Should Ireland have joined Allies in WW2

Morlar

Hookey wrote: »

DeV was probably betting on another Versailles,

I think De Valera was not motivated by economics in deciding whether or not to send more of our youth off to die fighting for the only country who had shown violence towards us. By fighting against one of the only countries who had stood allied with us when we were under occupation (Germany).

Hookey wrote: »

If any politician of any stripe had known what the Americans would ultimately do, they would have been stupid not to join the allies.

We can agree to disagree on that. I do not think we should ever go to war against countries that have not declared war against us on the basis of the potential economic benefits from a third party.

MarchDub

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Also curious as to how it was an imperialist war as well. Are you implying that Britain and France (who you seem to conveniently ignore) were only interested in gaining territory from Germany?

Not at all sure about what you are referring too - what do you mean "ignore"? I have stated a number of times on this forum what my position is. The British and French did not want any rivals to their imperialist interests. Of course they ended up with the Soviets - one of the allies - as the biggest threat of all. Not to mention a far more powerful USA and their own empires gone. So...not a good end after all from the British and French point of view.

Fratton Fred wrote: »

Just another question as well, if the death camps were known about in 1939, then surely this vindicates Britain's stance and damns Ireland's and in particular DeVelera for sending a message of condolence to the Germans.

This is the tragedy from the Jewish point of view. The war had nothing to do with the Holocaust - the allies were not interested in this and there is no mention of the death camps in any documents pertaining to the reasons for war. I don't think anyone has documented when exactly it became known to the Allies but the point I was making is that the Jews knew fairly early on but were not listened to.

The Death Camps were starting to rive up by the start of the war but the Jewish voices in Europe were ignored. It was 1941 when the appalling killing reached huge numbers. In fact, Hitler USED the war as a cover to get the massacre going. He said so himself when he used the example of the Armenian genocide of WWI as an example of how - under cover of war- a people can be exterminated and "no one remembers".

As for Jewish refugees - no county's record looks good on this issue:

The Simon Wiesenthal Center (SWC) - named after a death camp survivor who became a Nazi-hunter - says the Allies failed to take practical steps that could have helped many of Hitler's victims.
Lessons of the past
The SWC says the UK and the US could have relaxed stringent immigration policies to allow refugees a safe haven, and sent frequent and unequivocal warnings to Germany that its leaders would be held accountable.

brianthebard

ejmaztec wrote: »

All of the reasons for Ireland's neutrality didn't stop over 100,000 Irishmen joining the British forces in their fight against the Nazis, not to mention God knows how many more went to the UK to their bit in the essential industries. The depth of ill-feeling towards the British and Churchill can't have been that great, given the number of volunteers involved.

http://news.scotsman.com/breaking-news/Full-scale-of-Irish-WWII.5360587.jp

Had Ireland not had De Valera as its leader, I think that it would have sided with the allies, and would have received whatever it needed in the way of equipment.

100,000 is a pretty small minority in a population of about 3.5 million don't you think? If there had been a referendum on whether to join the war for instance, those 100,000 votes would not have been anywhere near the majority.

MarchDub

removed because it was a duplicate

MarchDub

Hookey wrote: »

Post WWII reconstruction was nothing like post-WWI though; that's my point; DeV was probably betting on another Versailles, or something even worse like the Morgenthau plan, whereas the Marshall Plan was radically different from anything that had gone before. If any politician of any stripe had known what the Americans would ultimately do, they would have been stupid not to join the allies.

Ireland WAS included in the Marshall Plan - ERP "European Recovery Program" is its real name. The Americans decided to include Ireland in spite of the fact that we did not participate in the war. Interestingly, economists say that Ireland's economy was amongst the strongest in Europe at the time - of course Europe was devastated - and why the US decided to include Ireland in this largess is much discussed. We were for one thing, still in the sterling area.

So no war - but the benefits of the Marshall Plan. Good deal?

getz

the UK took all the refugees in that it could, just before the war many large jewish camps had been set up for jewish refugees,after the war the UK was in a mess it couldent even feed it own people, i was born in 1940 we were all on food stamps,i was eight years old before i got my first orange,raw cocoa was handed out to children at school to eat out of newspapers,most of us had never even met our fathers untill 1946,some would never ever see them.so it should have been up to the less effected countrys to take the refugees in ,many would not step up to the mark,

ejmaztec

brianthebard wrote: »

100,000 is a pretty small minority in a population of about 3.5 million don't you think? If there had been a referendum on whether to join the war for instance, those 100,000 votes would not have been anywhere near the majority.

