracks, a detachment was sent to Amalienborg, the King’s palace, where they engaged the Danish sentries on guard, wounding three, one of them fatally. Meanwhile, a large fleet of bombers flew over the city at low altitudes.”
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“It has been difficult to ascertain exactly what occurred in Jutland. It is clear, however, that the enemy invaded Jutland from the south at dawn on the 9th April and were at first resisted by the Danish forces, who suffered casualties. The chances of resistance were weakened by the extent to which the forces appear to have been taken by surprise. The chief permanent official of the Ministry of War, for instance, motored into Copenhagen on the morning of the 9th April and drove blithely past a sentry who challenged him, in blissful ignorance that this was not one of his own men. It took a bullet, which passed through the lapels of his coat, to disillusion him.” (D-627)
The German memorandum to the Norwegian and Danish governments spoke of the German desire to maintain the territorial integrity and political independence of those two small countries. Two documents indicate the kind of territorial integrity and political independence the Nazi conspirators contemplated for the victims of their aggression. An entry in Jodl’s diary for 19 April reads:
“Renewed crisis. Envoy Braver is recalled: since Norway is at war with us, the task of the Foreign Office is finished. In the Fuehrer’s opinion, force has to be used. It is said that Gauleiter Terboven will be given a post. Field Marshal [presumably a reference to Goering] is moving in the same direction. He criticizes as defects that we didn’t take sufficiently energetic measures against the civilian population, that we could have seized electrical plant, that the Navy didn’t supply enough troops. The Air Force can’t do everything.” (1809-PS)
It will be seen from that entry and the reference to Gauleiter Terboven that already by 19 April, rule by Gauleiters had replaced rule by Norwegians.
A memorandum dated 3 June 1940, signed by Fricke, at that date the head of the Operations Division of the German Naval War Staff, which was a key appointment in the very nerve center of German naval operations, relates to questions of territorial expansion and bases (C-41). It reads: