quisling

Vidkun Quisling (1887–1945) was a Norwegian military officer and politician who collaborated with Nazi Germany during World War II. He headed a German-supported collaborationist government in occupied Norway from 1942 until the end of the war, and his name became a byword for treachery and political opportunism.

Quisling was born in Fyresdal, Telemark, and trained as a military officer. In the 1930s he founded the Nasjonal Samling party, a fascist-inspired movement that urged close cooperation with Nazi Germany and rejected parliamentary democracy.

During the German invasion of Norway in April 1940, Quisling briefly proclaimed a government and attempted a coup; the move failed to gain legitimacy at home. After the occupation was established, he was installed by the Germans as the head of a collaborationist Norwegian regime, sometimes called the Quisling government, which aligned Norwegian policy with German priorities and assisted in implementing anti-Jewish measures and other repression. He held the title of minister-president until the end of the occupation.

Following the war, Quisling was arrested, tried for treason and collaboration, and executed by firing squad on 24 October 1945 at Akershus Fortress in Oslo.

The term “quisling” has entered many languages as a synonym for traitor or collaborator with an occupying power.