Chapter 160 - Heat of the Moment: The Hårsfjärden War of 1982
Above: A confrontation between a Soviet helicopter and a Swedish patrol boat on September 30th, 1982 (left); a political cartoon in the
Chicago Sun-Times about the Soviet submarine reconnaissance that led to the war (right).
“I never meant to be so bad to you
One thing I said that I would never do
A look from you and I would fall from grace
And that would wipe the smile right from my face
Do you remember when we used to dance
And incidents arose from circumstance
One thing led to another, we were young
And we would scream together songs unsung
It was the heat of the moment
Telling me what my heart meant
The heat of the moment showed in your eyes” - “Heat of the Moment” by Asia
“Under Lenin, the Soviet Union was like a religious revival, under Stalin like a prison, under Khrushchev like a circus, and under Andropov like the US Post Office. Under Romanov… I’d say it's beginning to look like the inmates running the asylum.” - National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski at a cabinet meeting, as recorded by President Robert F. Kennedy’s tape recording system, October 1st, 1982.
“Anfall är bästa försvar.” - Swedish proverb, translation: “Attack is the best defense”.
Following the onset of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, the government of Sweden adopted a stance of armed neutrality, seeking to avoid being pulled into the direct influence of either superpower. The thinking in Stockholm was that neutrality of this sort had secured Swedish sovereignty through both of the World Wars. It had prevented the country from suffering invasion, bombing, or any other serious damage as a result.
Despite this adherence to neutrality, however, the vast majority of Sweden's military efforts were focused on defending against the potential for armed aggression by the Soviet Union. Without the backing of NATO afforded to its neighbors Norway and Denmark, Sweden would, if ever threatened, not be able to count on other countries coming to its aid. Hence, Sweden maintained a sizable navy, and was concerned with interdicting any foreign forces that violated Swedish territorial waters in the Baltic Sea.
From 1974 to 1981, a series of incidents occurred in which the Swedish Navy claimed to have detected foreign submarines near or inside Swedish territorial waters. Most notably, in 1981 an incident occurred in which the Soviet submarine S-363 became grounded 10 kilometers off the coast of Karlskrona naval base; further inflaming tensions was the fact that the grounded submarine was well within Swedish territorial waters and possibly armed with nuclear weapons. The Swedish Navy, enraged by these violations of their nation’s sovereignty, began to patrol its territorial waters more regularly and more equipped with deadly force. In hindsight, it was probably inevitable that if they caught Soviet submarines in their waters again, some sort of armed confrontation would follow.
Sure enough, they would.
…
Above: Grigory Romanov, First Secretary of the Soviet Union (left); the Soviet Naval flag (right).
On the Soviet side of things, in late September 1982, First Secretary Grigory Romanov was nearing the end of his ninth month in power. For the most part, his administration had seemed fairly “steady as she goes”, especially in the eyes of western observers.
While domestically, Romanov ramped up his crackdowns on corruption, “laziness”, and other “bourgeois behavior” in an effort to combat stagnation, abroad, the Soviet invasion and occupation of Afghanistan continued, as did the USSR’s buildup of arms, both for their own military and for those of their satellite states. Part of that military buildup, of course, involved expanding the Soviet Navy.
Due to the Soviet Union's geographic position, submarines were considered the capital ships of the Navy. Submarines could penetrate attempts at blockade, either in the constrained waters of the Baltic and Black Seas or in the remote reaches of the USSR's western Arctic, while surface ships were clearly much easier to find and attack. Because of its opinion that “quantity had a quality of its own” and at the insistence of Admiral of the Fleet Sergey Gorshkov, the Soviet Navy continued to operate many of its first-generation missile submarines, built in the early 1960s in 1982.
In some respects, including speed and reactor technology, Soviet submarines achieved unique successes, but for most of the era lagged their Western counterparts in overall capability. In addition to their relatively high speeds and great operating depths, they were difficult targets to destroy because of their multiple compartments, their large reserve buoyancy, and especially their double-hulled design. Their principal shortcomings were insufficient noise-damping (American boats were quieter) and primitive sonar technology. Acoustics was a particularly interesting type of information that the Soviets sought about the West's submarine-production methods, and the long-active John Anthony Walker spy ring may have made a major contribution to their knowledge of such.
