Operation Weserübung's first wave was divided among six naval groups. Scharnhorst and Gneisenau covered the force carrying about 2,000 mountain troops under General Eduard Dietl toward Narvik, while Admiral Hipper and four destroyers took about 1,700 troops to Trondheim. Köln, Königsberg, the training ship Bremse, the S-boat tender Carl Peters, two torpedo boats, and smaller craft carried roughly 1,900 troops toward Bergen. Karlsruhe, torpedo boats, motor torpedo boats, and the tender Tsingtau formed the group for Kristiansand and Arendal; other groups targeted Oslo and the communications point at Egersund. Norway's most ready formation, the 6th Division under Carl Gustav Fleischer, was far to the north watching the Soviet frontier during the Winter War. The simultaneous maritime thrusts turned Norway's long coastline and scattered ports into a command and mobilization problem.
Chapter · 37:20-40:28
Operation Weserübung attacks several ports at once
Six German naval groups carried troops toward Narvik, Trondheim, Bergen, Kristiansand and Arendal, Oslo, and Egersund, creating several distant crises at once.