Perhaps I should change that headline to a more accurate one?
“British Violence (By Irish People For Britain) Good, Irish Violence (By Irish People Against Britain) Bad”
For that in essence is the argument put forward by former Taoiseach and aficionado of several right-wing think-tanks John Bruton in a number of recent speeches. Of course his diatribes against the foundation of his own nation-state (for that is what they are) have been welcomed by the Righter-than-Right press in Ireland most of whom hold the same hypocritical views. The term for such a person in modern Irish political parlance is a “Neo-Unionist” or someone who longs for the “good old days” of British rule over the entirety our small island nation, of Union Jacks flying over the GPO and garden parties for the Governor General in the grounds of the Viceregal Lodge (now the residence of those upstart presidents of Ireland).
Of course some argue that such people are not so far gone in their delusional ideology as to be British Unionists per se but are instead simply partitionists: “Southern Irelanders” by any other name. This can be seen perhaps in some of their more irrational obsessions. The insistence that no one in the public eye should use the word “Ireland” for the Irish state but must use the invented term “Republic of Ireland” so (in their fervid imaginations) separating the nation from its island territory. However the partitionist excuse seems harder to justify with each passing year. When Irish journalists write or speak about “mainland Britain” in relation to differences with the country of Ireland, when they call the north-east of Ireland “Ulster” and the city of Derry by the British name of “Londonderry” then it is more than the closed minds and historical myopia of the Dublin overclass. These folk, those who shed copious tears for their grandfathers and great-grandfathers who fought in British uniforms on behalf of the British Empire while denigrating those who rejected the uniform of the Occupier and instead took up arms against that empire (and all empires), these folk would gladly walk Ireland back into some form of surreal, ersatz confederation with the United Kingdom. They would undo 1922 (or 1918 or 1916) and have us as servants in our own house to masters of another house. Such is the anti-democratic sickness at the centre of their anachronistic aspirations.
And is it not strange that those most readily identifiable with the term Neo-Unionist, most ready to worship at the altar of British militarism and violence, are the self-same people who now champion the military might of Israel in the Irish media (while making strange bedfellows with the Israeli-supporting but still fascist British terror gangs in our country)? Who attack with the ferocity of rabid dogs those who would question Israeli actions in the Gaza Strip and the killing of hundreds of Palestinian men, women and children, the vast and overwhelming majority of whom are innocent civilians?
Why is it that past British violence, or present Israeli violence, is justified, praiseworthy even, while past Irish violence in response to British violence is somehow abhorrent? Why is that those who fought in defence of the British Empire between the years 1914-1918 are worthy of commemoration while those who fought in defiance of the British Empire between the years 1916-1923 are worthy of condemnation?
As I said, Neo-Unionists.
AN SIONNACH FIONN 
I find it richly ironic that a former leader of Fine Gael should be so out of step with the iconic leaders of the party Micheál Ó Coilleáin and WT Cosgrave, both of whom participated in the events of Easter Week and the subsequent War of Independance!
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Even more ironic, a former head of government questioning the very foundation of the state he was the head of government in.
Could one imagine a French prime minister questioning the point of the Resistance 1939-45?
Or a US president questioning the point of the American Revolution?
Bruton’s views are anachronistic hangovers from the Irish Parliamentary Party. Worse he glosses over the participation of the latter in Britain’s war effort 1914-18, including encouraging recruitment in Ireland.
And what prevented the imposition of conscription on Ireland 1916-18 when demands for it were at a height in British state and military circles? Fears of sparking another Easter Rising.
Far from simply a loss of life the Rising actually prevented a far worse one with tens of thousands of Irish men being conscripted against their will and shipped off to the slaughter houses of Europe and beyond. Though John Bruton seems to have no issue with WWI. Nor do his supporters. They are modern jingoists.
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It would have been news to Michael Collins that he was one of the founders of Fine Gael, as he was dead ten years when the party was founded.
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I don’t know how he could be supported, but I’m way over here in the states. Shoneens still abound, I see.
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John Bruton was known as “Union Jack Bruton” during his term as Taoiseach and with good reason. The nickname was given in the 1990s. It seems to grow ever more apt.
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There known as “authoritarians” or “authoritarian followers”. They’re a breed of human that finds it impossible NOT to support and adulate the established authority. In the case of these ministers etc. the ‘power’ above them is the British govt. You probably know these types yourself from your own life, they are legion (as they say). They’re the type that exhibits a palpable fear of going against the grain or believing that the government might not have our best interests at heart.
