The Arctic archipelago of Svalbard, belonging to Norway, is famous for being home to the Global Seed Vault and for having recently emerged as a tourist destination where visitors can witness the northern lights, polar bears, and the midnight sun. However, while catering to tourists has become a new economic niche, the backbone of its economy remains coal mining, thanks to the region’s rich underground resources.

That was precisely what led the Allies during World War II to believe that it could attract a German invasion, prompting them to destroy the mines and evacuate the population in an operation known as Operation Gauntlet.

The terrain of Svalbard is covered by tundra, a frozen biome consisting of mosses and lichens, lacking tree vegetation, and often marshy, which facilitates the formation of peat bogs. Since the early 20th century, Norwegian and Russian companies have been extracting its coal—the former in Longyearbyen, the northernmost permanent settlement in the world, and the latter in Barentsburg. A treaty signed in 1920, when the archipelago was still called Spitsbergen (a name given by its discoverer in 1596, the Dutch explorer Willem Barentsz, and now used only for the main island), regulated the division of mining and fishing rights, granting the islands a neutral status.

Operation Gauntlet Svalbard
Map of the Barents Sea, where Operation Gauntlet took place, showing the locations of Svalbard, Bear Island, and Murmansk. Credit: NormanEinstein / Wikimedia Commons

The most common mining method used was drift mining, meaning that access to the deposits was through tunnels dug from the surface above sea level, following the coal seam rather than cutting across it. These tunnels were connected to the coast by wagons pulled by overhead cables, and if coal fell from the containers due to wind or other factors, it was not collected immediately but rather left until the summer thaw.

This was how approximately 3,000 people lived in Svalbard in 1939 (the name was changed in 1925), with an annual production of around 500,000 tons at the time (currently, it is significantly higher, reaching several million tons).

In June 1941, after occupying Norway a year earlier, Hitler launched Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union. The alliance between the USSR and Great Britain required the Royal Navy to send convoys of aid through the Arctic Ocean, but ensuring control of those waters was crucial—something the Kriegsmarine was determined to prevent.

Operation Gauntlet Svalbard
The coal transportation system using overhead cable wagons in Svalbard. Credit: Marius Fiskum / Wikimedia Commons

To that end, seizing the Svalbard archipelago seemed strategically advantageous, particularly since there would be no resistance and it would provide access to coal. In fact, the German cruiser Admiral Hipper patrolled the area that summer in an unsuccessful attempt to intercept British coal ships operating between Soviet ports and Pechenga.

Consequently, the London War Cabinet ordered the Admiralty to organize a fleet, Force K, for deployment in the Arctic. Admiral Philip Vian was sent to assess the defensive conditions of the Murmansk Oblast, where Pechenga was located, near Finland. Finland had recently fought the Winter War against the Soviet Union and was officially neutral at the time, though its government sympathized with Nazi Germany, which supplied it with military equipment in preparation for a potential renewal of hostilities. In June 1941, Finland joined Operation Barbarossa in what became known locally as the Continuation War, leading to direct conflict with Great Britain.

The British then reconsidered the situation in Svalbard, which was potentially in danger and also had a weather station broadcasting uncoded reports, benefiting both the enemy and the Allies. However, they also evaluated Pechenga, about which Admiral Vian wrote a negative defense report before visiting Svalbard, ultimately advising against establishing a base there due to two major issues. One was its proximity to German-occupied Norway—Luftwaffe reconnaissance planes even detected the presence of two British cruisers (HMS Nigeria and HMS Aurora), though they did not attack them. The other was the harsh climate, which would make resupplying the base difficult.

Operation Gauntlet Svalbard
Canadian troops throwing mining dynamite into the water to destroy it and prevent the Germans from using it. Credit: National Museum of the U.S. Navy / Public Domain / Wikimedia Commons

The conclusion was that abandoning the archipelago was the best option, leading to the formation of Force 111, composed of two Canadian infantry battalions. Their mission was to establish a temporary base for four months to coordinate the closure and destruction of all mining and port facilities, as well as communication stations, while also evacuating the population. The force was trained in Scotland, and after completing their preparation, they embarked on the RMS Empress of Canada (a former ocean liner converted into a troop transport). Escorted by the two aforementioned cruisers and the destroyers HMS Anthony, HMS Antelope, and HMS Icarus, they arrived safely in Svalbard on August 24.

They anchored at the Soviet settlement of Barentsburg and began organizing the evacuation of approximately 2,000 Soviet miners to Arkhangelsk. The operation was slow because Soviet authorities insisted on taking machinery with them first. Eventually, the Empress departed, escorted by the Nigeria and the destroyers, while the rest of the force spread out across the island to continue the mission. The coal—nearly half a million tons—was set on fire to prevent the Germans from using it, while thousands of liters of fuel met the same fate or were dumped into the sea. Additionally, the mining facilities were destroyed.

