To Michele:
My apologies for taking the time to respond, but real life took over, and I had on top some issues with my computer. I find these exchanges stimulating, as it can certainly help refine the understanding of particular points of history, and I hope we can keep this civil.
The fundamental point is that I think we don't agree about the definition of "alliance". In my definition of the word, an alliance implies a degree of automaticity whereby you are bound to intervene militarily to support the other party under certain circumstances - think NATO Article 5. This was not the case with the 1920 French-Belgian agreement, as this was made absolutely clear in the exchange of notes between the French and the Belgian governments at the time: "
Il va de soi que la souveraineté des deux Etats demeure intacte quant aux charges militaires qu'ils imposeront à leurs pays respectifs et quant à l'appréciation, dans chaque cas, de la réalisation de l'eventualité en vue de laquelle le présent accord est conclu." Free translation: "
It goes without saying that the sovereignty of each State remains intact with regards to the military charges that they will impose upon their respective countries, and with respect to the appreciation, in each case, of the realization of the eventuality (i.e. an unprovoked German aggression)
for which this agreement has been concluded."
You seem to have a more extensive interpretation of alliance, which is fine, and I have a more legal one. I acknowledge the agreement recognized a closeness between France and Belgium, but I would personally not qualify it as an alliance.
As for your argument that the fact that the agreement was registered with the League of Nations, the registration obligation covered "treaties and other international agreements". So, this does not prove that it was a treaty nor an alliance. In fact, there were many treaties registered with the LoN which had absolutely no military content.
The occupation of the Ruhr ended in 1925. It took until 1936, with the King's "solely and exclusively Belgian" foreign policy statement, for the Accord to be considered as abrogated by the Belgians. So maybe there was something more to it than the technical details of the occupation of the Ruhr.
The nature of the 1920 agreement evolved over time, especially after the signing of the Locarno treaty in 1925. When the occupation of the Rhur ended, there was indeed a very public debate in Belgium with respect to the fate of the Agreement. There were essentially three schools of thought:
1) Since the occupation of Germany had ended and the international security position was covered by the Locarno treaty, a first school of thought was that the 1920 Agreement had
de facto ceased to produce its effects, and thus lapsed.
2) Another opinion was that the 1920 agreement was in contradiction with, if not the terms, at least the spirit, of Locarno, and that it would be more appropriate to denounce it. Such was, for instance, the opinion defended at times by Emile Vandervelde, the leader of the Labor Party who was Minister of Foreign Affairs in various cabinets during the interwar period.
3) Finally, there was the opinion that the couple of clauses that didn't relate to the occupation of the Rhur (and which foresaw essentially a coordination of defense planning) provided an appropriate military content to the obligation made to France and Belgium to support each other in case of unprovoked German aggression as as one of the eventualities covered by the Locarno treaty. This is the interpretation that ultimately prevailed - see the 1931 speech by Paul Hymans in front of Parliament to which I provided the link previously. The French government agreed to that interpretation. So, the nature of the 1920 agreement evolved due to international circumstances and was made to fit within the Locarno framework.
After the remilitarization of the Rhineland in 1936, the Belgian diplomacy sought at first to salvage what it could from the Locarno framework. When it realized, quite fast, that the Locarno system had collapsed and could not be revived, it became inevitable that the Belgian government would also denounce the 1920 agreement, which it considered as intimately linked to that system.
You have to realize that level of trust into the French had been horribly damaged in Belgium after the lack of reaction to the remilitarization of the Rhineland. Initially, the Belgian Prime Minister Van Zeeland had reacted very forcefully and proposed a joint military intervention to the French. When confronted with the inaction of the French government, the Belgian Government was very quickly forced to backpedal vigorously lest it would be completely naked and isolated as a warmonger.
A pretty inaccurate description of the treaty. First, you omit to mention that Britain and Italy were signatories too, as guarantors; it was the post-WWI update of the multilateral guarantee of Belgium.
Yes, Britain and Italy were signatories as well, but I don't see how this changes the crux of the argument. I did not mention them as this was not really relevant.
Second, and most importantly, it was not equidistant, not even formally. Look up articles 2 and 3. They provide guarantees in the relations between "Germany and Belgium, and Germany and France". For some reason, the signatories did not think that commitments to peace and guarantees were needed between Belgium and France.
This is a fair point. When I referred to equidistance, I meant that Belgium was supposed to support militarily either France of Germany if it were subject to an unprovoked aggression by the other country. Belgium was thus a guarantor of the French-German border, which in a way was quite extraordinary if you think about it. So, to clarify my point, I find it difficult to qualify Belgium as a French ally under the Locarno system if Belgium was bound to go to war with France if it attacked Germany...
So the military staff enters an agreement for mutual defense in case of unprovoked attack by a third party, the government signs it, then they try to keep its contents secret, don't present it to the Parliament, or to the King, for their necessary approval. However, they behave as if it's in force well beyond the end of the joint military effort you claim it was about, but silently - until they decide they no longer want it.
That's what "no duplicity" means to you?
When I wrote there was no "duplicity", I meant that the interpretation of the 1920 agreement by the Belgian government was perfectly transparent to the French, who at least feigned to agree with it. That many people in Paris wanted to believe that the agreement meant more than it did in the view of the Belgians, is probably also true... As for the ultimate fate of the agreement, please see my comments above.
