ABSTRACT
This chapter analyzes the transnational dimension of the former Federation of Resistance Fighters (FIR) secretariat and the national dimension of one of the most important member organizations from communist East. It focuses on the origins of FIR in the latter half of the 1940s. The chapter discusses FIR's character as a communist "front organization" and its activities, spanning from material concerns to attempts at identity-building. FIR's forerunners originated in the early post-1945 context of international networks between former partisans and political prisoners of Nazi concentration camps. FIR formed part of the various international "front organization" that were created after 1945 and controlled by either of the blocs, despite their official policy of impartiality. FIR focused on the issue of social benefits and medical care and tried to equate the anti-fascist resistance fighters' rights to the rights of other veterans. FIR was involved in broader political debates that shaped Western Europe post-war.
