The Belgian Military Administration (AMB)

While in 1949 the question of the borders between Belgium and Germany was the exclusive responsibility of the Allies, after this date it was to become the subject of bilateral relations between Belgium and the FRG. It was within this context that, on the 23rd of April 1949, a Belgian military administration was put into place, with its headquarters at Eupen. As we have seen, the 4,000 Germans from the enclaves of Rötgen and Mützenich did not end up joining the Belgian heartland; it should be noted though, that a thousand of them, the inhabitants of the villages of Bildchen, Losheim and Hemmeres, were nonetheless placed under Belgian administration, although they were not obliged to take Belgian nationality. In the following years, the climate was one of negotiation with the Germans, a détente which was facilitated by two elements: one, linked to the general context, was the fact that Europe as a whole was anchored in a Cold War which was already well underway at this time; the other element was the Belgian accreditation of a German ambassador. Indeed, Belgium was the first country, along with Denmark, to reinstate diplomatic relations with the young federal Republic. “By analysing opinion polls of the time,” notes Christoph Brüll, “we can observe great suspicion on the part of the populations who had suffered under the German yoke. From 1950 and the Korean War onwards, however, the trend softened, despite certain caricatures appearing in the press, including the ‘Pourqoui Pas?’ for example which, on the occasion of the new German ambassador to Belgium did not hesitate to ironically run the headline “Ils sont revenus!” [They’re back!]”

On the diplomatic level, the years 1944-1947 marked a true turning point for Belgium. The British effectively refused the Belgians – who nonetheless made up a third of the Allied troops stationed in Germany – an occupied sector the length of their border, which was their express wish, and instead imposed upon them an elongated occupation zone, extending up to Westphalia, some 200 km east of the Rhine. This was catastrophic for the Belgians, who realised for the first time that their voice was no longer being taken into account and that they were no longer in any position to impose their views. The British, exhausted after five years of war and with a battered economy on their hands, would only taste this bitter truth in 1948 when they realised that the centre of gravity of Belgian foreign policy had shifted clearly from London to Washington.