Hitler's War Against the French Resistance: 1940-1944

In 1941, a year after France formally surrendered, Charles de Gaulle, the leader of the Free French forces, appointed Jean Moulin to coordinate the various resistance movements that had sprung up all over France.His mission was to unify the diverse and often fragmented resistance groups into a more cohesive organization.He successfully brought together various resistance factions under the umbrella of the National Council of the Resistance (CNR), which was a crucial step toward creating a united front against both the Nazis and the Vichy French regime. Since the start of the Occupation, the Germans realized that resistance to their rule was inevitable.With this in mind, they went about establishing total control of France, not only through the German Army forces stationed in the country, but using the entire Nazi security apparatus. From 1941 onwards, the Germans began to encounter frequent and increasingly more damaging acts of resistance, which required not only intelligence and coun