Which Country Remained Neutral During The War

Switzerland, Sweden, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Turkey, and a Few Others

When people ask me which country remained neutral during the war, they're almost always talking about World War II. It seems straightforward on paper — you declare neutrality, you don't pick a side, the world burns around you — but actually running a neutral policy while surrounded by occupying powers is one of the most stressful exercises in geopolitical survival I've ever seen anyone discuss in detail. Let me walk through how it actually worked for the main cases, because the textbook answer is misleading. Switzerland is the one people name first, and for good reason. They maintained armed neutrality throughout both world wars, with a mobilized militia of roughly 850,000 soldiers by 1939. The strategy was simple in theory: make invasion so costly that Hitler would find another route. In practice, Switzerland also engaged in significant economic accommodation with the Third Reich — trading foreign exchange reserves, routing gold shipments, and maintaining crucial railway links through the Gotthard tunnel even after 1943 when the outcome seemed clearer. I spent an afternoon once trying to untangle the timeline of Swiss gold transactions for a research project, and the paper trail is uncomfortably long. The Swiss National Bank accepted an estimated 1.574 billion francs worth of gold from German sources between 1940 and 1945, much of it from Holocaust victims. That's not anti-neutral commentary, it's just the ledger. Sweden's case is more complicated and honestly more interesting. They stayed officially neutral but made substantial concessions to Germany, particularly in the critical period of 1940 to 1943. Swedish iron ore from the Kiruna and Gällivare mines flowed to German industry throughout the war — about 60% of Germany's iron ore imports came through Swedish territory, often via Norwegian ports after the April 1940 occupation made the direct route harder. Sweden also allowed German transit troops to cross northern Finland (that's the Petsamo corridor arrangement) and supplied the Finns with weapons during the Continuation War against the Soviet Union. The Swedish government called it "neutrality with adjustments" — anpassad neutralitet — which is a phrase I've never found an English equivalent that captures the moral equivalency of it.

Spain under Franco declared "non-belligerency" rather than true neutrality when the war broke out, then shifted to neutrality in 1943 as the Axis situation deteriorated. The Blue Division — roughly 18,000 Spanish volunteers who fought on the Eastern Front against the Soviets from 1941 to 1943 — complicates the picture considerably. Franco kept them there until about August 1943, when he recalled them despite pressure from within his own regime to keep sending men. The timing coincided almost exactly with the Soviet counter-offensive at Kursk and the Allied landings in Sicily, which suggests the calculation was primarily strategic rather than moral. Portugal under Salazar maintained neutrality throughout, but the Azores issue caused enormous friction with the United States. Churchill pressured Lisbon relentlessly for military basing rights in the Atlantic islands. Salazar refused until November 1943, when he finally granted the UK and US use of the Azores bases — a decision that came after considerable hedging and only once the war's direction was clear enough that withholding the bases offered no leverage. The Portuguese had been playing both sides since 1939, selling tungsten to Germany while quietly allowing American pressure through diplomatic channels. Ireland (Éire) is perhaps the most principled neutral case. They maintained strict neutrality throughout the entire war, refused all bases to either side, and interned airmen from both the Allies and Axis who landed on their territory. The Irish government under de Valera attended Hitler's funeral in 1945 as a deliberate diplomatic statement — not sympathy for Nazism, but a signal that Ireland answered to no one's agenda. The cost was real though: Northern Ireland became a source of constant tension, and there were genuine IRA operations across the border that the Irish government struggled to contain without appearing complicit.

Turkey under Atatürk's successors stayed neutral until February 1945, when they finally issued a formal declaration of war — on Germany, incidentally, not Japan. This was almost entirely symbolic. Turkish troops never saw combat. The real game was economic: Turkey supplied chromium, a critical war material, to the Allies starting in 1941 after Germany threatened invasion if Turkey didn't choose a side. The chromite exports stopped briefly in 1944 when the Allies pressured Ankara, then resumed at reduced volumes. The exact quantities are disputed — Turkish customs records from this period are incomplete — but estimates put annual exports at somewhere between 50,000 and 100,000 tons before the final cutoff.

The Practical Mechanics of Staying Neutral

Neutrality isn't a switch you flip. It's a daily operational discipline that requires managing conflicting pressures from multiple belligerents simultaneously. The legal framework comes from the Hague Conventions of 1907 — specifically the Fifth and Thirteenth Conventions that define neutral rights and duties. A neutral state must not supply troops, weapons, or military credits to any belligerent, must prevent its territory from being used for military operations by any side, and must treat all belligerents equally in matters of trade and transit. The equal treatment requirement is where things get genuinely difficult. If you allow one side to use your railways for troop movements, you must allow the other side the same privilege — which means in practice you often allow neither, or you find ways to make both arrangements equally inconvenient. Switzerland handled this by allowing German goods trains through the Gotthard tunnel but requiring them to travel in darkness with armed escorts and at reduced speeds. The Germans accepted this because the alternative — using the older, longer routes through Austria — would have consumed valuable fuel and rolling stock. Sweden's transit arrangements followed a similar logic of calibrated inconvenience. The Germans could move divisional equipment through northern Sweden to Norway, but the Swedish rail authorities required advance notice of 72 hours, dictated the exact routing, and maintained the right to inspect all cargo. Most inspections were cursory — the Swedes understood that blocking German supplies entirely would invite occupation — but they kept the legal mechanism available as a deterrent.

