Oh owlstretchingtime? Ireland is not "fighting a war against Britain"

The BBQ Pit
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In this post you said:

Pray tell, on what do you base this piece of twaddle? Where on earth do you get your information on Ireland from? I urge you to do a bit of research on the subject rather than spouting uninformed and just plain incorrect nonsense about it (incorrect, that is, regardless of one’s political leanings).

Let’s put the record straight in a remedial style: as yojimbo said, Ireland is not “fighting Britain”, and as a state, never has done. Ireland is an independent, democratic country, that is an ally of Britain. It won its independence via an armed uprising, but since independence there has been no war.

The people who have been “fighting a war against Britain” over the past 30 years, some of whom have been “happy to deal with Gadaffi”, are terrorists from North and South of the Northern Irish border. They have nothing to do with the state of Ireland.

The Irish state has been trying to track down and imprison terrorists of all persuasions since The Troubles began. Ever heard of Special Branch? The IRA prisoners in Portlaoise jail? The Anglo-Irish Agreement? The Good Friday Agreement?

Historically, there may have been political wrangling between the two nations, but neither has ever fired a shot at the other in anger.

Another question for you: have you ever been here? Because I must say, for a country that is “fighting a war” against my country, the natives are jolly friendly.

So, owlstretchingtime, put your money where your bullshit is: give me some examples of Ireland welcoming “anyone who would hurt us”.

2

Well, I’ve heard of it. After Neil joined the police force, the Mussilini lookalike cop told him to watch out for it.

Even so, he stilled bumped his head on it.
Neil:[rubbing his forehead]“I don’t see what’s so special about it.”
Tree branch he bumped his head on:“I’ve got a degree in Computer Science!”
Neil:“Oh. I guess that is special.”

3

Is that a sly Young Ones reference?

4

Yes indeed!

5

bravo jjimm.
i hope he reads this.

6

I can almost predict how this is going to run, what arguments will be deployed, what defences etc.

I don’t really see anything good coming out of this, I doubt that there will be any great meeting of minds or opinions changed.

I hope this does not become a train wreck.

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I was quite interested in the history of the “problems” in Ireland, so I was very happy to see that PBS ran a two-part special titled “Endgame in Ireland” about the events and eventual solution up to now.

Couldn’t understand a bloody word of it! I was seriously pissed off! They absolutly needed subtitles or translators to get past the accent! A great opportunity for the acquisition of knowledge shot in the ass by my inability to understand English! :smiley:

May the mediocrity of several greeting-card salesman inhabit your soul like unmatched buttons in a empty mayonaise jar.

8

Not defending old owlstretching… but Ireland has had a somewhat ambiguous attitude at times towards England. While looking for a cite for the port issue I had in mind I found this site, which mentions that 70,000 Irish served with the British in WWII, even though they were officially neutral. http://indigo.ie/~kfinlay/General/vc.html

At the same time, Ireland’s decision WWII not to allow the allies access to Irish ports and airfields cost uncounted lives. The reasons for this are apparently complicated, and I’m not familiar with the details of the argument, but the situation has made me angry. Maybe it’s time to forget this kind of anger. http://www.sonic.net/~bstone/archives/000511.shtml

We can either lament that country X hasn’t always been 100% at all times in support with our country Y’s position, or we can move on and ask how countries with many of the same objectives end up damaging one another.

Given the current climate with Iraq, Saudi Arabia, and Pakistan, learning how to avoid these situations seems important, and bringing up old grievances just a way to perpetuate war.

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No? Really? Do tell.

‘They’, who ‘they’? The goverment, or state, were neutral, the 70,000 people who joined various armies - mainly the British one - weren’t the government or the state. I don’t see your point.

That’d be the neutrality thing again. Just think of how many lives were saved by not allowing the Germans to use Irish ports and airfields, that might help ease your anger. :rolleyes: There’s a lot of people in Ireland for whom neutrality is quite important, it’s one of the buttons being pushed in the lead-up to the second Nice referendum here, but thats a whole other debate.

Fair enough I suppose.

Why was I posting to this thread in the first place? Oh yeah, to call owlst a fucking ignorant bigot.

Casdave’s right by the looks of things.

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micilin, points well taken.

