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Perceptions between the French and their World War II allies on the size and importance of the Resistance still differ greatly. That, along with lingering humiliation over the defeat of 1940 and the ambiguous French record under German occupation, will continue to make Moulin's role in history a symbolically important one for the French. "The French have a profound thirst for national heroes, and Moulin--who had no military history prior to the Resistance--stepped up to become a hero and savior in the country's blackest of moments," Paxton says.

"A very small minority of French people collaborated with the Germans, while another small minority fought them in the Resistance," says Bedarida. "The vast majority had to get through life, day to day, putting up with the former, and psychologically associating themselves with the latter. That national association with the Resistance, personified by Moulin, remains important today."

Despite the differing opinions over the accuracy of evidence presented and conclusions drawn in both books, Baynac and Pean each do provide some new insights and information into Moulin's life. Neither, however, definitively solves the mystery of how the Nazis were able to learn Moulin's identity and order his arrest by Klaus Barbie, the Lyon-area Gestapo chief, nor reveal details of Moulin's torture and death in early July. Those enigmas, however, help reinforce Moulin's mythic stature in France--and provide factual gray areas in his life that allow everyone to imagine him according to their own perceptions of Resistance France. END