BOPA ( da, Borgerlige Partisaner, Civil Partisans) was a group of the
Danish resistance movement
The Danish resistance movements ( da, Den danske modstandsbevægelse) were an underground insurgency to resist the German occupation of Denmark during World War II. Due to the initially lenient arrangements, in which the Nazi occupation autho ...
; it was affiliated with the communists and developed after the
occupation of Denmark by
Nazi Germany during the
Second World War.
In 1942, the
Communist Party of Denmark was banned by the German authorities. Communists organized small
sabotage cells across the country, formed mainly by veterans who had been part of the volunteer anti-
Franco
Franco may refer to:
Name
* Franco (name)
* Francisco Franco (1892–1975), Spanish general and dictator of Spain from 1939 to 1975
* Franco Luambo (1938–1989), Congolese musician, the "Grand Maître"
Prefix
* Franco, a prefix used when ...
brigades of the
Spanish Civil War. However, as arms were scarce, their weapons were often
gasoline and
matches, and only small-scale operations were carried out.
On January 25, 1943 a group of students—who had previously been refused membership in the communist resistance group due to its members' distrust of elitists (including students)—set fire to a stock of German listening devices at ''Dansk Industrisyndikat'' in
Hellerup using a bottle of
spirit. The students were accepted into the group, which changed its name from the original KOPA (''Kommunistiske Partisaner'', Communist Partisans) to ''Borgerlige Partisaner'' (Civil Partisans) or BOPA. The new name was at first used jokingly by old members, since "borgerlig" in Danish also means "conservative", but it soon became the most widely used name.
Operations grew in magnitude as individuals with inside knowledge of possible targets joined the group. Young apprentices from large factories proved especially useful in identifying targets that were supplying the German military. The cells attacked factories such as
Burmeister & Wain and
Riffelsyndikatet in 1943, Riffelsyndikatet (again) and Global in 1944, and Always in 1945.
References
The Museum of Danish Resistance — BOPA
http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/revolt/danishresistance.html
Danish resistance groups
Communism in Denmark
{{Denmark-hist-stub