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Jesus, talk about single issue fanaticism. The Black & Tans probably killed about 400 people during this period, 300 of whom were IRA men. The IRA probably massacred about 1000 non combatants: Protestant civilians and Catholic ex servicemen. I am sure you could have found plenty of equally gruesome sights at the Cork “Sing Sing”
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John, with all due respect, you are the perfect illustration of the apologist/revisionist strand in Irish life. Statements and claims are thrown out as facts which stand not even the most cursory of examinations. Given that the total number of civilians killed in Ireland from 1919 to July 1921 didn’t exceed 1000 proves the utter nonsense spouted in the Neo-Unionist press which people are falling for. Every mainstream historian in Ireland recognizes that the vast majority of those civilian deaths were the result of actions by the British Occupation Forces. There were no massacres.
As for the Cork “Sing Sing” more pseudo-historical nonsense without a scintilla of proof.
For god’s sake stop believing these fantasy tales. There are real histories by real historians not the ravings of Sunday Independent ideologues on a mission to rewrite history in their preferred form. Go read them!
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You may wish to check your facts, John. Even though no atrocity can be morally justified or ever attributed to positively contributing to any military success (i.e. there is no fathomable excuse for any of them), for Ireland, those of the IRA pale in comparison to those of the minions of Britain, Irish or British. “History” here, like in any other conflict, was written by the victor. The honor and sancticity of the “heroes” vanquishing the “evils” of the enemy. They will only ever face up to what is uncovered, but there is much more that remains buried.
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Which facts should I check? The IRA murdered about a thousand civilians during this period.
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You might want to provide evidence for your claim here. The IRA fought against British soldiers, British police officers and MI5-sponsored paramilitaries.
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There were perhaps a thousand the British “confirmed.” Perhaps there were many more. The British certainly never fessed up to most of those they made “disappear.” I would even venture to say that many of those attributed to the IRA were actually casualties caused by British. Even if they only counted the “collateral damage.” The British weren’t exactly known for truthful reporting at the time(and later), Africa, India and the Middle East ring a bell? Of course, things were peachy there as well, only the indiginous were causing all the death and destruction there. The colonial forces were just keeping the peace in the most humane manner possible. John French, by the way, served in the Boer War, you know, the war with the first concentration camps? The techniques utilized in the 1916 uprising were, in part, eerily similar. He left many, many “disappeared” there in Africa as well. Then there is Lord Kitchener, that name rings loud and clear, I hope. He kept the head of the Mahdi in a bag on his travels. Very interesting personality with great regard for the human condition. The British at the time were willing to employ any technique to keep their empire together. One day their records will come to light, just like those of the Germans after World War II. I think their numbers will be right up there with Stalin and Hitler. But it is okay, it was just Indians, Africans, Arabs, Jews, Boers, Irish, and Scots, along with other “farm animals.” The Germans weren’t the only ones with “darkness in their soul.” Like I said before, history is written by the victor.
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When in doubt, change the subject.
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“Given that the total number of civilians killed in Ireland from 1919 to July 1921 didn’t exceed 1000 proves the utter nonsense spouted in the Neo-Unionist press which people are falling for. Every mainstream historian in Ireland recognizes that the vast majority of those civilian deaths were the result of actions by the British Occupation Forces. There were no massacres.”
I was referring to the whole period 1919-1924. Over two hundred Protestant civilians were murdered by the IRA in the Six Counties during this period (obviously, over 300 Catholics were murdered by loyalists in the same period)
About three hundred Protestant civilians were murdered in the south during this period, either by the IRA 1919-22, or by the irregulars in 23-24.
An indeterminate number of Catholic ex servicemen, probably in the region of 100-200 were also murdered by Republicans during this period.
There were about 750-1000 civilian casualties during the Civil War, some of which were caused by Free State Forces, or people who were killed in the crossfire, where responsibility cannot be ascertained, but many of these civilian casualties were caused by ill disciplined out of control irregulars, which is one reason why the Free State Army and Government had majority support in putting them down.
In my mother’s home village, Ballyconnell, Cavan, for example, One Michael Cull, one of an anti-Treaty band holed up in the hills nearby, went into a hardware shop and tried to hold it up: whereupon he was (quite rightly, in my view) shot by an off duty Free State policeman. A few weeks later, about 50 of Cull’s colleagues drove into Ballyconnell, shot the shopkeeper and his assistant (the latter fatally, and in front of his 80 yr old father) and for good measure also shot dead one Michael McGrath a Gaelic teacher whose only sin was apparently that he was lodging at the shopkeeper’s house. Similar stuff happened all over Ireland during this period.
There were plenty of massacres. The one at Altnagelvin committed by Frank Aiken for example, and the massacres of Protestants in Cork City and County.
No, I stand by the figures I quoted.
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Looks like along with the “indeterminate” and “about” your focus is entirely on one side without consideration for the other. Only the English version of “History” seems to count for you. Unfortunately, that is still much of the crux in finding an actual solution today. None of the excesses are excusable on either side. That the death and suffering on the republican side was purely fighters and the republicans only murdered scores of civilians and veterans hardly reflects objectivity. Citing some of the excesses of the loose cannons on the republican side does not even remotely justify ignoring the many who died unaccounted for.
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