BELGIUM

The country is in the north-west of Europe. It became popular in the Middle Ages for the wealth of its free merchant cities.

In the 15^th century the area belonged to the Duchy of Burgundy.

In 1477 it was taken into the Habsburg Empire by Maximilian I.

Habsburg established its Empire by marrying and therefore the phrase was coined “Other countries win countries by war but you, Austria, win countries by marrying.”

Between 1504 and 1715 the territory was rules by Spain

From 1713 till 1795 it was ruled by Austria and by France
=============================================================
PLEASE BE SO KIND AND CLICK ON ADVERTS. THANK YOU
=======================================================================

In 1815 it became a province of the kingdom of the Netherlands and in 1830 it received independence after a national revolution.  Prince Leopold of Saxon-Coburg was elected one year later as King of Belgium

An international treaty was drawn up in 1839 and it guaranteed Belgium to stay neutral. This treaty was ignored in 1914 and 1940 by Germany when Belgium was invaded.

In 1971 a constitutional reform was established which split the federation of Belgium into semi-autonomous regions of Flemish-speaking Flanders, French-speaking Wallonia and bi-lingual Brussels.  Brussels includes the headquarters of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) and the European Community (EU).

King Baudouin died in 1983 and was succeeded by his brother, Albert

BELGAE

Large group of Celtic tribes were living in the northern Rhineland, the Low Countries, northern France (Gaul) and southern England during the 2^nd and 1^st centuries BC.

The Belgae were well established people and put a fierce fight against the Romans. 

Eventually the Romans started to respect. 

Julius Caesar conquered Gaul in 50BC. It followed that Belgae noblemen were admitted to the Roman senate.

Today’s name Belgium derived from the name of Belgae.

BOMBED INTO SUBMISSION

The Allies bombing raids were a major break-through of defeating Hitler.

February 1942 RAF Air Commander Air Marshal Arthur Harris started an “area bombing” of Germany’s cities and industrial areas.

30/31 May, 1942 the first thousand bombers flew a raid on Cologne.

August, 1942 the US Army Air Force joined in with precision day raids.

1943 the RAF and USAAF bombed Hamburg, the Ruhr where Germany’s heavy industries were and the capital Berlin. The Luftwaffe’s fighters took heavy losses.

Under the armaments minister Albert Speer the production increased.

Long-rang escort fighters change the Allies bombing raids and succeeded in the destruction of Dresden in February 1945. The bombing raid caused a firestorm and till now it is not known how many people died but death-toll was massive. Mr Churchill declared Dresden a military-fee zone and refugees fled there thinking they are safe. Then he ordered one of the heaviest bombing raids.

================================================================
PLEASE, PLEASE BE SO KIND AND CLICK ON ADVERTS. THANK YOU
================================================================

Allies’ losses were estimated around 100,000 British and US air crew died.

On 6 June, 1944, the Allies liberation began on Western Europe with the D-Day landing under the command of the American General Dwight Eisenhower. Over 156,000 Allied troops landed on the first day in Normandy.

Caen fell to the British and Canadian after a month of heavy fighting.

At the end July US troops broke through and went on to the east and south. Paris was liberated on 23 August and Brussels on 3 September.

Montgomery planned to break into Germany through Holland but was beating back and had to withdraw to Arnheim.

Hitler had a last offensive in December through the Ardennes but was beaten back. And in March 1945 the Allies crossed the Rhine.

The Western Allies stopped at the River Elbe because of the agreement at the Yalta Conference. It left the Russian to take Berlin on 2 May, 1945

Hitler committed suicide two days before. It is the official announcement but many rumours stated that he fled to Argentine. The Russians never gave his body, what was left of it because it was doused in petrol and set alight, to be examined.

On 4 May, 1945 German forces in the north-west Europe area surrendered to Montgomery.

Germany surrendered at Eisenhower’s headquarters in Reims, northern France.

SECOND WORLD WAR

Reading the history of the Second World War it shows how it can escalate into a world wide war, very quickly, by one country gets involved after another.

At the moment, are we at the same point again?

When the First World War finished in 1918 everybody was sure of an everlasting peace. The following 20 years several diplomatic crises should have warned and prevented of slipping into another World War.

Fascist Franco in Spain, Benito Mussolini in Italy and in Germany Adolf Hitler became Reich Chancellor in 1933.  Japan threatened the peace in Asia.

