(THIS ARTICLE IS MACHINE TRANSLATED by Google from Norwegian)
Orientering 14. December 1968
For decades, the psychological novel has occupied a dominant place in Norwegian poetry. It has been the author's deepest pity to shed light on dark places in the enigmatic depths called the human soul.
This year we have received a book in which the author derives his material from an area that is far more unexplored and mysterious than the human mind: Our secret police. Here you have no research to adhere to, here you can not carry out on-the-spot investigations to obtain exact knowledge of the substance you want to treat. Everyone knows that the secret police (Surveillance Police) exists, but few know how it works. We know the boss's name, we know where the headquarters is (Victoria Terrace). Our knowledge is otherwise limited to what leaks out in "work accidents" ie leaks, or when the boss commits stupidity in newspaper interviews (Bryhn). Recently, Chief Editor Christensen in Morgenbladet has also given us a small glow on the television (where he has now apparently become a kind of permanent employee) about his many years of service in the monitoring service. Haavard Haavardsholm has written a book about the surveillance service. "The Hidden Services," and the title he got for free. It comes from a speech by Mr Advocate JC Mellbye, who chaired the parliamentary-appointed committee that examined our surveillance agencies: "If we think it serious that we want to defend ourselves, we have to accept the hidden services."
The lawyer seems to have kept his word. The freedom-loving Norwegian people have largely accepted the hidden services. For years, the secret police could conduct their political mapping activities without anyone being particularly disturbed by curiosity on the part of the public. The agency has been able to enjoy an extensive "work calm". Fortunately, it now seems that some people are beginning to realize the dangers of such a police and I think Haavardsholm's book can be a useful wake-up call, so that this interest is maintained.
The book is written as a series of reports from a snuff – he works as a handyman in a hotel – to his client. The production is exciting, entertaining and with an impressive richness of detail and ingenuity. One reads it as a crime novel. This is perhaps also the book's biggest weakness. The reader will probably regard it as a kind of science fiction novel, as far removed from our reality as Mandrake and the Phantom. But this objection can not possibly affect the author: He has not had any opportunities to write a documentary on the subject.
The author's intent has otherwise hardly stated on the cover: "What Haavardsholm has wanted to show is how a surveillance body can develop into a kind of secret police, where the 'right' unscrupulous people can become extortionists, provocateurs and secret murderers. »
Another important moment as the publisher does not mention: that a surveillance police in a NATO country must necessarily develop in a reactionary and fascist direction! Haavardsholm has, without saying it directly, asked the question that can simply be formulated as follows: What is the difference in principle between the secret police Justice Minister Schweigaard Selmer, and the secret police that her Greek colleague is in charge of? The differences may seem obvious, as the interrogations in Strasbourg have proven: our secret police have no yaros, no arbitrary arrests are made on a political basis, torture is currently not being carried out on Victoria Terrace. But the differences must not cover the main thing: the Norwegian and Greek secret police are in fact servants for the same cause and for the same gentlemen: NATO, the CIA and the Pentagon.
If now the political conditions were to change in our country? If we were to have an almost Greek situation in the sense that we had a political development that endangered our NATO membership? Our exception laws are ready for such an eventuality. What guarantees do we have for Mrs. Selmer's police officers to act more humane than her Greek colleagues? We have learned from Strasbourg that the very chief tourist tourist in Athens has received his education in the United States as a CIA fellow. Is it unlikely to believe that our surveillance police have also been provided with such scholarships? After all, the CIA has been extremely generous with financial aid in favor of other organizations in our country.
The Minister of Justice reassures: everything is under parliamentary control. We are encouraged to trust the Mellbye committee. After all, the most important sections of this report have not been published. Do we have any reason to trust that the committee has put all – absolutely all – facts on the table? We know that there is a lot of untruth in this case. For example, the claim that no registration is conducted according to political guidelines. It is, after all, the reality of the supervisor personally – Asbjørn Bryhn – in his notorious interview with VG, where he generally stamps left radicals – even opponents of the Common Market – as potential traitors. All "work accidents" and leaks in the Surveillance Authority point to a "political" registration.
Another question is also not mentioned much in the public debate (as also suggested in Haavardsholm's book): To what extent does the CCP cooperate with the CIA and similar bodies in other NATO countries? In an article in the Dagbladet, in my time, I accused the Surveillance Police of acting as a sign of Norwegians against a foreign power (USA). The starting point was the 17-year-old sea boy who was denied land in New York. His father was a communist and he himself had been to a children's camp in Czechoslovakia. How can police in the United States conduct such a close inspection of Norwegian seamen without intimate contact with Norwegian police? If there is no such contact, the matter is almost worse: then the Americans themselves have such a well-developed intelligence apparatus in this country that they survey seafarers and other political backgrounds.
I never received any response to this charge. Finn Gustavsen repeats the charge in his book, without reaction.
We must therefore assume that the indications have taken place, that is that the Surveillance Police in Norway furthers its brother organizations in other NATO countries with information on Norwegian citizens' political attitudes. The development in Greece has made this question particularly relevant: are there also contacts between the Norwegian and the Greek secret police? The likelihood suggests that the Greek military junta, through its intimate contacts with the CIA, will be able to obtain information about the Norwegians' political stance on the basis of material obtained through telephone interception and political registration of the junta on Victoria's terrace.
Both politically and militarily, we have become integrated into the NATO system. Does anyone really think that surveillance is kept out of this collaboration?
It is commendable that Haavardsholm has addressed the problems of the Surveillance Police to dictatorial treatment. He has done an outstanding job on an almost impossible task. But the question is whether the fictional form is the right way to deal with this problem.
Today is the slogan: concrete analysis of Norwegian reality. A survey of the activities of the Surveillance Police should be an important part of this analysis. A systematic collection of information on the work of the Surveillance Police should be initiated. Among other things, we know that around the various workplaces there are people who act as "snuff men" – they give reports of political activity, political attitude etc. among their workmates. They are perhaps the most important police assistants. These people should be located so that one can warn against their dirty business.
In such a localization work one should be able to use the experience of the Occupation period, even at that time Norwegians were willing to use themselves in this disgraceful way. They should constantly know that they are being observed.
Who should organize such a study? Of course, the group of Norwegians that the political mapping business is targeting: The left-wing radical movement, which today is at the forefront of Norwegian sovereignty and Norwegian independence.