When one considers the size of the Irish Defence Force at the time, the number is significant enough.

Morlar

ejmaztec wrote: »

When one considers the size of the Irish Defence Force at the time, the number is significant enough.

That number is 10x the current Irish defence forces number going by this official site ;

http://military.ie/dfhq/pubrel/faq.htm#5

So in the context of Ireland it is a very significant number. Per head of population I would imagine it rivals those levels of countries officially in the war. As a percentage of population 100,000 out of 3.5,000,000 probably more Irish per head of population fought in WWII than americans (per head of population).

*I just checked and USA population in 1940 was approx 135 Million (I had presumed it was reasonably similair to the 300 million population of today)

MarchDub

ejmaztec wrote: »

When one considers the size of the Irish Defence Force at the time, the number is significant enough.

Just like WWI the number of Irish reflects a broader story that the raw figures suggest.

Numbers alone do not always reveal a simple equation. A huge proportion of the number includes conscripted Irishmen who were living and working in England at the time. My uncles - young men in their early 20s - were living in England at the time and avoided conscription because of the work they were doing - but other Irishmen like them were conscripted into the British armed forces because they were resident in the UK.

To suggest that these were all willing "volunteers" in a statistical mistake.

getz

MarchDub wrote: »

Just like WWI the number of Irish reflects a broader story that the raw figures suggest.

Numbers alone do not always reveal a simple equation. A huge proportion of the number includes conscripted Irishmen who were living and working in England at the time. My uncles - young men in their early 20s - were living in England at the time and avoided conscription because of the work they were doing - but other Irishmen like them were conscripted into the British armed forces because they were resident in the UK.

To suggest that these were all willing "volunteers" in a statistical mistake.

any irishman born in the republic who was conscripted during WW11,joined the army because either they had a family in the UK or the felt they needed to fight for their new country.as a republican born citizen they could of hopped out of service.NO PERSON BORN IN THE REPUBLIC WAS CONSCRIPTED AGAINT THEIR WILL.the irish republic was a neutral country and so was their citizens

Morlar

Irish people living in the UK were liable to be conscripted (unless they were in a reserved occupation) - though Ulster was exempted.

MarchDub

getz wrote: »

any irishman born in the republic who was conscripted during WW11,joined the army because either they had a family in the UK or the felt they needed to fight for their new country.as a republican born citizen they could of hopped out of service.NO PERSON BORN IN THE REPUBLIC WAS CONSCRIPTED AGAINT THEIR WILL.the irish republic was a neutral country and so was their citizens

Getz - Would you please read over what I wrote, if you can. I said Irish born who were RESIDENT IN UK.

There were many Irish born who lived and worked in England and they were open to conscription because of their UK resident status. I personally know of two that this happened to - Irish working AND RESIDENT in England when the war broke out and then were conscripted.

The same thing applied to Irish in the US during the Vietnam era. Many who got green cards found themselves in Nam within a short while of arriving in the US.

IrelandSpirit

Yep, and WW2 is portrayed as the 'good fight' against evil, while Ireland's neutrality is generally viewed on the same lines as the current so-called war on terror, 'you're either with us or against us' - but WW2 was not the heroic enterprise we're spoon-fed by mainstream history; The Morgenthau Plan and other acts of deliberate genocide - the firebombing of Dresden, the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - clearly demonstrates the fact.

There is little to be proud of in WW2 - all sides committed atrocities, and ultimately, who proffits? Perhaps it served to further the economic interests of the banking industry, but certainly not the common people of Europe, or anywhere, and i can't see anything to suggest it would have been any different here.

I agree, 'the vast majority of politicians would sell their own mothers for more power and more money.' Well they'd certainly sell us!

Better off well-out of that one, i reckon.

toiletduck

brianthebard wrote: »

100,000 is a pretty small minority in a population of about 3.5 million don't you think? If there had been a referendum on whether to join the war for instance, those 100,000 votes would not have been anywhere near the majority.

Would it not be better again to compare the 100,000 figure against that of men of service age (17-40?) rather than the whole population?

getz

MarchDub wrote: »

Getz - Would you please read over what I wrote, if you can. I said Irish born who were RESIDENT IN UK.

There were many Irish born who lived and worked in England and they were open to conscription because of their UK resident status. I personally know of two that this happened to - Irish working AND RESIDENT in England when the war broke out and then were conscripted.

