Eddy de Bruyne - For Rex and for Belgium: Léon Degrelle and Walloon Political and Military Collaboration 1940-45

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Published by Helion & Company Limited 2004

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Helion & Company Limited 2004

ISBN 1 874622 32 9

ISBN 9 781 908916 34 1 (eBook)

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Dedication

Marc Rikmenspoel thanks Eddy De Bruyne for the opportunity to participate in this project, and further thanks Duncan and Wilfrid Rogers for taking on its publication. Marc dedicates his part to his late grandparents, and offers a special salute to the memory of Earl Murray. Hoka hey, Mitakola! Mitakuye Oyasin.

To Liliane for her precious help and support Eddy de Bruyne.

The name Lon Degrelle is well known, both in Belgium and abroad. Degrelle was active in pre-war Belgian politics, and became notorious during World War II for collaborating with the German occupiers of his country. He was frequently written about and photographed for the German and Belgian censored news and propaganda. As a result, photos of Degrelle are common, and appear in numerous postwar works.

In exile in Spain after the war, Degrelle wrote his memoir of the war years, based mainly on memory and a few personal notes.

This book, which eventually saw English translation as Campaign in Russia: The Waffen-SS on the Eastern Front, was widely translated and read, and then widely quoted, its contents being taken for granted. The consequence is that Degrelle is a well-known figure to students of the war, especially in the English-language world, which has seen an unabated flood of World War II book releases continue into the new millennium.

When Degrelle is discussed, it is usually in the context of his military service and that of his fellow Walloon volunteers in the German military. He and they are recognized as brave and determined soldiers, yet primary source material on which to base such judgments is lacking. One book seems merely to quote from another. I too have written about Degrelle, and had to rely on secondary sources, ones that I now realize are biased and inaccurate.

In this era we are not shocked to discover that a politician may have stretched the truth to some degree. Degrelle was a politician before he was a soldier, and as the book in your hands will show, he remained a politician during his wartime and post-war careers. He shaped his books and speeches to put himself in the best possible light. This is understandable, and even to be expected. The danger is that his errors and omissions have never been countered, at least in English, with documented, reliable information. Thus, they have entered the historical record, and rendered inaccurate portions of many works.

Walloon Collaboration specialist Eddy De Bruyne, a Belgian researcher and a correspondent to the Brussels based CEGES for more than 15 years, has devoted most of his time to studying Degrelle, Degrelles Rexist political party, and the Walloon civil and military collaboration during the World War II era. By sorting through mounds of documentary material in the original French and German including never before explored classified and restricted material not open to the public, via interviews and contact with survivors of that time, to start with Lon Degrelle himself, he has assembled unsurpassed knowledge on the topic. Eddy De Bruyne has shared that information in several books and innumerable articles written in French. In his capacity of Walloon Military Collaboration expert he has also participated in several TV programmes.

This material received no attention in the English-language world. However, Eddy De Bruyne, as he is quite aware that Degrelle and his fellow soldiers are well known overseas, decided to combine elements from several of his works in French into one introductory yet thorough English book, a release that would shed a new light on Degrelles war-time years. At the same time, the purpose of this publication is twofold: to complete the information on the one hand, and on the other hand to correct the errors previously presented on Degrelle and the military unit and also introduce English readers to the civil and political aspects of Rex and its collaboration.

It has been my privilege to assist in the translation and editing of this book. In reality, it was the best opportunity to educate myself ahead of all of the lucky readers who will now follow a tragic story from Belgian history.

Thank you Eddy, for letting me be a small part of this!

Marc Rikmenspoel

Fort Collins, Colorado, 25 November 2001

When speaking of collaboration during WWII in Belgium one faces two realities deriving from its political, cultural and ethnic components: Flanders, that is the Flemish-Dutch speaking part of Belgium and Wallonia, or the French-speaking provinces of the country.

This book deals with the Walloon military, cultural and political collaboration during WWII, explored to a much lesser extent than its Flemish counterpart. And there are good reasons for this!

Unlike the Flemish collaboration striving for separatism and independence thanks to the presence of the Germans in occupied Belgium, the French-speaking collaboration never was motivated by a similar (Walloon) nationalism. On the contrary, it focused on one single person: Lon Degrelle, anti-Communism being the apparent common denominator between the two communities. Apart from a very short period after the war, the Flemish collaborators and more particularly the former Eastern Front veterans could openly confess their past via writing and publishing. This is quite impossible in Wallonia where Rexists (by way of amalgam all former Walloon Eastern Front veterans are looked upon as Rexists!) are decried by most traditionally left-wing classes of French-speaking society. Until recently, the only literature dealing with the Lgion Wallonie were the books written by Degrelle himself. In addition, if the books by Degrelle are reliable as far as the chronology of the facts reported is concerned, for the substance they do not stand up to a critical examination by the historian.