Belgium allows Imperial German army through?

France had a fighting chance and took it, Belgium did not.
And yet, Belgium won.

The thing is, if Belgium did not resist the Germans and Germany lost, Belgium would have been punished. If Germany won, there would be a big chance Belgium would have become a German vasal state. In both cases it would mean that no other power would have cared for Belgians souvereinity. If Belgiun is unwilling to defend itself, it is not a country. It is a road.
 
And yet, Belgium won.

The thing is, if Belgium did not resist the Germans and Germany lost, Belgium would have been punished. If Germany won, there would be a big chance Belgium would have become a German vasal state. In both cases it would mean that no other power would have cared for Belgians souvereinity. If Belgiun is unwilling to defend itself, it is not a country. It is a road.

Sure, but in order to defend herself Belgium would have had to invest in it's defenses pre-war. If Belgium had proper defenses in 1914 then the decision to resist Germany would not have been decision to shoot herself into abdomen but sound military policy. Without much knowledge on Belgian military history, for an amateur like me, Belgium was caught between having a 19th century military force and a 20th century military force (incoming due to reforms) and decided to act like it had a 20th century military force.

I'm also doubting Germany would have been very interested in Belgium as a tightly controlled vassal state, especially if Belgium took a somewhat co-operative route, perhaps with, say, Zeebrugge as a leased military base etc.?

There is also a question, if France won as in OTL, would any punishment have been worse than what Belgium experienced in OTL 1914-1918 anyway? I very much doubt it would have resulted in tens of thousands of deaths.
 
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Everyone was in transition from a 19th century army to a 20th century one. Regardless Belgium and it's King was determined to protect the country independence.
 
Just to clarify something about the Belgian naval bases, and even those in northern France for that matter. These are not capital ship bases, the most Ostend and Zeebrugge could handle was a light cruiser and the French ports (north)east of Le Harve weren't much better in this regard.

However this doesn't diminish their importance, stacked with uboats, destroyers, monitors etc they make the channel an active war zone and close it to commerce as well as providing a possible base for littoral amphibious forces.
 

BooNZ

Banned
Again, in 1914 the average PM needs to explain himself to the average Englishman much less than today. He has to explain himself to the average MPs - who are much less in thrall to opinion polls than today and who know geopolitics.
Why are you referring to the 'average PM' when we know the PM was Asquith, who was a Liberal Party man first and a man of peace second. Without a decent CB, Asquith would have had to destroy the party he loved, to do something he loathed.

Why are you talking about average MPs, when the known members of the British Liberal Cabinet would be making the decisions. Those familiar with history know the British Liberal Cabinet of 1914 was overwhelmingly against war, with Gray and Churchill being the only pro-war exceptions. Immediately prior to the German invasion of Belgium, Asquith described the ineffectual pro-intervention speeches of Churchill as bellicose, whilst describing Lloyd George (being the notional leader of a block of seven pacifist/ non-interventionist members of Cabinet) as constructive.

The British Cabinet explicitly contemplated Belgium either not actively defending its neutrality and/or not requesting British assistance. In covert discussions with the conservatives, Churchill contemplated the British Liberal Cabinet choosing peace, even if the Germans choose to violate Belgium neutrality.

As to the man in the street, I think he did not like Germany at all, especially between 1908 and 1912. That's because of the naval arms race has gone beyond the awareness of just a few military experts, admirals and statesmen, and because of the Kaiser's mightily inappropriate interview in 1908.
The average British man on the street cared little for war, whilst the British powerful industrialists and financiers were actively lobbying against war.
 
France could have told the Russians to go pound sand for supporting Serbian Terrorists in Balkans. France didn't have an alliance with Serbia- if Russian wanted to support them, they were on their own

For all our obsession with Britain and Germany, the war actually started because of the actions of AH and Russia over Serbia. The British and Germans could have had all the peaceful intentions in the world but war is likely to break out in the Balkans like in 1912-1913.
 
And yet, Belgium won.

The thing is, if Belgium did not resist the Germans and Germany lost, Belgium would have been punished. If Germany won, there would be a big chance Belgium would have become a German vasal state. In both cases it would mean that no other power would have cared for Belgians souvereinity. If Belgiun is unwilling to defend itself, it is not a country. It is a road.

That's what I said above.
 
Why are you referring to the 'average PM' when we know the PM was Asquith, who was a Liberal Party man first and a man of peace second. Without a decent CB, Asquith would have had to destroy the party he loved, to do something he loathed.

Because in alternate history, it's not a given. Since I was making a general case for general trends in general British foreign policies, I was referring to a non-named PM.

Why are you talking about average MPs, when the known members of the British Liberal Cabinet would be making the decisions.

