Johan Wennström

Farmers, factory workers, gamekeepers, and traveling salesmen were recruited into a clandestine resistance network, trained to operate radios, use dead drops, scout escape routes, and if necessary, sabotage an invading army.

Historian Johan Wennström joins me to reveal the extraordinary story behind Sweden's stay-behind organization.

He explains why officially neutral Sweden quietly collaborated with MI6, the CIA, and NATO, how the organization preserved its secrecy, and why the royal family and government might have fled to Britain.

It's a gripping account of patriotism, secrecy, sacrifice, and of hundreds of civilian volunteers who carried the burden of a war that thankfully never came to Sweden.

I'm delighted to welcome Johan Wennström to our Cold War conversation.

Sweden during the Cold War is often perceived as this vaguely left-wing pacifist country that couldn't really decide between NATO and the Soviet Union.

But in fact, we abstained from joining NATO in '49 in order to protect our neighbor, Finland, from complete Soviet annexation.

It existed for decades, yet remarkably little was publicly known about it.

Our guest today, Johan Wennström, has used previously classified documents, archival research, and first-hand testimony to uncover the story of Sweden's extraordinary stay-behind network, who created it, how it worked, and what its existence tells us about Sweden during the Cold War.

[upbeat music] Do you love spy books, movies, and TV? Then the Spyberry podcast is for you.

Since 2017, host Shane Whaley and Spyberry field agents around the world dispatch reviews and interviews with authors, historians, and fellow spy fans.

Spyberry is available on all good podcast apps and at spyberry.com.

Välkommen.

How are you, sir, Johan Wennström?

[laughs] Thank you very much, Shane.