I.
THE violation of Belgian neutrality has brought forth a luxuriant crop of books, pamphlets, and articles in newspapers and reviews. Some indignantly denounce, others impudently defend the action of the German Government. The commentaries published on the treaties of 19th April 1839 have taught many Belgians who were ill-informed on the point what the permanent neutrality of their country really means. It was not a Heaven-sent blessing graciously poured out on the new State that had built itself up after the rising of the Flemish and Walloon provinces against the House of Orange. In recognizing it as an independent kingdom and granting it the privilege of permanent neutrality, the five Powers who at that time laid down the law to Europe invested it with a special character, as if it had been a creation of their diplomacy. The neutrality of Belgium was indeed to shield her from the grasping designs of her neighbours, but it was also destined to serve the interests of the great Powers by helping to maintain the balance of Europe. Thus the treaties of 1839 repaired the injury that had been done to the work of the Congress of Vienna, when that artificial fabric, the Kingdom of the Netherlands, was destroyed through Belgian efforts.
The assurance that we should enjoy the blessings of peace for an indefinite period carried with it no small obligations towards the guarantors of our neutrality. We could not let ourselves be induced to favour any one of them in particular, either through personal bias or through political considerations. The Belgian signatories to the pacts of 1839 fully realized the duties incumbent upon a perpetually neutral State, and their adhesion made it certain that their successors would always fulfil these duties. All Belgians are convinced that none of their ministers since then has failed to keep the engagements to which his loyal predecessors set their hand.[17]
More than twenty-five years ago, King Leopold, on the strength of some documents produced by two forgers, Mondion and Nieter, was repeatedly accused by sundry Parisian publicists, whose words carried a certain weight, of having entered into a secret convention with Germany against France. How little these writers knew of our King, and of his real sentiments towards our disconcerting eastern neighbours! Few rulers had a clearer insight than he into the ambitions that they had not yet laid bare. With his marvellous knowledge of men, he had read, as in open book, the erratic and overbearing character of William II. On one of the last occasions that he honoured me with his advice, he warned me to beware, when I went to Germany, of German civilities. As soon as the second King of the Belgians began once more, after a long interval, to visit Paris, the Parisians learnt to know him better; and the charges against his political good faith died down like an untended fire.
Was it impracticable for a Belgian sovereign to conclude a secret military convention? We learnt at the beginning of the present war that such a treaty existed between the King of Roumania and the Emperor of Austria, a treaty directed against Russia, and approved, whenever the time came for its renewal, by the Roumanian Prime Minister, whether Liberal or Conservative. When I was acting as representative of the Belgian Government at Bucharest, the existence of this pact was strenuously confirmed or as strenuously denied by several of my colleagues. The Russian minister, M. de Fonton, refused to believe in it; this was the only point on which he disagreed with his friend and ally, M. Arsène Henry, the French envoy. The convention was none the less real for all that, although it did not survive the ordeal of being dragged out from its hiding-place. In signing this futile agreement, King Carol had not overstepped his constitutional rights, as was proved by the counter-signature of the responsible minister. If such freedom of action was allowed to Roumania, why was it denied to Belgium?
The answer is not far to seek. Roumania is not, like Belgium, a neutral State. King Carol could pick and choose his secret allies, according to his political plans or his hereditary instincts; a King of the Belgians cannot. The diplomatic instruments sanctioned by our rulers have always been drawn up in the full light of day. Supposing (although the supposition is an insult to his memory) King Leopold had not wished to observe the 1839 treaties, or King Albert, who is the soul of honour, had been guilty of the same base intention. Neither would have found a minister to countersign a secret convention with France, England, or Germany. It is formally laid down by article 64 of our constitution, that without the signature of a responsible minister, no royal document can be valid. A treaty furnished merely with the royal seal would have been, in Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg’s immortal phrase, nothing more than a scrap of paper.
An underhand compact, when our Government takes counsel, debates, and acts in broad daylight, under the alert control of the Parliamentary opposition and of public opinion! A military convention, framed for the defence of the country, not transgressing indeed (according to the doctrine in vogue) the rights of a neutralized State, but wholly running counter to our deep-rooted belief in the sovereign virtue of our neutrality! A hidden pledge, out of all keeping with the friendly and trustful spirit that guided our relations with each of the guaranteeing Powers! I feel certain that not one of the statesmen who had the honour of succeeding Frère-Orban, Malou, Beernaert, our great ministers of the past, would have consented to sign such a covenant.