Belgian armed forces in Cologne

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Coat of arms of the Belgian Armed Forces in Germany

Belgian armed forces were stationed in Cologne after the two world wars . The city temporarily housed the Kingdom of Belgium's largest garrison abroad. The official approval took place in 2002, and in 2003 the military tribunal was the last Belgian institution to leave Cologne.

Stationed after the First World War

After the signing of the armistice at Compiègne at the end of the First World War on November 11, 1918, as part of the Allied occupation of the Rhineland on December 1, 1918, Belgian units coming from France were relocated to Germany via Belgium - also to Cologne , although Cologne was a British bridgehead . On January 31, 1926, they left Cologne together with some units of the French occupation.

Development after the Second World War

After the Second World War , on May 15, 1945, the Piron Brigade was the first to march into Germany as an auxiliary on behalf of the British occupying army. Coming from the bridge in Arnhem , she marched via Burgsteinfurt and the northern Münsterland into the southern part of the Münsterland. A short time later, the first units of the Belgian armed forces were stationed in Cologne and the surrounding area . From 1951 onwards they were seen less and less as part of the occupation forces of the Belgian Corridor in the south of the British zone , but rather as allies in the sense of what later became NATO . This was a result of the growing fear in Western countries of a Soviet attack in the post-war period, especially after the Berlin blockade and the February coup in Czechoslovakia in 1948, the detonation of the first Soviet atomic bomb in 1949 and because of the looming Korean War that began in 1950 . This resulted in NATO in 1949 and, from 1951, the gradual softening of the occupation statute in Germany. At that time, the Federal Republic was not yet allowed to have its own armed forces, but from 1951 onwards, with the support of the Allies , it began to prepare .

In October 1948, the headquarters of the Belgian armed forces were relocated from Lüdenscheid to Bonn , with the symbolically significant use of the historical objects Palais Schaumburg , Villa Hammerschmidt as well as Redoute in Bad Godesberg and the Hotel Petersberg . When Bonn was designated the provisional seat of government, the headquarters moved in November 1949 to the Haelen barracks, the former Etzel barracks of the Wehrmacht , in Cologne-Junkersdorf, known in the Belgian army as "Weiden". At the same time, Belgium resumed diplomatic relations with Germany and later set up a consulate general in the Belgian House , Maison Belge , in downtown Cologne (near Neumarkt ). This was built in 1948/49 by the Belgian government. It housed a hotel , a restaurant , an air traffic office, meeting rooms and the headquarters of an association for the promotion of German-Belgian relations in cultural and economic terms.

Locations

Structure of the former Belgian barracks Haelen in Cologne-Junkersdorf
Former Belgian settlement in Cologne-Neuehrenfeld

In the Cologne area either existing facilities of the former Wehrmacht were used or new barracks were built. Housing estates for members of the armed forces were built near the barracks . At times Cologne was the largest Belgian garrison abroad.

In 1953, the Butzweilerhof airfield in Cologne-Ossendorf became a Belgian military airfield . First the 16th Air OP (16th Squadron) of the Belgian Air Force moved there . In addition to the existing Royal Air Force (RAF) facilities on the airfield, new barracks and aircraft hangars as well as a new tower with a radio mast for the Belgian Army Aviation were built. Until their completion, the soldiers of the Belgian 16th Air OP were housed in former barracks of the German Wehrmacht on Fühlinger See in Cologne-Fühlingen .

On April 15, 1954, the Belgian flight unit 16. Air. OP was renamed 16. Esc. Lt. Avn. and was no longer under the Belgian Air Force. She was assigned to the land forces and worked as an army aviator , including with Piper Cub L-18C aircraft . Likewise, the maintenance and supply squadron of the Belgian army aviators came to the Butzweilerhof. On February 1, 1956, the Belgian Army Aviation received helicopters of the Alouette II type and the maintenance and supply squadron of the Belgian Army Aviation arrived at Cologne Butzweilerhof airfield. From 1959 the Belgian army aviators also used the German Dornier Do 27 . On October 5, 1995, the Butzweilerhof was given up.

