It was indeed suggested at Paris that Holland might be induced to relinquish Zealand Flanders and Limburg in return for a compensation in the Prussian territory on her eastern frontier, either in East Friesland or in the region of Cleves and Wesel on the lower Rhine, districts which once had much in common with the adjacent portions of the Netherlands. There was, however, no indication of any desire on the part of the inhabitants of these territories to change their political allegiance, nor was Holland in the least disposed to face the uncertainties arising out of any such exchange. The whole idea smacked too strongly of the methods of the Congress of Vienna.
One matter affecting Holland did, however, concern the Conference, namely Belgium’s compulsory and guaranteed neutrality, and it was the Belgian contention that this involved also her frontiers. The international status of Belgium rests upon the three treaties of April 19, 1839, one between the Five Great Powers and Belgium, one between these powers and Holland, and one between Holland and Belgium. These documents, in substance identical, fix the boundaries of Belgium at the same time that they establish her as an independent and perpetually neutralized state, “bound to observe the same neutrality toward all other states.” This whole system of neutrality collapsed in 1914, and Belgium wanted no more of it. By the time of the Peace Conference Prussia, Austria, and Russia were certainly in no position to guarantee Belgium’s neutrality, while France and England joined with Belgium in considering a revision of the treaties necessary. Upon the advice of its Commission on Belgian Affairs, the Conference took the position that the treaties, as constituting a single entity, should be revised in the entirety of their clauses, at the joint request of these three powers, and that Holland as a signatory of one of the treaties should take part in the revision, together with the Great Powers whose interests were general. The declared object of the revision was “to free Belgium from that limitation on her sovereignty which was imposed on her by the treaties of 1839, and, in the interest both of Belgium and of general peace, to remove the dangers and disadvantages arising from the said treaties.” Belgium and Holland were accordingly invited to appear before the Conference in order to set forth their views with regard to such a revision.
This action was taken by the Council of Ten March 8; but the Conference was busy with more pressing things, and it was not until May 19 and 20 that the representatives of the two countries were at last heard. The Belgians maintained that Belgium had been given weak frontiers in 1839 on the ground that she was to be protected by the Powers; such protection having failed disastrously in 1914, she should be given frontiers which would enable her to hold her own with her neighbors, in war and in peace. The unlimited sovereignty which had been promised her in President Wilson’s seventh point ought to carry with it the frontiers denied her in the days of her weakness. Holland had no objection to the abandonment of Belgium’s neutrality, which had been guaranteed to her as well as to Belgium, but she would not consider for a moment any cession of her own territory. She declared, however, that she was ready to discuss amicably with Belgium any adjustments of the conditions of navigation, etc.
A commission was then appointed, representing Belgium and Holland as well as the principal Allied and Associated Powers, but its field was specifically restricted to “proposals involving neither transfer of territorial sovereignty nor the creation of international servitudes.” As any thoroughgoing settlement satisfactory to Belgium could not help touching in some way the sovereignty of Holland, and as the regime of the Scheldt already constituted an international servitude, the terms of reference were generally regarded as a triumph for the Dutch. The commission went to work in the summer in two sections, one military and the other economic, but no final results had been reached when the Peace Conference dissolved in December. The reference of such outstanding matters to the governments concerned is another victory for Holland, who desires no change in the existing situation. In these matters Belgium has derived little advantage from the support of her allies. Holland still holds the lower Scheldt and the lower Meuse; Luxemburg seems permanently lost; except in the matter of her neutrality, Belgium stands substantially where she stood in 1839.
If the territorial status of Belgium has not been essentially bettered by the war, her economic status is certainly worse. No share in a problematic indemnity will compensate her for her direct losses, not to speak of her other expenses—the stripping of her resources, the enforced idleness of her factories, the disappearance of her foreign markets and her transit trade. Dependent in an extraordinary degree on the outside world, Belgium was cut off from it for nearly five years, and it is a question how fully she can recover her previous position. A hero in 1914, is Belgium to remain a cripple for the future? The German is gone, but he left ruin and disillusion behind him. Small wonder that many a Belgian asks whether it was all worth while, as he contrasts his lean and hungry country with the prosperity of neutral Holland. Small wonder that the neutral world, as it looks to the future, is encouraged to imitate the Holland that stood pat, the Luxemburg that succumbed, rather than the Belgium that resisted. The neutral is more prosperous than the ally.
In order to get a just perspective in the face of such considerations, it is necessary to go back a few months. Germany’s plan was not merely to use Belgium as a highroad to France, but to make Belgium permanently subject to German interests, if not politically subject, at least under complete military and economic control. The German literature of the war, official and unofficial, is full of plans for the permanent control of Belgium—political annexation, at least of that great Flemish-speaking half of the country which the German administration had separated from the rest of Belgium, and which, if not annexed outright, was to remain apart as the great support of German policy in the Belgium of the future; military control, of railroads and telegraphs, perhaps of the Flemish coast and the fortresses of the Meuse; economic control, through a customs union, railway tariffs, port privileges, and the domination of Belgian industrial enterprises. Now Belgium has at least escaped all this. She has maintained her independence while she has saved her soul. When discouraged about the present state of the world, it is well to remind ourselves that the war accomplished, at least for the time being, one great thing it set out to secure, the destruction of German militarism and the protection of small states against the imperial ambitions of Germany. Belgium has also improved her colonial position, not only by frustrating German plans against the Belgian Congo, but by receiving a mandate over an adjacent portion of German East Africa.
For the future Belgium’s security lies in a strong League of Nations and in what such a League stands for. At first Belgian statesmen took the League somewhat coldly, for the treaty of 1839 was an international covenant, and they had ample experience of the futility of mere paper guarantees. If the League covenant were merely another piece of paper, they would be right. The hopeful side of the League lies rather in its assurance of general coöperation, its growth as an administrative and informing body, its development of an international habit of mind and an international conscience. After all, it was the sense of international right that brought the world to Belgium’s side in the Great War, and it is in the broadening and deepening of that sense that the chief hope lies in the future. For centuries the position of Belgium surrounded by France, Germany, and England has made it the battleground of Europe, and it is only by diminishing the likelihood of battles that it can hope to escape this fate. The best guarantees of the security of small states are a stronger sense of right and justice throughout the world.
Bibliographical Note
On the problem of Schleswig the best collection is the Manual historique de la question du Slesvig, ed. F. de Jessen (Copenhagen, 1906); supplemented by Le Slesvig du Nord, 1906-1914 (Copenhagen, 1915). For a German view, see E. Daenell, Das Dänentum in Nordschleswig seit 1864 (Kiel, 1913). After the armistice Daenell protested strongly against the surrender of any part of Schleswig to Denmark: Has Denmark a claim to North Sleswick? (Münster, 1918). For a summary of conditions under Prussian rule, see L. M. Larson, in American Historical Review, xxiv, pp. 227-252 (1919); and M. Mackeprang, Nordslesvig (Copenhagen, 1910; German translation, 1912). For the Danish discussion in 1919, see Miss Karen Larsen, in Political Science Quarterly, December, 1919. G. Rosendal’s Sönderjylland (Odense, [1919]) contains convenient maps and statistics. See also the British Handbook.