There are no doubt, those who will say ''Belgian war heroes/heroines?-after The way Belgian King Leopold, left the B.E.F.'s flank gaping wide open just before Dunkirk by his capitulation to the Nazis?.
But whatever the historcal accuracy of that event one should never, ever, overlook or ignore the bravery and huge contribution of other Belgians to the allied war effort post the 1940 capitulation by King Leopold.
But of those Belgians who continued the struggle against Nazism between 1940-45 who was possibly the bravest and most effective?
One could nominate the two Belgian youth who -having secreted a Tiger Moth type biplane from the occupying Germans, eventually saved up enough rationed petrol to fly it, daringly to England, where they joined the Belgian forces in exile.
Or one could nominate the handful of Belgian students who -armed only with wire cutters and small calibre pistols halted Train N0-20 from Mechlen Belgium to Auschwitz and freed around 40 Jews from the boxcars and certain death.
But for me, the most outstanding Belgian of World War Two was the young woman called Andree De Jongh code name'' Dedee'' whom Colditz escaper and sometime Maggie Thatcher adviser Airey Neave dubbed the ''Little Cyclone'' in his book of identical name..
Lookiing like a mere slip of a ...., ''Dedee'' organised in Brussels Belgium's capital city -with her Dad -the fabled ''Comet Line'' which collected allied airmen and other evaders from Nazi imprisonemt to cross the Pyreness to safety and liberty after hair raisng journey's over the Pyrenees .
Dedee impressed all those allied evaders many who could not believe that this gentle, slim, looking young Belgian woman could undertake exhausting dual trips over the Franco-Spanish mountains borders area which many of the men that she helped found both daunting and exhausting just one way.
Eventually when the Gestapo capturedDedee they refused, at first, to believe that a mere slip of a woman like Andree DeJongh could possibly be the guts, heart and soul of the ''Comet ''Escape Line.'' -which she was.
She even survived torture and ill treatment in Ravensbruck -the infamous women's concentration camp and post -war, was decorated by King George VI for her great services to the allied war effort. where she saved the lives of some 800 allied servicemen.
So for me, Andre De Jongh was the greatest Brlgian in W.W. 2. although -with typical modesty, she would have claimed her role was less important than the many other Belgians and French people who aided the ''Comet' line
But whatever the historcal accuracy of that event one should never, ever, overlook or ignore the bravery and huge contribution of other Belgians to the allied war effort post the 1940 capitulation by King Leopold.
But of those Belgians who continued the struggle against Nazism between 1940-45 who was possibly the bravest and most effective?
One could nominate the two Belgian youth who -having secreted a Tiger Moth type biplane from the occupying Germans, eventually saved up enough rationed petrol to fly it, daringly to England, where they joined the Belgian forces in exile.
Or one could nominate the handful of Belgian students who -armed only with wire cutters and small calibre pistols halted Train N0-20 from Mechlen Belgium to Auschwitz and freed around 40 Jews from the boxcars and certain death.
But for me, the most outstanding Belgian of World War Two was the young woman called Andree De Jongh code name'' Dedee'' whom Colditz escaper and sometime Maggie Thatcher adviser Airey Neave dubbed the ''Little Cyclone'' in his book of identical name..
Lookiing like a mere slip of a ...., ''Dedee'' organised in Brussels Belgium's capital city -with her Dad -the fabled ''Comet Line'' which collected allied airmen and other evaders from Nazi imprisonemt to cross the Pyreness to safety and liberty after hair raisng journey's over the Pyrenees .
Dedee impressed all those allied evaders many who could not believe that this gentle, slim, looking young Belgian woman could undertake exhausting dual trips over the Franco-Spanish mountains borders area which many of the men that she helped found both daunting and exhausting just one way.
Eventually when the Gestapo capturedDedee they refused, at first, to believe that a mere slip of a woman like Andree DeJongh could possibly be the guts, heart and soul of the ''Comet ''Escape Line.'' -which she was.
She even survived torture and ill treatment in Ravensbruck -the infamous women's concentration camp and post -war, was decorated by King George VI for her great services to the allied war effort. where she saved the lives of some 800 allied servicemen.
So for me, Andre De Jongh was the greatest Brlgian in W.W. 2. although -with typical modesty, she would have claimed her role was less important than the many other Belgians and French people who aided the ''Comet' line