Throughout Andropov’s tenure and into the New Troika/Suslov and Romanov eras, the Soviets extensively probed the Baltic Sea with their submarines. The goal of this was to map routes that could, in the event of conflict with the West, be best suited to deploying the subs to deliver their payloads of ballistic missiles (both nuclear and conventional). Unfortunately, these patrols often entered the territorial waters of neutral Finland and Sweden. The Navy assured Comrade Romanov, as they had Andropov and Suslov before him, that the Scandinavian nations would “not retaliate” over these minor incidents, for fear of provoking a war.
How wrong they would turn out to be.
…
In 1982, the Swedish government planned to conduct an anti-submarine warfare exercise to test the nation's ability to detect and destroy foreign submarines. This exercise was planned for September, coinciding with NATO military exercises in the Baltic. The complete purpose of the Swedish exercise (termed, in English, “Operation Safeguard”) remains a matter of debate; some sources speculate that the operation was a standard military exercise which had been modified to respond to a false alarm, while others claim that the operation was either a pre-planned attempt to entrap a foreign submarine (using unknowing American warships calling in Stockholm as bait) or an opportunistic attempt to engage a trespassing sub.
Simultaneously, the Swedish parliament (having been reshuffled amidst a series of elections) was in a state of flux, effectively leaving the nation without a government from late September to early October.
Above: Map of the Baltic Sea region. (Note: International boundaries are not accurate to TTL).
Just before dawn on the morning of September 30th, Swedish naval units detected an “unknown foreign submarine” entering Hårsfjärden Bay near the coastal town of Nynäshamn, where the Swedish Navy had established a hydrophone network and placed naval mines to interdict an intruding submarine. The detection of the sub caused the Swedish Navy to scramble its forces. Though there were some dissenting voices within the navy who feared that an armed response might cause “an escalation”, high command felt that the time had come to “get serious” with “whomever might be violating our sovereignty”. These officers knew full well what they were implying. They gave the go-ahead for their ships to pursue the intruding vessel, to lay depth charges, and to take “any and all defensive actions that the captain and crew deem necessary, up to and including deadly force.”
The Soviet sub was
K-123, an Alfa-class, nuclear-powered attack-sub first put into service back in 1971. Among the fastest submarines (and indeed ships in general) in the world at the time, the sub was also heavily-automated and technologically advanced for its era, especially as far as the Soviet Navy was concerned. It required a relatively small crew of only 30, and could reach speeds of up to 41.2 knots (76.3 km/hr). Perhaps its best feature was its specially designed, titanium-alloy hull, which allowed for its high speeds and ability to dive quite deep. Unfortunately for the crew aboard
K-123 that day, the Swedish Navy had, by scrambling immediately, effectively trapped them. About three hours after Swedish detectors first picked up the sub’s presence,
Hälsingland, a Swedish destroyer, managed to chase it into a particularly narrow stretch of water. The destroyer lay depth charges. One of these struck
K-123 head on, severely damaging that advanced hull, and catching the crew off-guard. Panicked, the sub’s captain saw no choice but to surface and beg the Swedes to tow them to the nearest port, lest they lose the sub.
Above:
K-123 and
Hälsingland, the two ships that arguably started the Soviet-Swedish War of 1982.
After radioing back to Stockholm about what had occurred, the
Hälsingland and its escort ships received permission to surround the sub, move in, apprehend the Soviet sailors, and recover the damaged sub. The Swedes did so. The units involved thought surprisingly little of the incident.
Despite the damage to
K-123, no one was killed or even severely injured in the skirmish. The Swedes provided food, blankets, and medical care to the few Soviet sailors who were hurt. Tentative plans were made to house them in Stockholm until their return to the USSR could be arranged. All in all, most expected this to blow over. It was really a political question, not a military one. After all, this was typical Cold War espionage, was it not?
Meanwhile, the Swedish high command, who had orchestrated the navy’s response in hopes of just this outcome, were ecstatic. They had, in their mind, restored Swedish national honor, and stood up to the “lumbering brutes” (the Soviets), embarrassing them on the international stage. The Soviets would issue some kind of awkward apology for the whole thing and the world would move on. The only thing this incident would change, they thought, was that perhaps the Soviets might think twice about violating Swedish neutrality again.