The same thing applied to Irish in the US during the Vietnam era. Many who got green cards found themselves in Nam within a short while of arriving in the US.

playing with words,-- goverment web sites, during WW11, mandatory conscriptions only for male BRITISH citizens 18years + so if a irish lad from the republic living in the UK was concripted he would have to have been classed as a british citizen

ejmaztec

Had I been so vehemently opposed to helping Britain in a war, I would have put on my water-wings and headed across the Irish sea, or chanced it by becoming a Quaker and declaring myself a conscientious objector.

Morlar

getz wrote: »

playing with words,-- goverment web sites, during WW11, mandatory conscriptions only for male BRITISH citizens 18years + so if a irish lad from the republic living in the UK was concripted he would have to have been classed as a british citizen

The point is that Irish people living in the UK (excepting Ulster) were conscripted during WWII. The fact that an Irish person who lived in the UK for 2 years or more was deemed a british citizen for the purposes of conscription is neither here nor there. They were still Irish men living in the UK who were conscripted into the british army.

Morlar

ejmaztec wrote: »

Had I been so vehemently opposed to helping Britain in a war, I would have put on my water-wings and headed across the Irish sea, or chanced it by becoming a Quaker and declaring myself a conscientious objector.

Jersey was another option

ejmaztec

Morlar wrote: »

Jersey was another option

No, water wings are better. Jerseys weigh you down.:D

brianthebard

ejmaztec wrote: »

When one considers the size of the Irish Defence Force at the time, the number is significant enough.

With respect all that proves is that Ireland had a small army, another reason to stay out of the war.

toiletduck wrote: »

Would it not be better again to compare the 100,000 figure against that of men of service age (17-40?) rather than the whole population?

My point is that we can assume that 100,000 who enlisted approved of the war, but this is still a tiny proportion of the population and gives no indication of their social status, economic needs, etc. I'm not sure but I imagine that emigration was stopped or significantly slowed during WWII, as it had been in WWI, which would in itself provide a stimulus to join the British army. I don't think we can assume that if there had been a vote to join the war or not, that much more than 100,000 would've been in favour. Even doubling or tripling the number for the sake of what if's still means a very small minority.

Fratton Fred

there is a memorial in my local church to men of the parish who died in both world wars. the WWII section has about 8 names on it, all bar two were in the RN.

I wonder if there were a number of Irishmen in the RN because of the treaty ports and the convenience.

Just an idea.

Morlar

Fratton Fred wrote: »

there is a memorial in my local church to men of the parish who died in both world wars. the WWII section has about 8 names on it, all bar two were in the RN.

I wonder if there were a number of Irishmen in the RN because of the treaty ports and the convenience.

Just an idea.

There are a lot of churches around Ireland with discreet plaques commemorating Irishmen who died in the world wars. I came across a site recently where someone had catalogued them extensively but dont have the link at the moment.

I would not have thought there was a particular preference for the royal navy above other branches so that could just be a co-incidence though I could be wrong.

ejmaztec

brianthebard wrote: »

With respect all that proves is that Ireland had a small army, another reason to stay out of the war.

It's more logical to compare the 100,000 with the size of the IDF, than to compare the 100,000 with the entire population, most of whom were either too young, or too old to fight, given the emigration levels.

Only one of my uncles was old enough, but fortunately for him, he was a sergeant based at the Curragh, ironically enough guarding British and German internees, or should I say escorting them to the local pub.

In times of war, standing armies are enlarged for those countries on a war footing.

MarchDub

IrelandSpirit wrote: »

Yep, and WW2 is portrayed as the 'good fight' against evil, while Ireland's neutrality is generally viewed on the same lines as the current so-called war on terror, 'you're either with us or against us' - but WW2 was not the heroic enterprise we're spoon-fed by mainstream history; The Morgenthau Plan and other acts of deliberate genocide - the firebombing of Dresden, the nuclear bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki - clearly demonstrates the fact.

There is little to be proud of in WW2 - all sides committed atrocities, and ultimately, who proffits? Perhaps it served to further the economic interests of the banking industry, but certainly not the common people of Europe, or anywhere, and i can't see anything to suggest it would have been any different here.

I agree, 'the vast majority of politicians would sell their own mothers for more power and more money.' Well they'd certainly sell us!

Better off well-out of that one, i reckon.

