Linda, As in the Linda Murder

45 Stockholm, Monday 4 August

On Monday morning the National Rapid-Response Unit conducted a major exercise around the Kronoberg block that contained police headquarters on Kungsholmen in Stockholm. Neighbouring blocks were cordoned off, but ‘for practical reasons and out of consideration for the people living there’ local residents and people already in the area weren’t evacuated. So there were plenty of spectators to watch what was happening, and within just a few minutes the first camera teams from the usual television channels were in place.

In total, four members of the unit, wearing black overalls and black face masks and with the usual weapons, abseiled down from the roof of the block closest to the road. When they reached the ninth floor they — to judge by the muffled explosions — set off small explosive devices around the windows, knocked them out and clambered into the building. The phones in the national police headquarters were extremely busy, a special press officer was already in place, and the representatives of the media were told that this was an entirely normal exercise within the frame of the so-called 11 September Project.

The National Rapid-Response Unit was practising in case there was ever a coup aimed at the top leadership of the Swedish Police, but more detailed information could not be revealed for obvious reasons, because further disclosure would have negated the whole point of the exercise.

The media were apparently happy with this explanation. All the television channels showed footage of the exercise, but mainly because they were good images in a time of news drought. A representative of the rapid-response unit was interviewed, and explained in general terms what they were doing.

‘We conduct exercises all the time,’ he said. ‘And it’s in the nature of the beast that some of our exercises involve people and targets that mean they can’t always be concealed from the general public. Unfortunately this is unavoidable, and naturally we can only apologize if we alarmed anyone unnecessarily. We did consider evacuating local residents, but because that’s a different sort of exercise, and one that is principally the domain of the regular police, we decided against it.’

And with this the matter was put to bed. People from the highways agency, overseen by uniformed police officers, cleaned up fragments of glass from the lawn and street in front of police headquarters, the uniformed officers removed the cordons with the help of the highways agency, and everything returned to normal. The weather had been just the same as it had been throughout this remarkable summer. Between twenty and thirty degrees in the shade, from early morning to late in the evening.