Фламандская милитантская организация: история и распад

Defunct Flemish nationalist organization

The Order of Flemish Militants (Vlaamse Militanten Orde or VMO) – originally the Flemish Militants Organisation (Vlaamse Militanten Organisatie) – was a Flemish nationalist activist group in Belgium defending far right interests by propaganda and political action. Established in 1949, they helped found the People's Union (Volksunie or VU) in 1954, a Belgian political party. The links between the extremist VMO and the VU lessened as the party moved towards the centre. In later decades the VMO would become linked to neo Nazism and a series of paramilitary attacks on immigrants and leftists before disappearing by the late 1980s.

In the years following the end of World War II, Flemish nationalists often fell victim in anti Nazi rallies, manifestations and riots because of their anti Belgicism and because the entire Flemish movement was discredited by military, political and economic collaboration with the Germans during World War II. The only outlets for organised Flemish nationalism were charitable groups dedicated to war veteran care or local branches of the dominant Christian Social Party (Christelijke Volkspartij, CVV) which, whilst not avowedly nationalist, did have a significant separatist wing. The VMO was founded in 1949 by Bob Maes; it was part of a wave of Flemish nationalist groups that emerged that year, including Vlaamse Concentratie (partij) (Vlaamse Concentratie, VC). The group sought the creation of an independent Flanders. Soon, the VMO started expanding and turned into a full scale paramilitary organization. Between 1950 and 1970 it was heavily criticized by, but nevertheless tolerated by, the Ministry of Justice. On 14 December 1953, however, 16 individual VMO members were convicted for the possession of forbidden weapons earlier that year. The VMO itself was not convicted (since it was impossible at that time to prosecute a group on penal grounds, only individuals). In 1954 the VMO became associated with the Christian Flemish People's Union (Christelijke Vlaamse Volksunie, CVV) and the more formal alliance of the People's Union (Volksunie, VU) that followed this group that same year. A formal schism between the two organisations was announced in October 1963. In 1974 it announced that it intended to take on an active role against leftists as well as its pro Flemish independence agenda. Chief among these was Xavier Buisseret, who served as propaganda chief of the Vlaams Blok, having previously held high office in the VMO. The new VMO became associated with a series of attacks on immigrants, Walloons and leftists as well as the organisation of annual international neo Nazi rallies at Diksmuide, where representatives of the League of Saint George and the National States' Rights Party were amongst those in attendance. These rallies had initially been for Flemish only but in the late 1960s the VMO began to invite other rightist groups to participate and they eventually became an important annual event in the international neo Nazi calendar. Especially close to the League of Saint George, the two groups were part of a wider network that also included the Deutsche Bürgerinitiative in Germany, the NSDAP/AO in the United States and France's Fédération d'action nationale et européenne. The group also sought, albeit unsuccessfully, to forge links with Irish republican groups and to this end distributed leaflets in support of Bobby Sands during his 1981 hunger strike. However in a subsequent volte face the VMO threw its lot in with Ulster loyalism and attempted to link up with the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF). This came to nothing either however after the UVF rejected the VMO's request that they should target Jews, with the UVF a pro Israeli group in opposition to the pro Palestine stance of republicans. In the seventies, VMO gained international attention by repatriating the corpses of former collaborators of World War Two to their homeland. In Austria, a VMO commando (Operation Brevier) claimed to have dug up the corpse of the priest Cyriel Verschaeve, a leading figure of the collaboration, and buried it again in Flemish soil. The dead bodies of Staf De Clercq, the former leader of the Vlaams Nationaal Verbond (Operation Delta), and Anton Mussert, the former Dutch NSB leader (Operation Wolfsangel), were also dug up and reburied in Flanders.

December: attack on the Polish soccer player Włodzimierz Lubański in Lokeren.

February: riots with the police after an anti immigrant demonstration in Schilde. April: attack on a francophone school in Mortsel. May: fire bombing of a Turkish bar in Antwerp. June: fire bombing of the car of a francophone inhabitant of Voeren. August: training camp in Germany together with the terrorist Hofmann Group. October: attack on the town hall of 's Gravenvoeren.

February: attack on a socialist book store in Mechelen. March: attack on a bar in Moelingen. April: attack on the Halletoren in Bruges. October: training camp in the United States together with the Ku Klux Klan. November: riots with the police after a Flemish nationalist demonstration in Kraainem.

April: fire bombing of a Moroccan bar in Lokeren. May: attack on a trade union building in Sint Niklaas.

February: visit to Léon Degrelle in Marbella, Spain.

July: attack on a francophone bar in Voeren.

December: attack on a socialist bar in Bruges.

March: attack on leftist demonstrators in Ghent. September: fire bombing of a socialist book store in Sint Niklaas. October: attack on the Masereelfonds building in Bruges. November: attack on anti fascist demonstrators in Lommel.

In 1981, 106 VMO members were sentenced by the Antwerp Court to imprisonment although their sentences were overturned the following year on appeal. In 1983, the VMO was condemned as a private militia by the Ghent Court of Appeal and outlawed. Despite this verdict, the VMO was considered to be active and operational until the late eighties, when several similar organizations were founded to replace the VMO. The two most successful of these VMO successors are the Odal Group and Voorpost.