Why did Great Britain and many others favor Belgian Independence?

[User29]

Wasn't the point of the United Netherlands to be a part of checking French Power since the end of the Napoleonic Wars?

Why was everyone so keen on Belgian Independence which happened not 10 years after Napoleon's death?

 

[Cavalry]

I think the France has intervened. So Belgian Independence was better than Belgian become a province of France.

 

[User29]

That's something else to ask, how likely was it that Wallonia could become a French Province?

 

[Plank of Wood]

I think "Take that, Frenchie!" was the main motivating factor.

 

[User29]

But French Speakers(Walloons) gained power here.

 

[Kaiser Franz]

Belgium's ports like Antwerp supposedly have a very good strategic position and have warranted British interest in keeping it out of the hands of major rivals, so whilst Austria ruled them it was fine as they were no major maritime threat, Netherlands post-1814 were an ally anyway and no threat and post-1830's it was cool in the hands of a neutral state. Keeping the Low Countries free from big power rivals was a major theme in British strategy - not entirely sure why the other nations went along with...

All that 'maintaining the balance of power' stuff.

 

[Drakken]

Belgium is a backdoor to Paris, as much as a backdoor to the Ruhr and Berlin. Guaranteeing Belgium ensured a bottleneck that made Germany, France, and Britain play honest with one another.

 

[User29]

All these reasons don't add up to Belgium independent from Netherlands though. How could the Netherlands not provide all those exact same roles plus being a buffer to France(the main friggin point post Napoleon)

 

[Drakken]

IIRC, because the strong Walloon community staunchily refused to be governed by a Dutch and Flemish majority.

 

[User29]

IIRC, because the strong Walloon community staunchily refused to be governed by a Dutch and Flemish majority.

Strong everywhere-else communities weren't quite so favored.

Why would British who had huge quantities of everywhere-else communities favor it?(Not that they thought uncivilized peoples would even learn of this development)

 

[Mathrim]

That's something else to ask, how likely was it that Wallonia could become a French Province?

But French Speakers(Walloons) gained power here.

IIRC, because the strong Walloon community staunchily refused to be governed by a Dutch and Flemish majority.

You're really making mistakes here. The irredentist claims of France encompassed all of Belgium (including Dutch Limburg, too), and there was no Wallonia to speak of. The liberals who rose up against the Dutch weren't based in Wallonia, as a matter of fact Wallonia was more Orangist than Flanders. The entire bourgeoisie, all over the country, was French-speaking. Regular Walloons didn't speak French, they spoke Walloon. The organizers of the 1831 and 1841 coup attempts were conservative Walloons.

To sum it up, the Catholic hierarchy was displeased with the Northern government. The liberals disliked the Orangist regime, and a minority of people in Brussels wanted independence. A minority of liberals in Brussels organized the revolution and once the Dutch retreated, the rest of the country decided to support them. But the Belgian independentist movement wasn't a Walloon one, and one the reasons the Belgian army fared so poorly against the Dutch during the Ten Days' Campaign was that conservative elements - French-speaking people as well - supported an Orangist restoration. The sides of the Belgian Revolution had no linguistic divide, Orangists and independentists both spoke French.

 

[User29]

You're really making mistakes here. The irredentist claims of France encompassed all of Belgium (including Dutch Limburg, too), and there was no Wallonia to speak of. The liberals who rose up against the Dutch weren't based in Wallonia, as a matter of fact Wallonia was more Orangist than Flanders. The entire bourgeoisie, all over the country, was French-speaking. Regular Walloons didn't speak French, they spoke Walloon. The organizers of the 1831 and 1841 coup attempts were conservative Walloons.

To sum it up, the Catholic hierarchy was displeased with the Northern government. The liberals disliked the Orangist regime, and a minority of people in Brussels wanted independence. A minority of liberals in Brussels organized the revolution and once the Dutch retreated, the rest of the country decided to support them. But the Belgian independentist movement wasn't a Walloon one, and one the reasons the Belgian army fared so poorly against the Dutch during the Ten Days' Campaign was that conservative elements - French-speaking people as well - supported an Orangist restoration. The sides of the Belgian Revolution had no linguistic divide, Orangists and independentists both spoke French.

ah very interesting, I have never claimed to be an expert on this at all, but it still comes back to my main point, Why would Great Powers support an act they instituted, and at the same time make it appear that granting Independence to a region was an okay thing to do.

 

[Cavalry]

That's something else to ask, how likely was it that Wallonia could become a French Province?

The Belgium rebels get France troop's support. So no way France will return Belgium back. If the British hadn't said anything, the France may annexed it as will or some Belgian will ask France to annex them.

 

[Mathrim]

ah very interesting, I have never claimed to be an expert on this at all, but it still comes back to my main point, Why would Great Powers support an act they instituted, and at the same time make it appear that granting Independence to a region was an okay thing to do.

France and Britain were growing closer as a consequence of the revolution in France, and restoring the status quo was unacceptable for the French. That's why they intervened during the Ten Days' campaign too. The Dutch once had the support of the Russians, but the Polish troops that were supposed to go to Belgium rebelled. So in order to build good French-British relation, Belgium had to exist. On top of that, British investments in Wallonia were rather important and the protectionist outlook of the Dutch wasn't loved by London.

 

[Closet Skeleton]

ah very interesting, I have never claimed to be an expert on this at all, but it still comes back to my main point, Why would Great Powers support an act they instituted, and at the same time make it appear that granting Independence to a region was an okay thing to do.

The Netherlands wasn't a Great Power any more. Great Powers don't care about precedent for fairness. For a modern example, Russia doesn't see the annexation of Crimea as precedent for Self-determination, it sees it as precedent for gaining territory. No autonomous province of Russia could use Crimea referendum as a precedent to leave Russia. Russia is currently supporting multiple secessionist movements in the Georgian region of the Caucasus while suppressing Chechen rebels in their own section of the Caucasus.

France backing Belgian independence doesn't have any bearing at all on them accepting a Breton independence movement or anything of the sort. Any more then they considered the German taking of Alsace-Lorraine to be fair because the had annexed Nice and Algiers themselves.

If the United States hadn't stepped in then the British wouldn't have allowed Irish independence just because they were allowing the Austro-Hungarian Empire to be divided up at the same time.

 

[DoomBunny]

All these reasons don't add up to Belgium independent from Netherlands though. How could the Netherlands not provide all those exact same roles plus being a buffer to France(the main friggin point post Napoleon)

Because Belgium had rather strongly protested such a situation. Better to have two stable countries in the region than have an unstable one.

 

[DarthJF]

But French Speakers(Walloons) gained power here.

It was better to give more power to French speakers and keep them outside of France, than have them join France and give France more power. Plus, supporting the independence also gave British influence in Belgium instead of leaving it solely to the French.

 

[User29]

All that does make sense... So a stable not French owned Belgium superceded the precedent that a nation(ireland, brittany, hungary) could successfully declare independence?

Also that Crimea analogy seemed beyond silly to me, Crimea was annexation INTO Russia, it's like comparing that to the Texas annexation. Completely different from letting a nation leave.

 

[KINGBEN]

If the United States hadn't stepped in then the British wouldn't have allowed Irish independence just because they were allowing the Austro-Hungarian Empire to be divided up at the same time.

Wait. When did the United States step in?

 

[knul]

Wouldn't the other Powers be quite upset with France annexing Belgium? It was only two decades since the Napoleonic Wars and I can imagine them being very wary of France expanding again.