TREATIES ARE AGREED BETWEEN STATES WHICH RECOGNISE EACH OTHER. THERE WAS NO TREATY SIGNED IN LONDON BY THE DEMOCRATICALLY ESTABLISHED AND FUNCTIONING IRISH REPUBLIC AND THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT WHICH WAS USURPING POWER IN IRELAND.
Dail Eireann acquiesced by a small majority in its acceptance. It was seen as a Mafia-type offer which the delegates couldn’t refuse. Richard Mulcahy TD, Chief of Staff of the IRA made clear his dislike of the Articles, but acquiesced in them because he maintained that they had suffered a defeat. Arthur Griffith hailed Michael Collins as “The Man Who Won The War” (for the IRISH!) but regarded the document that they both signed as an instalment, not a settlement of Irish national rights.
In fact neither the British nor the Irish won the war. Britain’s terrorist war failed to break the spirit of the Irish people nor Ireland’s National Army, the IRA. The IRA failed to drive the British Forces into the Sea. The British Government sued for a Truce, realising that it had failed to win world or even domestic British opinion to favour its treatment of Ireland. Irish resistance helped inspire Indian and Egyptians, Ho Chi Min, and won the praises of Marcus Garvey and others.
Britain’s greatest resources were centuries which earned it the reputation of Perfidious Albion, a Cabinet as devious, ruthless and able as any in history and a first class Civil Service. Poor Michael Collins thought he could out-cheat and double-cross the world’s unbeaten champions.
More on the establishment of Britain’s Vassal State in Ireland and how De Valera and Fianna Fail and
the electorate re-established Democratic Government in Ireland will follow.
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