Fatherland Front (Bulgaria)

The Fatherland Front (Bulgarian: Отечествен фронт, ОФ, romanized: Otechestven front, OF) began as a Bulgarian communist political resistance movement in 1942 during World War II. The Zveno movement, the communist Bulgarian Workers Party, a wing of the Bulgarian Agrarian National Union and the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers Party all became part of the OF. The constituent groups of the OF had widely contrasting ideologies and had united only in the face of the pro-German militarist dictatorship in Bulgaria. At the beginning, the members of the OF worked together, without a single dominating group. Professional associations and unions could be members of the front and maintain their organisational independence. However, the Bulgarian Communist Party soon began to dominate. In 1944, after the Soviet Union had declared war on Bulgaria, the OF carried out a coup d'état (9 September 1944) and declared war on Germany and the other Axis powers. The OF government, headed by Kimon Georgiev of Zveno, immediately signed a ceasefire treaty with the Soviet Union (28 October 1944).

Fatherland Front Отечествен фронт
Founded	July 17, 1942 (1942-07-17)
Dissolved	1989
Succeeded by	Fatherland Union
Ideology	Communism Marxism–Leninism
Political position	Far-left
Party flag
Politics of Bulgaria Political parties Elections

On November 18, 1945, the OF, the only party or alliance listed on the ballot, won a large majority in national elections.[1] In November 1946 Georgiev resigned as Prime Minister; Georgi Dimitrov, leader of the communists succeeded him. Bulgaria became a People's Republic on 15 September 1946. The OF eventually transformed into a wide-ranging popular front under overall Communist control, and all member-parties except the Bulgarian Agrarian People's Union dissolved. With the fall of communism in Bulgaria in 1989 the Fatherland Front was dissolved.