Hans S. Jacobsen: Founder and Editor of the National Socialist journal Ragnarok

(February 10, 1901 - November 19, 1980)

Background and studies

Jacobsen was trained as a social economist and was a research fellow at the Institut für Weltwissenschaft und Seeverkehr at the University of Kiel in the period 1922–1925. In the period 1925–1927 he was a scholar in the USA.

Back in Germany in 1927, he became acquainted with Norwegian students, such as the jurist Albert Wiesener and the later social scientist Arvid Brodersen. These acquaintances made Jacobsen orientate himself in the direction of pan-Germanism. Brodersen in particular gave Jacobsen the intellectual basis for his racial thinking. During his time in Germany, he experienced the suffering and distress after the Treaty of Versailles close to his life, and tied him emotionally strongly to Germany.

He began his stay in the USA by working in the Ford factory in Detroit, where he got to experience the perspective of the workers from below. These experiences made him a sharp critic of unfettered liberal capitalism.

In the period leading up to the war, he worked as a ship broker and journalist. Among other things, he founded and edited the National Socialist journal Ragnarok.

National Socialist involvement in the pre-war period

In Norway, Jacobsen early became a prominent figure in the left-wing Quisling-critical National Socialist milieu, where emphasis was placed on the last link in National Socialism, with community solutions, planned economy, high tax pressure for high incomes, publicly owned institutions and social systems. This was necessary to get society out of the social distress that private capital's greed and politicians had gotten society into. This environment was not internationally oriented, the solutions had to be found on a national level, but Jacobsen, like so many in this environment, was also strong characterized by pan-Germanic and Völkisch thinking.

Through the journal Ragnarok, Jacobsen measured much of this criticism and released it to many others in the environment, including Stein Barth-Heyerdahl, Per Imerslund, Geirr Tveitt, Tor Strand, Otto Sverdrup Engelschiøn, Albert Wiesener and eventually also Walter Fyrst. Jacobsen was strongly skeptical of the leadership principle, as power should go from the bottom up, from the campaigners who were constantly hardened in battle, and to leaders who are also actively participating in the battle and know it. Only in this way would the leaders have legitimacy.

The Ragnarok Circle and the SS

Jacobsen voiced his concern in a conversation with Heinrich Himmler during the annual conference of the Nordische Gesellschaft in 1937. When it gradually dawned on the Norwegians that Hauer and his neo-pagans could no longer function as an efficient ally, their focus gravitated more towards Himmler and his organization, especially after the German occupation of Norway.

In the summer of 1940 Jacobsen traveled to Germany on behalf of the Ragnarok Circle and other prominent pro-German, anti-Quisling Norwegians who had received disturbing reports indicating that Hitler had decided to opt for a government led by Quisling. In Berlin he was received by Heinrich Himmler himself. Himmler was no supporter of Quisling, but was compelled to inform Jacobsen that Hitler's decision was final. However, later that year he wrote to Jacobsen, assuring him the Ragnarok Circle would soon be given the opportunity to fight for their ideas within the framework of the ss, since it had been decided to establish a local equivalent to the Allgemeine-SS in Norway – Norges SS, later renamed Germanske SS Norge (GSSN).

According to Jacobsen's view, the ss was an exponent of 'aristocratic socialism', and drew together the supreme elite of committed idealists within the Germanic countries. It 'struggled for full equality and against any degrading or suppression of the racially kindred Norwegian people', as he puts it. Consequently, the GSSN, and the SS in general, seemed to strive for exactly the same goals as the Ragnarok Circle, and could therefore in the latter's view be of use in their oppositional struggle against Quisling and Terboven. It is thus no wonder that they grabbed at the sacrifice made by Himmler. Jacobsen became editor of Germaneren, the house organ of the gssn, and Per Imerslund became one of its most prominent contributors.

Nasjonal Samling

When Norway was occupied by Germany in 1940, Jacobsen, like a number of others in his circle who had previously been members, rejoined the Nasjonal Samling. He continued to publish the NS-critical Ragnarok and was also linked to the Germanic SS Norway, which also distinguished itself as a National Socialist and pan-Germanic to Nasjonal Samling.

After the war

In 1948 he was sentenced to eight years of forced labour. After the war, he resumed his writing and publishing activities. In 1966 he had the Quisling biography Quisling — Prophet without Honor translated by Ralph Hewins, which resulted in a much-publicized libel lawsuit.

Storting representative Sverre Løberg called Jacobsen a falsifier of history and Jacobsen responded with a libel lawsuit. The case went before the Oslo City Court in 1969 and had the appearance of being a rematch of the court settlement after the war. Løberg won the case, eventually also in the Supreme Court. In 1970, he complained about the case to the Council of Europe. He died in Oslo in 1980.