Should Irish Army WW2 Deserters (to join B.A.) be pardoned ?

Maoltuile wrote: »

Amusingly enough (or not), I saw one such letter-writer today telling how a would-be Jewish immigrant was sheltered from being deported to Belfast - now the question that went unasked, of course, is what this implied the UK's very own policy was at the time.

Actually, the letter writer made this explicitly clear:

However, it was not any benign Irish State policy that eventually saved her. Rather, what undoubtedly saved her life were the simple compassionate actions of two Irish State-employed people: one, an official who simply refused in the end to “obey his orders” to deport her out of the State by putting her on a train from Dublin to Belfast, from where she would have been dispatched back to Germany or Poland; and the other, a garda who subsequently sheltered and protected her within the safety of his family as one of his own.

But had Irish government policy been implemented as planned my mother would have had her life taken away from her . . .

I read that letter but missed the very good point you make. Irish state policy towards Jewish refugees at the time was appalling and inhumane, but I can't understand why this letter excoriates this state, while giving the UK a complete pass for the same policy.

Another professional soldier gives his view on this controversy in today's (04/02/12) "Irish Times":

Sir, – Two points must be addressed before dealing with the main question of desertion.

Neutrality was the only realistic policy for Ireland. In 1939 just Great Britain and France of all the countries in Europe went to war with Germany. Others became involved only after they were invaded or were coerced into joining the Axis powers. In the uncertain state of affairs it was necessary to maintain the Army at as full a strength as possible until the cessation of hostilities in Europe, not least because of Éamon de Valera’s guarantee, repeated more than once, that in no circumstances would Ireland be used as a base for hostile action against Great Britain.

Desertion is a grave offence. On attestation, a recruit takes an oath to serve his country, the full implications of this having been explained to him by the attesting officer. The punishment for desertion, following a guilty verdict by a court-martial, is imprisonment. The dismissive statement in your Editorial (January 26th) describing as “codology” the assertion that desertion is always wrong is not merely offensive: it is foolish. Deserters are not schoolboys playing truant. No crime, however lightly it may be punished, can be air-brushed away as if it never happened.

More alarming, however, is the statement of the Minister for Defence (Home News, January 25th). He said: “Some of those [ie, Irish who fought in British uniforms] included members of our Defence Forces who left this island that time to fight for freedom.”

Left this island when we were on a war footing, as if they were free to come and go at will! The Minister for Defence has a leading role in the upholding of the Defence Acts. Is this his view of desertion?

Given that this was said by the Minister, could one see it being advanced as a defence in a future court-martial trial for desertion?

His further statement that “. . . in the context of the Holocaust, Irish neutrality was a principle of moral bankruptcy” is quite appalling. Is he saying that at the time that the horrors were emerging in 1945 we should not have been neutral? If so, should we have been in the war from the outset; or should we have joined in at some later date?

How does he envisage that such involvement might have come about? Of course, this controversy would not have occurred if the 5,000, like the rest of the 45,450 men and women from the then 26 counties that departed to serve in Britain without hindrance from the Irish government, had gone straight into the British forces rather than join the Irish Army and then desert.

I can accept the granting of pardons if doing so brings comfort to elderly men in their declining years, but this must not involve the condoning of their desertion. – Yours, etc,

DONAL O’CARROLL,
Col (Retd)

gbee wrote: »

That gets my vote.

gizmo555 wrote: »

I read that letter but missed the very good point you make. Irish state policy towards Jewish refugees at the time was appalling and inhumane, but I can't understand why this letter excoriates this state, while giving the UK a complete pass for the same policy.

Cork was very proud of its jewish population and my grandfather was very friendly with his dentist who emigrated to Israel. Chaim Herzog was from Cork.

The state was very harsh on its own citizens during the Emergency and maybe this was the reality of the colonial era. Italy invaded Ethiopia & France had Morocco & Germany was pissed off having lost its empire.

The Western world had no problem subjugating other nations and peoples. It was the colonial & imperial way.

We were the little guys. The poorest in Europe. We were hardly very sophisticated with a shrinking population as countries in Europe were growing emigration continued at a huge rate until 1970.

That's a very important question . What did other nations do ???

To try to pin the horror's of the holocaust on the Irish is a huge jump.

CDfm wrote: »

Cork was very proud of its jewish population and my grandfather was very friendly with his dentist who emigrated to Israel. Chaim Herzog was from Cork.

The state was very harsh on its own citizens during the Emergency and maybe this was the reality of the colonial era. Italy invaded Ethiopia & France had Morocco & Germany was pissed off having lost its empire.

The Western world had no problem subjugating other nations and peoples. It was the colonial & imperial way.

We were the little guys. The poorest in Europe. We were hardly very sophisticated with a shrinking population as countries in Europe were growing emigration continued at a huge rate until 1970.

That's a very important question . What did other nations do ???

To try to pin the horror's of the holocaust on the Irish is a huge jump.

WHat about limericks jewish population? Oh yeah, the good catholic people of limerick chased them all out in 1904(with Papal Blessing).

gizmo555 wrote: »

Thanks - missed that yesterday. In fairness, it was the BBC and their cheerleaders in the "Irish Times" which had more questions to answer about balance than RTÉ.

