“Will Freedom
Movements Spark Ireland?”
By Seán Rielley
2/28/11, Kansas City, Missouri
As St. Patrick’s Day
approaches again, I have mixed emotions. As a Catholic
Christian I venerate Patrick and all of the Irish saints,
whose beautiful contributions to Christianity make for great
reading. I was raised in a staunchly Irish family, my
grandmother straight from County Cork. A passion for Ireland
was passed on to me. I am all for having fun during the
“season”, but I feel there is something much deeper about
being Irish than green beer and Celtic-inspired rock music.
A big part of that deeper connection to Ireland for me is
the general feeling I have always had that Ireland should be
united and free; that England needs to get out. As Middle
Eastern nations erupt in populist uprisings to political
tyranny, I envision this as a perfect time for the Irish to
protest en masse for freedom. But as the newly built British
MI5 superbase outside of Belfast stands imposingly over
Ireland without public outcry, I am left to wonder if
England has finally accomplished the goal of pacifying the
Irish nation.
Tom Williams, the 18-year
old Irish Republican hung by the British authorities in
1942, wrote to his comrades, “Well may England quake,
Ireland’s awake, Ireland’s awake”. The young man knew Irish
history well, for he was repeating a battle cry that goes
back to the 1798 Rising, and probably further than that.
Today though, I think the Irish people have been lulled to
sleep, and Irish-Americans have as well. The Good Friday
Agreement and the political process that followed have
resulted in a great decrease in the violence in the North of
Ireland. This peace is a wonderful development, and a
fragile reality. But we must recall the history of the
Anglo-Irish conflict. The old saying, “Those who do not know
history’s mistakes are doomed to repeat them”, applies here.
A big reason why peace is fragile is because of the nature
of the “Northern Ireland” statelet. The late all-Ireland
Catholic primate, Tomás Cardinal Ó Fiaich,
told Margaret Thatcher that the Northern Ireland state was a
lie from the beginning. He was speaking to the colonial
reality of the British imposed division of Ireland, which
has also divided Catholics and Protestants in the occupied
six counties. I am a recent college graduate and have
studied Irish history on my own for over a decade. I agree
with Ó Fiaich’s analysis that England’s foreign occupation
is the root cause of centuries of war in Ireland. I am
convinced that any reasonable person who studies the history
of British imperialism in Ireland, through eight centuries
of oppression, starvation, and conflict, will come to the
same conclusion.
If we agree that England’s
colonial rule is the root cause of the conflict, then why
are the Irish people, and Irish-America for that matter,
sold a bill of goods that the Good Friday Agreement is the
final political settlement of the Anglo-Irish conflict?
History shows that successive British governments have tried
to settle the “Irish problem” with acts of parliament that
merely copper-fastened foreign dominion. For me, the
Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921 is the best example of dubious
British statecraft. The Irish people had fought the British
government and military to a standstill, and yet even
leaders such as Michael Collins accepted a treaty that
allowed six northern counties to remain under British rule.
Collins held that the treaty was a “stepping-stone” to a
32-county sovereign Republic, but republicans of that day
knew better. Flash forward ninety years, and it is clear to
see that the 1921 Treaty, far from being a final settlement
of the Anglo-Irish conflict, is actually the source of
decades of war and tragedy. The problem then was that the
Treaty was merely a restatement of the British Government of
Ireland Act of 1920,
which illegally divided the Irish nation for England’s
colonial gain. Some people today argue that the Good Friday
Agreement of 1998 is the same British restatement,
copper-fastening partition and re-packaging foreign
occupation. Even Gerry Adams, the famed Irish republican
leader who led the bulk of the republican movement to
accept the agreement, still insists that Britain’s false
claim to sovereignty over six of Ireland’s counties is the
root cause of conflict and the biggest obstacle to peace.
When I bring up the
occupied six counties talking point, many people say, “Well,
things have really calmed down in Northern Ireland, haven’t
they?” I point out to them my conclusion that England’s
occupation is still the biggest obstacle to peace, and I
also point out that England has no intention of leaving.
Gerry Adams has called for reunification of Ireland by 2016,
and while I love the optimism, I wonder if this is wishful
thinking. Let’s look at the facts that have not changed in
the north. The wound of partition remains and continues to
divide the Irish nation and its people. “Peace walls” still
divide Catholics and Protestants in Belfast, continued
symptoms of the inherent sectarianism of the statelet. The
bulk of the republican movement has decommissioned its
weapons, but England has not. Her guns are still aimed at
Ireland, as thousands of British troops are still stationed
in the occupied counties, with an infinite amount that
remain on standby in England, readily accessible via
helicopter. The British have always used Irish territory for
military purposes, whether as defense against the threat of
Spanish, French, German, or Soviet invasion, or for military
training against a recalcitrant native population. As Fr.
