I find it a little bit hard to believe that finding a couple of medals would be a priority as you're invading Denmark and Norway.
Sure, the Danes basically lay down and let the Germans march in, but really? The Germans needed to get to Norway asap, and were probably more concerned about that. Secure airfields, harbors, that kind of thing.
More likely the Danish cooperation policy helped later on, after the Germans had established themselves. Basically, the Danish government decided to save everyone a lot of trouble by cooperating with the invaders, a policy that is much discussed in Danish politics. It came to an end in 1943 after the Germans had done a number of hard to tolerate things.
They weren't looking for the medals specifically, they were looking for evidence of wrongdoing. If you're going to search for evidence, you're going to do it at least semi-thoroughly , cause you don't expect that sort of thing to just be sitting on a workbench (though you probably wouldn't go as far as digging holes in the backyard, unless you have specific reasons to think evidence was literally buried).
So the thing to do then is to track down the source quoted in the article When the Nazis ransacked Bohr's institute and figure out if it is exaggerated.
Your mere disbelief is rather weak in the face of statements like that one.
Flipping through the book, it doesn't give much detail as to when exactly the German stormtroopers came knocking.
The notes and errata at the end of the book don't seem to specify it either.
The point is the article makes it look like "oh crap the nazis have invaded, let's dissolve these medals" rather than "they been here for a few weeks and look like they're about to settle some bits of nazi business".
Sure, the Danes basically lay down and let the Germans march in, but really? The Germans needed to get to Norway asap, and were probably more concerned about that. Secure airfields, harbors, that kind of thing.
More likely the Danish cooperation policy helped later on, after the Germans had established themselves. Basically, the Danish government decided to save everyone a lot of trouble by cooperating with the invaders, a policy that is much discussed in Danish politics. It came to an end in 1943 after the Germans had done a number of hard to tolerate things.