They were wrong.
First Secretary Romanov was in the middle of his morning meetings when his military advisors interrupted to inform him of what had transpired in Hårsfjärden Bay. By the time the First Secretary was informed, however, Defense Minister Ustinov and Foreign Minister Gromyko, who had more friends and informants in Moscow than the Union’s new leader, were already well-aware of the day’s events. They’d taken the liberty of advancing to the opening stages of crafting the USSR’s response. As usual for them, they favored a “strong” response.
Above: Dmitry Ustinov, Minister of Defense (left); Andrei Gromyko, Foreign Minister (right).
Without worrying about the minor inconvenience of checking with the First Secretary first, Gromyko called a press conference in Moscow, where he coolly refused to apologize. According to the Foreign Minister, the sub’s mission had been “a routine patrol of international waters, to support the defense of the USSR’s allies in the Warsaw Pact”. He condemned Sweden’s “attack”, which he decried as, “an outrageous and unwarranted assault upon a vessel of a friendly nation in peacetime”. Claiming to speak on behalf of the Kremlin, he demanded the “immediate and unconditional” release of the Soviet sailors, as well as reparations be paid by the Swedish government, not just to repair damage done to the submarine, but also as a punitive measure. He also called upon Stockholm to “carefully consider the situation in which it [Sweden] has now found itself”, and to “rein in the ambitions of its naval officers before the nation suffers for them.”
As if that thinly-veiled threat were not direct enough, Ustinov almost simultaneously gave the order for the Soviet Navy and Air Force to move to “heightened” combat readiness, the middle of three statuses (between “routine” and “full” readiness). The US/NATO equivalent would be somewhere around DEFCON 3. Across Europe, as word of Gromyko’s statement and Ustinov’s order hit the morning television shows and evening newspapers, a wave of tension, even fear, erupted. This was the first serious threat of military action between one of the superpowers and a “neutral” country in Europe in nearly thirty-five years.
Across the Pond in Washington, President Kennedy was informed of the events off the coast of Sweden in his first morning security briefing at around 6 AM local time. It was the top item on the agenda. The Soviets’ aggressive moves worried the president. Not only did he fear that innocent people would get hurt, even killed over what essentially amounted to posturing by the Kremlin, but especially concerning was the nearby presence of Denmark and Norway - NATO allies since the alliance’s formation in 1949. If this incident escalated, as it looked like it was about to, and fighting spilled into one of the Nordic NATO countries, Article 5 of the NATO Treaty would be activated. All of Western Europe, Canada, and indeed, the United States would be called to war with the Soviet Union.
Hoping to contain the situation, some on EXCOMM recommended that the president use the “hotline” to speak directly with First Secretary Romanov. Kennedy held off for the time being, however. He believed that if he stepped in too soon, he could be seen as politicizing the situation, or turning it into an opportunity to grandstand. That would open Romanov to further criticism and humiliation back home, and might harden his stance, which, at present, Kennedy was not certain could be ascertained. He also did not want to preempt Swedish sovereignty over their own affairs.
Above: President Robert F. Kennedy (left); Soviet Ambassador to the US Anatoly Dobrynin (right).
Instead, Kennedy called the Soviet embassy and asked to speak to Anatoly Dobrynin, the Soviet ambassador to the United States since early 1962. Kennedy knew Dobrynin well. He’d been one of the Kennedys’ chief nemeses during the Cuban Missile Crisis. In their meeting, held in the Roosevelt Room just after lunch on September 30th, Kennedy asked Dobrynin point blank if “[his] country meant to go to war with Sweden”. Dobrynin stated, “that he hoped for a peaceful resolution”. And was “joined in this view by the highest officials of the Soviet government”. Kennedy asked that Dobrynin maintain communication with his office, and that he keep the US infomed. Dobrynin agreed. The meeting concluded after about an hour. Kennedy, however, was not satisfied. He called Thomas J. Watson, Washington's Ambassador in Moscow, and ordered him to “keep a damn good eye on things”. He also ordered the CIA to monitor the situation closely, and to share intelligence with their Western European and NATO counterparts.
Unfortunately, this is where the uncertainty surrounding Sweden’s government at the time begins to play a role in our story.
