The end came with a surprise and a smash. To the hard-fighting Nazi forces commanded by his good friend Lieut. General Eduard ("Bull") Dietl, Adolf Hitler had promised aid. With the "Bul" and his men holed up in a railway tunnel just six miles from the Swedish border and facing gradual annihilation by British planes and artillery, the promised help arrived suddenly and unexpectedly in the form of a major naval force including the 26,000-ton battleships Gneisenau (reported sunk in Oslo Fjord) and Scharnhorst (damaged in an exchange of shots with the Renown).
Caught off guard and inadequately protected, the...