I think there's a disconnect between your argument and mine. You seem to be using talent and results interchangeably throughout your argument, whereas I was referring only to talent. For example, Spain have generally had lots of talent. This may be their golden generation, but it's not as if it sprang up out of nowhere. Spain didn't have the results and thus were labeled perennial underachievers, but the talent was there on an individual level prior to this generation. Germany certainly didn't have a "dearth" of talent before this current generation. There was a brief period of time including the World Cup in '98 and the European Championship in '00 where an aging German team achieved very little, but that was the same generation that won the European Championship in '96. The following years brought the likes of Michael Ballack, Torsten Frings, Jens Lehmann, Miroslav Klose, Lukas Podolski, Bastian Schweinsteiger, Philipp Lahm, etc. The current generation of young German talent is the best we've had in decades. England is an interesting situation, because I think there are serious problems with the way English talent is developed rather than there being a lack of talent itself. Belgium doesn't suffer from the same backwards mentality that retards the progress of creative players. A more nurturing environment for skill and intelligence over raw athleticism and toughness would pay dividends for England, but I digress.
Back to Belgium. Let's say that this is indeed Belgium's golden generation. From your list, I see two players that have the potential to be world class - Hazard and Courtois. There are a number of players that are already quite good, such as Fellaini, Vermaelen and Kompany, but who I don't believe have much room to improve. Furthermore, there are players like Lukaku, Witsel and de Bruyne who have the potential to join the second tier of players, but aren't likely to be more than that. The likes of Defour and Mertens are decent players that every big country has plenty of equivalents to. They'll never be special. The key here is that you've just about exhausted the list of exciting young Belgians whereas a list of young Germans or Brasilians with similar ability would be much, much longer. There are players like Sidney Sam, who are barely on our radar for a spot with the senior team, that would have made your list if they were Belgian. There's a tendency to make a bigger deal out of the quality of talent because you wouldn't expect it from a nation as small as Belgium, which was the primary comparison I was making with Bosnia & Herzegovina.
The only aspect of my argument that I might reconsider is saying "never". That's a word that perhaps I have a tendency to overuse when what I really mean to say is that something is extraordinarily unlikely. Could Belgium, for a period of one or two years, field a more talented national team than, for example, Germany? Yes, it's technically possible. Every one of those players you named could meet or exceed expectations, Germany could have significant injuries, most of our young players could fail to reach their potential for one reason or another, etc. However, that's a scenario that'd require so many unlikely events to happen that I have trouble even imagining it. Of course, we'd still have the issue of whether we're discussing results or talent. Belgium could go on a great run and win a major tournament, but that wouldn't mean they necessarily have more talent than the countries they've beaten.
