THE TREATY - 100 YEARS ON
RECASTING THE
CONQUEST BY MÍCHEÁL Mac DONNCHA
Recast (verb)
If you recast something, you change it by organising it in a different way.
(COLLINS DICTIONARY)
James Connolly called for the reconquest of Ireland by the Irish people. A mighty effort was made to achieve political reconquest between 1916 and 1921 but, 100 years ago, the British government, through a combination of force and fraud, managed to maintain its grip on Ireland and to recast the conquest. In Ireland today, the debate on the Treaty of 1921 focuses primarily on the Irish protagonists, with relatively little attention paid to the British government side. The perpetual De Valera versus Collins argument predominates. This obscures the fundamental issues involved – Irish Republic versus British Empire, Irish Unity versus Partition, and the cohesion of a political movement versus the personalities and prestige of leaders. And underlying all were economic forces exercising a decisive influence. The global context needs to be addressed. Britain had emerged victorious from the First World War, but at enormous cost in human life and finances. She was still at the head of her Empire; indeed, she had gained more territory. But subject peoples in India and Egypt and elsewhere were beginning to rise up against British rule. In Britain itself the labour movement was growing and becoming more militant and many looked to the Bolshevik victory in Russia for inspiration. At the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, the British and French sealed their victory. The United States by its entry to the war on their side in 1917 had saved them from defeat by Germany and US President Woodrow Wilson came to Paris in a blaze of glory with his rhetoric of democracy and self-determination for nations. The British and French adopted the rhetoric too - so long as the nations in question were not those subject to their empires. The map of Europe was redrawn with the
THE TREATY – SOME KEY QUOTES
“I … do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I do not and shall not yield a voluntary support to any pretended Government, authority or power within Ireland hostile and inimical thereto, and I further swear (or affirm) that to the best of my knowledge and ability I will support and defend the Irish Republic and the 42
Government of the Irish Republic, which is Dáil Éireann, against all enemies, foreign and domestic, and I will bear true allegiance to the same, and that I take this obligation freely and without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, so help me God.” – Oath taken by all TDs and IRA Volunteers 1919-1921. ISSUE NUMBER 4 – 2021 - UIMHIR EISIÚNA 4 anphoblacht
