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Belgian Colonial Empire
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Map of the Belgian Colonial Empire around 1920.
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The Belgian colonial empire comprised three colonies possessed by Belgium between 1901 and 1962: Belgian Congo (now Democratic Republic of the Congo), Rwanda and Burundi. The empire was unlike those of the major European imperial powers in that roughly 98% of it was just one colony (about 76 times larger than Belgium)—the Belgian Congo—which had originated as the private property of the country's king, Leopold II, rather than being gained through the political action of the Belgian state. There was a tendency within Belgium to refer to its overseas possessions as 'the colonies' rather than 'the empire'. In addition, unlike other countries of the period with far-flung colonies, such as Britain or France, colonial Belgium did not have a monarch styled 'Emperor'.[1]
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Belgium itself achieved independence only in 1830. (Immediately prior to that (1815-1830), it had formed part of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.) By the time Belgium entered a position in which it was able to consider an overseas empire, major imperial powers such as the United Kingdom and France, and to some degree, Spain, Portugal, and the Netherlands already had the most economically promising territories for colonization within their spheres of influence. In 1843, King Leopold I signed a contract with Ladd & Co. to colonize the Kingdom of Hawaii, but the deal fell apart when Ladd & Co. ran into financial difficulties.[2] Leopold II tried to interest his government in establishing colonies, but it lacked the resources to develop the candidate territories and turned down his plans.
Leopold II exploited the Congo for its natural rubber, which was becoming a valuable commodity. His regime in the Congo operated as a forced labor colony, with murder and mutilation as punishments for villagers who did not fulfill the quota for and distribute the appropriate amount of rubber. It is estimated that millions of Congolese died during this time[3], although many of these could be attributed to the introduction of new diseases by European colonists.
Although the Congo Free State was not officially a Belgian colony, Belgium was its chief beneficiary, in terms of its trade and the employment of its citizens. The wealth Leopold extracted was used in the construction of numerous fine public buildings in Brussels, Ostend and Antwerp. This led to him being remembered in Belgium today as the 'Builder-King'. Through the Royal Trust he sold most of his property to the nation, adding to his fortune.
In 1908, to defuse an international outcry against the brutality of the Congo Free State, the Belgian government agreed to annex it as a colony, which forthwith was named the Belgian Congo. It also annexed Katanga, a territory held under the Congo Free State, which Leopold had gained in 1891, when he sent an expedition that killed its king, Msiri, cut off his head, and hoisted it on a pole.[4] Leopold had administered Katanga separately, but in 1910 the Belgian government merged it with the Belgian Congo. The Belgian Congo was one of the three colonies Belgium occupied.
The Belgian Congo became independent on 30 June 1960, and is now called The Democratic Republic of the Congo.
Along with several other European powers and the United States of America, as a result of the Boxer Rebellion, Belgium also gained a Concession (Chinese: zujie 租界) of some few square kilometers in Tientsin or Tianjin; a Chinese Treaty port). This was essentially a trading post, rather than a colony, and reverted to China in 1930.
During the East African Campaign of World War I, the north-west part of German East Africa, Ruanda-Urundi, was invaded by Belgian and Congolese troops in 1916, and was still occupied by them at the end of the war in 1918. As part of the Treaty of Versailles, the major part of German East Africa was handed over to British control, but Ruanda-Urundi, twice the size of Belgium, but only about 2% of the size of the Congo, was confirmed as a Belgian protectorate by a League of Nations Mandate in 1924, later renewed as a United Nations Trust Territory. The territory was granted independence in 1962 as the separate countries of Rwanda and Burundi in 1962, thus bringing the Belgian colonial empire to an end.
Following the independence of both colonies, Belgium kept political and economic relationships with the three succeeding African republics: The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and Burundi.
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