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Paul-Henri Spaak
Paul-Henri Spaak · Unknown author Unknown author, CC BY-SA 3.0 de, Wikimedia Commons
Person

Paul-Henri Spaak

1899 – 1972 · aged 73

Belgian politician (1899-1972)

Born
25 Jan 1899 · place not recorded
Died
31 Jul 1972 · Braine-l'Alleud
Part ofBelgium54 BCE – today

Life timeline

Their life from birth to death. On the timeline, world events of the time are shown faintly.

Showing 84 years
  1. 25 Jan 1899BornBorn
  2. 1914 – 1918WarWorld War I
  3. 1932 – 1957RoleMember of the Chamber of Representatives of Belgium
  4. 1935 – 1936RoleMinister of Mobility
  5. 1936 – 1939RoleBelgian Minister of Foreign Trade
  6. 1936 – 1939RoleMinister of Foreign Affairs in Belgium
  7. 1937AwardKnight Grand Cross of the Order of St Michael and St George
  8. 1938 – 1939RolePrime Minister of Belgium
  9. 1938AwardGrand Cross of the Legion of Honour
  10. 1938AwardKnight Grand Cross in the Order of the Netherlands Lion
  11. 1939 – 1949RoleMinister of Foreign Affairs in Belgium
  12. 1942 – 1943RoleMinister of Mobility
  13. 1946RolePrime Minister of Belgium
  14. 1946 – 1947RolePresident of the United Nations General Assembly
  15. 1947 – 1949RolePrime Minister of Belgium
  16. 1949 – 1951RolePresident of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
  17. 1949 – 1954RoleRepresentative of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe
  18. 1949AwardGrand Cross of the Order of the Southern Cross
  19. 1952AwardDoctor honoris causa from the University of Aix-Marseille
  20. 1953 – 1957RoleMayor of Saint-Gilles - Sint-Gillis
  21. 1954 – 1957RoleMinister of Foreign Affairs in Belgium
  22. 1955AwardGrand Cross of the Order of Christ
  23. 1956AwardKnight Grand Cross of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic
  24. 1956AwardGrand Cross 1st class of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany
  25. 1957 – 1961RoleSecretary General of NATO
  26. 1957AwardCharlemagne Prize
  27. 1961 – 1966RoleMember of the Chamber of Representatives of Belgium
  28. 1961 – 1966RoleMinister of Foreign Affairs in Belgium
  29. 1961AwardMedal of Freedom
  30. 1963AwardCompanion of Honour
  31. 1963AwardKnight Grand Cross of the Order of the Falcon
  32. 1965RoleMinister of Development Cooperation
  33. 31 Jul 1972DiedDied in Braine-l'Alleud

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Meanwhile in the world

Major world events during their lifetime (1899 – 1972).

  1. 1904 – 1905Russo-Japanese War
  2. 1915 – 1923Armenian genocide
  3. 1917Balfour Declaration
  4. 1917February Revolution
  5. 1917October Revolution
  6. 1917 – 1922Russian Civil War
  7. 1919 – 1920Paris Peace Conference
  8. 1920Treaty of Versailles
  9. 1933 – 1945The Holocaust
  10. 19341934 FIFA World Cup
  11. 19361936 Summer Olympics
  12. 1937 – 1945Second Sino-Japanese War
  13. 19381938 FIFA World Cup
  14. 1938Munich Agreement
  15. 1939 – 1940Winter War
  16. 1939 – 1945World War II
  17. 1940 – 1945Auschwitz concentration camp
  18. 1941Attack on Pearl Harbor
  19. 1941 – 1945Eastern Front
  20. 1941Operation Barbarossa
  21. 1942 – 1943Battle of Stalingrad
  22. 1945Atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki
  23. 1945 – 1946Nuremberg trials
  24. 19501950 FIFA World Cup
  25. 1950 – 1953Korean War
  26. 1953 – 1959Cuban Revolution
  27. 19541954 FIFA World Cup
  28. 1955 – 1975Vietnam War
  29. 1956Hungarian Revolution of 1956
  30. 1956Suez Crisis
  31. 19581958 FIFA World Cup
  32. 1959Antarctic Treaty System
  33. 19621962 FIFA World Cup
  34. 1962Cuban Missile Crisis
  35. 19661966 FIFA World Cup
  36. 1966 – 1976Cultural Revolution
  37. 1968Prague Spring
  38. 1969Apollo 11 Moon landing
  39. 19721972 Summer Olympics

Biography

Paul-Henri Charles Spaak (French: [pɔl ɑ̃ʁi ʃaʁl spak]; 25 January 1899 – 31 July 1972) was an influential Belgian Socialist politician, diplomat, and statesman who thrice served as the prime minister of Belgium and later as the second secretary general of NATO. Nicknamed "Mr. Europe", he was a leader in the formation of the institutions that evolved into the current European Union, along with Robert Schuman, Alcide De Gasperi and Konrad Adenauer.

A member of the influential Spaak family, he served briefly in World War I before he was captured, and rose to prominence after the war as a tennis player and lawyer, becoming famous for his high-profile defence of an Italian student accused of attempting to assassinate Italy's crown prince in 1929. A convinced socialist, Spaak entered politics in 1932 for the Belgian Workers' Party (later the Belgian Socialist Party) and gained his first ministerial portfolio in the government of Paul Van Zeeland in 1935.

He became the prime minister in 1938 and held the position until 1939. During World War II, he served as foreign minister in the London-based Belgian government in exile under Hubert Pierlot, where he negotiated the foundation of the Benelux Customs Union with the governments of the Netherlands and Luxembourg. After the war, he twice regained the premiership, first for under a month in March 1946 and again between 1947 and 1949. He held various further Belgian ministerial portfolios until 1966. He was Belgium's foreign minister for 18 years between 1939 and 1966.

Spaak, a convinced supporter of multilateralism, became internationally famous for his support of international cooperation, in which he hoped to include geopolitical enemies of Belgium and NATO such as the Soviet Union and its satellite states. In 1945, he was chosen to chair the first session of the General Assembly of the new United Nations. A long-running supporter of European integration, Spaak had been an early advocate of customs union and had negotiated the Benelux agreement in 1944.

Text from the Wikipedia article Paul-Henri Spaak, CC BY-SA 4.0

About this information

  • The place of birth is not recorded.

Dates and life events come from this person’s Wikidata entry.

We only show events that the sources give a date for. Anything without a date is left out rather than guessed.