Sweden supplied 10 million tons of iron ore per year to Germany from 1940-1943, as much as in the pre-war year 1938, in addition to vast numbers of manufactured ball bearings.
All in all, Sweden, just like Switzerland, avoided WWII and occupation by becoming nazi collaborants, rather than their credible deterrent force. The vast income they made on the tremendous suffering of WWII is the source of their current-day prosperity. Frankly, both country should cough up some large sum to compensate the victims of WWII.
- Among other things, remaining neutral in the context of an armed conflict involves continuing doing trade with everyone.
The Swedish trade policy remained intact.
Back then, Sweden would have been happy to do much more of trade with the Allies.
However, Germany happened to invade Denmark and Norway.
If the generation of my grandparents simply would've shut the country down, deliberately starve themselves and refuse to do trade with anyone else, would that’ve meant true neutrality?