# Abraham Kuyper & WWI



## Poimen (May 2, 2010)

The wikipedia article on Abraham Kuyper claims that



> During the First World War Kuyper sided with the Germans, because he had opposed the English since the Boer wars.



Does anyone have any more information on this? A citation from some work of his that proves this statement?


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## MW (May 2, 2010)

Poimen said:


> The wikipedia article on Abraham Kuyper claims that
> 
> 
> 
> ...


 
The biography by Frank Vanden Berg "construes" his pro-Germany stance as an anti-England attitude.


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## BertMulder (May 4, 2010)

While I do not have any material to prove or disprove that statement, it was not at all uncommon for the Dutch to be anti-English, and not least of all because of the behavior of Britain in the Boer wars. The Dutch, in general, were very sympathetic to the Boers, as they, in general, were of Dutch ancestry. The Dutch queen Wilhelmina was once termed 'the only man in Europe', for receiving a state visit of Paul Kruger, president of the Transvaal. She send a Dutch navy ship to enable his visit. Let us not forget that it was the English that 'invented' the concentration camp, involving civilian women and children in the war. Also, the Dutch and English have a long history of being at war with one another, while the Netherlands roots lie in the German empire, and historically were closely allied. As such, there was no war between the Netherlands and Germany until WWII.

---------- Post added at 08:29 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:27 PM ----------

The Netherlands were officially neutral during WWI. Many believed, and still do, that WWI was in many ways a continuation of the Franco-Prussian wars.


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## Jack K (May 4, 2010)

I think the idea of siding with Germany in WW1 sounds bad to us because of what happened a few decades later with the Nazis and WW2. But there's no great shame in a Dutch stateman sympathizing with Germany in the first war. Had Kuyper lived to see the second war, I cannot imagine he would've supported Germany. The regime in power in Germany was quite different by then.


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## BertMulder (May 4, 2010)

you can read about Dr. Kuyper's views here:

Abraham Kuyper: a centennial reader - Google Books


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## TimV (May 4, 2010)

I don't see a problem with Dutch volunteers in WW2. The Allies murdered many millions more Christians than the Axis. There were 30,000 Dutch volunteers who fought for the nazis. I would have done the same.

You can't listen to the herd.

I'd be glad to give specifics about the Second South African War of independence, if anyone is interested. The British murdered 25 percent of the Calvinists in South Africa by torturing them to death in death camps. Of course any right minded person would have held the British guilty. Duh.


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## BertMulder (May 4, 2010)

Another proof of the close alliance of the Dutch with Germany, is that the last kaiser of Germany found a refuge in the Netherlands, where he lived till his (natural) death. He lived for a while in a castle near Amerongen, which is close to my hometown, until he bought an estate at Doorn, not far from there. Of course he was a close relative of the Dutch royal house (as well as the British). The allies wanted to hang him though, for war crimes.


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