…
Above: Thorbjörn Fälldin (left) and Olof Palme (right), political rivals whose premierships bookended the Soviet-Swedish War.
Eleven days before the showdown between
K-123 and
Hälsingland, on September 19th, the Swedish people went to the polls to vote in that year’s general elections. At the time, foreign affairs were just about the last thing on voters’ minds.
Thorbjörn Fälldin, leader of the center-right coalition which led the country since 1976, had already suffered a political setback the year before, when the rightist Moderate Party chose to withdraw from his government, protesting against Fälldin’s centrist tax policies. Fälldin, the first prime minister from any party but the Social Democrats in over forty years, had been the hope for many in Sweden for change, for an end to the mid-seventies malaise seemingly being felt across Europe and the world. He failed to deliver on those hopes.
On the 19th, Fälldin and his coalition took a shellacking, being roundly defeated by former prime minister Olof Palme and the social democrats, who won another majority with over 2,500,000 votes cast for them, still a record for a single party in Swedish politics.
A longtime protégé of Prime Minister Tage Erlander, Palme first became Prime Minister of Sweden in 1969, heading a Privy Council Government. He left office after failing to form a government after the 1976 general election, which, as previously stated, ended 40 years of unbroken rule by the Social Democratic Party. While Leader of the Opposition, he served as special mediator of the United Nations in the Iran–UAR War, and was President of the Nordic Council in 1979. He faced a second electoral defeat that year, but returned, triumphantly, as prime minister following the September 19th, 1982 general election.
Palme is often considered both a pivotal and polarizing figure in Swedish history, both within his own country and around the world. He was, for his entire career up to 1982, steadfast in his non-alignment policy towards the superpowers. He believed that neutrality had “saved” Sweden in the past, carrying it through the 19th and early 20th centuries relatively unscathed. He believed further that neutrality would “save” Sweden again. Accompanied by Palme’s support for numerous liberation movements following decolonization including, most controversially, economic and vocal support for a number of Third World governments. He was the first Western head of government to visit Cuba after its revolution, giving a speech in Santiago praising contemporary Cuban revolutionaries.
Though these stances earned Palme few friends in Washington (where he was viewed as - at best, naïve, and at worst, a puppet-friend of Moscow), he was equally as critical of the USSR as he was the USA. Expressing his “equivalent revulsion” to Erich Honecker and Francisco Franco, for example, he accused both superpowers of “waging ideological war that threatened to engulf the world in fire, while the rest of us simply want to get on with the business of living”. News of his reelection was greeted with equal groans in both Washington and Moscow.
But although Palme emerged victorious, he was not immediately sworn in as Prime Minister of Sweden. The new session of the parliament was not scheduled to begin until October 12th. In the meantime, Fälldin continued to serve as PM.
For his part, Fälldin was not overly surprised when he heard the news of the events of September 30th. Just a year prior, Soviet submarine
S-363 accidentally hit an underwater rock about 10 kilometers from the South Coast Naval Base at Karlskrona and surfaced within Swedish waters. Though an investigation performed at the time by Swedish naval vessels in the area for an exercise “could not determine” the true nature of the Soviet ship’s mission, Fälldin suspected (as did many in the West) that the surfacing was proof of Soviet infiltration of the Swedish coastline.
US commentators had advised Fälldin to deploy incident weapons to deter future infiltration. On the basis of an investigation carried out after the incident, the Swedish government concluded that the submarine had “entered Swedish waters knowingly to conduct illegal activities”. Fälldin had afterward given his tacit, if not explicit consent to the navy to pursue “whatever measures they deemed necessary to protect Sweden’s territorial waters from foreign encroachment”.
Now, on September 30th, with his political future all but evaporating before his eyes, Fälldin had one final role to play on the stage of world history.
Upon receiving the official version of Gromyko’s requests from the Soviet ambassador, Fälldin balked. He explained to the ambassador that both he and the Swedish Navy believed that the navy’s actions were justified under international law. He refused to grant the release of the prisoners, or to draft up a bill in parliament to fund any kind of reparations, until Moscow issued a formal apology for
K-123’s presence, accepted responsibility for the entire situation, and made some kind of pledge not to violate Sweden’s waters in the future, or to infiltrate their coastline. The ambassador agreed to pass this message along, leaving Fälldin to wonder, constitutionally, what his next move ought to be.