Yes, well said - as usual it was the banks who came out of it on top and the working classes who shed the blood.

arnhem44

I would have to say no to this,Ireland had provided thousands of men only twenty + years before hand,a lot of these returning home got a poor reception due to the civil unrest already in place,some of these soldiers felt they had been stabbed in the back by the treatment of the army they were serving in for what happened during 1916.The figure of 100,000 shouldn't be used as an exact figure,a huge porportion of these men were already serving in the British army as had been the case of Irish men for decades before hand,employment into the British army had always been the main incintive to join up.Its always been understood that Ireland remained neuteral during the war,thats true for most of it,they interned any Germans who landed here or made it to land from the sea however for any British or American service men they were sent across the border to the north and any aircraft that was recoverable were handed over to the appropriate authorities,when you look at these things that are happening you'd wonder were we helping them from the start.

ChocolateSauce

I think no. Primarily and above all else, we wouldn't have made a difference, and also importantly every Irish person who felt it was a just war and who wanted to fight in it was more than welcome to join the British army (and tens of thousands did). By joining the vastly more effective British army, each Irish man contributed more than he would have in a seperate, Irish army.

Bragadin

I have a english translation of a german document which evaluated britains geography, peoples, infrastructure and industry for the purposes of invasion and occupation.

One thing in particular kind of struck me, and that was the small section on race. They refered to the people of the east of england as 'bright and beautifull' while the people in the south west and wales were 'short and dark'. Maybe an a anlysis based more on the assumptions of distinct 'saxon' and 'cletic' areas and not a very detailed (by nazi standards) evaluation of race. But there is still something chilling about this clear differntiation they made. It seems that if they ever invaded ireland they would have conjured reasons to brand us as less then human. I'd say we had much to gain from an allied victory.

Morlar

Bragadin wrote: »

It seems that if they ever invaded ireland they would have conjured reasons to brand us as less then human.

With respect that seems like pure conjecture to me. They also invaded and occupied France and did not treat the Bretons, gauls etc any differently than other french people in practice (despite the apparent differentiation mentioned in your lone document) . The people they took issue with racially were jews, roma gypsies, and russian/slav's, there was no actual evidence they viewed any other western european races as inferior. In the western european countries they invaded and occuppied they recruited heavily, even into the ss.

Out of curiosity could I ask about the document ? Is that an official document/copy ? Published when & authored by whom etc ? Was it a policy document in any way ? In any organisation that size you will find conflicting documentation as not every single person was on the exact same page, the ones setting policy (as outlined above in the western european examples) seem to have taken a different approach.

Of course this is all assuming they intended to invade and occupy Ireland which is not proven. They would have had contingency plans on paper but a realistic intention to do it is a seperate thing. They never invaded Spain, or Switzerland etc. They went after Norway as Britain had already sent an invasion force enroute. An even more realistic threat of invasion of Ireland came from Britain (churchill of course confirmed this I believe in his VE Speech which triggered a reply from De Valera).

Bragadin

Morlar wrote: »

With respect that seems like pure conjecture to me. They also invaded and occupied France and did not treat the Bretons, gauls etc any differently than other french people. The people they took issue with racially were jews, roma gypsies, and russian/slav's, there was no actual evidence they viewed any other western european races as inferior. In the western european countries they invaded and occuppied they recruited heavily, even into the ss.

Oh it i could well be conjecture, i understand that. It certianly is based on very little evidence. Also thats a good point with regards to france. I always wondered what they would make of irish people. They may have confined most their descrimination to eastern european ethnic groups, but the similarities between jews, gypsies and slavs are vast and just reading that document made me wonder.

Edit:Just saw your edit. It was a small bound copy sold in the imperial war museum, i just bought it as souvineer but just that section struck my interest.

Here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/German-Invasion-Plans-British-Isles/dp/1851243569

Also you're right there was no definitive proof that the germans intended to invade ireland, it was just a consideration as a possible approach to britain.

Morlar

Bragadin wrote: »

Here: http://www.amazon.co.uk/German-Invasion-Plans-British-Isles/dp/1851243569

Also your right there was no definitive proof that the germans intended to invade ireland, it was just a consideration as a possible approach to britain.

Thanks for that - it looks like an interesting document. Reading the description one part stood out :

Prior to the invasion, a complex set of documents had been drawn up, consisting of maps, aerial photographs, a physical description of the British Isles - region by region, statistics about roads, lists of strategic targets, and a short phrase book for the invading forces when it became necessary to fraternize with the local populace.This book brings together a selection of these documents and reproduces them in a handy-sized format.

I can just picture a bunch of german paratroopers lined up to go, practicing their cockney slang in german accents - 'A-wite Gavnor' & their 'Ow's ya father's.