John Toland (1670-1722). Father of Irish Republicanism.
Some wars seem more intrinsically justified than others - obliterating Hitler for instance, the American colonists war with George III, Lincoln's fight against the South; powerful arguments can be arrayed in support of all these conflicts which I, knowing what I know now, would gladly take up arms had I been alive then to fight them. Others, more proximate in time are less conclusive. You could argue that long-time Washington ally Saddam received mixed signals and simply assumed he'd the 'go-ahead'. Either way, was re-installing an unelected Kuwaiti dictatorship the optimum outcome? Among other things WWI divided the old Ottoman Middle East among the Entente powers creating the Seven Sisters oil monopoly in the process, amidst much native resentment; hence the toppling of Mossadeq and the Iranian Revolution. The "Great War" was an avoidable tragedy; its roots lay in imperial rivalries and colonial greed underwritten by a racial ideology of white supremacy which destabilised the 'balance of powers' as a resentful Germany militarised and sought naval parity with Britain; the proud 'master of the seas'.
With regard to the question of the Anglo-Irish Treaty; yes, it was different from Home Rule, and by some margin. It meant the Free State was a de facto fully autonomous nation separated utterly from the UK and the Empire; it could take its seat in the League of Nations and vote according to its conscience and interests and not be bedded down by the dictates of Westminster. It meant it actually had a foreign policy, control of its currency, its trade tariffs, internal taxation and revenue streams and could dissolve the office of Governor-General and in time, abolish the much-loathed oath of allegiance and declare a Republic. Home Rule was a desultory terminus to almost a century of nationalist campaigning (if we accept O' Connell's Repeal movement as it beginning) circumscribing, perhaps indefinitely the boundaries of the 'march of the nation' (Parnell) and was sufficiently unsatisfactory to guarantee the perpetuation of agitation (both physical and political) for generations to come. As Collins observed, with the Treaty we would be at last 'rid of them', with the Civil War splintering largely on the axis of this "truth".
The Civil War emerged from a collapse in strong leadership; more De Valera's than anyone else and the fall-out and fault-lines were indeed avoidable and tragic - but this does not nullify the gains secured from the War of Independence and few Irish hailing from a Treaty or anti-Treaty position would argue otherwise today. Partition too was already inscribed in future statute books on foot of Carson's agitation and that line was drawn long before the IRB and Volunteers ever decided to take the GPO. So yes, to my mind, it was justified.
In fact, there's few things on earth that gladden me more than knowing I'm born into a country that has a document such as the Easter Proclamation as its foundational bedrock; or to reflect on the minds of the men who conceived it. This is a personal thing & I could care less for arguing the toss about it. An Ulsterman's heart will beat proud at the thought of Carson and that is his personal thing too - and he is entitled to it. People haven't the slightest conception of what sacrifice means today, I don't mean individually, but just generally, all around us, but that's okay, because we were never taught otherwise. We were never taught to think of Washington laying down his arms like the good Cincinnatus or of what was in the heart of Nelson as he bade farewell and merely said; "Thank God I done my duty". We are utterly divorced from these things, so much so we may as well hail from another planet. British rule in Ireland deserved, and got, a bloody severing, and so much bloodier the better. This is not a question of glorifying dead martyrs or playing pied-piper to some prismatic nationalism. It's a question of self-respect, and you either feel it, or you don't. Simple.
Some have criticised the conservative, almost stultifying influence of the Catholic Church and the culture of republican militarism which the revolutionary years arguably spawned but the fact that Fianna Fáil could come into power at all and be democratically elected in the 30's was an achievement in itself (global depression, blue-shirt unrest, IRA split) when you consider all Europe was collapsing into fascist dictatorship. The usual formula in such instances is to declare a state of emergency, cue indefinite martial law before having a 'caretaker' army government leech off the populace for a decade or two. God knows, there were no shortage of pretexts at the time to do so. We tend to think readily of the divisive elements but what of the forces that held the whole together?? The peaceful transition to power of the anti-Treaty side was a revelation to previously sceptical international observers.
To take the wider view, European society from about 1850 onwards (if we can handily jettison post-Reformation and Enlightenment based fissures for the moment) was engaged in assimilating four Fates, or genies, which had "escaped" and demanded containment by the "powers that be", i.e. liberalism, democracy, nationalism & socialism; affecting an internal pressure on the aristo-monarchical, capitalist, pan-European order complicated by the outward expansion of Empire which drew the rest of the globe into a "free trade" zone, with 'civilizing' and 'Christianising' pretensions a key justifying dynamic. Thus the fifth Fate, anti-colonialism.
The tensions herein exploded at their summit, thus precipitating the Great War and, the dust settled somewhat, the great ideological debates after WWII polarised on two inter-related pivots; free market capitalism vs. sundry variants of (now largely discredited) communism and nationalist, anti-colonialism vs. exploitative neo-imperialism.
The resultant "traffic" of ideas criss-crossing the axes of the Cold War created a "depth" of human discourse perhaps unseen since the days of the French Revolution or the aftermath of the Treaty of Versailles, hence the very real impression we have nowadays (post-Glasnost, post Reaganomics) of drinking from very shallow waters indeed; but the perceived absence of "Great Issues" is a dangerous illusion as we can clearly see from what's happening in the Middle East, Human Development Indices, "peak oil" concerns, climate change, resource constraints of all kinds (grain, water, oil etc.) & all overseen by an outmoded & fractured UN Security Council all pursuing their own interests (China & Russia generally vetoing US, GB & France (and vice versa).
This is broadly how I see things being "wired up", both in the past, in the period under question, and presently i.e. there is and always has been an unacceptable misallocation of power, rights and resources. The Easter Rising and the subsequent revolution to my mind played a very small role in reversing the trend of some of these imbalances ... it was anti-colonial, democratic & nationalist.
3 out of 5 ain't bad, as Meat Loaf might say.
No comments:
Post a Comment