Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1914-12-05
BATTERED BELGIUM
A WARD OF CHARITY
Industry ParaIyzed, Factories
Demolished, People Face
Starvation.
UNPREPARED FOR WAR,
KINGDOM is CRUSHED
Unless America Can Feed the Inhab-
itants Until Conflict Ends,
Future Is Hopeless.
BY WILL IRWIN.

BY WILL IRWIN.
When we first saw the German army
come through Belgium in full, last Au-
gust. the month of harvests. We used tc
remark casually, now and then: We'll
there's one thing; it looks like starva-
ton in this country this winter" We
said it rather careIessly; we had enough
of the horror of war on every hand to
keep us from bothering very much about
a faraway. imaginary danger. But the
situation, when stopped to think
about il, admitted of only one interpre-
taton.
Belgium is the most thickly populated
country in Europe; it is almost like one
great town interspersed with fields. AS
a matter of cold statistics, We know that
it raised less than 40 per cent of its
own food The war struck it in the
midst of the harvest. Unlike Germany
and France, Belgium had made no pro-
vision to feed itself in time of trouble.
Her bigger, more Warlike neighbors had
reckoned with the harvest part of the
plan of war. Germany, across the east
ern boundary. was putting the land
Strum not into the trenches but into the
helds, that they might garner the last
grain of wheat To the south, France
concerned herself almost as much with
the harvest as with the mobilization. =
Industries Unprepared.
But the war struck Belgium UMPIRE
pared-in an industrial if not in a mill
tary sense. The hasty mobilization took
many of the farmers and field hands
away; and the government had no time.
in the sudden. pressing duty of resist
ing invasion, to set aside other labor
for his har fol
went ungarnered for lack of men. And
before any one could touch the late
crops, the Germans We're upon them.
n@htins skirmiSheS and pitched battles
all over the east and north.
The rural population fled in great
numbers from the advance. as they
have been fleeing everywhere. Through
all the strip which Germany used as a
route to France l saw ruined harvests
The wheat was falling from the stalks.
the cabbages were growing unattended.
In the region to the west of Brussels
about Client, BrugeS and OStend-the
peasants had more time, since the Ger
mans did not take possession of that
part of Belgium until late in the au-
tumn. Here, alone in all Belgium, was
there anything like full crop this
year.
Wrecking of the Industries.
One must see Belgium to understand
what conquest means to subject peo-
pie. L can scarcely express it in mere
words. any more than 1 can convey
what war means as a whole.
Here was a manufacturing nation.
producing little raw material. depend
ing for the materials of industry, as
we'll as for food. upon imports. and for
money upon exports. Most of these in
dustries stopped suddenly and abruptly
when the war came, because the young
men had gone to the front. That was
phenomenon common to all the con-
tinental countries involved in this un-
paralleled mess. Even In Germany,
trolled system. the wheels generally
rested during the period of mobiliza-
tion. But the rest pulled their indus
tries together little. Factories man.
ufacturing articles of domestic con-
sumption found ways to replace their
soldier operatives or managers by men
immune from military service, by men
past the age for service or by women.
Even Germany found ways and means
TO get some supply of imported raw
materials Manufacturing was resumed
in France at about quarter of the nor
NAL production, in Germany at perhaps
one-third. These. by the way. are only
guesses- Just now the French govern
rnent is too busy to gather statistics
on production. and the German govern
nent is keeping its secrets to itself.
Humanity adjusts itself to any condi-
ton, and even in sound of the guns the
people made a show at least of keeping
the WheelS running
Some Cities Lie Flat.
1t was different with conquered Bel
GUM. Some of her towns. factories and
all had been battered to pieces. This
kind of damage has probably been ex-
aggerated. I know now, what 1 did
not realize when 5f~saw that city in
flames. that only 20 per cent of Louvain
was destroyed by the conQuerors. But
there remain such cities as Tirlemont
and Tiremond. which lie almost fiat, as
result, not of reprisals, but of battles.
For the rest, there was no possible or
practical way of keeping industry go
ing Flanders, in modern times as in
medieval is great weaving center.
Flemish weavers had small stock
ahead, and much of that went up on the
smoke of war They had been depend
ing on imports, and with all their har-
bors cut on in the second week of the
war they could import no more. Even
at that. there were no markets, do
nestle or foreign, and there was no
means of transportation. since the Ger
mans. lighting -and-death strus-
gle on their right wing, needed the
railroads for military purposes.
Business of Killing Only One Left.
Finally. there was no coal. For this
necessity of manufacturing the Bel
RianS depended on their own coal mines
along the southern border-notably on
the line which runs through Charleroi
and Mons. Now that line was by the
end of August dark and bloody
ground of the war. 1t was there that
the allies made their first stand. Ii
was only few miles away that the
Germans made their own stand when
Joffre drove them back from Paris
Finally, you come to the railroads
again. Coal is bulky. 1t takes much
railroad service to move it. And for
the purposes of industry there was
practically no railroad service.
The manufacturer could not get his
goods to market, and equally he could
not get power to his goods Scarcely
chimney was smoking in all Flanders
during August and September. Then
the Germans took Antwerp and Clean
ed up the coast strip about Client
Bruses and the harbor cities of Os-
TEND In them, also. the fires Of indus
Try went out In that southwest strip
or Belgium, hitherto one of the most
thick'y settled and productive parts OF
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