Belgian stay-behind network
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The Belgian stay-behind network, colloquially called "Gladio," was a secret military unit trained to form a resistance movement in the event of an communist invasion by the Soviet Union. It consisted of two organizations: SDRA8 (French: service de documentation, de renseignments et d'action VIII) as part of the Belgian General Information and Security Service, and STC/Mob (Dutch: Sectie training, communicatie en documentatie), as part of the Belgian State Security Service.
The network became publicly known on November 14, 1990, when Defense minister Guy Coëme announced its existence following Italian Premier Giulio Andreotti's revelations concerning the Italian branch of Gladio. Afterwards, a parliamentary inquiry was held by the Belgian Senate, detailing the history of the network.
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[edit] SDRA8 (Service de Documentation, de Renseignements at d'Action 8)
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[edit] STC/Mob (Section Training, Communication/Mobilisation)
Civilian branch of the Belgian stay-behind had the mission to collect intelligence under conditions of enemy occupation which could be useful to the government and to organize secure communication routes to evacuate the members of the government and other people with official functions.
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[edit] Parliamentary Inquiry
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[edit] Comité I
In 1995, the Belgian Chamber of Representatives organized a parliamentary inquiry into the effectiveness of the Belgian police and judiciary with regards to the Nijvel gang investigation. The conclusions of this inquiry, as well as the earlier Senate inquiry on SDRA8 and the Chamber inquiry on banditism, resulted in the preparation of new legislation governing the mission and methods of the Belgian State Security Service and Belgian General Information and Security Service, which was passed in 1998.
[edit] Shape
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After the French withdrawal from NATO's unified command structure in 1966, SHAPE, NATO's central headquarters, moved from France to Mons in Belgium. Following the October 24, 1990 revelation of the existence of Gladio in Italy by prime minister Giulio Andreotti, several others governments' spokespersons claimed that any stay-behind in their own country was history. This only exasperated Andreotti, who declared to the press that the last stay-behind meeting had taken place in Belgium a few days ago.
[edit] Gladio conspiracies
[edit] Assassination of Julien Lahaut
In 1950, the assassination of Julien Lahaut, chairman of the Communist Party of Belgium (PCB) had doubtless both a national and international signification, in which Gladio's influence has been suspected. [1] Repeated requests have been made in the Belgian Chamber of Representatives for an investigation into Lahaut's death. Only recently it has became known that François Goossens, a Leopoldist, was his killer.
[edit] Attempted coup d'état
A September 10, 1973 note from the Belgian Brigade de Surveillance et de Renseignement intelligence agency described the organization of a coup d'état by certain "financial networks and far-right organizations", naming among others Emile Lecerf, boss of the Nouvelle Europe magazine (NEM) and political godfather of Francis Dossogne (future leader of far-right Front de la Jeunesse - FJ) and Paul Latinus, founder of the Westland New Post extremist group, in which Gladio's influence has been suspected, although ultimately never proved in justice. Paul Latinus would escape to Pinochet's Chile for a few months in 1981, before committing suicide in 1984. On the other hand, Emile Lecerf was also a member of the Jeune Europe far-right group [2].
[edit] Nijvel gang violence, 1980s
The violence of the Nijvel gang was linked in 1985 by the press to a conspiracy among the Belgian stay-behind SDRA8, the Belgian Gendarmerie SDRA6, the Belgian neo-Nazi group Westland New Post, and the Pentagon secret service Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). However, after a parliamentary inquiry, no hard proof substaining these claims was found, and investigations into the Nijvel gang continue to this day. However, the mystery of how those cold-blooded massacres were committed did convince the Belgian Parliament to create a Permanent Committee of Surveillance of Intelligence Agencies' activities [3].
