The Norwegian Homeguard of today differs a bit from the one that was active during the cold war.
Heimevernet was established immediatly post-WWII and initially had to make do with old gear as the army had priority. One reason for its establishment was the idea of "controling" the wartime resistance movements like Milorg - a side effect of that was that the Norwegian Home Guard had a sort of dual identity - one line was that the purpose of the Home Guard was to protect against coups/surprise attacks - as the members kept their weapons and gear at home they would be very quick to mobilise.
The other leg it rested on was the idea that the Home Guard was to be able to conduct geurilla warfare - which was, AFAIK, unofficial, but many officers in the Home Guard had their background in the WWII resistance/sabotage type organisations(Kompani Linge/Milorg). According to the Norwegian Defence hompage the debate about the use of the Home Guard as Geurilla units was hot up to the 1970s. The homepage also states that "the further north you got the closer the co-operation with the army".
source:
http://hv.forsvaret.no/om/historie/Sider/Gerilija.aspx
Not sure how the Home Guard designated it's units during the cold war though...