The Italian resistance movement ( or just ) is an umbrella term for Italian resistance groups during World War II. It was opposed to the forces of Nazi Germany as well as Nazi Germany's Italian puppet state regime, the Italian Social Republic, especially following the German invasion and military occupation of Italy between September 1943 and April 1945 (though the resistance to the Fascist Italian government began even prior to World War II). Known as partisans (), the conflict that the Italian resistance fighters took part in is referred to as the National Liberation War (, when referring to the part they took in the Italian Campaign against the Germans and the rest of the Axis) or as the Italian Civil War (when referring specifically to their conflict with Italian Fascists).