[edit] Jean Thiriart's far-right Parti Communautaire Européen
According to Amnistia.net, Luc Jouret, founder of the Order of the Solar Temple with Joseph di Mambro, had helped far-right activist Jean Thiriart organize a split in the Communist Party of Belgium (PCB) in the 1970s, creating the "Parti Communautaire Européen, a "Nazi-Maoist" party which succeeded to the Jeune Europe far-right group. According to Bruno Fouchereau, author of La mafia des sectes and collaborator of Le Monde Diplomatique, quoted by Amnistia, this Belgium "Nazi-Maoist group" was in fact controlled by the SDRA-8, Belgium's branch of Gladio. SDRA-8 other's creation was the Westland New Post group.[4]
[edit] 1995: Le Soir controversy
In 1996, Le Soir newspaper caused a public uproar by revealing the existence of a classified document, dated August 1995, and titled "Plan de base de la défense militaire du territoire" ("Base plan of the military defense of the territory"). The newspaper quoted some passages of what it called a "racist plan": "Many communities of immigrants have settled themselves in large agglomerations. If these population groups should reach a position of strong disagreement with Belgian politics, they could launch actions destined to counteract these policies or to make their concerns known [...] We consider that there exists no open threat in Belgium [...] But there is a clandestine threat with a permanent character" ("Nombre de communautés immigrées se sont fixées dans les grandes agglomérations. Si ces groupes de population devaient entrer clairement en désaccord avec la politique belge, ils pourraient déclencher des actions visant à contrarier cette politique ou visant à faire connaître leur mécontentements (...) Nous considérons qu'il n'existe aucune menace ouverte en Belgique (...) Mais il existe bien une menace clandestine avec un caractère permanent" - sic).
The dissolved SDRA-8 had been replaced by the "Commandement territorial interforces" (CTI), a military intelligence agency organized by provinces and essentially composed of about a thousand reserve officers. Its goal was to infiltrate civil society and find informants, with the mission to be especially concerned by the "immigrant communities which represented a permanent clandestine threat". According to Le Soir, if the CTI is not closely linked to the military agency Service Général du Renseignement et de la Sécurité (SGRS), then it is "nothing else than a new structure of military intelligence... particularly suspicious of anything that is foreign to it".[5][6] Defense minister Poncelet replied in the Belgian Senate that the plan was only an internal draft proposal, which was never approved by the military command or the defense minister himself.[7]
Finally, the activities of the Belgian military intelligence agencies prompted the Parliamentary Committee of Surveillance (Comité R) to investigate various abusive wiretappings. "The central documentation of the SGR is composed of 450 000 files", stated Le Soir.[5]
[edit] BBET, 2006
The police arrest of members of far-right group Bloed, Bodem, Eer en Trouw in September 2006 made the Belgian press recall the "Bloody Eighties," during which the Brabant massacres were carried out (28 deaths), and the Marxist organization Communist Combatant Cells carried out terrorist attacks (2 deaths).[8]. According to Justice Minister Laurette Onkelinx and Interior Minister Patrick Dewael, the suspects (11 of whom were members of the military) were preparing terrorist attacks in order to "destabilize" Belgium.[9][10]
[edit] References
- ^ Hans Depraetere and Jenny Dierickx, "La Guerre froide en Belgique" ("Cold War in Belgium") (EPO-Dossier, Anvers, 1986) (French)
- ^ Résistances.be [1]
- ^ Permanent Comittee for the Control of Intelligence Agencies (Belgium) See in particular the "history" section in the "Presentation" part.
- ^ Amnistia info on the Order of the Solar Temple and links with Gladio
- ^ a b "L'Armée craint une menace immigrée - L'armée tisse un nouveau réseau d'espions - La justice et le Comité R enquêtent", Le Soir, July 30, 1996. Retrieved on February 2006. (French)
- ^ LE DERAPAGE RACISTE A L'ARMEE LE MONDE POLITIQUE ET SOCIAL SOUS LE CHOC, Le Soir, August 1, 1996 (French); UN CONCEPT RACISTE POUR LA DEFENSE MILITAIRE DU TERRITOIRE L'ARMEE FAIT -PARTIELLEMENT- AMENDE HONORABLE, Le Soir, July 31, 1996 (French)
- ^ Question Period Bulletin no. 1-28 Belgian Senate, September 24, 1996
- ^ Un arrière-goût d'années de plomb, La Libre Belgique, 8 September 2006 (French)
- ^ De nouvelles découvertes, La Libre Belgique, 8 September 2006 (French)
- ^ Mandats d'arrêts confirmés pour les néo-nazis, Le Soir, 13 September 2006 (French)
[edit] Further reading
- Colby, William, (former CIA director), Honorable Men (1978)
- Ganser, Daniele. NATO's Secret Armies: Operation GLADIO and Terrorism in Western Europe. ISBN 0-7146-8500-3
- (French) Willems, Jan. Gladio, (1991), EPO-Dossier, Bruxelles. ISBN 2-87262-051-6
[edit] See also
[edit] External links
- Belgian parliamentary report concering the stay-behind network, named "Enquête parlementaire sur l'existence en Belgique d'un réseau de renseignements clandestin international" or "Parlementair onderzoek met betrekking tot het bestaan in België van een clandestien internationaal inlichtingenetwerk" (Parliamentary investigation on the existence in Belgium of an international clandestine intelligence network)
