Resistance movements in Malaya and France

Resistance in France

• People from all backgrounds joined FR resistance

  • Mostly driven by patriotism + desire to see FR free from foreign control

  • Women often joined resistance because gave chance for freedom, away from male-dominated FR life

• Acts of resistance could be small gestures of defiance

  • e.g. when FR signed armistice with GER in 1940, two boys tried to lay flowers at tomb of Unknown Soldier

• Acts of resistance also more significant

  • e.g. helping FR POWs escape before transportation

Organised resistance in France

• Being in organised resistance = dangerous

  • If caught, Nazis would retaliate harshly

    • Resister may be executed themselves, but Nazis might also take anger out on family + friends

• Difficult to form effective resistance

  • Resistance movements made of civilians

    • Not many had military experience

  • Shortage of weapons

• Therefore many acts of resistance, esp in early days of occupation, focused on printing + circulating underground newspapers

  • Shared intel across network of resistance groups, and with BR authorities when possible

• Links made with British Special Operations Executive

  • Small org to support resistance groups in occupied Europe + carry out sabotage operations

French resistance and Allies

• FR resistance played important part in success of Allied invasion of Normandy, June 1944

  • Provided Allies with info about GER defences

  • Sabotaged rail network to stop supplies reaching Germans

• Damaged telephone + telegram comms

  • → GER had to use radio → messages easier for Allies to intercept

• Peaceful acts of resistance like strikes + deliberately slow work

  • Delayed movement of GER troops + supplies to invasion area

  • Factories + industrial centres targeted to slow war production

Resistance in Malaya

• Malay People’s Anti-Japanese Army (MPAJA)

  • Jointly organised by BR ex-colonial authority and Malay Comm Party

  • Most members Chinese

• 1942: started with 3000 men + women

  • 1945: grew to 7000

• BR supplied some military supplies for MPAJA, provided it followed their instructions

• Main purpose was to fight JAP in guerrilla war

  • Only partly successful because Japanese stayed put in Malaya + Singapore

• Punished local Malays who collaborated with JAP

• Conducted guerrilla warfare + harassed JAP occupiers

  • → Travel disruption, comm breakdowns and deaths

  • But never strong enough to push JAP out of Malaya

Effectiveness of resistance in Malaya

• At end of war, one estimate suggests MPAJA lost 1000 + caused 5500 JAP deaths

• → Partly effective by being regular nuisance that JAP had to deal with