Under the 1975 Instrument of Government, the responsibility of dismissing or appointing a prime minister fell to the Speaker of the Riksdag (parliament). At the moment, that was Ingemund Bengtsson, a Social Democrat and ally of Palme. Though the constitutional mechanism for how this might work (with all the newly elected MPs not yet sworn in) was a bit murky, Bengtsson could, in theory, dismiss Fälldin, appoint Palme prime minister, and call upon the Riksdag, in session, though not for long with the weekend approaching, to vote to confirm Palme early. Given the weight and urgency of the crisis facing the country, this seemed the most likely scenario. But it also had its issues. Under the current configuration of the parties, the social democrats lacked an outright majority. Fälldin could ask his coalition to go ahead with the vote. But would they agree? The elections had been personal and tough at times. Would they really back Palme getting into power, and themselves out of it, early?
It was also possible, Fälldin supposed, for Bengtsson to call the Riksdag into an “Extraordinary Session”. This would allow for the formation of an Interim Government, presumably with Fälldin at its head, to remain in power until October 12th. This struck Fälldin as unlikely, however. His coalition had just been handed one of the biggest electoral defeats in the history of Swedish politics. If Fälldin suggested such a move to Bengtsson, then it might be seen as his hoping to assume “extraordinary powers”, or to remain in power for longer than he was “supposed” to. This was not Fälldin’s intention. But Sweden had a long, proud history of respect for its constitutional ideals and mechanisms. Democracy was wonderful; but it was also slow.
Then there was the issue of Palme himself. The man famously supported “bilateral” relations with both the US and Soviet Union. Would he jeopardize his beloved neutrality in the name of standing up to Soviet aggression? Could Fälldin trust him to handle the crisis effectively? Fälldin hoped so.
After hours of deliberation, Fälldin ultimately decided not to make a decision. At least, not yet. He would allow the Riksdag to do as it would about constitutional matters. In the meantime, he convened his cabinet and worked closely with them (in particular Defense Minister Torsten Gustafsson) on preparing the nation’s (admittedly outnumbered) armed forces for, in Fälldin’s words, “whatever the Russians might try and pull”.
This lack of decisive action had consequences of its own, however.
Above: War Flag and Naval Ensign of Sweden, not used since 1814.
…
As the morning of Friday, October 1st, arrived, First Secretary Grigory Romanov had been brought on board with Gromyko and Ustinov’s plans. Though at first Romanov privately favored diplomacy, he understood his advisors’ points about not being made to appear “weak” on the international stage. With America finally flexing its muscles again, so to speak, the USSR could not bear any humiliation, especially from such a small, “insignificant” country as Sweden. Romanov gave Gromyko the go-ahead to turn the previous day’s “requests” into “demands”. Though no specific threat needed to be made, the unspoken threat should be underlined. Gromyko did as he was bid.
Diplomatic cables were exchanged throughout the day on the 1st. Little headway was made.
In Stockholm, the Riksdag met to consider whether or not an “Extraordinary Session” need be called. As the Swedish sailors and high command had, most members of Parliament dismissed the situation as “little more than Russian sabre rattling”. They expected the “posturing” to end “any minute now” and for cooler heads to prevail. In Moscow, however, the mood turned decidedly grim.
On the 2nd, the previous day’s demands became an “ultimatum”. Either Stockholm turned over the captured sailors and
K-123 to the Soviets by midnight on the 3rd, no questions asked, with plans for reparations drawn up, or else. Or else
what exactly was still left unclear.
Outraged at the tenor of the demands, Fälldin declared that, “The Kremlin is intent on provoking a war in Europe.” Gromyko denied this, but the question on everyone’s mind was: what exactly were Moscow’s intentions? This was getting serious.
Fälldin and the cabinet, which were also trying to simultaneously perform an inquiry into the true nature of the submarine’s mission in Swedish waters, offered to return the sailors, but not the sub, on a promise from Moscow that they would be returned to Stockholm if needed for questioning. They also denied that any reparations would be paid. Moscow refused to accept this.