Quote: “That’d be the neutrality thing again. Just think of how many lives were saved by not allowing the Germans to use Irish ports and airfields, that might help ease your anger. There’s a lot of people in Ireland for whom neutrality is quite important, it’s one of the buttons being pushed in the lead-up to the second Nice referendum here, but thats a whole other debate.”

Specifically regarding Sweden’s and Switzerland’s activities during WWII into account, “neutrality” seems to mean “We want to stay out of the war, and we’ll do whatever we feel is necessary so that our blood is not shed”.

Obviously, this isn’t the case with Ireland, 70,000 troops aren’t a small, or insincere contribution.

America’s idea of neutrality before WWI and WWII was that there were a bunch of countries out there fighting about things it didn’t care at all about. Let 'em fight, they’ve been fighting for centuries. We’re above that. So we hoped. Alas.

Do the “neutrals” in WWII imagine Nazi Germany wouldn’t have pillaged and raped their whole country after they were done with Britain, Russia and the U.S.? It takes three players for one to be neutral, the Nazis, in the long term, weren’t buying it.

When you folks in Ireland think of neutrality, what does it mean? Is it a general feeling, or are there laws enacted?

(This is not a flame. I don’t understand the position of a country saying it’s “neutral” before the issues that will eventually confront it are identified. What is it a “neutral” is neutral about?)

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It has nothing to do with any particular issue. It’s just a protective policy. The neutral country makes a public statement that it won’t fight in any war, on any side (except if attacked, of course). But of course in order to work (assuming that the neutral country isn’t strategically important enough to justify the losses involved in attacking it anyway), the warring parties must feel confident that the country will actually stay neutral.
So, I suppose that declaring itself neutral is a confidence builder. If said country makes a big deal about its neutrality, build its foreign policy around this concept and has actually avoided being involved in any conflict for an extended period, it’s more convincing that if it declares its neutrality only about a particular issue at a particular moment.

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It has nothing to do with any particular issue. It’s just a protective policy. The neutral country makes a public statement that it won’t fight in any war, on any side (except if attacked, of course). But of course in order to work (assuming that the neutral country isn’t strategically important enough to justify the losses involved in attacking it anyway), the warring parties must feel confident that the country will actually stay neutral.
So, I suppose that declaring itself neutral is a confidence builder. If said country makes a big deal about its neutrality, build its foreign policy around this concept and has actually avoided being involved in any conflict for an extended period, it’s more convincing that if it declares its neutrality only about a particular issue at a particular moment.

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I am not personally in favour of Ireland’s neutrality, and think it was a crying shame during WWII, but there are several issues to temper that feeling:

deValera, the prime minister, considered that by allowing the Allies to use the Cork ports (which, by the way, were occupied by the British at the time), he was a) inviting a blitz on Irish towns and cities, and b) negotiating with the loser - at the time it appeared that Britain would be defeated. Selfish? Yes. Pragmatic? Yes. Bitter? Probably.

Ireland had been independent for only 13 years at the start of WWII. Clearly there was a lot of ambivalence towards the country that had just been at war with the people of the new state; that war, of course, being the denoument to centuries of oppression.

So strong was this consideration, that Churchill actually offered to ‘sell out’ the Unionists in the 6 counties of Northern Ireland by giving Northern Ireland to the Repubic. Dev refused.

The 70,000 Irish people who fought with the allies did so largely for reasons of economic necessity, or for noble sentiments. But they did so as individuals.

Furthermore, allied and German soldiers who ended up on Irish soil were put in POW camps. The Germans were kept under lock and key, while the Allies were kept in the camps under an ‘honour system’ - they had to sign a document to pledge not to escape. Only one allied prisoner ever did, a Canadian, and he was returned to approbation from his fellow prisoners. Clearly, Ireland’s neutrality was skewed towards the allies in this respect.

Why is the ire about neutrality not directed so strongly at the Swiss? If the Allies had demanded the use of Basel and Schaffhausen and been refused, would we be so angry?

Anyway, I’m not trying to make excuses; I think Ireland’s neutrality during WWII was highly unfortunate, but fairly inevitable. But what happened then should not cloud the issue with regard to Ireland’s policies since 1945. I am stilll interested to hear of this war that the land of my birth and the land of my residency are currently engaged in.

