A subject likely unfamiliar to most English-speaking readers is the 1973 “IB affair”, when the existence of Sweden’s secret intelligence service was exposed and its director, Birger Elmér, named. A left-wing journal revealed that IB, as the service was known, collaborated with Western and Israeli counterparts—and conducted surveillance of domestic communists in strategic Swedish workplaces, with the assistance of Social Democratic officials. It is above all the latter activities that have endured in public memory, and that still haunt Swedish debate.
IB and its chief Elmér figure in the background of my forthcoming book, The Stay Behinds: Sweden’s Cold War Guardians (Osprey/Bloomsbury, 2026). I also spoke to Jan Guillou, one of the journalists whose reporting brought IB to light. In today’s Aftonbladet, I offer a fuller account for Swedish readers that challenges received ideas. What follows is a translated excerpt:
[N]either Social De…