Whether genuinely frustrated by Sweden’s refusal to comply with the ultimatum, or carrying out the plan that Gromyko and Ustinov had orchestrated from the start, Romanov decided to retaliate against Swedish naval vessels near the edge of Sweden’s territorial waters. He ordered additional Soviet ships - submarines, surface combatants, and support vessels - into the area. He then ordered them to strike, targeting Swedish ships with missile attacks and torpedoes. This order was carried out immediately.
Above: Artist’s rendition of the task force from the Baltic Fleet sent to “deal with” Sweden.
In the early morning hours of the 3rd, several Swedish warships, caught off-guard by the Soviets’ sudden escalation, were attacked and damaged. More than a dozen Swedish sailors were killed and many of the ships were damaged. Though none sunk, one would eventually be scuttled due to its damage being so severe. The hope, back in Moscow, had been to show Stockholm the gravity of their threats. They thought that if their words were backed up with sufficient force, the Swedes would surrender to their demands.
They thought wrong.
Alarmed and outraged, the international community swiftly condemned the attack. In the US, President Kennedy appeared on national television in a special news bulletin to condemn the attacks, to demand a peaceful resolution to the crisis, and to express his “steadfast support” for the people of Sweden to “defend their liberty and their sovereignty against Soviet aggression”. The president’s words were widely echoed across the Western world, particularly in Europe.
The response was, understandably, most vitriolic in Sweden itself. The Swedish people were aghast that the Soviets had been so brazen as to actually attack them. Sweden, who had not been at war since the dying days of Napoleon Bonaparte’s empire, Sweden, who had remained steadfast in their neutrality for decades, Sweden, whom even the Nazis had known better than to attack, had just been “consciously and deliberately” attacked. In the complex game of geopolitics, Romanov and his backers had just committed a fatal error. They’d not only made a mistake, they’d made an enemy.
The bickering in the Riksdag swiftly faded in the name of national unity. Palme, who until that point had been gesturing that he might favor a negotiated solution to the crisis (perhaps dropping the request for a Soviet apology and allowing only a truncated investigation of the sub’s mission), suddenly sang a different tune. His deeply-held patriotism activated, Palme decried the Soviet leadership as “murderers and warmongers”. He personally visited the families of the fourteen Swedish sailors who’d been killed, and called Fälldin, still prime minister, to offer his rival his “full support”.
This was much appreciated by Fälldin, who ordered the mobilization of Sweden’s armed forces and implemented defensive measures to protect the country’s territory from further incursions. His government then issued a stern warning to the Soviets, emphasizing its commitment to defending Sweden’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
“We do not want war.” Fälldin’s statement concluded. “But neither do we fear it.” This was a bold statement for the PM to make. On paper, at the time, the Soviets’ military outclassed Sweden’s in virtually every possible metric.
Whereas the entire Swedish army numbered just under 200,000 active-duty personnel, with perhaps another 100,000 in reserve, the Soviet army had several divisions, numbering nearly one and a half-times that number
already posted at the Swedish border, far to the north. The USSR also had hundreds of thousands of more active-duty soldiers ready to be redeployed, not to mention the millions of men it held in reserve. Sweden’s entire population in 1982 was only 8.3 million. The USSR’s was nearly 270 million.
While a land war between the two seemed unlikely given the geography involved, Sweden’s chances at sea and in the air did not seem much better.
While Sweden’s navy was professionally trained and widely held to be eminently competent, its entire navy numbered about the same number of vessels as
just the Soviets’ Baltic Fleet. If the USSR so desired, it could reinforce the fleet with other vessels from the Arctic or even the Black Sea via the Mediterranean. Because Sweden was not a NATO member, the Soviets did not need to fear Turkey closing the straits near Istanbul to their warships. Sweden could boast
maybe 200 aircraft that were “combat ready”. The Soviets possessed hundreds of fighters, bombers, and interceptors in the region, ready to fly at a moment’s notice. The Soviets also possessed strategic air forces (bombers, missiles, etc.) that could decimate Sweden’s infrastructure and domestic cities, sending them, as Curtis LeMay might have put it, “back to the stone age”. Then, there were nuclear weapons. The USSR had the largest stockpile in the world. Sweden had not a single one. Of course, it was also unlikely that the Soviets would be so insane as to annihilate a neutral country over a single incident involving what essentially amounted to a dispute over territorial waters. But at that time, with Cold War paranoia at its highest peak since twenty years prior, anything seemed possible.
