Why on earth is the United Kingdom "Scandinavian Intervention" focus so aggressive?

[KelLorien]

I'm trying to play Fascist Sweden to combine all the Nordic states, but I'm a little shocked at how aggressive the UK's "intervention" is, so early on. Basically, it kickstarts the war as early as you either go it alone against the Allies, or join the Axis immediately, and either way, i don't like how that feels. I don't see why it doesn't just shut you out of trade with the British, or hell, all the Allies, rather than start an immediate war.

Is closing trade with Germany the only option to avoid this? I think the opinion penalty from Germany may be enough to stop you from being able to join the Axis, which leaves you without your only good option for allies in war later on (since you can't conquer Denmark without getting the allies involved anyway).

 

[KelLorien]

I just discovered that closing trade to Germany doesn't actually affect opinion, just trade opinion, so that's not nearly as bad. The point remains, it doesn't seem remotely realistic that the UK would engage in all out war immediately against Sweden just for their refusal to embargo Germany.

 

[PanzerMan7]

Well, the British did have a habit of protecting their interests. They almost invaded Sweden during the Winter War over this actually so there's some precedent

 

[Eh up me duck]

The point remains, it doesn't seem remotely realistic that the UK would engage in all out war immediately against Sweden just for their refusal to embargo Germany.

There was a British plan for invading Norway and Sweden during World War 2. When you remember that the entire Nazi war machine was sustained thanks to Swedish co-operation it doesn't seem so far fetched.

 

[Uniform764]

What's amusing is that it's comparatively hard to trigger the Anglo-Iraqi war which did actually happen historically.

 

[Agenor]

When you remember that the entire Nazi war machine was sustained thanks to Swedish co-operation it doesn't seem so far fetched.

To be fair to the Swedes, they were completely dependent on imports of German coal, without which their economy would have collapsed. They produced almost all of Europe's military-quality ball bearings, essential to both the British and German war efforts, and throughout the war traded with both nations. They were also dependent on imports of fuel and oil, mainly from the US and all their trade (which declined significantly during WW2) had to pass through both British and German naval blockades.

The British required Sweden to run a trade deficit with them throughout the war, as a sign of their good faith, while they ran a trade surplus with Germany. Iirc, they were also made to provide trade credits to Britain, while the Germans had to pay for their imports. The general impression I get is they were rather bullied by both the Germans and the British at various times during the war, being in the unenviable position of having to trade with both to survive.

 

[Agenor]

I'd just like to add one thing to my above post. The event that makes Britain demand Sweden end its trade with Germany makes no economic sense. Sweden had to import German coal to produce the ball bearings the UK needed for it's planes, tanks and ship engines. Thus demanding and end to trade would have hurt Britain's output of war materiel.

In peacetime, it would probably have been contrary to international law to make such a demand and thus provoked the ire of the League of Nations. The more I think about it, the less the event makes sense.

 

[Wasted Shampoo]

Well, historically all of that hasn’t happened, HOI4 gives you the opportunity to make it happen but of course doesn’t mean that you must succeed in every ahistorical scenario you want. It’s fair like this.

 

[DicRoNero]

I'm trying to play Fascist Sweden to combine all the Nordic states, but I'm a little shocked at how aggressive the UK's "intervention" is, so early on. Basically, it kickstarts the war as early as you either go it alone against the Allies, or join the Axis immediately, and either way, i don't like how that feels. I don't see why it doesn't just shut you out of trade with the British, or hell, all the Allies, rather than start an immediate war.

Is closing trade with Germany the only option to avoid this? I think the opinion penalty from Germany may be enough to stop you from being able to join the Axis, which leaves you without your only good option for allies in war later on (since you can't conquer Denmark without getting the allies involved anyway).

It's by far the very best opening you can get as Sweden. Nerfed a bit in 1.5.1 thanks to PITA with increasing War Support (thus hindering your Total Mobilization economy law), but still very challenging and fun overall for a simple reason you end up against 2 majors (UK and France) very early and basically alone (unless of course you join Axis which is robbing yourself).

You can conquer Denmark just fine even with both these majors sending their fleets to the Baltics.

Besides, if you're simply not that good at the game, you can always accept volunteers from both Germany and Italy, which makes defending you land almost trivial. If not (and that's what I prefer) you need some 8-10 divisions to guard you ports until you switch to fascism and overrun Denmark, rendering the whole of the Baltics your oyster.

If not for this very scenario, I would have ceased playing SP HoI4 long ago.