Gladio: history in Holland
01 January 1991
Gladio: history in Holland
bacdoc March=1992
On 25 January 1992, the Dutch weekly Vrij Nederland published
a 6-page article on Dutch Gladio history (Paul Koedijk,
"Gladio in
Nederland") based on interviews with some retired officers. It
gives some details on the fifties and sixties, mostly on the
Intelligence branch, not the Operations.
The foundation for Dutch post-war intelligence was laid by
(then
captain) J.M. Somer in London on Nov. 28, 1942, when he
established Bureau Inlichtingen (Intelligence Dept.). At that
moment, Dutch intelligence in London was in shambles. After
returning to liberated Holland, Somer began working on the
secret stay behind network which he concluded had been badly
missing in
1940. This became the section G7 Algemene Zaken (General
Affairs) in 1947. Col. Somer recruited many former resistance
members before he was succeeded by Baron Van Lynden in 1948.
This cavalry officer had little experience in intelligence,
but had gained himself a reputation in political stubbornness
against
the German authorities (not very usual among Dutch military
officers during World War II) and escape techniques. By 1950,
the
intelligence network consisted of some 100 agents. From 1961
to 1971, Van Borssum Buisman headed section `I'.
In 1949 the Wuco, the Western Union Committee, had been
established to coordinate European networks. In 1951 this was
replaced by the Coordination and Planning Committee (CPC),
situated in Paris. By 1956 the cooperation between Western
European stay behind networks had reached a fairly high level.
Almost all had in the early days drawn on British training
facilities, but in the late 1950s the American influence
became stronger.
In the 1950s the other branch, Operations or `O', of the Dutch
stay behind organization was formed by Dr. Louis Einthoven,
who was at the same time head of the Binnenlandse
Veiligheidsdienst BVD (Security Service). This branch was even
more secretive than the intelligence branch (known as `I').
Its members seldom met, there was no full-time staff nor a
fixed address or offices.
Peter Klerks (Statewatch, Amsterdam)