Georges Delfanne, called Christian Masuy (22 January 1913 – 1 October 1947) was a Belgian collaborator and spy during the German occupation in

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Early life

He was born January 22, 1913, in

Brussels Brussels (french: Bruxelles or ; nl, Brussel ), officially the Brussels-Capital Region (All text and all but one graphic show the English name as Brussels-Capital Region.) (french: link=no, Région de Bruxelles-Capitale; nl, link=no, Bruss ...

. Prior to the war, Delfanne was a far-right Rexist militant and gained the confidence of

Léon Degrelle Léon Joseph Marie Ignace Degrelle (; 15 June 1906 – 31 March 1994) was a Belgian Walloon politician and Nazi collaborator. He rose to prominence in Belgium in the 1930s as the leader of the Rexist Party (Rex). During the German occupatio ...

(later a general in the

Waffen SS The (, "Armed SS") was the combat branch of the Nazi Party's ''Schutzstaffel'' (SS) organisation. Its formations included men from Nazi Germany, along with volunteers and conscripts from both occupied and unoccupied lands. The grew from th ...

Spying years

According to Pierre Mallez, a member of the Turma-Vengeance network and head spy. He was arrested on 3 October 1943 by Delfanne, and tortured by him, before being deported. Se
ses mémoires
/ref> In the 1930s, he got Jews out of Germany in return for money but was in the process arrested in

Cologne Cologne ( ; german: Köln ; ksh, Kölle ) is the largest city of the German western state of North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) and the fourth-most populous city of Germany with 1.1 million inhabitants in the city proper and 3.6 millio ...

and recruited by the German intelligence services Abwehr. He got a task to discover everything he could about the deployment of the Belgian army. In the cover of travelling salesman, he travelled through Belgium on his bicycle visiting all kinds of military institutions. In some time he was able to create a complete picture of Belgian army's order of battle. This information helped to defeat Belgian army in 1940. Arriving in France in 1940, he bought the services of the politicians

Jacques Doriot Jacques Doriot (; 26 September 1898 – 22 February 1945) was a French politician, initially communist, later fascist, before and during World War II. In 1936, after his exclusion from the Communist Party, he founded the French Popular Party (P ...

and

Marcel Bucard Marcel Bucard (7 December 1895 – 13 March 1946) was a French Fascist politician. Early career A decorated soldier who earned a reputation for bravery in World War I, Bucard became active in politics after 1918, initially as a member of '' ...

and became their handler. Under the occupation, he became an auxiliary of the Gestapo in France, sometimes presenting himself as "head of counter-espionage" in his sector. He infiltrated or organised the infiltration of

French Resistance The French Resistance (french: La Résistance) was a collection of organisations that fought the German occupation of France during World War II, Nazi occupation of France and the Collaborationism, collaborationist Vichy France, Vichy régim ...

networks, notably the ''Parsifal'' and ''Défense de la France'' networks, and arrested more than 800 Resistance workers, some of whom he interrogated and tortured, notably Simone Michel-Lévy.

Death

At the end of the war, he fled to Spain but was tracked down by the Americans, tried in France, condemned to death and shot by firing squad on 1 October 1947 at Fort de Montrouge ( Hauts-de-Seine).

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Delfanne, Georges 1913 births 1947 deaths Belgian fascists Belgian people convicted of war crimes Belgian spies People from Brussels Gestapo personnel Nazi collaborators shot at the Fort de Montrouge Executed Belgian collaborators with Nazi Germany People executed by the French Fourth Republic