One thing most people miss about wartime neutrality is how much it depends on domestic political cohesion. Switzerland's neutrality worked partly because the country had genuine multilingual, multi-ethnic tensions that made any collaboration with Nazi Germany politically toxic across the entire spectrum. French-speaking Switzerland was vehemently anti-German, Italian-speaking Switzerland had fascist sympathies but also strong anti-Nazi sentiment, and the German-speaking population was divided but not majority-collaborationist. The resulting political equilibrium made decisive pro-Axis action impossible without triggering civil conflict. Spain's case shows the opposite problem. Franco's regime was deeply factionalized, with genuine Francoists who wanted to join the Axis and pragmatic conservatives who understood Spain had just suffered through a brutal civil war (1936-1939) and couldn't sustain another conflict. The result was a policy of "non-belligerency" that satisfied neither camp fully and required constant improvisation. I once read a transcript of a September 1940 meeting between Franco and Hitler at Hendaye where Franco effectively negotiated for two hours of additional territory and supplies before the meeting was cut short by German impatience. The handshake photo was published worldwide as a triumph of Spanish diplomacy, but the actual substance was closer to stalling until the war's outcome became clear.

The Gold Standard Problem

Swiss banks during the war accepted deposits from Nazi Germany that included gold ripped from occupied countries and murdered citizens. The exact figures remain disputed because Swiss banking secrecy laws protected the records until the late 1990s, when international pressure forced partial disclosure. What we know is disturbing: an estimated 2.3 billion francs in deposits came from German sources between 1939 and 1945, representing roughly 15-20% of all Swiss banking assets at the time. A significant portion of this was gold — not just central bank reserves, but personal gold including teeth, wedding rings, and coins extracted from concentration camp victims. The Swiss argument was that they were simply processing transactions like any other bank, and that refusing the gold would have caused Germany to confiscate Swiss assets outright. This is technically true but morally insufficient. The Swiss National Bank could have required additional documentation, delayed settlements, or at minimum flagged suspicious transactions. They did none of these things systematically. The 1996 collapse of the Jaffa lawsuit (where American Holocaust survivors sued Swiss banks for dormant accounts) forced some transparency, but the full picture may never emerge given Swiss succession laws that destroyed many wartime records in the 1950s. Sweden's gold transactions were smaller in absolute terms but equally troubling per capita. The Riksbank accepted roughly 20 tons of German gold during the war, including some that can be traced to Holocaust victims. The Swedish government's defense was that they needed hard currency to buy essential imports from countries that demanded payment in gold — particularly the United States, from which Sweden imported food and industrial materials throughout the conflict. This is a genuine constraint, not an excuse, but it doesn't absolve the moral responsibility.

Small Neutrals That Got Squeezed

Austria was neutral in 1938-1939, then ceased to exist as an independent state after the March 1938 annexation (Anschluss). Technically Austria was a neutral country until it wasn't, which is an unhelpful distinction for anyone researching the period. The Austrian government under Schuschnigg had maintained a form of neutrality similar to Switzerland's since 1934, but the policy collapsed entirely when German troops crossed the border without significant resistance. Liechtenstein is an interesting edge case. They maintained neutrality throughout the war, had no army (having dissolved theirs in 1868), and were essentially economic vassals of Switzerland. When Hitler asked Liechtenstein to join the Reich, the Prince responded by declaring that Liechtenstein would remain neutral and that the request was "not in the spirit of German-Liechtenstein relations." The exact wording is debated, but the gesture — coming from a country with a population of about 16,000 at the time — carries more weight than most people give it. San Marino declared neutrality in 1939, then was occupied by Italian forces in 1943 when the Fascist regime collapsed. The San Marinese government re-established neutrality in 1944 after Allied troops passed through the territory. The entire conflict involved perhaps a single artillery exchange between British and German forces near the border, with no significant San Marinese involvement. It's the smallest neutral state in absolute terms, and arguably the least consequential.

