 Active resistance to the German occupation among the populace, virtually nonexistent before 1943, increased after the declaration of martial law.The intelligence operations of the Danish resistance was described as "second to none" by Field Marshal Bernard Law Montgomery after the liberation of Denmark.After Nazi Germany invaded the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, and the Wehrmacht reached Estonia in July 1941, most Estonians greeted the Germans with relatively open arms and hoped for restored independence but it soon became clear that sovereignty was out of the question.