Seán McManus of the Irish National Caucus has noted, members
of Britain’s undercover military units, responsible for
colluding with loyalist murder gangs for decades in the
north, are now employed in Iraq, to cause harm there.
In fact, some of those units have made their appearance
again on Irish streets. Furthermore, even though the vast
majority of Irish (and Americans) do not condone a
continuation of violence, the fact that there are still
Irishmen and women in prisons, north and south, for their
resistance to British rule, makes me very uncomfortable,
especially since they have been close to the brink of
prolonged hunger-strike recently. We must be concerned also
for cases of innocents incarcerated, so prevalent in decades
past. This highlights the need for an independent
all-Ireland judiciary system. As further proof that the
British are trying to normalize their occupation, my cousin
in Ireland told me that the British are actively promoting
English soccer as a way to normalize foreign rule. I was
shocked at how many English soccer jerseys I saw Irish kids
wearing. Even worse was the 2006 England-Ireland Rugby match
played in the Gaelic Athletic Association’s Croke Park
stadium. This was the first time the GAA held an England vs.
Ireland sporting event, as it has always been considered
unjust while England continues to occupy part of the
country. The Union Jack was hoisted and “God Save the Queen”
was played.
For centuries up to 1922,
Dublin Castle was the incastellation of British rule in
Ireland; the eyes and ears of foreign oppression. The new
British MI5 superbase outside Belfast now serves that role.
Finished in 2007 at the cost of £100 million, (roughly $161
million) the base in Holywood, Co. Down even has a deep
subterranean level, making it the backup headquarters for
England’s Secret Service in London. Fr. Joe McVeigh, a
priest active in the north, has described the new superbase
as an obvious example of England’s entrenchment in Ireland,
politically and militarily. For decades, human rights
organizations, nationalists/republicans and religious
leaders have denounced the collusion between the British
intelligence apparatus and loyalist murder squads for
killing nationalists and random Catholics. In 2006, the
Dublin government concluded that this collusion was indeed
widespread. But where was the condemnation from the Dublin
government over the new British intelligence fortress? The
silence is deafening there, but we must not be duped by
England’s posturing of neutrality in Ireland. Instead of
being a neutral arbitrator, an image that the British have
worked carefully to portray through the media in Ireland and
in America, England has been and continues to be the
colonial aggressor.
The big question then is
what can be done in Ireland, and in America, to make the
final push for Irish national self-determination? I have a
great admiration for the Irishmen and women who have fought,
and often died, facing the British militarily, even during
the recent “Troubles” period. While I admire the sacrifices
of many young and women, I am aware that many atrocities
were committed in the name of Irish freedom, and over a
thousand lives were taken in that effort, including many
uninvolved civilians. Terrorism, specifically, can never be
justified, no matter the cause.
After watching the events in Egypt unfold on the news, I am
convinced that mass peaceful demonstration can do more for
freedom’s cause than the gun and bomb can ever do. There has
not been this kind of involvement of the masses for
Ireland’s cause since the 1981 hunger-strike days, but the
time is now for that kind of movement. If the youth of Egypt
can organize spontaneously through internet social
networking, the Irish can as well. And getting back to us in
the States, it has often been said by Irish republicans that
Irish-America holds the key to a united Ireland, especially
since our nation’s closest ally is England. The message is
simple. We want England to make a public declaration of its
intent to withdraw from Ireland. On an international level,
we can support the efforts of Irish groups to petition the
United Nations on the illegality of Britain’s occupation.
Locally, we can march in “England get out of Ireland”
marches on St. Pat’s Day, and distribute buttons that
proclaim the same message. (Those buttons are easy to make
on the computer. I just used Microsoft Word to create
oval-shaped graphics, fit them to the size of large lapel
buttons from a local crafts store, print and cut). We can
also get the message out through bumper stickers, which can
be found online, and by contacting our congressmen and
women. Finally we can promote Irish culture through
patriotic music and Gaelic sports. I recently saw Derek
Warfield and the Young Wolfetones in town, and I hope they
are not a dying breed.
All of these efforts mentioned
can help the Irish defend their nation against Anglicization
and foreign rule. Prayer and fasting are also time-tested
Christian expressions of solidarity, in the hope that peace,
justice, and freedom will finally come to Ireland.