I'm watching girl with the Dragon tattoo and one of the chars in the family is a former Nazi and when Craigs character says perhaps you should redecorate?

The old man responds hide the past like they do? I'm the most honest of all of them.

Your family?

Sweden.

I know it's a movie but historically does Sweden have history with the Nazi party during the war?

Yes

Dat iron tho.

I know they basically didn't allow Jewish refugees, supplied Nazi Germany with a lot of resources, and helped launder Jewish valuables that were confiscated.

They did have active Nazi party in the country for a while. Though they remained neutral during the war I believe some Swedish men joined up with the German Nazis.

Yes Sweden has a history there but there were nazi sympathizers in the USA and Britian too during the '30's.


ETA: Henry Ford and Charles Lindbergh were even given medals by Hitler. Had it had more time to fester nazism might have become an actual political party with power in the US.

Polandball covered it well...

Sweden also turned over crashed V-1s and V-2s to the British during the war so this issue is not as cut and dry as it seems.

At one time some upper crust German families settled in Sweden and a relationship existed on some level between the countries.  This relationship also existed in all the Baltic countries.  Germany was to the Baltic region what France was to Russia, a source of somewhat higher culture.  Many Swedish families have German names.  Many Germans lived in Sweden off and on.  

Sweden remained neutral during the war.  Norway was invaded by Germany and so was not pro-German.  Finland, on the other hand, was fighting the Soviets at exactly the same time Germany was fighting the Soviets and accepted aid from Germany to do this.  They had a much closer relationship with Germany than did the Swedes.  In fact, Finland as been accused of being a stealth Nazi government during these times.  Their aircraft displayed a blue swastika.

Hermann Goehring had some sort of close relationship with Sweden, his wife may have been Swedish or something like this which is one reason for Sweden being accused of being too close to the Nazis.

there were quite a few Swedes who joined foreign Waffen SS units

they remained politically "neutral" in WW2 by allowing the nazis free passage through their country so the nazis could more easily fight countries around them that were not neutral in exchange for not being attacked themselves.

Swedish monarchy was pro Nazi.  Just like the British monarchy.

Hermann Göring with King Gustav V and his grandson Prince Gustaf Adolf in Berlin.

In the original movie "Journey to the Center of the Earth" the crazy Swede had a duck.

What kind of Nazi takes a duck with him to the center of the earth?



Drop mike boooom!

Simply put, Scandinavia and the rest of Finland was kind of in a shit sandwich.

You have nationalist Germans below and internationalist Russians on your side and the rest of the allies too scared to help you.

  That is an interesting take on the Baltic Germans;not exactly how I would describe the relationship.

  You should probably know that the blue swastika on Finnish aircraft,tanks etc predated Nazi usage,via a Swede who did have Nazi sympathies but there is no connection between the symbols. For that matter,the design has been found on pre-Viking age artifacts in Sweden. There may have been Iron Age Nazis...maybe.

 Göring's first wife was of Swedish nationality but not heritage,she was Anglo-German.

  Sweden had a choice: get invaded or not. They needed coal so they traded ore and some finished steel with Germany. On the other hand,they also smuggled ball bearings and finished steel to the UK. Sweden's armed forces were very weak in 1939-1940,they couldn't have stopped a German invasion. Even the buildup that really got underway in 1942 was with already dated technology hardly on par with Germany. Not that it would have been neccessary to do much more than freeze and starve them into submission,where were they going to get help from in 1941-1942?

SS Wiking


5th SS Panzer Division


Check out the book "Twilight of the Gods" by Thorolf Hillblad. Swedish volunteer in the SS Nordland Division.


It's a available on Amazon. Interesting read. Gives some insight into the mindset of the Scandinavians in regards to the Bolsheviks.

  Not really all that many,a couple hundred.


ETA: can't resist the cheap shot of mentioning that they have sent more to join ISIS

Hans was Icelandic. He and Gertrude were my favorite characters.

Craig? Dragon Tattoo?

Dragon Tattoo had Noomi Rapace and Michael Blomkvist.