Above: The air force roundels of the USSR (left) and Sweden (right).
At this point, war between the two nations, though as of yet undeclared, seemed inevitable. With Sweden mobilizing and the Soviets refusing to stand down, further firefights between Soviet and Swedish forces were bound to break out, and they did.
Though Swedish vessels were under strict orders not to fire at the Soviets unless fired upon, over the next several days (Oct. 4th - Oct. 8th), a series of skirmishes and brief exchanges of fire were recorded throughout the Baltic Sea, along the border of Sweden’s territorial waters. Several hundred sailors and pilots were killed, several thousand more injured, and a number of ships sunk. Surprisingly, however, the Swedish, at least initially, appeared to be holding their own. They managed to give the Soviets a pretty nasty black eye.
A pattern emerged in these early engagements: the Swedish fought like Hell; the Soviets fought like… well, a bunch of conscripts who were underpaid, overworked, and undersupplied. Soviet commanders, more interested in looking good, currying favor with the Kremlin, and advancing their careers, made short-sighted decisions and generally displayed an incompetence that would later be described by CIA analysts as “mortifying”. Even up against numerically superior forces that were better armed and equipped, the Swedes still seemed capable of providing stiff resistance. They performed daring evasive maneuvers and lay traps for the bigger, cockier Soviet vessels. Though most of the tonnage they managed to sink were unarmed supply ships, this too disrupted Soviet plans.
Ustinov and his high command had worked carefully with Gromyko on a very specific war plan that would allow for multiple “exit ramps” for Sweden to “gracefully” bow out without looking like it had immediately capitulated. First, the Soviet Navy was to eviscerate Sweden’s in these initial combats. Seeing that resistance was futile, Sweden would then surely surrender. If they somehow still refused, then war would be officially declared, and the air force would launch a series of strikes on Sweden’s few air and naval bases. If then the Swedes still did not surrender, well… Not even the Swedes were that foolhardy.
Unfortunately, this plan blew up in Gromyko and Ustinov’s faces. With “tiny” Sweden managing to hold back the Soviet Navy as effectively as they were, all the undeclared war appeared to be doing was exposing the extent of the Soviets’ weakness to the world, the very thing that not backing down from their demands was supposed to have prevented.
The mood in Moscow went from celebratory to panicked rather quickly. Romanov, who by now was furious with his underlings for dragging both him and the Union into this mess, decided that he had had enough. He promptly secured the backing of the rest of the Secretariat and the Politburo. Once he was sure he had this support, he sacked both Gromyko and Ustinov, his former patrons who had brought him to power in the first place. Both men accepted their fate, realizing that they lacked the political capital to oppose it.
Though some, including KGB head Viktor Chebrikov, encouraged Romanov to have the former Ministers “taken care of”, Romanov declined. Finally gaining the confidence in himself he needed to develop his own ideological bent, Romanov decided to pivot toward moderation. He arranged for Gromyko and Ustinov to spend the rest of their lives under close surveillance near their respective hometowns. He appointed Mikhail Gorbachev foreign minister and Sergei Sokolov defense minister in their steads. The First Secretary then turned his attention toward getting himself and his country out of this mess. His chief priority became finding a way to do so without the USSR and its military facing further humiliation. Thankfully, he was about to be offered an olive branch and an exit.
President Kennedy heeded the advice of EXCOMM and reached out to Romanov directly via the “Hotline”. For the very first time, the two leaders communicated with only a translator to aid them, no other intermediaries. Though the conversation was short, blunt, and to the point, it achieved its purpose. Kennedy informed Romanov that he intended to continue to publicly back Sweden.
“If you’d like a way out of this thing,” the president said. “Then I believe I have one.”
Romanov said something. Kennedy waited for the translation. “I’m listening.”
Kennedy, looking across the command center at Ken O’Donnell, breathed a sigh of relief. Listening, the president firmly believed, was truly the first step toward understanding.
