THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 15, 1937 BELGIUM STANDS ASIDE

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22860, 15 October 1937, Page 10

THE New Zealand Herald AND DAILY SOUTHERN CROSS FRIDAY, OCTOBER 15, 1937 BELGIUM STANDS ASIDE

Belgium has managed to round off her new foreign policy of independent neutrality within a year of the day, October 14, 1936, on which King Leopold stated it to his Cabinet. The joint announcement by Germany and Belgium of the Reich's guarantee of the integrity of Belgian territory completes a portentous change. Once convinced that Belgium was set on her new course of neutrality, Britain and France offered similar guarantees and these were accepted some months ago. Belgium assents to the three guarantees but makes no commitments in return. She has few illusions about their value. Her experience in 1914, her witness of the League's futility in 1935, and her too close observation of the denunciation last year by Herr Hitler of the Locarno Treaty, have shattered her faith in guarantees, whether joint or several. In a realistic mood, which many call clear-sighted, she has turned her back on collective security, whether regional as conceived at Locarno or universal as stated at Geneva. It is true that Belgium still professes to accept her obligations under the League Covenant, but her leaders make no secret of their belief that the Covenant is dead. If it were resurrected and applied to a real issue, then Belgium claims the same right that other nations, large and small, have asserted by word or deed —to judge the particular issue. In other words, Belgium fears automatic sanctions and none can blame her or any other small over-shadowed by powerful neighbours.

For the future, as King Leopold has made plain, Belgium will stand free of alliances with any other State, will take her own military measures for self-defence, and refuse to lend her territory to any Power as a means of transit, or as a base or aid in the conduct of war. Britain, always concerned with the fate of the Low Countries, now has an added interest with the rise of the air arm. The shortest distance between hei'self and Germany lies across Belgium, whether by land or by air. Cognisance of this geographical fact is taken by the Belgian Foreign Minister, M. Spaak, who repeats an earlier contention that Belgian air must be considered as inviolable as Belgian land. That is a warning to both sides to keep their aeroplanes clear of Belgian frontiers. Failure to do so would be adjudged as aggression and permit any of Belgium's other guarantors, to go to her aid. In doing so, they would secure the important advantage of establishing advanced listening posts and aerodromes on Belgian territory. So caution will be enforced by the most practical reasons on Germany, France or Britain. This, then, is one of the technical reasons inducing Belgium to fall back on neutrality in the hope of achieving security, of avoiding being turned once more into the cockpit of Europe. She regards wistfully the immunity achieved by Holland and Switzerland in the Great War, and her new policy is based on the Swiss analogy. A year ago she demanded that she shall be wholly independent, that her independence, neutrality and territory be guaranteed by the Powers, but that she shall not hersplf be a guarantor in any treaty system. With Germany's assent, her demands have now been fully met. It would be idle to pretend that the Belgian change of policy does not give "a definite strategic advantage to Germany," as the Berlin correspondent of the Times makes clear this morning. Belgium has ceased to be committed to a system of mutual defence with Britain and France, Britain's air defence problem becomes more difficult and France has a long new length, of frontier to guard. On the other hand, Germany has to watch France on the much shorter line, Mctz to Mulhouse, and hopes to stalemate the French on the Rhine. Her own advance westward would also be constricted by the limitation of a short front, but at present her policy faces in the opposite direction—the old and traditional policy of "the drive to the east." Now she can feel her hands are freed for a move down the Danube. She believes she can hold a French thrust in aid of South-Eastern Allies and deal with the latter at leisure. This palpable menace and Belgium's example have caused most of these smaller nations to seek cover. The chief exception is Czechoslovakia. She cannot but know that the Little Entente has lost solidarity, and she must ponder whether her Great Power allies, France and Russia, could reach her in time. One would have to cross South Germany, and the other Poland or Rumania. Yet, far from repining, Czechoslovakia is remarkably confident, an example that might well be followed by a quaking world. Nor can there be any just quarrel with Belgium's declaration for independent neutrality. Internal politics and external changes compelled her. The increase of the Flemings in numbers and political influence constrained Belgium in the interests of • national unity to sever the close post-war association with France. The FrancoSoviet pact, along with its consequences in the rcinstitution of conscription in Germany and the reoccupation of the Rhineland, as well as the Popular Front Government in Paris, worked in the same direction. So did the virtual abdication of the League and the unchallenged denunciation of Locarno. Whatever the outcome, Belgium cannot be blamed for her attempt, by standing aside, to avoid being involved in European collisiona.