RESISTANCE IN EUROPE 177
RESISTANCE
IN EUROPE
The brutality of Nazi rule led to the rise of resistance
movements in every occupied country. These local groups
received assistance, wherever possible, from Britain’s
Special Operations Executive (SOE), while the Soviet Union
helped pro-Communist guerrillas in Eastern Europe.
Resistance groups often emerged spontaneously. Their operations
took various forms, from passive opposition, such as that practiced
in Germany by White Rose activists who distributed anti-Nazi
pamphlets, to large-scale military activity. The mountainous terrain
of the Balkans lent itself particularly well to the latter, and Yugoslavia
and Greece experienced years of guerrilla warfare.
Elsewhere, opposition activities ranged from sabotage missions
against military and industrial facilities to espionage and intelligence
gathering. Sometimes local operatives carried out the actions, but
the SOE (see pp.138–139) also inserted agents secretly by boat or
parachute. Capture by the German authorities or collaborators usually
meant torture and death, and successful ventures risked violent
reprisals against the local population. However, such acts of
resistance helped to divert valuable Axis resources from the two
war fronts, as well as depleting the occupiers’ morale. Equally
important, resistance to the Nazi regime asserted human dignity
in the face of oppression.
DEFYING THE OCCUPIERS
Across continental Europe, from Norway to the Balkans, local resistance
fighters chose to risk torture and execution rather than submit passively
to the occupation of their countries by Axis forces. By doing so, they
ensured that Nazi control would never become fully secure.
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3
4
1
TIMELINE
KEY
Strikes and
industrial action
Detention centers
Allied territory
Axis territory, occupations,
and cobelligerents, Nov 1942
5
1939 1941 1942 1943 1944 1945 1946
6
7
RESISTANCE WRITING
Swaying public opinion was a vital
part of the war effort: Vichy French
authorities used propaganda to
mobilize hostility to the resistance
and the reprisals that they
provoked. In response, resistance
fighters set up underground
newspapers that helped keep
protest alive. In France there
was Libération and Combat
(edited by philosopher Albert
Camus) and in Belgium La
Libre Belgique, while in the
Netherlands there were more
than 1,000 publications.
Combat, May 29, 1944
Black^ Sea
Sicily
Sardinia
Corsica
Ne
ret
va
Warsaw
Radom
Prague
Kladno Będzin
Częstochowa
Tarnów
Sobibor
Trieste
Padua
Bologna
Stari
Báctopolya Timișoara
Šabac
Čačak
Zaječar
Niš
Salonika
Coka
Tirane
Luxembourg
Rome
Naples
Piombino
Brest
Oradour-sur-Glane
Beyssenac
Grenoble
Marseille
Toulouse Vercors
Madrid
Barcelona
Lisbon
London
Copenhagen
Bialystok
Krynks
Petrovgrad
Petrila
Aninoasa
Lupeni
Ketrzyn
Athens
Patras
Sofia
Plovadiv
Kruševac
Topollica
Zasayi Belgrade
Bolzano
Milan
Fossoli
La Spezia
Genoa
Florence
Monte
Battaglia
Turin
Paris
Metz
Strasbourg
Marburg
Amsterdam
The
Hague
Brussels
Lille
Berlin
Stefanau
Oslo
Stavanger
Herning
Silkeborg
Bergen
Orkdal
Kharkov
Moscow
Nowogródek
Kleck
Nieswiez
Treblinka
Munich
Le Havre
Rouen
Arhus
OCCUPIED
FRANCE
DENMARK
POLAND
VICHY
FRANCE
LUXEMBOURG
SWITZERLAND
PO
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UG
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ALBANIA
NETHERLANDS
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FINLAND
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GREECE
FRENCH
NORTH
AFRICA
HUNGARY
SYRIA
S
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GERMANY
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SWEDEN
1940
“France has lost a battle, but she has not
lost the war.”
GENERAL CHARLES DE GAULLE, 1940
Pre-war France
Main underground
courier routes
COORDINATING THE FRENCH RESISTANCE
JUNE 1940–OCTOBER 1944
After the fall of France in 1940 (see pp.54–55), the
initial efforts of resistance fighters in the country were
uncoordinated. However, after May 1943, Free French
forces joined with the Army Resistance Organization
to form the National Council of Resistance; Communist
freedom fighters continued to operate independently.
Their combined efforts made a major contribution to
France’s liberation in 1944.
1
Major reprisal
PROTECTING DENMARK’S JEWS
APRIL 1940–MAY 1945
The German occupation of Denmark was less brutal
than elsewhere, but growing economic exploitation
led to civil unrest, strikes, and demonstrations. When
the Nazi authorities sought to impose anti-Semitic
legislation on the country in October 1943, substantial
numbers of people came together to thwart the
move, helping all but some 500 of the nation’s 8,000
Jews to escape to neutral Sweden.
2
Pre-war Denmark
Main operations area for
Danish Resistance groups
Escape route
to Sweden
YUGOSLAVIAN RESISTANCE
APRIL 1941–MAY 1945
With Yugoslavia divided after the 1941 occupation,
resistance crystallized in Serbia. The most effective
fighting units were the pro-Communist Partisans, led
by Josip Broz Tito, who faced nationalist Chetnik
forces as well as the Germans (see pp.202–203). Tito’s
military successes won him Allied support, which was
confirmed when the Partisans were recognized as the
official national liberation movement of Yugoslavia at
the Tehran Conference (see pp.162–163).
3
Pre-war Yugoslavia
Major reprisals against the civilian population
US_176-177_Resistance_in_Europe.indd 177 22/03/19 11:48 AM