Through the Iron Bars: Two Years of German Occupation in Belgium

I believe, by the Belgian Premier, Baron de Broqueville, in the solemn sitting of the House, when the German violation of Belgian neutrality was announc

ng, with a sneer, "You have lost everything," and the King replies, "Not my soul." It is so intimately associated with

in spite of the most ruthless oppression and the most cunning calumnies. We must now look at the darker side of th

ery word of patriotism was forbidden her, Belgium could remain vanquished but unconquered, bleeding but unshakeable. She enjoyed, in the face of her oppressors, all the privileges of the Christian martyrs of the first centuries; she could smile on the rack, laugh under the whip and sing in the flames. She remained free in her prison, free t

udden and striking. But Belgium's oppressors do not any longer want to convert her. They have tried and they have failed. They merely want to take all the food, all the raw materials, all the machines and-last but not least-all the labour they can out of her. Their fight is not the fight of one religion against another. It is the fight of material pow

e been to develop its resources, as long as there was some hope of annexing it, though this benevolent spirit had scarcely any time to manifest itself. After the Marne and the Yser, however, when it became evident that anyhow the who

so important, in proportion to the number of the population, nowhere did the average square mile yield such rich crops, nowhere was the railway system so developed. Pauperism was practically unknown, and, even in the large towns, the number of people dependent on public charity was comparatively very small. To this picture of unequalled prosperity oppose the present situation: Part of the countryside left wit

ministration of Belgium. When he arrived in Brussels, Governor von Bissing declared that he h

aw materials. But, if this were the case, the situation ought not to be worse in Belgium than in Germany. On the contrary, thanks to the splendid work of the Commission for Relief, she ought to be far better off. How is it then that-according to General von Bissing's own declaration made

d, German industry has transformed itself, many factories which could not continue their ordinary work owing to the shortage of rawstuffs having been turned into war-factories in which there is still a great demand for labour. On th

chapter, with the first question. L

omplete and a full list of German exactions has not yet been drawn up. Let us, however, try to give an i

ed to pay, every month during the coming year, a sum of forty million francs, making a total of about 480 millions (o

e ordinary taxes, to the commune, to the province and to the

in ordinary times, amount scarcely to 75 million

imposed by the war had considerably reduce

e requisitions which he is obliged to make in order to supply the army of occupation with food, fodder, and so on. As, most of the time, the Germans only pay for what they requisition in "bons de guerre" payable after the war, and as, in spite of their sound appetite, we can scarcely believe that the few thousand "landsturmer

s would henceforth be paid for in money. Needless to say, none of these promises have been fulfilled, and the contribution of 480 millions was renewed at the beginning of 1915, and even increased to 600

If one inhabitant succeeds in joining the army, if an allied aeroplane appears on the horizon, if, for some reason or other, the telegraph or the telephone wires are out of order, a shower of fines falls on the neighbouring towns and villages. In June last the total amount of these exactions was estimated, for 1916, at ten millions (￡400,000). If we add to this the fines inflicted constantly, on the slightest pretext

of the German argument which shifts on to the English blockade the responsibility for Belgium's ruin. Even a complete stoppage of trade could not have done the country as much harm

from the point of view of propaganda, and, while posing as Belgium's kind protectors, they might always have reaped the benefit through fresh taxes and new contributions. If they have killed the goose rather than gather its golden eggs it is because they could not afford to wait. It was one of these desperate measures, like the violation of Belgian neutrality, the ruthless use of Zeppelins and the sinking of the Lusitania, which did th

nsidered as military requisitions. In a most interesting article published in Smoller's Jahrbuch für Gesetzgebung Verwaltung und Volkswirtschaft, Professor Karl Ballod admits that the requisitions made in Belgium and Northern France have more than compensated for the harm caused by the Russian invasion of East Prussia. No

ay, all the machines which could be employed, beyond the Rhine, for the manufacture of shells and munitions. I am afraid of tiring the reader with the long enumeration of these arbitrary decrees, but in order to give him an idea of what is still going on, at the present moment, I have gathered here all the measures of the kind taken by the paternal administra

have been so frequent in Flanders that

bicycles and horses, some tradespeople in

have been requisitioned. Potatoes cannot be conveyed

possessing more than 50 kilos of straps or cables must report it un

good crop. The peasants were forbidden to pull out their plants befo

s in Brussels are forbidden to

rax to the list of sulphurous products which must be

d to Hanut has been demolished. A great deal of rolling stock has been commandeered. Owing to the shortage of lubric

severe. All the steel material-in whatever shape it may be (including tools)-must be declared to the Abt

f 40,000 francs for the purchase of wooden shoes as the shor

ns, hosiery, etc. No more than one-tenth of the stocks can be manufactured, under a penalty of 10,

to Germany in order to be worked there. As it has become evident that the Belgian workers will not submit to war work so long as they remain in their surroundings, they must be torn away from their country and compelled to follow the materials and machines over the frontier. Labour has become an inanimated object necessary to the prosecution of the German war. It is as indispensable to Germany as cotton, nickel and copper. It will be treated as s