Secret Army (Belgium)

Secret Army Armée Secrète (French) Geheim Leger (Dutch)
Uniformed members of the Secret Army with a Canadian soldier in Bruges in September 1944
Also known as	Belgian Legion (1940–43) Army of Belgium (1943–44) Secret Army (1944)
Leaders	Charles Claser Jules Bastin Jules Pire
Dates of operation	August 1940–October 1944
Active regions	German-occupied Belgium
Ideology	Right-wing Catholic Leopoldist
Size	54,000+ members (1944)
Preceded by Belgian Legion (1940–41) Reconstructed Belgian Army (1940–41)

The Secret Army (French: Armée Secrète or AS, Dutch: Geheim Leger, GL) was an organisation within the Belgian Resistance, active during the German occupation of Belgium during World War II. With more than 54,000 members, it was by far the largest resistance group active in the country.^[1]

Founded in August 1940 as the Belgian Legion, the Secret Army changed its name on a number of occasions during its existence, adopting its final appellation in June 1944. The Secret Army incorporated many former officers from the defeated Belgian Army and, politically, was dominated by right-wing conservatives and royalists. Although sometimes strained, the Secret Army enjoyed the closest relations of any large resistance movement with the Belgian government-in-exile.