How Did Switzerland Manage To Remain Neutral In Ww2?

Its kinda surrounded by mtns...Hitler couldn't get in quickly and it would cost too much and take too much time to conquer Switzerland...Hitler had bigger fish to fry.

Almost everyone has heard about the complicated situation of Switzerland during the second world war. As the country was told to remain neutral in 1815 - when Napoleon's France was defeated and the winner nations drew up a new Europe - Switzerland had a "defence-only" army.

During ww2 Switzerland continued selling military equipment to the axis AND allies. Germany was also free to use it as economic platform. Beside this some swiss bankers made dealings receiving jewish money or gold as exchange - it is not known if they knew exactly where it came from. And as main sponsors of the construction of the north-south-railway line before 1900, Germany and Italy still had transportation privileges. But this is only the situation Adolf Hitler's Germany could live with in the very late years of the war... At the beginning, in late 1939, everything looked different.
Mussolini's Italy worked together with Germany, Russia had signed a non-aggression paper and the USA entered war in late 1941. German troops easily conquered Poland and France... Britain seemed to fall soon, too (even if it didn't at the end).
Switzerland, not used to join any alliances in times of war, was literally all alone - mobilising it's army to guard the border with 450'000 soldiers - as Germany had already plans for invasion.
But taking Norway easily with 6 divisions the plans to take on Switzerland included about 15 infantry and 15 tank divisions... And clashes between swiss air force and german Luftwaffe in June 1940 had surprisingly negative outcome for the germans.

Swiss government dressed up the strategic (and insane) "réduit" defence plan - consisting in a complete withdrawal of troops into the alpine area in case of a german invasion. Bridges and tunnels were charged with explosives (in fact a traffic accident in St. Gotthard few years ago almost blew up the mountain because of the extremely near charges).
To leave Switzerland aside wasn't what Germany intended to do in the early moments of war... But defence attitude delayed any projects. Later in war the german troops were spread all over Europe and couldn't be concentrated anymore. The second option, leaving it in peace, became viable - as Switzerland wasn't dangerous for Germany and it could be used as economic platform by any country on earth.

Swiss media, especially newspapers and radio were uncensored during war. Foreign aircraft were forced to land... More than 1'000 US airmen of damaged bombers stayed in Switzerland at the end of the war. About 30'000 jewish refugees entered the country; others couldn't enter anymore when the border was closed (what in fact a lot of nations did, USA included).

All this in fact means that the country didn't join any side at war. Though it played a certain role... For allies and axis as economic or spy platform... And for itself.
In a real invasion situation Germany would certainly have overrun Switzerland at the end... Nevertheless the "down-to-earth" swiss soldiers showed they would at least have tried to prevent this.
So, neutrality is complex and difficult. Switzerland did some mistakes. But the legend of the swiss army isn't only a 100% mythos... At least nobody can call them cowards.