With the Norwegian army forces at Trondheim about to give way to a German amphibious assault, only one option remains: Attack the landing craft. The terribly obsolete Norwegian navy, consisting of four late 19th century coastal defense ships and some ancient destroyers, steams out of Narvik where it had been hiding from German torpedo bombers. Having no reliable intelligence on the enemy fleet, Admiral Henry Diesen can only pray that the transport ships are lightly guarded. If not, well, at least nobody will say Norway went down without a fight.
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And so it was that the Norwegian coastal defense ship
Harald Haarfagre, launched in 1897 and weighing 3,920 tons, somehow managed to sink the 14,890 ton
Graf Spee, forcing the Germans to flee and marking the end of Operation Weserübung.