Albert's Doves

Albert's finest squad in Verdun.

At the start of World War I in August 1914, the Belgian armed forces were being restructured, due to this measure and the rapid occupation of Belgium only 20% of men were mobilised and incorporated into the armed forces. Ultimately, 350,000 men were incorporated into the Belgian armed forces, although one third of these did not participate directly in combat.

Invaded by surprise by the Imperial German Army, which was approximately 600,000 men strong, the small, ill-equipped, 117,000-strong Belgian army succeeded, for ten days, in holding the German army in front of Liège in 1914. They fought between the emplaced forts in the area and with their support.[14] This strategy was based on the Napoleonic concept of fighting the advance force and preventing a portion of the enemy forces joining the main body. At the time, the authorities and the public celebrated a determined Belgian resistance that the Germans did not expect. Indeed, the Belgians delayed the Germans and thus allowed the French armies to resist the German attacks which became the First Battle of the Marne.

For four years, under the command of King Albert I, the Belgian army guarded the important sector of the Allied left wing between Nieuwpoort, on the coast, and Ypres with the help of the forces of the Entente but did not participate in any of the major Allied offensives, which were deemed unnecessarily expensive in terms of cost and manpower by the King of the Belgians.

In 1916, a body of Belgian armoured cars were moved from the IJzer front to help the Russian Empire. The force found itself alongside an identical body sent by the British on the Eastern Front.[15]

In Africa a company-sized unit of Belgian colonial troops participated in the occupation of the German colony of Togoland, The Force Publique subsequently played a major role in the East African Campaign against German forces in German East Africa, providing over 12,000 askaris under Belgian officers for the Allied offensive of February 1916.[16] The most significant Belgian action was the capture of Tabora in September 1916, by a force under the command of General Charles Tombeur.

In Belgium, after four years of war, as of 26 May 1918, the army had 166,000 men of which 141,974 were combatants, forming twelve infantry divisions and one cavalry division. It had 129 aircraft and 952 guns of all calibres. From September, the Belgian army was involved in the Allied offensive until the final victory of 11 November 1918. (source: Wikipedia)