Page:Karl Liebknecht - Militarism (1917).djvu/80

 48 diers of olden days, they are now carried out under a sharp control and punctuality is enforced by punishments. It is to be noted that this reorganization of the civic guard has only taken place in communities of more than 20,000 inhabitants, whilst in the other places the civic guard has remained a ridiculous pretence. That fact, too, marks the civic guard to be a special force of the government in the struggle against the "interior enemy." Excluding the military police, the standing army numbered, in 1905, about 46,000 men; the active civic guard numbered about 44,000 men, almost as many.

Belgium thus possesses an army against the exterior, and a special army against the interior enemy, an exquisite arrangement which, as the employment of the civic guard during the late suffrage struggles and strikes has proved, renders and will continue to render good service to the capitalist regime in Belgium.

In addition, there is in Belgium the constabulary or military police, who have simply to perform military tasks in war as well as during strikes