Everybody their own State, at what costs?

King Willem I of the Netherlands (including Belgium)

In 1813 Napoleon got defeated by the world powers of the time and all countries he had conquered had to be re-distributed. This was done at the Congress of Vienna (1814 – 1815). The Kingdom of the Netherlands was born anew, with king William I of Orange-Nassau as the ruling king. His territory comprised the present independent states of the Netherlands and Belgium. In 1832 Belgium wanted to be independent of the Northern half of the new kingdom and started a separation movement, supported by France that felt punished by the large kingdom at its Northern border. The separation reasons were not formed by ratio, but by feelings. The North was mainly protestant, the South Roman Catholic. The Southern people had a more or less Roman lifestyle, the Northern people were more Calvinistic. In the South nobility, clergy and elite were still powerful forces, in the North merchants and elite were more enlightened and more “democratic” (although not comparable to what today is understood by that concept). It would however have made far more sense if the states remained together. Together they had everything a modern state needed to develop: raw materials, infrastructure (heavily supported by the new king), ports and harbours, colonies, a developed agricultural sector, cities such as Brussels, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Liege, etc. But no, the elites of both parts of the country despised each other and found the others dumb and not reliable. A theatre play in Brussels in 1832 was the spark in the powder barrel. The audience got inspired to raise an uprising movement. The Northern answer was sending an army but neighbouring countries put pressure to withdraw the army, and king William II lost his Southern part of the kingdom. Negotiations followed, and the South had to leave the provinces of North Brabant and Limburg to their Northern neighbours although these provinces had the cultural traits of Belgium: Roman Catholic and a Southern lifestyle. Otherwise the North half would be smaller than the South half and that wasn’t considered “fair”.

I tell this story because of the striking resemblance with “modern” conflicts such as in Georgia, where people from different cultures don’t want to live with each other in one state. Such conflicts are never rational, and are exploited and encouraged by more powerful nations who see this as an opportunity to increase their own power. The same holds for the Kosovo-conflict and other conflicts.

Suppose that one day Belgium would claim the South bank of the river Schelde which is the access to the harbour of Antwerp, and is Dutch territory. The Dutch have obliged themselves to scoop out the Dutch part of the Schelde, but are sometimes slow with performing this duty, and always are accused by the Belgians of slowness, and that they want to protect the interests of the competing harbour of Rotterdam. Suppose that one day the people of the Dutch province of Limburg would be “fed up” with the “Hollandse” exploitation of their province, and want to be part of Belgium, and Belgium would support their claim. Numerous other such examples could be mentioned in Europe, of parts of countries that would like to be independent or belong to another country: maybe Alsace would like to be German (their previous country), maybe Friesland would like to be independent, etc. In fact, Sweden would not hinder their Southern part to become Danish again, as I read a couple of years ago in the newspapers, but this isn’t realized yet. The Basks would also like their own republic, and maybe also other provinces of Spain and Italy. These strivings are not taken seriously because of arguments of reason, of ratio. Except in some rare instances (the Basks) this never leads to war-like situations.

After the fall of communism, it seems as if history repeats itself in countries formerly dominated by communism and, consequently, by the Soviet Union. This “union” appeared to be an imposed union, enforced by Russian power. Now Georgia shows that Russia wants to gain back part of this old power, if not by a communist ideology, then otherwise. Georgia itself had to deal with a similar claim by the Ossetians and other small nation-like groups within and around their young country. Everybody seems to want to have their country, and is prepared to shed blood for it. What this means to welfare and prosperity, doesn’t seem to be of interest. This way a conflict becomes a real conflict because of feelings of misery and revenge for lost house and family. It escalates, former friends and family become mutual enemies, within only a week or so.

Just like in the case of Belgium and the Netherlands, the Georgians and Ossetians would have done better to co-operate, just like all other small countries around the Russian Empire, and don’t give super-powers the alibi to interfere and take advantage from their quarrels. But this seems to be asked too much. It’s not Estonia, Georgia or Poland that Russia wants to “teach a lesson”, what they fear is USA-, NATO- and European influence in these young states. Russia is at this moment the most capitalist country in the world. Former party coryphées are now the billionnairs because they became the president-directors of oil and gaz firms and rule the country still more autocratic than even under communist regime. They don’t want to loose this wealth overnight, and know that many Russians are longing to the time in which they were a superpower, and will forget about the drawbacks. If these super-rich élite can help, then many “common” Russians want to remain poor and pay for protection by the rich, exactly like the Medieval farmer was protected by the count or duke. A dream world, don’t forget that Russia knew centuries of serfship, prolongated in the kolkhozes. Many Russian country people take life as it is, the last thing they long for is democracy, let alone they want to die for it. They only fear it because it belongs to non-Russian lifestyles, and the modern rich will do everything to let them keep this belief. They themselves fear it, too.

