(Chronicles, A Magazine of American Culture), April 2002 
 
http://www.chroniclesmagazine.org/Chronicles/April2002/0402Sunic.htm 
 
From the April 2002 issue of Chronicles: 
 
Letter From Belgium 
by Tomislav Sunic 
 
The Coming Belgoslavia? 
 
What was meant to grow separately cannot last long as an artificial whole. 
This prehistoric wisdom seems to be forgotten by advocates of 
multiculturalism-which is just a misleading euphemism for polyethnism and 
multiracialism. The unpredictable side of multiracial conviviality seems to 
be deliberately overlooked by political elites in multiethnic and 
multiracial Belgium, a miniscule country that has recently been rocked by 
pedophile scandals in the lofty corners of high politics. Its venerable 
royal court, under King Albert, and the liberal-leftist coteries in power 
have found themselves popularly referred to as the "Chester Molesters in 
charge of running Belgoslavia." 
The separatist-minded Flemings also derisively dub the Belgian state "the 
last Soviet republic." There may be some truth to that appellation, and not 
just because Brussels is the site of the Ceausescu-style building that 
houses the E.U. eurocrats. The Belgian postal authorities have recently 
produced a stamp with Lenin's face on it. That which would be violently 
rejected in the more virile postcommunist Balkans or Russia seems to enjoy 
market value among the political class and socialist trade unions in this 
artificial state. By contrast, any minor and inoffensive joke against the 
rising tide of illegal Asian immigrants, or any criticism of the Asian and 
Albanian drug dealers who have invaded Antwerp, can get you into legal 
trouble and earn you the label of a racist right-winger. 
A complicated coalition government, elected on a proportional basis, runs 
the country. Belgium has two parliaments but refuses to accept the Flemings 
as a separate and distinct ethnic group within the clearly defined federal 
republic. Instead, the leftist-controlled media refer to the Flemings as 
the "Dutch-speaking residents of Belgium residing in the 'region' of 
Flandres." The phrase "region de Flanders" is in every politician's mouth. 
In the early 1970's, the Flemings, after a century-long legal (and often 
violent) fight, had managed to win a great deal of linguistic and cultural 
autonomy, but Francophile Jacobinism still lurks everywhere. The 
pro-government media quickly rebukes as racism any sign of Flemish 
separatism or nationalist sentiment. 
The towering irony is that the Flemings are not an ethnic minority in 
Belgium. They represent the absolute majority, totaling 6.6 million 
residents. Unlike the 3.5 million French-speaking Belgian Walloons, who are 
located in the southern half of Belgium, the Flemings have a more 
pronounced sense of national identity and cultural distinctiveness, which 
cannot be solely attributed to their Germanic roots or their distinct 
language. For over a century, Flanders has been part and parcel of a larger 
entity, and most Flemings, regardless of their political credo, reject 
centralism, which has been exported to them by neighboring France since the 
14th century. Within this context, we can understand why the so-called 
right-wing nationalist Vlaams Blok has a rather poor and awkward 
relationship with Jean-Marie le Pen's Front National in France. The party 
is, however, rather supportive of the separatist Quebecois in Canada and 
shows no hesitation in backing the autonomy of Northern Ireland or the 
Basques. In France, on both the right and left wings of the political 
spectrum, hardly anyone questions the centralized structure of the French 
state. 
That is not the case in Flanders, which nurtures a strong central-European, 
confederalist, and quasi-imperial attitude toward former bits and pieces of 
the defunct Habsburg Empire. The Belgian government, eager to show its 
politically correct credentials, was in the forefront of the condemnation 
two years ago of the alleged xenophobia of Austria's Jorg Haider. Flemish 
nationalists quickly responded to the Belgians' undiplomatic posturing. The 
Vlaams Blok loudly sided with Haider's beleaguered FPO party and his 
coalition government, rapidly dispatching truckloads of Flemish youngsters 
to mountainous Austrian Corinthia on skiing holidays. 
The Flemings' pro-Central European inclinations are firmly grounded in 
history. During the Flemish-born Charles V's reign, Flanders became part of 
the vast, confederal Holy Roman Empire, whose longevity and solid structure 
overshadows the nebulous Soviet-inspired European Union. The Holy Roman 
Empire's main goal was to chase the Turks out of Europe and to keep the 
Turkish ally in the West-treacherous proto-Jacobin France-from crossing the 
Rhine River. The terrorist artillery bombardment of Brussels by Louis XIV 
is often cited among Flemings as a warning against any rapprochement with 
France. By the end of the 17th century, while Louis XIV was realizing his 
aggressive dreams in the west, Flemish volunteers, along with thousands of 
Central European fighters under the charismatic Prince Eugene of Savoy, 
were desperately trying to stem the Turkish tide in Central Europe. Even 
