WAR MEMORIAL AT DUBLIN’S ISLANDBRIDGE
Maeve Hurrell, rightly, decries disrespectful
behaviour at the “National War Memorial” but is mistaken in believing
that is
“dedicated to all who gave their lives that
we can live in freedom.”
Neither Germany nor Austria-Hungary nor the
Ottoman Empire, in 1914 coveted or planned to extend their territories
beyond those they held in the previous decade,
nor did the destruction of their empires reveal any evidence of such
covetousness or planning.
The first paragraph of David Lloyd George’s
“War Memoirs” recalls, how, as a Backbench (Opposition) Liberal MP
in 1904 (during the Tory rule of
Arthur Balfour) he called on Lord Roseberry, who had been Prime Minister some
years earlier. Britain and France had just established the
“Entente-Cordiale” and the elder statesma the young backbencher
what he thought about it. “I was delighted that our snarling and
scratching with France had come to an end
at last” said the younger man “You are all wrong. It means war with
Germany in the end ” said Rosebery.
Britain and France pulled Czarist Russia into
their conspiracy with the bribe of Constantinople. Britain had allied herself
with the
Ottoman Empire in the Crimean War to keep Russia
away from Constantinople.
The Irishmen slaughtered wearing British uniforms
in both wars were pawns in a cynical game which could bring no benefit to
Ireland. At Balaclava, and later in
Flanders they suffered much more than they might have, if their senior British
commanders had
been intelligent and competent.
Weep for those pawns if you must, but their
sacrifice gained no freedom for anyone.
Yours faithfully
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