In 1813 Napoleon got defeated by the world powers of the time and all countries he had conquered had to be re-distributed. This was done at the Congress of Vienna (1814 – 1815). The Kingdom of the Netherlands was born anew, with king William I of Orange-Nassau as the ruling king. His territory comprised the present independent states of the Netherlands and Belgium. In 1832 Belgium wanted to be independent of the Northern half of the new kingdom and started a separation movement, supported by France that felt punished by the large kingdom at its Northern border. The separation reasons were not formed by ratio, but by feelings. The North was mainly protestant, the South Roman Catholic. The Southern people had a more or less Roman lifestyle, the Northern people were more Calvinistic. In the South nobility, clergy and elite were still powerful forces, in the North merchants and elite were more enlightened and more “democratic” (although not comparable to what today is understood by that concept). It would however have made far more sense if the states remained together. Together they had everything a modern state needed to develop: raw materials, infrastructure (heavily supported by the new king), ports and harbours, colonies, a developed agricultural sector, cities such as Brussels, Amsterdam, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Liege, etc. But no, the elites of both parts of the country despised each other and found the others dumb and not reliable. A theatre play in Brussels in 1832 was the spark in the powder barrel. The audience got inspired to raise an uprising movement. The Northern answer was sending an army but neighbouring countries put pressure to withdraw the army, and king William II lost his Southern part of the kingdom. Negotiations followed, and the South had to leave the provinces of North Brabant and Limburg to their Northern neighbours although these provinces had the cultural traits of Belgium: Roman Catholic and a Southern lifestyle. Otherwise the North half would be smaller than the South half and that wasn’t considered “fair”.

I tell this story because of the striking resemblance with “modern” conflicts such as in Georgia, where people from different cultures don’t want to live with each other in one state. Such conflicts are never rational, and are exploited and encouraged by more powerful nations who see this as an opportunity to increase their own power. The same holds for the Kosovo-conflict and other conflicts.

Suppose that one day Belgium would claim the South bank of the river Schelde which is the access to the harbour of Antwerp, and is Dutch territory. The Dutch have obliged themselves to scoop out the Dutch part of the Schelde, but are sometimes slow with performing this duty, and always are accused by the Belgians of slowness, and that they want to protect the interests of the competing harbour of Rotterdam. Suppose that one day the people of the Dutch province of Limburg would be “fed up” with the “Hollandse” exploitation of their province, and want to be part of Belgium, and Belgium would support their claim. Numerous other such examples could be mentioned in Europe, of parts of countries that would like to be independent or belong to another country: maybe Alsace would like to be German (their previous country), maybe Friesland would like to be independent, etc. In fact, Sweden would not hinder their Southern part to become Danish again, as I read a couple of years ago in the newspapers, but this isn’t realized yet. The Basks would also like their own republic, and maybe also other provinces of Spain and Italy. These strivings are not taken seriously because of arguments of reason, of ratio. Except in some rare instances (the Basks) this never leads to war-like situations.

After the fall of communism, it seems as if history repeats itself in countries formerly dominated by communism and, consequently, by the Soviet Union. This “union” appeared to be an imposed union, enforced by Russian power. Now Georgia shows that Russia wants to gain back part of this old power, if not by a communist ideology, then otherwise. Georgia itself had to deal with a similar claim by the Ossetians and other small nation-like groups within and around their young country. Everybody seems to want to have their country, and is prepared to shed blood for it. What this means to welfare and prosperity, doesn’t seem to be of interest. This way a conflict becomes a real conflict because of feelings of misery and revenge for lost house and family. It escalates, former friends and family become mutual enemies, within only a week or so.

Just like in the case of Belgium and the Netherlands, the Georgians and Ossetians would have done better to co-operate, just like all other small countries around the Russian Empire, and don’t give super-powers the alibi to interfere and take advantage from their quarrels. But this seems to be asked too much. It’s not Estonia, Georgia or Poland that Russia wants to “teach a lesson”, what they fear is USA-, NATO- and European influence in these young states. Russia is at this moment the most capitalist country in the world. Former party coryphées are now the billionnairs because they became the president-directors of oil and gaz firms and rule the country still more autocratic than even under communist regime. They don’t want to loose this wealth overnight, and know that many Russians are longing to the time in which they were a superpower, and will forget about the drawbacks. If these super-rich élite can help, then many “common” Russians want to remain poor and pay for protection by the rich, exactly like the Medieval farmer was protected by the count or duke. A dream world, don’t forget that Russia knew centuries of serfship, prolongated in the kolkhozes. Many Russian country people take life as it is, the last thing they long for is democracy, let alone they want to die for it. They only fear it because it belongs to non-Russian lifestyles, and the modern rich will do everything to let them keep this belief. They themselves fear it, too.