Talk:Treaty of London (1839)

Flanders, Dutch-speaking Belgium
The article should explain why Dutch-speaking Flanders and Brabant did not remain as part of the Netherlands, given that linguistic divides seem to have motivated border-drawing at this time of history. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.43.59.159 (talk) 13:48, 9 March 2019 (UTC)

War Commitment
I take exception to the last sentence of the intro, that "Article VII ... by implication committed the signatory powers to guard that neutrality in the event of invasion". The citation doesn't say as much. And I don't think that most reasonable people would be able to read that kind of commitment into article seven, extremely brief as it is. There is a body of opinion that sees the Treaty of London as placing all its obligations on the Belgians and almost none, besides diplomatic recognition and access to trade, on the other signatories. Opinion includes those of both brothers Hitchens, one of the few things the two political authors agreed on. 80.5.23.215 (talk) 08:29, 27 December 2013 (UTC)
 * A big factor in the outbreak of WW1 was the ambiguous wording of the treaty, allowing different interpretations. Valetude (talk) 11:53, 5 December 2016 (UTC)

I also object to the idea that Britain -- or any signatory -- had an obligation to take particular military action. They did not -- nor did Britain think it had such an obligation. The British government was leaning toward NOT intervening in fact...until both the Belgian question...and a decade of previously undisclosed military promises to France...were enough to tip the balance in Parliament.

The sentence On 31 July 1914 the mobilisation of the Belgian Army was ordered, and the Belgian king at the same time publicly called Europe's attention to the fact that Germany, Great Britain and France were solemnly bound to respect and to defend the neutrality of his country.

...is most assuredly misleading. The Great Powers that signed the treaty did "guarantee" the neutrality and territorial integrity of the new state of Belgium -- it certainly did not obligate any Great Power signatory to take any particular action. No single Great Power was obligated to be hero. The false impression comes from condensing the idea into a single misleading sentence. Chesspride216.144.161.51 (talk) 00:18, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

As an addition The five great powers of Europe (Austria, France, Prussia, Russia, and the United Kingdom) also pledged to guarantee Belgium's neutrality.[16]

Notice that...Austria did not derail its pending war with Serbia to "defend" Belgian neutrality or territorial integrity under the Treaty of London. Also Russia did act on that basis either. The Great Powers escalated the Austro-Serbian war, the Russians hid their early mobilization for nearly a week...and the alliance system did the rest. Britain was tied to the French by military commitments that dwarfed any obligation under the Treaty of London -- though yes indeed they used it as the casus belli for their declaration of war. Chesspride216.144.161.51 (talk) 00:41, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

Inquest on article "Treaty of London, 1839"
In order to clear up the problems with this page in a way that can be audited without repeating my "detective work", here's the story so far:


 * 11:38, 2003 Sep 21 UTC: 80.40.30.126 appears from the history to have created the page; the content was a repeated block of nonsense text, IMO consistent with some kind of technological error (or with intentional creation without a great effort). (I prefer the tech problem intepretion, bcz the title is perfectly sensible, while the content leaves me at a loss what payoff a vandal would have had.)
 * Two unremarkable edits ensued, then:
 * 12:31, the same date:  195.92.67.209
 * adapted (ambiguous) material that had been added, 3-4 weeks earlier, to Treaty of London, and
 * added boiler-plate about being a stub.
 * 17:16, 18 Oct 2003 (UTC): this article, Treaty of London, 1839, was added to Pages_needing_attention, with the justified complaint that the title and main content seemed incompatible
 * 18:24, the same date: the offending text was removed, leaving a stub with just a link to Treaty of London

Following that link leads to disamb-style info including "Treaty guaranteeing the neutrality of Belgium, 1839" (but linking back to this article)

That info should be added here, creating a less confusing stub that may have a fair chance for a fullfilling life; i'm inclined to kill this article's link as well.