Hitler, Germany, began a rearmament and March 1936 he re-occupied the Rhineland despite the Treaty of Versailles. Two years later he annexed Austria. Annexed is just another word for occupied which does not make sound so sever.

====================================================
PLEASE BE SO KIND AND CLICK ON ADVERTS.  THANK YOU
====================================================

Hitler made Britain and France for Czechoslovakia to give up the German-speaking Sudentenland. In 1939 Hitler’s army marched into Czechoslovakia and occupied the rest of the country.

His action made Britain and France signed a guarantee to Poland. It did not stop Hitler and he invaded Poland on 1 September, 1939. Now Britain and France were forced to declare war. Poland was overrun and Warsaw declared capitulation on 27 September.

April 1940 Hitler invaded Denmark and Norway.

May 10 Winston Churchill became British Prime Minister. The Germans offensive in the West went through the Belgium Ardennes. At the same time they broke through the French line with tanks, assault troops and air support.

They were heading towards the Channel and splitting the Allies armies. At Dunkirk they had the British and French army cornered. 338,000 were rescued by any boat available and brought back to Britain. Although the Germans were already there to invade Britain and could have wiped out the British army Hitler would not give the command. The reason will never be known. Maybe the huge British Empire was even for Hitler too much.

The German army continued and on 22 June, 1940 France signed an armistice.

Britain faced Hitler alone with Italy entering the war and fought on the Hitler’s side.

In July Hitler commanded to draw up a plan of invading Britain. To achieve it he had to bomb Britain into submission first. The Luftwaffe under Reichsmarshall Herman Goering began its offensive on 13 August.

The Real Reality of War

on both sides

Nobody wins but the Fatcats (again)

and it is them who want war

Air Chief Marshal Hugh Dowding’s RAF fighter Command was down to its last reserve when the Germans stopped bombing airfields and attacked London on 7 September and other cities.  Ten days later Hitler postponed his invasion.

Hitler tried to bombard Britain into submission from September, 1940 to May 1941 but never achieved it.

Due to Britain’s colonies it was the greatest sea power and ruled the waves. Germany’s U-boats was the biggest thread.  By 1942 they were sinking 92 ships a month. After the British invented Sonar the table turned and Admiral Karl Doenitz’s U-boats experienced a heavy loss.  From 40,000 men only 10,000 survived.

BEGINNING OF FIRST WORLD WAR 100 YEARS AGO

ARCHDUKE FRANZ FERDINAND
AND HIS WIFE SOFIE AND  
THEIR THREE CHILDREN 
IN 1910

When Gravilo Princip fired a shot at the Archduke Franz Ferdinand, killing him, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, he did not realize that he started something that would spin out of control. Although, in general, he was blamed for the First World War but there always playing other factors into it to ignite such devastation.

On one hand, there was Germany united since the Franco-Prussian war of 1879-1. The balance of Europe started to shift which was frowned on by other countries. Tensions started to build up by national ambitions, economic rivalry and setting up colonies.

In the year 1914 there existed a Triple Alliance of Austria-Hungary, Germany and Italy. This other Triple entente was between Britain, France and Russia. These two Triple Alliances caused the spreading of the conflict. Therefore, when Kaiser William II invaded Belgium, for unknown reason, it seemed that the stage was set for the First World War. Britain had to declare on Germany on 4 August, 1914 because Britain guaranteed Belgium to protect their independence.  

At that time Britain had the largest Navy for obvious reason but they did not have any army.  The secretary of state for war, Lord Kitchener, rushed around to get a volunteer army together.  In 1915 he counted around 2.5million man. Since the war continued the number of volunteer slumped and the casualties rose rapidly; he was forced to introduce a compulsory army.

Germany’s attempt to defeat France before Russia could mobilise failed at the Battle of the Marne in September 1914. Trenches were tugged in on both sides. Due to the accuracy of modern weapons, especially the machine gun, it was realized that soldiers can safe themselves by taking shelter in the trenches.

At the battle of Ypres in November 1914 the British Expeditionary Force under Sir John French was almost wiped out.  By December 1914 there were trenches from the English Channel all the way down to Switzerland.

After that the Allies and the Germans tried to end the stalemate.  The only way they could do it by bombarding the enemy’s position, using poisonous gas and built tanks. The loss of men was huge. The Battles of Verdun and the Somme in 1916 cost the Allies 1.1million. The Germans had the same number of men lost.  British forces under the command of Sir Douglas Haig lost around 44,000 men a month which rose to 75,000 by 1918.

