Short History

After WW II, Belgium was co-founder of the Western Defense Union (1946, precursor of NATO) and of NATO (1949). Within these organizations Belgium committed itself to build 15 airbases, partly for its own use and partly to provide facilities for allied forces in case of war.

The bases to be used by the Belgian Air Force (8) were: Beauvechain, Brustem, Florennes, Chievres, Koksijde and Melsbroek (all ex-Luftwaffe fields), together with 2 brand new bases: Kleine-Brogel and Bierset (Liege). The so-called reserve bases (6) are: Zutendaal, Weelde, Zoersel-Oostmalle, Ursel, Bertrix and Saint-Hubert. Intended for deployments of both BAF units and allied units.

All airfields were extended (existing bases) or newly built to NATO standards between 1950 and 1955. Runway length tobe 2400 meter with preference for an emergency parallel runway (23 meter width) of also 2400 meter. NATO minimum for the back-up runway was 2000 meter. Airfields with an existing cross runway (Chievres, Koksijde, Melsbroek) did have indeed a secondary runway of 2000 meter.

Later, between 1958 and 1961, the main runways of all bases were lengthened to 10.000 ft class (3000+ meter) with the addition of so called overruns. These overruns could be used for additional takeoff distance but in practice they were mainly used as stopway in case of emergency, when using an emergency brake system like a cable arresting gear and a net arresting system. Both type of systems were(are) used by the Belgian Air Force on active bases.

The 15th airfield was canceled before being built. It was planned at Sart-les-Saint-Vith (North of the city of Saint-Vith in the Ardennes area). But later another 15th airbase Kitona airbase was built (1957-1960) in Congo (present Democratic Republic of Congo) to house a fleet of Neptunes anti-submarine warplanes. But the sudden independence of Congo in 1960 prevented the actual use of the airbase.

(Text courtesy of Jean-Pierre Pulinx, thanks a lot!)