What Neutrality Actually Cost

Switzerland's economic cost was significant but survivable. The country experienced severe food shortages during the war, with rationing similar to what Britain endured. The Swiss franc strengthened considerably against most European currencies, which helped finance imports but made Swiss exports uncompetitive. Industrial production grew but was directed primarily toward military needs — the Swiss arms industry supplied rifles, artillery, and precision instruments to Germany despite official neutrality. Sweden's cost was higher. The country ran persistent balance of payments deficits, financed by drawing on pre-war foreign exchange reserves and borrowing from Germany. The Krona was overvalued relative to the Reichsmark, which subsidized German purchases of Swedish goods. This created inflationary pressure that didn't become obvious until after the war, when Sweden faced the same kind of postwar adjustment that Britain and France had already experienced. Turkey's neutrality was economically costly in a different way. The chromite embargo imposed by the Allies in 1944 cut off Turkey's primary export market almost overnight. The Turkish lira depreciated sharply, and the country experienced serious inflation. The government responded with price controls and rationing, which were partially effective but created black markets that persisted for years after the war ended.

The human cost of neutrality is harder to quantify but more important. Switzerland interned roughly 100,000 refugees during the war, including about 30,000 Jews who were turned away at the border in conditions that some historians compare to the handling of the MS St. Louis in 1939. The Swiss government's policy was explicit: refugees would be processed at the border, and those without valid documentation or financial means would be returned. This policy saved some lives — the processing system meant that wealthier Jews could sometimes bribe their way in — but it also meant that poor Jews, who were often the most vulnerable, were systematically excluded. Sweden interned roughly 2,000 refugees and turned away an estimated 10,000-12,000 more, including many Jews fleeing Norway and Denmark. The Swedish government's justification was capacity: the country simply didn't have the infrastructure to absorb large numbers of refugees during a wartime economy. This is partially true but also a convenient explanation — Sweden had accepted far larger numbers of refugees during the Finnish Civil War in 1918 and the Spanish Republican exodus in 1939.

The Postwar Reckoning

Switzerland's neutrality was largely accepted by the Allies after 1945, partly because the country's strategic position made occupation impractical and partly because Swiss banks held substantial deposits belonging to Allied governments and institutions. The U.S. Congress debated withholding Swiss gold reserves in 1945 but ultimately decided against it, citing the need to maintain Swiss financial stability during the reconstruction period. The Cold War further cemented Switzerland's importance as a neutral banking hub, and the postwar narrative of heroic resistance largely erased the accommodationist aspects of the wartime period. Sweden faced more criticism but less structural consequence. The country's prewar cooperation with Nazi Germany was well documented, and the postwar government acknowledged some mistakes — particularly the transit arrangements for German troops heading to Finland. But Sweden's position as a bridge between East and West during the Cold War gave it strategic value that outweighed the moral in the eyes of Western policymakers. Spain's Franco regime survived the war largely because the Allies needed a stable, anti-communist government in the Iberian Peninsula. The Spanish claim to "non-belligerency" was accepted with some embarrassment, and the Blue Division veterans were welcomed home as heroes rather than treated as collaborators. It wasn't until the 1980s, when Spain joined the European Community, that the Franco period was more honestly reassessed — and even then, the transition to democracy was negotiated rather than revolutionary, which meant that many Franco-era institutions and personnel remained in place.

Turkey's neutrality was largely forgotten after the war, partly because the country quickly aligned with the West during the Cold War and partly because the chromite dispute was resolved through the Marshall Plan, which provided Turkey with substantial economic assistance in exchange for political alignment. The neutrality period was treated as a pragmatic necessity rather than a moral achievement, which is probably the most accurate assessment. Ireland's neutrality was respected but not celebrated. The country's refusal to join NATO or accept American bases was consistent with its broader policy of military non-alignment, but the wartime record was relatively quiet compared to the dramatic neutrality debates that consumed Swiss and Swedish politics. Postwar Ireland focused on economic development and eventual European integration, treating the wartime period as a chapter best left undisturbed.

Why the Question Keeps Coming Up

People ask which country remained neutral during the war because the answer feels morally ambiguous in a way that most historical questions don't. The Allies committed atrocities (the firebombing of Dresden, the atomic bombings, the Soviet occupation of Eastern Europe). The Axis committed atrocities (the Holocaust, the Nanjing massacre, systematic rape and murder across occupied Europe). Neutrality sits in an uncomfortable middle ground where you're neither hero nor villain but also not innocent. The countries that maintained neutrality during the war did so for a combination of geographic, economic, and political reasons that vary significantly by case. Some were mountain fortresses (Switzerland). Some were resource suppliers (Sweden, Turkey). Some were exhausted from previous conflicts (Spain, Ireland). Some were strategically positioned to play both sides (Portugal). None were morally blameless. The difference between them is largely a matter of degree and timing — how much accommodation they made, when they made it, and whether they tried to minimize the harm afterward. The practical lesson for anyone studying this period is that neutrality isn't a moral category. It's a set of policies that can be implemented with varying degrees of integrity and courage. Switzerland's neutrality required genuine military preparation and diplomatic skill. Sweden's required constant balancing between German demands and Allied pressure. Spain's required maintaining authoritarian control while avoiding entanglement in a continental war. Turkey's required economic management under severe constraint. Each approach had costs and compromises that deserve honest assessment rather than simplistic judgment.