Meanwhile, the communication stations continued transmitting weather reports to maintain the appearance of normalcy, though they falsely reported foggy conditions to discourage enemy curiosity. This continued until September 1, when the fleet left Svalbard, taking 800 Norwegian workers, 15 sled dogs, and nearly 200 French soldiers who had escaped German captivity and sought refuge in the Soviet Union. The Soviets had kept them in Svalbard until they could be transferred to Great Britain.

Only one person remained behind, hiding—a Scandinavian conscientious objector named Anders Halvorssen, who feared being conscripted into the Norwegian forces in exile. Meanwhile, seventy of his evacuated compatriots chose to enlist.

Operation Gauntlet Svalbard
The Norwegian population of Svalbard preparing for evacuation. Credit: National Museum of the U.S. Navy / Public Domain / Wikimedia Commons

Operation Gauntlet had been carried out with as much success as discretion—no casualties, no fighting, and without the Germans even finding out. After all, from a certain comical perspective, rifles in Svalbard were mostly used to protect against polar bears. Moreover, no one could have imagined back then that shortly after the war, in the 1950s, authorities would have to ban burying the dead for a rather peculiar reason: permafrost prevents bodies from decomposing, which led many people to request in writing to be buried there after rumors spread that Walt Disney had arranged for his body to be frozen in case it could be revived in the future.

There are two epilogues to Operation Gauntlet. The first involves the capture of an enemy convoy by British ships returning from Arkhangelsk. The convoy consisted of an icebreaker, a whaling ship, and a tugboat, later joined by the training vessel Bremse; two troop transports, the Barcelona and the Trautenfels, managed to escape and find refuge in a Norwegian fjord. The only recorded damage from this operation occurred when the Nigeria, which had just destroyed a German station on Bear Island, suffered a damaged bow. Initially, it was believed to have struck a sunken ship at shallow depth, but upon returning to port and undergoing inspection, it became clear that the damage had been caused by a mine (the ship was repaired in Newcastle and continued to serve in the Mediterranean and the Far East).

The second epilogue was Operation Fritham, through which the Allies secured the coal mines. The Germans never occupied Svalbard, and in fact, they were unaware of its development. Without coal, the only thing of interest to them in that location was meteorological data, as the Arctic influenced the weather in Western Europe, and relying on data from submarines and aircraft was insufficient and impractical. That is why they were surprised when, all of a sudden, the weather station stopped transmitting, prompting them to investigate the cause. To that end, the Luftwaffe launched Operation Bansö, led by Dr. Erich Etienne.

Operation Gauntlet Svalbard
Demolition of a German communications antenna installed in Svalbard. Credit: National Museum of the U.S. Navy / Public Domain / Wikimedia Commons

Born in Leipzig in 1915, Etienne was a geophysicist who had participated in the polar expedition sent to Greenland in 1936 by the University of Oxford—where he was a fellow. When the war broke out, he became an airborne meteorologist for the Luftwaffe. He was tasked with finding out what had happened in Svalbard, and if no one was there, as command suspected after a reconnaissance flight revealed burning coal and empty bases, he was to establish a station, as was being done on other northern islands, to continue gathering weather data.

On September 25, four days after Force 111 had departed, a Junkers JU 52 aircraft landed, soon joined by a JU 88 and a Heinkel 111, thanks to the hasty construction of a makeshift gravel runway. The Germans made use of the abandoned facilities and found the Norwegian deserter, who explained what had happened. However, they were unable to accomplish their mission. The British, having intercepted enemy radio communications, were aware of their movements and sent four minesweepers, forcing the Germans to evacuate quickly. They returned as soon as the ships left and, after thirty-eight supply flights, prepared to overwinter.

In mid-October, the Kriegsmarine sent in a team of half a dozen more meteorologists, alarming the Allies. In response, they launched Operation Fritham: a Free Norwegian force set sail from Scotland in May 1942 with a plan to invade the island, but it was intercepted by German aircraft that sank several ships. Nevertheless, they managed to land, and later reinforced by a second operation, Gearbox, the Norwegian expedition was able to expel the Germans permanently in July.

This article was first published on our Spanish Edition on March 17, 2025: Operación Gauntlet, la destrucción de las minas, el carbón y las estaciones de Svalbard en la Segunda Guerra Mundial

SOURCES

Ryan Dean y P.W. Lackenbauer, Conceiving and Executing Operation Gauntlet: The Canadian-Led Raid on Spitzbergen, 1941

Ernest Schofield y Roy Conyers Nesbit, Arctic Airmen: The RAF in Spitsbergen and North Russia 1942

Richard Woodman, Arctic convoys, 1941-194

Life, Spitsbergen British Blow Up Coal Mines on Norway’s Arctic Ocean Island

Wikipedia, Operation Gauntlet

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