The Klerken barracks were built on Butzweiler Strasse in 1947 and were given up on November 9, 1995.

In Dellbrueck the 6th referred pioneer - battalion (6 Geniebataljon) in November 1951 to the end of 1952 and August 7, 1969 to 1992 the barracks Kwartier Becquevort (preliminary, unofficial name in 1946), later renamed Moorslede , at the Bergisch Gladbach Street. From June 21, 1951 to the end of 1952, there were 2 tank engineer companies of the 6th Engineer Battalion in Fühlingen in Camp General Leman , sometimes also referred to as Camp Graaf Leman , on Lake Fühlinger See , which at that time was not yet expanded. In Junkersdorf , from May 1946, the Etzel barracks on Dürener Strasse became the Haelen barracks until December 18, 1996. The barracks also housed the headquarters of the Belgian armed forces in Germany for a long time. A special unit, the 1 Cie GVP / ESR-Gespecialiseerde Verkenningsploegen-Equipe Spécial de Recherche , was housed for a short time in the nearby Schmitz camp on the site of today's sports university in Müngersdorf .

In Longerich the Knesselaere barracks on the military ring road were moved into from October 1951 .

The OLT barracks was located in Niehl . Holm on Geestemünder Straße at the height of today's waste incineration plant. On Niehler harbor a fuel depot was located from 1949 until the end of the 1,992th There were 1953-1960 boats of the Rhine Flotilla of the Belgian Navy , (BMRS / ENBR: Belgisch Maritiem Rijn Smaldeel / Escadrille Navale Belge du Rhin, "La Flottille du Rhin", "Rhine Flotilla") stationed. The boats were often used to secure exercises on the Rhine and patrolled in different sections and years between Oberwinter near Remagen and the Rhine estuary. The command boat was the Liberation . At the beginning of the nineties, after being relocated to Belgium and taken out of service, it was reactivated, among other things, for nostalgia trips on the Rhine. Sister ships were Meuse , Schelde and Sambre . Later the boats were also used in the Congo.

In the city of Porz, which was incorporated into Cologne in 1975, the former Wehrmacht barracks Mudra and Unverzagt became the barracks Nieuwpoort (1953) and Brasseur (1951 to July 1995) on Kölner Strasse in Westhoven . In 1951 the Passendale barracks were rebuilt. It was given up on December 1, 1998. The former pioneer port of the Wehrmacht was also used on the Rhine, but it silted up more and more. Since the practice area of ​​the barracks Brasseur extended as far as the Rhine, there was regular practice with pontoon bridge components. To the north of the training area, between Westhover Weg, Autobahn and Weidenweg, there was a large ammunition depot that was cleared in the 1980s. At the end of the 1950s, a Bailey Bridge was even built over the Rhine for a whole day and shipping was blocked for a day. A garrison church was also built between the barracks on Kölner Strasse.

In the Wahner Heide on the city limits of Altenrath Kwartier Maj SBH-BEM Legrand was built . In Troisdorf-Spich , the Kamp Vlaanderen , later renamed Camp Roi Baudouin-Kamp Koning Boudewijn, was built. In the Wahner Heide and in the Königsforst , a large military training area including a firing range and tank loading facility developed from the existing training area .

At the Adenauer-Weiher in Cologne's green belt , near Junkersdorfer Strasse in Cologne-Lindenthal , the Club Astoria officers' mess was built in 1948 .

In 1953 the military tribunal of the armed forces moved into the converted Villa Vorster in Marienburg . Other military units were in Braunsfeld , Ichendorf, Lindenthal and Klettenberg . The former Israelite asylum for the sick and the elderly on Ottostraße in Neuehrenfeld , confiscated by the National Socialists in 1942 , was expanded as a military hospital.

