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Secret police

A secret police force is an informal term for a police organization that operates in secret to enforce state security.

In non-democratic countries, such as police states, dictatorships and totalitarian states, the secret police often uses violent methods to suppress sedition, dissent, or political opposition.

Examples of Secret Police Forces

Nazi secret police forces:

• the Gestapo in Nazi Germany (the name is an abbreviation for Geheime Staatspolizei, German for "secret state police")

Fascist secret police forces:

• the OVRA in fascist-ruled Italy
• the Kempeitai in imperial Japan
• the Milice in Vichy France

Secret police forces in communist states:

• the Stasi in East Germany
• the CHEKA in the early days of the Russian revolution
• the NKVD in Stalin's USSR
• the KGB in the erstwhile USSR
• (See List of Soviet secret police agencies for the full list)
• the Securitate in communist-ruled Romania
• the Sigurimi in communist-ruled Albania
• the StB in communist-ruled Czechoslovakia
• the ÁVH in communist-ruled Hungary
• the Urzad Bezpieczenstwa (UB) and then Sluzba Bezpieczenstwa (SB) in the communist-ruled Poland
• the State Safety and Security Agency in the DPRK
• the Presidential Guard in Belarus
• to be done: People's Republic of China, Vietnam?

Middle-eastern secret police forces:

• the SAVAK in pre-revolutionary Iran
• the VEVAK in Iran today
• the Mukhabarat in Iraq under Saddam Hussein
• the National Security Service in Maldives
• the Ministry of National Security in Turkmenistan

North American secret police forces:

• the FBI (under the administration of J. Edgar Hoover)
• the Secret Service (domestic arm of the United States executive branch)
• the CIA (international arm of the United States executive branch)

Latin American secret police forces:

• The DINA under Augusto Pinochet's military dictatorship of Chile
• to be done: see also: Operation Condor

Caribbean secret police forces:

• Ton Ton Macoute in Haiti under François Duvalier, better known as Papa Doc
• Mongoose Gang in Eric Gairy's Grenada

African secret police forces:

• Bureau of State Security in South Africa
• DEMIAP in Congo-Kinshasa
• CIO in Zimbabwe

Historical secret police forces

The secret police of late Imperial Russia was the Okhranka, whose stated goal was to ensure the security of the Tsar.

Before World War II, the German Nazis created the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) to control domestic opposition.

During World War II, the Soviet Union had a counter-espionage agency, Smersh.

Fictional Examples of Secret Police Forces

• The Thought Police from George Orwell's Nineteen_Eighty-Four
• Section 31 from Star Trek - Federation
• Tal Shiar from Star Trek - Romulan secret police
• Obsidian Order from Star Trek - Cardassian secret police
• Cable Street Particulars from the Discworld - Ankh-Morpork secret police (under Captain Swing)
• Nightwatch from Babylon 5 - Earth Alliance secret police
• Psi Corps from Babylon 5 - Earth Alliance secret police composed of telepaths, essentially "Thought Police", often working in tandem with the Nightwatch. Possess obvious references to the tv show The Prisoner and the Gestapo, which several characters comment on within the series ("...what are you up to today? Annexing Sudetenland?")
• Inquisition (Warhammer 40,000) from Warhammer 40,000 - Imperial secret police similar to the Spanish Inquisition
• The Finger, the secret police of Norsefire, the fascist government of England, in V for Vendetta

Related articles

• Intelligence agency
• List of intelligence agencies
• Mass surveillance