Same as above, but with the added distinction that I talked about the government explaining themselves to the Parliament. Yes, the cabinet makes the decisions; but the parliament can always boot the cabinet out if they don't like the explanations. So your remarks about who was in the cabinet are irrelevant to this aspect. Had the cabinet been led by Hitler, Gengis Khan and Napoleon, they would still have needed to avoid a no-confidence vote by the MPs.

The British Cabinet explicitly contemplated Belgium either not actively defending its neutrality and/or not requesting British assistance. In covert discussions with the conservatives, Churchill contemplated the British Liberal Cabinet choosing peace, even if the Germans choose to violate Belgium neutrality.

Of course. Any good politician contemplates the worst-case scenarios.

The average British man on the street cared little for war, whilst the British powerful industrialists and financiers were actively lobbying against war.

Naturally. No man in the street actively wants war, ever. The general point was whether his opinion would be important enough to prevent the cabinet from deciding for war. And the specific point I was making is that Germany was pretty strongly disliked, in that street.
 
France could have told the Russians to go pound sand for supporting Serbian Terrorists in Balkans. France didn't have an alliance with Serbia- if Russian wanted to support them, they were on their own

For all our obsession with Britain and Germany, the war actually started because of the actions of AH and Russia over Serbia. The British and Germans could have had all the peaceful intentions in the world but war is likely to break out in the Balkans like in 1912-1913.

So have we now moved to the usual thing in all WWI threads, i.e. the eternal question of who's to blame?
 
Naturally. No man in the street actively wants war, ever. The general point was whether his opinion would be important enough to prevent the cabinet from deciding for war. And the specific point I was making is that Germany was pretty strongly disliked, in that street.
It does if the government wants to recruit the large number of men needed to fight a continental power on land.
 
It does if the government wants to recruit the large number of men needed to fight a continental power on land.

Oh sure. But now you're talking about the policies during the war, not about the decision to declare war or not. Once the Germans are doing to some French towns what they did to Belgian towns, once they sink a transatlantic liner, the British propaganda will have more or less the same ammo as in OTL. On top of that, as mentioned, during the Korean or Vietnam war one couldn't count on automatic patriotism. Things were different in 1914, and actually it's probably the 1914 carnages that contributed to reduce the automatic patriotism all round.
 
One thing I think has not been mentioned, is that in a case of Belgium passively or actively co-operating with Germany, it would still have the option of switching sides in case France looked like it would be winning - sitting nicely on the logistical lines of German armies in Northern France. Turning coats is the oldest trick in the books for small countries.
 
Naturally. No man in the street actively wants war, ever.

I personally think that's a pacifist and elitist myth, cattle led to slaughter. Men and women in the street have demanded war, throughout history. Even if the euphoria of 1914 is largely a myth, there was a large portion of population actively wanting their country to fight in order to correct past injustices, whether real or imagined.
 
I personally think that's a pacifist and elitist myth, cattle led to slaughter. Men and women in the street have demanded war, throughout history. Even if the euphoria of 1914 is largely a myth, there was a large portion of population actively wanting their country to fight in order to correct past injustices, whether real or imagined.

By "man in the street" one means the average of the population, generally. Portions of the population might want war, and they may even be large, depending on the situation, but I do believe most people think "I might be drafted and killed" or even worse "My son would be drafted and might be killed", and conclude they don't care much about the poor border region suffering under the neighboring state's oppression.

Note Goering, not known as a pacifist and elitist, agrees.
 
One thing I think has not been mentioned, is that in a case of Belgium passively or actively co-operating with Germany, it would still have the option of switching sides in case France looked like it would be winning - sitting nicely on the logistical lines of German armies in Northern France. Turning coats is the oldest trick in the books for small countries.

Not a bad idea, but it still requires finesse, favorable geography, and luck at the final peace conference. Czechoslovakia and Finland did that in WWII, but the final result was not the same. Chiefly favorable (and unfavorable) geography, if you ask me.
 
There is also a question, if France won as in OTL, would any punishment have been worse than what Belgium experienced in OTL 1914-1918 anyway? I very much doubt it would have resulted in tens of thousands of deaths.
Belgium would probably have lost Wallonia, for a start.
 

NoMommsen

Donor
Please note the German Septemberprogramm of 09 September 1914. A partial list of German demands as found on Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Septemberprogramm):

...
Holy .... crap.
There're still seem people around paying much of significance to the so-called "Septemberprogramm".
Might help to read the cited source a wee bit further :
...The government, finally, never committed itself to anything. It had ordered the September Programme as an informal hearing in order to learn about the opinion of the economic and military elites.
 
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