Decade of commemorations stoking cult of violence (Irish Times)
Stephen Collins writes Ballocks, as is his wont.
Exercising their right to self-determination, the Irish people in two General Elections and the Local Elections between December 1918 and the 1921 Truce established and consolidated a Republic.
Their refusal to knuckle under to British terrorism, or to allow the British Government a monopoly of propaganda won them supporters world wide – including the most decent elements in Britain itself.
In America, de Valera was not just the voice of Clan na Gael and American Citizens of Irish ethnicity, but the living head of the elected Irish Government, acting with the unanimous agreement of Dail Eireann, Archbishop Mannix of Melbourne, both in that city and on
his way to Ireland through America, was another prominent exposer of British hypocrisy. And Terence MacSwiney’s heroism was recognised all over the world by people who had never before heard of Ireland.
Actions like Kilmichael and Crossbarry were puny skirmishes in the context of the near universal violence of the decade following the shooting of unarmed Dubliners by the British Army on Bachelors Walk in July 1914. But they demonstrated that whilst the British could employ terror they could not crush Irish democracy.
The British Government, not the elected Irish Government, sued for a truce.
How both Governments played their hands then is another story.
Comments are closed.