A German Defense of Belgium

BEFORE the war Belgium had ordered from the Krupp Company in Essen four large modern guns (twenty-eight centimeters) for the fortifications of Antwerp. At the beginning of 1914 the guns were completed, accepted, paid for in full, and ready for shipment; but the work on the fortifications of Antwerp had not yet been carried so far that the guns could be set up. The debates on this subject in the Belgian Chamber of Deputies will perhaps be recalled. At this point the Belgian government requested Krupp to keep the guns in storage for the time being. Krupp agreed, but not willingly. Such storage is unusual, and it entails many inconveniences. Krupp repeatedly took steps, both byword of mouth and in writing, to get rid of the guns; the Belgian Government continually repeated its request that Krupp be kind enough to keep them, and was even ready to pay for the accommodation. A modus vivendi was repeatedly found, but the attitude of both parties remained unchanged until the war broke out, when the Prussian Ministry of War at once seized these guns in Essen as booty (value four million marks).

From this I draw the following conclusion: Had the Belgian Government had any evil intentions whatsoever against Germany; or had it expected a German attack, it would, at the very latest when war threatened, have secured possession of its expensive guns, instead of insisting that they should remain in Krupp’s care. . .

A few months before the war Belgium established another and particularly important connection between itself and Krupp. For its supply of a new (scarcely tested) ammunition for field artillery it placed itself entirely in the hands of this company. After securing large direct orders, Krupp conceded the privilege of manufacturing this ammunition to the Belgian firm of Cockerill, with the cooperation, of course, of the competent (Belgian) authorities, who saw to it that their own works also secured the same privilege. For Cockerill and the Belgian Ministry of War this arrangement meant active and sustained cooperation with Krupp’s representatives, engineers, etc., and a corresponding dependence on the grantor of the licenses. At that time one of Cockerill’s directors paid me frequent visits; and I do not consider it superfluous to note that, at the moment of the outbreak of the war, a letter from Cockerill lay before me, informing me that he was just sending a payment on the license amounting to one million francs.

Consider the close dependency of the war-material business on governmental intentions, and then, on the basis of the occurrences I have here recounted, which are matters of public knowledge, pass judgment on the alleged mala fides of the Belgian Government towards Germany.