Military Equipment of Belgium - World War II

World War II

• See article: Battle of Belgium
• See article: Belgian Army 1940
• See article: Battle of France

The Belgian Army was organized as follows in 1940. The King of Belgium was the commander in chief. There were 100,000 active duty personnel with army strength reaching 550,000 when mobilized. There were five corps, including three Active Army Corps (Infantry); Brussels, Antwerp, and Liege and later as follows:

The I Corps with the 1st, 4th, and 7th Infantry Divisions, the II Corps with the 6th, 11th, and 14th Infantry Divisions, the III Corps with the 1st Chasseurs Ardennais and the 2nd and 3rd Infantry Divisions, the IV Corps with the 9th, 15th, and 18th 18th Infantry Divisions, and the V and VI Corps with three divisions each. Army Corps consisted of Corps Staff, two active and several reserve Infantry Divisions, Corps Artillery Regiment of 4 battalions of two batteries with 16 artillery pieces per battalion, and a Pioneer regiment.

The infantry divisions had a division staff and three infantry regiments each of 3,000 men. each regiment had 108 light machineguns, 52 heavy machineguns, nine heavy mortars or infantry gun howitzers, and six antitank guns.

There was also a cavalry Corps of two divisions.

Within the Free Belgian Forces that were formed in Great Britain during the occupation of Belgium between 1940–45, there was a land force formation, the 1st Belgian Infantry Brigade. An additional three divisions were raised and trained in Northern Ireland, but the war ended before they could see action. However they joined the initial Belgian occupation force in Germany instead, I Belgian Corps, whose corps headquarters moved to Luedenscheid in October 1946. (Isby and Kamps, 1985, 59)

During the Cold War, Belgium provided the I Belgian Corps (HQ Haelen Kaserne, Junkersdorf, Lindenthal (Cologne)), consisting in the 1980s of the 1st Division and 16th Mechanised Division (HQ Nehiem, FRG), to NATO's Allied Forces Central Europe for the defence of West Germany. There were also two reserve brigades (10th Mechanised Brigade, Zonhoven, and the 12th Motorised Brigade, Liege), slightly bigger than the four active brigades, which could act independently if necessary. Interior forces comprised the Para-Commando Regiment, the 31st-39th independent cadre para-commando companies, three national defence light infantry battalions (5 Ch, 3 Cy, and 4 Cy) and nine provincial regiments with two to five light infantry battalions each. (Isby and Kamps, 1985, 64, 72)

After the end of the Cold War, forces were reduced. Initial planning in 1991 called for a Belgian-led corps with 2 or 4 Belgian brigades, a German brigade, and possibly a U.S. brigade. However, by 1992 this plan was looking unlikely and in 1993 a single Belgian division with two brigades became part of the Eurocorps.