…
The ultimate agreement that ended the short-lived, undeclared Soviet-Swedish War of 1982 (heavily influenced by President Kennedy’s suggestions, but publicly proposed by US Ambassador to the UN Madeleine Albright), was as follows:
- Both Sweden and the Soviet Union agree to an immediate cessation of hostilities and the withdrawal of military forces from contested areas.
- Soviet forces will withdraw to pre-conflict positions along the border with Sweden, while Swedish forces will return to their bases. Both sides agree to refrain from any further military action or provocation.
- Neutral observers, possibly from the United Nations or a neutral country agreed upon by both parties, will be deployed to monitor the ceasefire and ensure compliance with the terms of the agreement. (This role would eventually be played by Finland).
- A joint verification mechanism, composed of representatives from both Sweden and the Soviet Union, will be established to verify the withdrawal of military forces and monitor the situation along the border.
- Sweden and the Soviet Union commit to engaging in diplomatic dialogue to address the underlying issues that led to the conflict. This may include discussions on territorial disputes, military maneuvers, and bilateral relations.
- President Kennedy, or a designated mediator approved by both parties, will facilitate diplomatic negotiations between Sweden and the Soviet Union to resolve any outstanding grievances and prevent future conflicts. (This role would eventually be fulfilled by Kalevi Sorsa, PM of Finland)
- Both parties agree to explore opportunities for cultural and economic exchange to foster mutual understanding and build trust between the Swedish and Soviet populations.
- Both Sweden and the Soviet Union express a commitment to reconciliation and cooperation, pledging to work towards a stable and peaceful relationship based on mutual respect and cooperation.
- A joint statement, issued by the leaders of Sweden and the Soviet Union, reaffirms their commitment to peace, stability, and the principles of international law. The statement acknowledges the challenges faced during the conflict and expresses a shared desire to move forward in a spirit of cooperation.
Because of the manner in which this final point was written, both sides could claim a moral victory. The Swedish could claim that they had stood firm, protected their territorial waters, and enforced international law. The Soviets meanwhile, did not have to admit that they were at fault for the war. They quietly dropped their demands for reparations. In the end, the damaged (but still afloat)
K-123 was delivered to Leningrad by Swedish tug boats. The thirty Soviet sailors whose capture had initiated the entire war were also returned. This occurred on October 13th, 1982, the day after Olof Palme began his next term as Prime Minister of Sweden.
The legacy of the Soviet-Swedish War is a complex one.
Despite being undeclared and lasting only about two weeks, it represented the start of a major turning point in the Cold War. An obvious instance of Soviet aggression had backfired spectacularly. The United States once again appeared reasonable, an arbiter of world peace, in comparison. President Kennedy won international praise for his role in negotiating a ceasefire. First Secretary Romanov meanwhile, was criticized for his “indecision” and “deference” that made the war possible in the first place, even if Gromyko and Ustinov were largely blamed for instigating it. Overall, it made the Soviet Union appear very, very weak.
Romanov’s moderate position became increasingly untenable in the Kremlin. Battle lines were being drawn between reactionary hardliners (who believed that Romanov should not have backed down, but should have given the military time to get its act together) and liberal reformers (who believed that he’d been too accommodating to the conservatives in the first place). With Gromyko out as foreign minister and Gorbachev, now one of the most influential voices on the Politburo in, the USSR’s foreign policy began to take a decisive step toward making peace and detente, at least for the foreseeable future. Romanov brought the increasingly popular Gorbachev into the fold, even naming him Deputy First Secretary of the Communist Party. For his part, Gorbachev used the experience of negotiating an end to the conflict to build relationships with President Kennedy and the American diplomats. He would need them to be friendly in order for his long-term plans to work out.
In Sweden, the families of the dead mourned, while the wounded did their best to carry on. Though relatively limited in scope, the war did cause the country’s vaunted policy of neutrality to undergo its first serious reexamination since 1945. Initially, Palme remained aloof to US overtures toward the possibility of Sweden joining NATO. But there was a growing movement within the country to abandon neutrality and to join the alliance. This movement would eventually grow to be too popular for Palme to ignore. In the lead up to the 1986 general elections, he vowed that, if reelected, he would not prevent Sweden’s joining NATO.
Only time would tell if that sentiment would hold.
Next Time on Blue Skies in Camelot: The 1982 Midterm Elections in the US