Furthermore, the necessary infrastructure facilities for a large foreign garrison were built in Cologne , including Belgian department stores and cinemas . The Belgian institutions and residential areas were supplied with home information via a separate transmission and reception mast at Bachem for Belgian television and other relay stations. The children were looked after in five primary schools in Ossendorf, Dellbrück, Weiden, Rodenkirchen and Westhoven / Eil with affiliated day-care centers . There were secondary schools in the form of a Walloon grammar school in Rösrath , and a Flemish one in the baroque castle of Bensberg . From 1953 there was also a military canteen for Belgian families outside the barracks in Porz, Helmholtzstrasse.

BSD / FBA coat of arms

The Belgian armed forces stationed in Germany (BSD / FBA) from 1946 to 2003 were a special part of the Belgian army. Therefore, after a short time, the self-created coat of arms of the Piron Brigade , the first Belgian unit in Germany, developed into its own coat of arms with a golden lion head under a royal crown, in front of crossed swords and with the motto Scutum belgarum (shield of the Belgians). Many army vehicles were marked with a lion's head in a circle on the left.

Deduction and conversion

and display information about the image
Former entrance gate of the Klerken barracks in Cologne-Ossendorf , today the entrance to the "Ossendorfpark" residential area
Former cinema in the Belgian housing estate "Quartier Haelen", Cologne-Junkersdorf; today a concert hall with a restaurant

From 1988 the Belgian armed forces were restructured, in 1993 compulsory military service in Belgium was abolished and from 1996 the headquarters moved back to Belgium. Associated with this was a downsizing of the units in Germany up to and including their dissolution. The number of soldiers and their relatives fell from 46,289 in 1988 to 8,203 in 1998. At the beginning of the 1950s, up to 40,000 Belgian soldiers are said to have been stationed in Germany . The official and solemn farewell took place on June 7, 2002 in the "Camp King Baudouin-Kamp Koning Boudewijn" in Spich in the presence of Belgium's King Albert II , Federal President Johannes Rau and Defense Minister Rudolf Scharping . The last institution to leave Cologne in 2003 was the Belgian military court .

The complete withdrawal of the units located outside Cologne in Spich and Altenrath was completed in 2004, Camp Vogelsang in the Eifel followed in 2005. The demolition of the Maj Legrand Kwartier in Altenrath began on Friday, January 13, 2012. The site will then be renatured and reforested and will become the property of a foundation for German natural heritage. The Nieuwpoort barracks were renamed Mudra barracks and the Bundeswehr personnel office moved in; Passendale was demolished and a new forensic clinic was built there; Brasseur has become a large recreational and leisure area on the Rhine, and businesses are to be settled in the remaining area. The customs office and small businesses moved into the Moorslede barracks . In addition, car-free living is to be realized there. The urban forest district of Junkersdorf was created from Haelen and the neighboring Belgian settlement, including the listed buildings. The Belgian cinema became Limelight in Cologne. The residential area Ossendorfpark and an industrial area were created from the Kleerken barracks. Butzweiler Hof airfield was demolished except for the historic airport building, which today houses an aviation exhibition. A commercial area including a media center was created on the site.

See also

literature

  • Adhemar De Bruycker: Belgian garrison Porz-Westhoven. From 1951 ff . Ed .: Heimatverein Porz in connection with the Porz town archive (=  our Porz . Issue 11). Self-published, Porz 1969.
  • Walther Rotsaert: De Belgische Bezetting in Duitsland. 1945-1949. Self-published, Walther Rotsaert, Koning Boudewijnlaan, 5, 9840 De Pinte. 2008.
  • Walther Rotsaert: L'Occupation belge en Allemagne. 1945-1949. Self-published, 2008, ISBN 978-90-811001-2-0 .

