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Belgium Quotes

“Congo reformers like Morel, much to the annoyance of Hochschild, advocated either German or British colonization of the area (Congo). Morel’s view, according to Hochschild, speaking ex cathedra from the hallowed seat of modern California, “seems surprising to us today” and was among his “faults” and “political limitations.” Quite the opposite. The moment the Belgians colonized the Congo in 1908, a miraculous improvement was noted on all fronts. Seeking to debunk colonialism, Hochschild’s book demonstrates the opposite. This is the first and biggest lie at the heart of King Leopold’s Ghost.”

ColonialismLeopold IiBelgiumAdam HochschildBelgiansLeopold S GhostBruce GilleyKing Leopold S GhostEdmund Dene Morel
Book:King Hochschild’s Hoax: An absurdly deceptive book on Congolese rubber production is better described as historical fiction.
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“Hochschild is at pains to convince the reader that anyone opposing the EIC was good, whether brutal slave trader, inveterate cannibal, fetish priest, or ethnic-cleansing warlord. His treatment of the 1895 rebellion by native soldiers at a military camp named Luluabourg in the southern savannah strains to portray the rebels as noble savages pining for freedom and a return to pastoral life. In his telling, the Belgian commander Mathieu Pelzer was a “bully” who “used his fists” and thus got his comeuppance at breakfast with a knife to the throat. Actually, Pelzer had nothing to do with it. The rebels were former soldiers for a black slave king. The EIC had brought them to the southern camp to reintegrate them as government soldiers. But their loss of royal prerogatives to whore, steal, and maim caused them to rebel. The group never exceeded 300 (Hochschild speculates that it reached 2,500) and petered out in the northern jungles in 1897, a rag-tag criminal gang gone to seed.”

CongoLeopold IiBelgiumCongo Free StateAdam HochschildLeopold S Ghost
Book:King Hochschild’s Hoax: An absurdly deceptive book on Congolese rubber production is better described as historical fiction.
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“Hochschild repeats the urban legend that Léopold burned all the EIC documents, going “to extraordinary lengths to try to erase potentially incriminating evidence.” Quite the opposite: Léopold was proud of the EIC and went to extraordinary lengths to leave behind an extensive record. The testimony of his military aide that Hochschild cites about “burning the State archives” and turning “most of the Congo state records to ash” was a misunderstanding: what the aide saw burning were ruined and unreadable papers among the thousands of documents that came back in crates from the Congo in 1908. Léopold left behind 14 trunks filled with his personal letters and financial statements. Everything was carefully cataloged in “a vast room that looked like a post office,” the aide recalled. Some of it went missing in the turmoil of World War II before resurfacing in the basement of a house in 1983. Just last year, researchers at the Royal Museum for Central Africa who work on the EIC archives published a new book, The Congo Free State: What Could Archives Tell Us?”

CongoLeopold IiBelgiumCongo Free StateAdam HochschildArchibesRoyal Museum For Central Africa
Book:King Hochschild’s Hoax: An absurdly deceptive book on Congolese rubber production is better described as historical fiction.
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“In Brussels between 1909 and 1914, Louis Mascré sculpted away for Belgium’s Royal Academy of Science, creating a plaster cranium, a mother and child, the upper body of an elder. At a time when Belgium was brutalizing the Congo, the country’s Royal Academy compared Africans to apes and also depicted Neanderthals as simian rather than caveman-like.”

BelgiumBrusselsPrehistoryBelgium CongoLouis MascréRoyal Academy Of Science
Book:The Invention of Prehistory: Empire, Violence, and Our Obsession with Human Origins
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“I will instruct the minister of war to strengthen the Gendarmerie in Brussels, to recognize the addresses and customs of the demagogues and to try to find out what is coming up, I am told that the demonstrations which are only intended as intimidation and as preparation in an unguarded moment are able to turn into something else, once they have everyone on the street they will attack the government, what measure have you taken to face such a surprise attack? Do the regiments have been ordered to march on their own accord to the Rue de la Loi and the Boulvard, where in the summer it is more difficult to summon soldiers, will they be more satisfied now, working in the open air is now impossible, if I were you I wouldn't hesitate for a minute to summon them, the responsibility is too great, you are not protected from an incident, and you will have to face a formidable riot, all yours.”