today, Flemings harbor a great deal of sympathy for the Habsburg Empire and 
its mythic queen Maria Theresa. Not surprisingly, Flemish nationalists were 
among the first to flock to the aid of Croatia after Croatia's proclamation 
of independence in 1991. The Walloons, as well as the neighboring French, 
were not happy with the dissolution of multiethnic Yugoslavia. Its breakup 
vividly reminded them of their own historical miscreants. 
A foreigner must be cautious in addressing a Flemish passerby in French. A 
Fleming will feign ignorance and play dumb, although he may speak perfect 
French. Yet, when approached by a foreign tourist, he will immediately 
start speaking fluently in both English and German and will escort the 
tourist to the next village and show hospitality. Even a simple Flemish 
garbage collector gets by in three different languages. In Wallonia, it is 
a miracle to encounter a public official who speaks a word of Dutch, let 
alone one who can stutter broken English or mutter some German words. 
Although smaller nations are seldom enamored of their big neighbors, 
Flemish nationalists are amicable toward Germany. Their overtly warm ties 
to Germany during the past century have led to setbacks in their quest for 
independence. They are immediately called "former Nazi collaborators" by 
leftist journalists each time the Vlaams Blok makes some politically 
incorrect statement. And while the Flemings speak the same language as the 
neighboring Dutch (and despite the fact that Flanders was, from 1816 to 
1830, part of the larger United Kingdom of the Netherlands), they do not 
have pronounced affection for the Dutch. Their Catholic tradition and their 
baroque mentality have separated them from their Protestant and mercantile 
next-door neighbors. An important figure from the Vlaams Blok Youth, lawyer 
Karim Van Overmeire, told me that the Flemings reject with horror the 
permissiveness and decadence of the Dutch and cannot accept their tolerance 
for drug consumption. 
This is not to say that the Flemings are pious Catholic believers. In fact, 
the Vlaams Blok includes a considerable number of agnostics and pagans 
among its ranks. At political gatherings, you seldom see a Catholic 
priest-as is almost always the case in Croatia-pontificating on the virtue 
of global brotherhood or multiracialism. Flemish nationalists, unlike other 
European nationalists, have also avoided clannish nationalism and party 
intrigues, which have been a hallmark of Umberto Bossi's Lega Nord in Italy 
and Le Pen's Front National. 
The greatest weapon that Flemish nationalists wield in their quest for more 
autonomy is their thriving economy, built on their exceptional service 
industry, which is the best in Western Europe. The Flemings could easily 
bail out of Belgium, but the Walloons, whose work ethic is poor and whose 
corrupted politicians and trade unions have become addicted to generous 
Flemish subsidies, could not. A prominent Flemish scholar of Hinduism, Dr. 
Koenraad Elst, who is also critical of "Belgoslavia," summarized the 
psychology of the Walloons in one curt sentence: "The debtors always hate 
their creditors." Until 1970, the Walloons had run the Belgian military and 
diplomatic show, but their economic clout began to fade by the late 70's. 
Wallonia-which had been, since the Industrial Revolution, the main European 
location of industry-lies barren and destitute today. Closed-down factories 
in the cities of Liege and Charleroi, decorated by throngs of idle and 
destitute Arab youth, look like they belong in Third World countries. 
By contrast, the Flemings-who, until the early 1950's, were held in 
contempt and often derided by Walloon high bourgeoisie as lowly proles who 
are only good for milking cows and shoveling horse dung-have surpassed the 
Walloons in wealth. Flanders' economic growth has been on the order of 2.5 
to 3.2 percent annually over the past decade, while the growth in Wallonia 
has not exceeded 1.9 percent during the same period. The number of 
unemployed in Flanders stands at 4.9 percent of the population; in 
Wallonia, it is a staggering 15 percent. Flanders accounts for 86 percent 
of the country's exports. A major point of contention is the centralized 
social-security system and government-run pension funds, whose prime 
benefactors are Walloons. Flemish fiscal transfers to Wallonia are about 
120 billion Belgian francs annually (approximately three billion U.S. 
dollars). In other words, each Flemish family pays over $500 per month in 
welfare to Wallonia. 
Along with the historical and cultural gap between these two peoples, the 
economic arguments seem reason enough to write the country off the map. 
This may not be easy, considering that the European Union chose the tiny 
multiethnic and multiracial Belgium as its Politburo. Only when Belgium 
begins balkanizing into Euroslavia will some eurocrat in Brussels likely 
start scratching himself behind the ear. As in the case of the former 
Yugoslavia, it may be too late. 
 
Tomislav Sunic, a writer and former Croat diplomat, resides in Europe. 
Copyright 2002, www.ChroniclesMagazine.org 
 
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