I intend to do another of these, on Treaty of London, which will also resolve the ambiguous information that also appeared here for close to a month. --Jerzy 01:40, 2003 Nov 14 (UTC)


 * Yeah, well, for whomever cares, Jerzy and I refixated the article (is refixated a word?)... ugen64 02:56, Nov 30, 2003 (UTC)

"At that point, British Prime Minister Herbert Henry Asquith declared war on August 4 of the same year."
Correct me if I'm wrong, but the Prime Minister has no power to declare war. --Daniel C. Boyer 17:09, 4 August 2005 (UTC)


 * He does indeed. The power to declare war comes under the royal prerogative powers of the prime minister (nominally exercised by the sovereign, but binding advice to the sovereign on the use of these powers is at the discretion of the prime minister and cabinet). It's the prime minister who has the final say on the deployment of forces and the existence of a state of war. This is a lot of power to concentrate in the hands of the head of government, but bear in mind that under the Westminster system parliament can remove the prime minister more easily (by a loss of confidence in the government) than the legislature can remove the president in a presidential system (by impeachment), so it roughly balances out, although there's a lot more that could be said on this subject. 02:45, 15 April 2006 (UTC)


 * While the PM has the de facto power to declae war, my understanding has been that the actual right to declare war wrests with the monarch. Even if the monarch has to quote Matthew 10 all works out, I think.

Significance
I splitted the section "significance" into two parts, the existing part became "historical significance" and I added a part with regards to the Iron Rhine controversy under "modern day significance" as in 2005 the Permanent Court of Arbitration used the 1839 treaty to decide a dispute between Belgium and the Netherlands (in favor of Belgium). -- fdewaele, 19 April 2007, 15:22.

More should be definitely be said about modern significance. If the treaty was deemed to give Belgium rights in the Iron Rhine dispute, why has no one kicked up a fuss about Belgium's distinct lack of neutrality these days, something the treaty bound it and other European powers on? This is the country that hosts the headquarters of NATO! 23:03, 6 December 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.68.212.219 (talk)

I think you have to see the two issues separatly. Belgium tried to remain neutral before the start of both world wars, but this neutrality was never respected, so it was forced to choose sides. This part of the treaty was violated but that was not Belgium's fault. Since the neutrality was violated and Belgium is too small to defend its own (especially with its strategic location that seems to attract invasions), Belgium had no choice but to join a military alliance like NATO. The issues about the Dutch-Belgian border and the Iron Rhine are something entirely different, this was an agreement between Belgium and the Netherlands and no World War really changed anything about that. --Lamadude (talk) 17:03, 12 May 2009 (UTC)

Belgian neutrality -- Belgium was supposed to be neutral by treaty. The Belgian govt. talked that way in 1914, but the reality was that it had moved ever-so-softly to the French / Entente side in political matters by 1914. Chesspride216.144.161.51 (talk) 00:35, 26 January 2023 (UTC)

Treaty of Maastricht (1843)
Why this article doesn't talk about the Treaty of Maastricht (1843) ?--Io Herodotus (talk) 08:20, 27 November 2013 (UTC)

Suggestion: A section on lead-up to the treaty's creation
I would like to see a section that expands a bit the background leading to the treaty, especially the negotiation behind the treaty. For example, who came up with the ideas behind the treaty? What motivated them to suggest what became part of the treaty? For example, from what I've read elsewhere in the Wikipedia, it appears that Lord Palmerston, the British Foreign Secretary at the time treaty was signed or at least being negotiated, made the guaranteed neutrality of Belgium part of the treaty in the name of British security interests. Hence the British involvement in Lower Countries from to time, particularly that French invasions of Austrian Netherlands (which Belgium once was part of before being incorporated into Netherlands before 1830) led to Britain being dragged into war with Revolutionary France (it appears that Britain is more interested in securing that flank than in internal affairs of France at that time). Anyway I digress but I would like to at least see the background behind the treaty expanded a bit. --Legion (talk) 20:23, 5 December 2014 (UTC)
 * Started a Background section with text and cites from International relations of the Great Powers (1814–1919). More can be added. Whizz40 (talk) 14:56, 2 May 2016 (UTC)

Obscure statement
"Belgium's de facto independence had been established through nine years of intermittent fighting culminating in the Belgian Revolution. "

This statement is obscure. Which 9 years are being refered to, here ? 1830-1839 ?  1821-1830 ?   If it is supposed to mean the 9 years prior to the making of the 1839 treaty,   well that 9 year period started with the "belgian revolution",  it did not "culminate" with it,  not in the English language at any rate.Lathamibird (talk) 17:21, 4 August 2016 (UTC)
 * You're exactly right. I'll remove the words after "fighting" from the sentence involved. Gerard von Hebel (talk) 17:42, 4 August 2016 (UTC)