Leopold IiBelgiumBrusselsLeopold Of Belgium
Author:Leopold II
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“Dear Minister, I particularly regret that the government, as I had expressly requested, did not make the royal referendum a sine qua non, three points in the program concern the crown directly, the possibility of expanding the territory, the referendum and the princely marriages, I would have liked to see this matter implemented, we have been clear about this during our discussions, we have taken a very moderate attitude with this at a time when the most democratic constitution in Europe is being even more democratized, a constitution drawn up during a revolution, and at a time when there was no monarch, your devotee, etc.”

Leopold IiBelgiumLeopold Ii Of BelgiumLeopold Of BelgiumLeopold
Author:Leopold II
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“I was received with an overwhelming display of military and civilian tributes, all the way to the royal palace where I was to stay, troops were lined up behind which enthusiastic people were chanting their viva, it seemed to me that a major change had come in the Belgian public opinion on the importance of the Congo, when I first went there, the Belgian newspapers spouted nothing but criticism, they were completely dumbfounded, the king was recognized as the great benefactor of the nation.”

CongoLeopold IiBelgiumCongo Free StateLeopold Ii Of BelgiumHenry Morton Stanley
Author:Henry M. Stanley
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“Palmerston likes to put his foot on their necks! Now, no statesman must triumph over an enemy that is not quite dead, because people forget a real loss, a real misfortune, but they won’t forget an insult. Napoleon made great mistakes that way; he hated Prussia, insulted it on all occasions, but still left it alive. The consequence was that in 1813 they rose to a man in Prussia, even children and women took arms, because they had been treated with contempt and insulted.”

FranceBelgiumPrussiaNapoleonLeopold IPalmerston
Author:Leopold I
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“Constitutional government, especially in a small country, takes a great deal of time, and causes sight to be lost of the questions, which lone can secure to the country a political future. I have many a time that I saw you feeling more and more interest therein, and I am very anxious that it should be so, for it is time to be seriously occupied with those questions; otherwise Belgium will find herself at the tail of all other countries. I have heard that an association of German princes is actively occupied in an attempt at colonization in Texas…”

United StatesGermanyTexasColonialismBelgiumColonizationLeopold ILeopold I Of Belgium
Author:Leopold I
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“The sedition mongers are not numerous, but they frighten the peaceful majority, who, although it can be really strong, feels a veritable panic before this agitating force in the shadows? It is in this fear that lies the principal danger, and it would be in the veritable interest of the welfare of Europe that the Powers could show that the necessary force to support and defend the right is not still lacking to them.”

EuropeBelgiumLeopold ILeopold I Of BelgiumConcert Of Europe
Author:Leopold I
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“Abuse is somewhat the staff of life in England everything, everybody is to be abused; it is a pity, as nothing more unproductive as this everlasting abuse can be imagined. As nothing ever gave the slightest opening to this abuse, it is hoped that it will be soon got over the meeting of Parliament will now do good in this respect. As far as your few continental relatives are concerned, I don’t think they will be able to fix anything upon your faithful servant. I have done in England at all times good services… Successes of vanity, I am never fishing for in England, nor anywhere else. The only influence I may exercise is to prevent mischief where I can, which occasionally succeeds: if war can be avoided, and the same ends obtained, it is natural that they should be tried first…”

EnglandGreat BritainBelgiumUnited KingdomLeopold ILeopold I Of Belgium
Author:Leopold I
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“The economic crisis which weighs on Europe since the industry took such a big development, carries the nations towards the colonial companies. Belgium could not remain a stranger to this movement without seriously compromising its material interests; our King Leopold II understood this, and this is what determined him to substitute his individual initiative for the persistent inaction of the government and the nation.”

Leopold IiBelgiumLeopold Ii Of BelgiumBelgian ColonialismBelgian Colonial EmpireBelgian ImperialismBelgian NationalismBelgian Patriotism
Author:Alexis Henri Brialmont
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