In spite of the Russia enormous effort to mobilise in 1917 they suffered great losses. They won a great victory in 1916 over Austria in the offensive of General Alexei Brusilov but at the end they were exhausted. We also got to remember they had a revolution in 1917 while whole Europe was at war.  After the revolution the Provisional Government led by Alexander Kerensky the offensive in summer was a failure. It is assumed that the Bolsheviks got tired of fighting. In March 1918 Lenin signed a peace treaty which was humiliating, the treaty of Brest Litovsk.

ALBERT EINSTEIN

Albert Einstein's theory was a revolution in the understanding of space, time and  motion even till today.

This year was the 100th anniversary of the relativity   

ALBERT  EINSTEIN AND
 HIS WIFE ELSA 

Einstein (1879-1955) changed the understanding of how the physical world works. He was born in Ulm, Germany and showed at an early age an interest in machineries. His father was an electrical engineer. He attended the technical college in Zurich. In 1901 he became a Swiss national and worked at the patent office in Bern. During this time he continued his own research. In 1905 he became a doctor of physics.

After that he started to formulate the ideas which changed the concepts of physics established by Sir Isaac Newton. His special theory of relatively was that the speed of light was fixed and any physical objects ( spacecraft) could not travel faster. He proved that objects shrink when reaching the speed of light and their mass increases and time slows down.

In 1916 he established four-dimensional description of the Universe. He called it space time which turns time into length, width and depth. Over decades this theory had been repeatedly confirmed.

After Einstein published his papers on the special theory of relativity he was able to move from the patent office to a number of academic positions in Europe. Eventually he took up a position in Berlin in 1914 as director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for physics. He worked there till 1933.

Einstein’s fame grew when his general relativity was confirmed by the British astronomer Arthur Eddington. In spite of only a few people could understand his work he became world famous and a symbol of the ultimate achievements of science.

Einstein received the Nobel Prize for physics in 1921. It was not for his special theory of relativity but for theory set out in 1905 how the photoelectric cells work.

Albert Einstein left Germany in 1933 because he was Jewish. It was the year when the Nazis came to power. He first lived in France but then moved to Princeton in the USA. He continued his research at the Institute of Advance Study.

In 1939 Einstein contacted Franklin D Roosevelt advising him to start manufacture atomic weapons to counteract the production of weapons in Germany. After the war he tried hard to stop the Cold War arms race. Although he described the fission of radio-active material which came from special relativity. Einstein had no part in the manufacturing these weapons.

In his later years with his greatest work written he gave the impression of an eccentric, anti-establishment figure but still respected for being a pacifist.

In 1952 he declined the presidency of Israel.

Even today after all the great developments in the technical world which open up space and gave a greater knowledge to mankind; Einstein’s work still stands.

Based on his theories Professor Stephen Hawking and others attempting to produce a unified theory to explain how the entire University works.

 

KING LUDWIG II OF BAVARIA

KING LUDWIG II 

Crown Prince Ludwig of Bavaria was born on 25 August 1845 in the palace of Nymphenburg in Munich.  He was the first son of King Maximilian II of Bavaria and Queen Marie (a Prussian Princess).

He was very romantic, a bit of a dreamer and handsome looking King.  The people named him the fairytale King.  He was 1.91m tall.  He adored Wagner's music and was a great builder.  He loved Bavaria and the people.  They loved him, even nowadays.  Unfortunately, through continued intermarriage of royalty the result was that his younger brother Otto went mad.  King Ludwig also withdrew in later life because the Bavarian government stated that he is making Bavaria bankrupt with building all these palaces and castles.  Yet Bavaria could effort to be involved in a war with Prussia and later on with the Franco-Prussia war.

KING LUDWIG'S
SLEDGE RIDE - PAINTING

16 June 1861 Crown Prince Ludwig heard for the first time Wagner's opera 'Lohengrin' which is part of the Germanic mythology.

RICHARD WAGNER

Richard Wagner was an absolute genius of a composer but he was always on the run from his creditors. Ludwig was his saviour. If it wasn't for Ludwig's protection the world would have never had these magnificent operas. Also performed in the full magnitude they deserved.

Mid August 1864 The Crown Prince Ludwig had a meeting with the Chancellor Bismark and on 15 December the very ill King Maximilian I was persuaded to returned from Italy on the request of his people.

KING MAXIMILLIAN II  
AND WIFE,
CROWN PRINCE LUDWIG
AND PRINCE OTTO

10 March 1864 King Maximilian died and Ludwig was crowned as King Ludwig II. Ludwig's Grandfather was King Ludwig I but had to abdicate and Ludwig's father Maximilian then became King.