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as far as i remember from irish history in school DeV had very little choice but to declare neutrality if he wanted to maintain irish independence for long.

you see the irish army at the time was small and had no large guns. the airforce was more or less non-existant and the navy consisted of 3 elderly and very small ships.

if ireland had declared itself on the side of the allies it would have become inundated with British, and later US, forces using the country as a glorified army camp. this is not something that a country with recently won independence is going to submit to willingly.

As it was ireland allowed Allied planes to take short-cuts over it’s airspace, re-patriated Allied troops who crossed it’s borders (it interned the Axis forces) and generally was as friendly to the allies as it could afford to be.

Irish neutrality prevented the invasion of the island by either side and the loss of civilian lives. since the allies still got 70,000 men and some perks not available to axis forces i reckon they got a pretty good deal.

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Yeah, why didn’t the men who had fought a armed struggle with the British just over 10years before and had been involved in the struggle for a Republic for most of their lives let the British back to take control of the ports and airstrips? Since the country was just recovering from a very nasty civil war and it would of been a very very risky political move as well I can understand why they didn’t. BTW my grandfather was a decorated soldier in the British Army. Fought in Burma. As jjimm said there were several reasons why Irish men fought. My grandfather joined up for the money. Working class Dublin in them days was a very hard place to live. Poverty was rampant. A job in the British Army was very seductive to a young man with children to feed. Principals be damned.

As for owlstretchingtime well he’s already shown that he has a fairly one sided view on things when it comes to issues regarding Ireland and the UK in the Bloody Sunday Thread which I can’t seem to find.

Yes some of my countrymen have and still do class themselves “at war” with Britain
But that’s not the national feeling with regard to Britain.

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I don’t think it will become a train-wreck, for the simple reason that there is a right and a wrong answer to the statement. The answer is ‘no, Ireland is not “fighting a war against Britain”’. This could almost be in GQ, if it weren’t for the necessity to say unkind things! :wink:

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Pax, irishgirl and yojimbo, i’ve been to Ireland. Always kind and polite, i remember them.

I’m just wading through intellectual baggage on a couple subjects… I hadn’t realized until this thread what a slippery concept “neutrality” is, so even if owlstretching hasn’t given the opportunity to roast him/her, I got something out of it.

What I was also thinking of… anticipating a response while the SDBM server was doing god knows what … backups? … was that for the first year of the war the English did not understand how problematic the U-Boats would prove. (Their approach to defeating the submarines almost lost them the war.) So, at a guess, they weren’t conveying to the Irish how important a few airbases and ports would have been. Probably, no one realized in the beginning. What a communications f*** up.

As for Swiss and Swedish neutrality? Well. I only understand one side of the position. If there are folks from thereabouts who’d like to talk about it, I’d be interested. Otherwise… I guess I’ll just go on being ignorant about how neutral countries form their policies.

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The English?

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<Stand by your beds>
owl now posts in the thread linked to in this OP:

BTW partly_warmer, before you corrct yourself to say “Briish” you may also wish to recall other notable contributions at that point, particularly and for example, the Canadians.
<As you were>

20

truthstretchngtime claims not to be able to access this thread due to swearing. However, back in the original thread, in a response for a request for evidence, he’s posted this:

OK, may I summarise your assertions here:[ol][li]Irish terrorists have planted bombs in England.[]The Irish state gives them “support and succour”.[/ol]Am I right? If so, I refute your assertions quite easily, to whit:[ol][]Half of the Republican terrorists are from Northern Ireland. In fact, there are many terrorists in Northern Ireland of both persuasions - which is under UK jursidiction. By your assertion, these “someone elses” make the UK a “terrorist state” too…The Irish Police and Special Branch division track down terrorists, unearth arms caches and training camps all the time. This is hardly “harbouring”. While there are supporters of terrorism both sides of the border, those supporters are in the distinct minority.[/ol]You will note, Mr. Stretching, that I have refrained from insulting you thus far, preferring to give you the benefit of the doubt. However, I shall now call you an ignorant, bigoted fucking twatwhistle. [/li]
You ignorant, bigoted twat.

Ignorant: because you clearly don’t know what you’re talking about (you proved this both here in the Bloody Sunday thread).
Bigoted: because you are condemning a people and its government based on the actions of a small number of extremists. Kind of like the attitude of people who blow up shopping centres to get at the government.
Twat: see the above two points.

Before you accuse me of collusion, I must reinforce that I am English, from a British military family; I have absolutely no love for terrorists; I am not a Republican. But, unlike you, I know a little about the situation.