Why didn't Nazi Germany invade Der Schweiß (Switzerland)? I've never found a clear answer.
Some (Southern Europeans) think because they had all the money. Others (Anglophones) think because Nazis kinda sorta respected neutrality (but usually when it involves the Swiss having all the money).
>>667917
It's an extremely well situated country in defensive terms, you can blow up one or two bridges and mountain passes and no motorized vehicle will be able to get in.
The swiss were also a bitch to fight against since like forever.
>>667929
I don't that buy that argument. The Nazis did actually have top-notch alpine troops who got 'wasted/misused' doing other shit (and in bigger numbers than the swiss)
It's more that it was a waste of time and effort, the Swiss were neutral, and totally surrounded by them, there really wasn't much of a point to an invasion.
Unlike Yugoslavia which began to lean too the allies after the Coup, The Netherlands, Luxembourg and Belgium to take down France, and Denmark and Norway to seize the sound strait, and Norway's resources, invading Switzerland didn't offer anything
>>667917
Why would they waste their time invading a neutral country when they have more important issues to deal with? Especially one with natural defenses such as Switzerland
>>667932
They got beaten in the Caucuses didn't they?
>>667932
Sweden isn't alpine terrain from a military perspective. It is constrained hilly terrain.
Because they didn't have to or want to. Switzerland was a major trading partner of Germany and was more than happy to conduct business with them, negotiate with them and hammer out various deals. Any potential execution of operation Tannenbaum was down at the bottom on any list of German priorities in the war.
>>667946
Mountains, altitude and snow. Come on, man,
>>667947
Also their economic relationship only grew stronger as the war went on and Germany was hit both literally by air raids as well as figuratively by shortages and manufacturing disruptions.
>>667943
Yeah, but it took a while, didn't it?
>>667949
Have you looked at a map of Swiss terrain? No, you're spouting bullshit.
>>667947
>>667952
Further more it took until late 1944 (!!!) that the Swiss stopped manufacturing weapons for Germany after allied pressure (and, obviously, allied gains against Germany).
So the question boils down to why didn't Germany attack one of its few remaining trading partners, a country which posed no threat, a place where it conducted a lot of business, a country which built weaponry for them, and a country which unlike the Soviet Union/Balkans/France/Norway/North Africa was not a battlefield nor a potential one... and then the answer is obvious.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Morgarten
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Laupen
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Sempach
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_St._Jakob_an_der_Birs
>>667964
>four medieval battles are the reason for geopolitical happenings or nonhappenings in ww2
>>667917
Since Switzerland is too hard to conquer with a military force, I guess Germany tried to subjugate first its surrounding regions (Austria, France, Italy) and then try to impose so many diplomatic and economic sanctions until they would give in and get annexed.
>>667973
>I guess
Why do you guess when the information is literally at your fingertips in this day and age.
>>667972
It's illustrating a rather common theme, usage of terrain and willingness to fight until death.
Germans tactic of rushing in with armored vehicles wasn't going to work this time.
>>667981
Every cuntwit on /his/ "guesses" because Generation Y are illiterate.
>>667917
"Der Schweiß" translates to "the sweat".
You meant "Die Schweiz"
>>667917
It's die Schweiz, not der Schweiß.
Der Schweiß means the sweat.
>>667982
That might or might not be the case but in the end it's not an answer to OP's question.
>>667982
>Germans tactic of rushing in with armored vehicles
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Why are my undergraduate students so much more intelligent than this?
>>668001
That's what they did in France and Russia didn't they? two pronged attack, isolating pocket and then beating it.
>>668019
>That's what they did in France and Russia didn't they? two pronged attack, isolating pocket and then beating it.
You've got a long way to go mate.
Panzer weren't decisive.
Luftwaffe weren't decisive.
German infantry divisions were decisive.
>>668024
Panzers weren't attached to (motorized) infantry were they? Maybe my knowledge is off but I seem to recall armor leading the way in Russia.
>>667990
Yeah, I forgot the Swiss don't use sharp s's. Sorry for insulting your language.
>>667917
>shoot twice
>go home
>>667947
At what stage did they primarily only shoot down Luftwaffe planes as opposed to Allied ones?
>>668032
German tactics were predicated on infantry.
German operational warfare was predicated on a decisive role of mobile kampfgruppe: a divisional mentality.
>>668024
You are retarded. German infantry were untrained conscripts who were good as fillers in the wake left by panzer divisions. The 2 panzer corps did more than the 100 infantry divisions in France, and the 3 panzer groups did more than the 150 infantry divisions in Russia.
>>667917
there was no point. They probably would have done had they won the wider war, but it's a bit pointless to consider given how unlikely that was.
>>668115
>German infantry were untrained conscripts
Tactics, operations and strategy were predicated on the infantry. Read more idiot.
>>668067
well any land doctrine is based on infantry because you need to get your lads in the sharp end if you actually want to take an objective. But the point was to get the infantry moving at the same pace as the armour formation, so you can get your blokes on task immediately and with organic support as opposed to crawling along with your armour going at the pace of infantry
>>668136
Yet German infantry divisions were always horse mobile, and the US and UK demotorised in 1944.
>>668145
In fairness in WWII Europe the infrastructure was pretty limited in terms of supporting a huge motorised logistics chain. The point is your scheme of manoeuvre rather than your mode of transport anyway
>>668157
And your scheme of manoeuvre is dependent upon... the infantry which makes the kessel boil
ffs sweden = ikea
swiss = chocolate
>>668157
*Funny but unrelated note
My Grandfather saw the Germans operating one of those spinning radar dishes near the village he lived in, but neither he nor anyone in the whole region knew what the fuck it was.
Of course electricity had to be brought in from the nearest city with an electricity grid so they had this rubber cable running from there to the radar dish for a couple of miles. Perhaps they should have known better than to lay the cable along a railroad. The guy operating the boiler simply scooped some burning coals from the boiler on the cable while the train was moving.
Funny how little people knew of technology back then.
>>667917
>Attacking your allies
>The dudes who are literally fighting on your side via sending volunteers into your army, and holding most of your dough
Come on, the Nazis were mean, but they weren't arbitrary evil animals that would attack anything not also as twisted as they for the sake of it.
>All those answers trying to use Swiss impregnability as an argument
Literally why would Germany annex Switzerland, their partner and a small piece of land that didn't compare favorably to the Ukraine agriculturally.
>this is a place of serious academic discourse
>anons confuse switzerland with sweden
>>667917
Because the swiss were helping Germany stockpile gold, which after the war when nobody came to collect, was appropriated for personal use
um, everyone in Switzerland is in their army, and their army is one of the best in the world