King Ludwig's love and admiration for art and music was part of the decline in finances of Bavaria. Although he gave a lot of work to the people by building all these palaces and castle but it had a tremendous strain on Bavaria's finances.

Wagner was pressuring him and taking advantages of King Ludwig's friendship to further his music. Admittedly we wouldn't have had that amount of music from Wagner and all these beautiful buildings but the Bavarian government didn't see it that way and couldn't because Bavaria was on the verge of bankruptcy, so they said.

Ludwig's best friend was aide de Camp the Prince of Turn and Taxis from a very rich Bavarian family. Ludwig also had lifelong friendship with his half-first cousin once removed, Duchess Elisabeth of Bavaria, later Empress of Austria. It was assumed they were very fond of each other and had the same taste in art, music and poetry.

Elisabeth was made to marry the Emperor of Austria. Although the Emperor loved her, he could not stand up to his mother who was evil. At one stage Elisabeth was so ill they feared for her death, most properly if Ludwig and Elisabeth married they would have been happy.

4 December 1864 First performance of Wagner's 'Flying Dutchman'.

10 June 1865 First performance of Wagner's 'Tristan and Isolde'

Yet on 11 May 1866 the Bavarian government was able to finance the war with Prussia and Bavaria was heavily defeated in June/July. 28 July a truce with Prussia and 22 August peace was declared.

This had a traumatic impact on King Ludwig having to send thousands of his beloved people into war. He himself rode with them. After that he refused to see his minister and loved the company of his mountain people. He withdrew from politics and started to build Neuschwanstein and Linderhof.

22 January 1867 King Ludwig II got engaged to the Duchess Sofie but it was annulled on 10 October 1867. The Duchess Sofie married on 28 September 1868 the Duke of Alencon.

21 June 1868 was the first performance of Wagner's 'Meistersinger'. In that year the palace Linderhof and the castle of Neuschwanstein were planned and the building of Linderhof began.

22 September 1869 The first performance of Wagner's 'Rheingold' and in the same year they started building Neuschwanstein.

26 June 1870 the first performance of Wagner's 'Walkuere' and on the 16th July King Ludwig was made to sign the mobilization against France.

On the 1 September there was the Victory at Sedan. After that Bismark made Ludwig to include Bavaria into the unification of the German Empire with Prussia being the leader.

Bavaria lost its sovereignty and King Ludwig was just a figurehead. It was all a tragic build-up in Ludwig's life. He withdrew from an unkind world into a world of his own making.

6 May 1872 the start of opera house in Bayreuth this was purely designed and builds to perform Wagner’s operas. Wagner became more and more domineering.

1873 King Ludwig bought the Herreninsel in lake Chiemsee.

5 and 15 August and 26 till 31 August 1876 King Ludwig attended the performance of Wagner's opera 'Ring der Nibelungen' at the Bayreuth opera house.

King Ludwig began more and more to retreat and showed depressions.

1878 The building of Linderhof is more or less finished and the building of Herrenchiemsee started.

1883 Wagner died in Venice.

1886 King Ludwig II moved to Neuschwanstein. On 11 June Dr. von Gudden, a psychologist, came to Neuschwanstein. King Ludwig said, "How can you declare me for mad? You have not examined me."

They moved the King to the small castle Berg at the shore of Lake Starnberg. On the 12 June Ludwig went for a walk with Dr Gudden. Gudden told the guards not to follow. Both were found, in shallow water, dead.

Ludwig's death was established as suicide by drowning but Ludwig was known as a strong swimmer. The autopsy showed no water in the lungs. People belief he was murdered by his enemies.

Jacob Lidl, the king's fisherman said, "Three weeks after the king's death I was made to swear an oath that I would never say a certain thing, not to my wife, nor on my deathbed and not to a priest. The state has undertaken to look after my family if anything would happen to me either in peace or war".

Lidle kept his oath, but only orally. He left a note saying that he had hidden behind bushes with his boat, waiting to meet the king, to row him out into the lake, where loyalist were to help him to escape. As the king stepped out and put his foot into the boat a shot rang out from the bank and killed him.

Officially there were no scars or wounds on his body. Another theory is that King Ludwig died naturally (heart attack) brought on by the extreme cold of the lake during the attempt of escape.

WHERE KING LUDWIG DIED - - YOU CAN SEE HOW SHALLOW IT IS