Web links

Commons : Belgian Armed Forces in Cologne  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Rhine Province, Events 1918–1933
  2. ^ History of the 1st Belgian Group 1940–1945, Brigade Piron, Veldtochen, Duitsland
  3. ↑ Heimatverein Attendorn, issue 27, The closure of the Belgian garrison Attendorn (PDF file; 2.5 MB)
  4. ^ Matthias Dederichs: History of Camp Spich. In: campspich.de. June 2007, archived from the original on July 18, 2011 ; accessed on July 9, 2018 .
  5. ↑ Construction work for the allied armed forces in the FRG, international agreements, Federal Ministry of Transport, Building and Urban Development
  6. ^ [Walther Rotsaert: De belgische Bezetting in Duitsland, p. 59]
  7. ↑ Foreign Office, Foreign Policy, Belgium
  8. ^ Googlebooks, files on the foreign policy of the Federal Republic of Germany, Hans-Peter Schwarz, Institute for Contemporary History, Munich, Germany
  9. ^ Historisches Luftfahrtarchiv Köln, Die Chronik der Kölner Luftfahrt, Suntrop, 1953, 1954, 1956, 1959
  10. ^ Ministry of Economy and Medium-Sized Enterprises, Energy and Transport of the State of North Rhine-Westphalia, Conversion Report Volume IV, Balance Sheet Perspectives, Ten Years of Troop Withdrawal and Conversion in North Rhine-Westphalia, 2000 ( Memento from January 18, 2012 in the Internet Archive )
  11. ↑ BSD Kazernes, Keulen-Bützweilerhof  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / archive-be.com  
  12. ↑ BSD Kazernes, Dellbrück  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / archive-be.com  
  13. ↑ BSD Kazernes, Fühlingen  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / archive-be.com  
  14. ^ Petrol station in the Belgian barracks - Geestemünder Str. (50735 Niehl). In: bilderbuch-koeln.de. Retrieved August 8, 2018 .
  15. ↑ Page no longer available , search in web archives: residual waste incineration plant in Cologne, construction documentation, renovation and foundation work@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.profi-store.de
  16. ↑ P903 MEUSE. In: marine-mra-klm.be. Retrieved August 8, 2018 (French).
  17. ↑ Marine Component Eenheden P902 Liberation . mite. Retrieved November 19, 2011.
  18. ^ Camp Vogelsang, Interactief, Willy, Recour, No. 10, Opleiding Vedette Selve te Westhoven . kamp-vogelsang.be. Archived from the original on January 12, 2012. Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. Retrieved November 19, 2011. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www2.kamp-vogelsang.be
  19. ↑ Geschichtsspuren.de
  20. ^ History of the military training area. In: wahnerheide.de . December 24, 2007, accessed June 29, 2020.
  21. ↑ Pigasus, Relics in the Heath, Remnants of the Belgian Troops, Nato Station
  22. ^ History. In: club-astoria.eu. Retrieved August 8, 2018 .
  23. ^ Zone FBA. Clickable map of Belgian schools in and around Cologne. In: ecoles.cfwb.be. Archived from the original on April 18, 2002 ; accessed on August 9, 2018 (French).
  24. ^ House Venauen / Athénée Royal (Rösrath) . bgv-rhein-berg.de. Retrieved November 19, 2011.
  25. ↑ Belgians returned Bensberg Castle to the country on Friday . bgv-rhein-berg.de. Retrieved November 19, 2011.
  26. ^ Adhemar De Bruycker, Belgische Garrison Porz-Westhoven, 1951 ff, Die belgische Wohngemeinde, Unser Porz, issue 11, Heimatverein Porz in connection with Stadtarchiv Porz, 1969, self-published
  27. ↑ Adhemar De Bruycker, Belgische Garrison Porz-Westhoven, 1951 ff, page 168, Unser Porz, issue 11, Heimatverein Porz in connection with Porz town archive, 1969, self-published
  28. ^ History of the 1st Belgian Group 1940-1945, Brigade Piron
  29. ^ History. In: club-astoria.eu. Retrieved January 16, 2019 .
  30. ↑ Print archive of the Berliner Morgenpost
  31. ^ Initiative building, living, working