Letter from the Benelux
Stay at all costs the King of the Belgians, even under the domination of Nazi Germany: it was therefore the project of Leopold III (1901-1983), which reigned over his country from 1934 to 1951, when he had to abdicate because of his attitude during the Second World War. In the summer of 1942, two years after the Belgian army had surrendered without conditions, the king envisaged a “Compromise peace” Negotiated with the Hitlerian regime and which would have preserved its throne on a small part of Belgian territory, an area transformed into a sort of royal dictatorship, neutral and subject to the Reich.
We knew this stubborn monarch, blind to certain realities and seduced by autocratic regimes. Until the recent works by Vincent Stuer and the publication of his book Rexit (Borgerhoff & Lamberigts, not translated), it was unknown that Léopold III was inspired by the example of the Vichy regime and was ready to direct a dealed Belgium under the control of Hitler.
Mr. Stuer, historian, spokesperson for the European Parliament and playwright, found in the hidden archives of a former secretary of the Palais de Laeken (Royal Residence) a 22-page text written by advisers from Léopold III. The latter had asked them for scenarios for the end of a war which he thought was certainly won by Germany.
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Source: Lemonde