Maybe I spoke too soon, with regard to the I.T. which provides some balance this morning, especially on how little is known about how many of these men actually went on to join Allied forces. Do we really want to establish a precedent of pardoning deserters from our army, but only if those concerned can prove they left to join another country's armed forces?

Wrong to assume all Irish deserters were Allied veterans

MICHAEL KENNEDY

OPINION: IN THE debate on granting pardons to second World War deserters from the Defence Forces, the question of where the men on de Valera’s deserters’ blacklist actually deserted to might seem an odd one to pose.

Perhaps this is because the answer has already been assumed: all those on the blacklist joined the Allied forces. Although the blacklist underpins the entire debate, little thought has been given to what the document itself tells us on this point.

The blacklist of 4,983 deserters has been called “Ireland’s list of shame”. It is seen as the nationally damning roll-call of those who deserted the Defence Forces, fought with the Allies to liberate Europe from Nazi tyranny and were subsequently disowned by de Valera, the man who signed Hitler’s book of condolences.

Could the Irish authorities compile such a list? They could not. They compiled a blacklist of personnel dismissed for desertion, being absent without leave from the Defence Forces for more than 180 days. The list gives Army number, name, last recorded address, date of birth, occupation and date of desertion.

The Irish authorities could not accurately say where these deserters had gone.

A 1945 Department of Defence cabinet memorandum suggested “that the majority of them are or have been serving in the British Forces or are in civilian employment in Great Britain and Northern Ireland”. It did not speculate further. It did not provide figures. It did not ask where the minority might have gone.

Many of the deserters were later decorated for valour by the Allies. One cannot ignore their sacrifice and achievement. That is not at issue here. Rather it is to suggest that 2012 interpretations of the deserters blacklist misread the evidence.

A similar situation existed almost 70 years ago. Then, as now, many claimed – as a 1945 department of external affairs memo noted – that the de Valera government aimed solely “to penalise men, not for desertion from the Irish Army, but for joining the British Forces”. In the view of external affairs, this attitude did not accept the seriousness of the offence of desertion.

Under Emergency Powers Order 362, returning deserters were subject to swingeing penalties, including being denied State jobs for seven years. It was attacked in the Dáil in 1945, but deputies agreed that desertion warranted harsh measures.

Fianna Fáil’s Harry Colley explained that the order showed deserters “that their duty was first to their own”. Labour Party deputy Jim Larkin jnr amplified the point: “Our own country claims our first duty.”

Today’s pro-pardon campaigners do not contest that the deserters committed a military crime. They argue instead that they were deprived of their right to due legal process.

This argument has elicited considerable sympathy. However, many expressions of sympathy are confusingly conflated with wider issues. It is not clear whether public distaste for the emergency powers order and the blacklist is based largely on the belief that the punishment for desertion was too harsh; or because of a belated desire to honour Allied veterans; or because of some national sense of shame over wartime neutrality.

All of these are legitimate subjects for debate. But the desertion debate should centre around the core issue: these men deserted the Irish Defence Forces. It should also centre around accurate facts.

It is clear that the belief, expressed both in 1945 and today, that many enlisted in the British forces, is correct. Yet all we have is a list of deserters and the knowledge that 100 or so of those named on that list definitely joined the Allied forces and are still alive. The remainder have not been accounted for.

Belligerent forces service and pension records and family histories can fill in some further details. But it is an error to transform an entire blacklist of Defence Forces deserters into an entire blacklist of Allied war veterans. We simply do not know why the men on this list deserted, where they deserted to or what they did subsequently.

Should those who deserted to take up civilian war work in Britain and Northern Ireland be seen as war heroes or economic migrants? Surprises of ultimate allegiance and intention may lie within the blacklist.

What hostages to fortune lie ahead if a universal pardon is given? Perhaps an opt-in approach to pardons, with the sole issue facing each applicant being their desertion from the Irish Defence Forces, would be a way forward.

Dr Michael Kennedy is executive editor of the Royal Irish Academy’s Documents on Irish Foreign Policy series. difp.ie, Twitter @DIFP_RIA

Manic Moran wrote: »

In that glimpse of the Minister of Defence at the very end of that broadcast, is it me, or did they have the tricolor in an inferior position to the UN flag? Is that the way it's supposed to be?

NTM

According to the Dept of the Taoiseach, you're right, the positions of the two flags should have been reversed:

Where either an even or an odd number of flags are flown in line on staffs of equal height, the National Flag should be first on the right of the line (i.e. on the observer’s left as he or she faces the flags).

Manic Moran wrote: »

So who wants to tell DFHQ?

Another protocol that's honoured more in the breach than the observance is the requirement that the flag only be flown in public between sunrise and sunset.

I recall a furore some years ago when someone in An Post decided as a cost saving measure not to bother taking the flag down in the evenings at weekends over the GPO, of all places.

Pat Kenny pointed out on his radio programme that one might expect better from an organisation whose then CEO held a commission in the FCA. I believe the decision was reversed . . .

Morlar wrote: »

It looks like Alan Shatter has given the quiet nod that he is going to pardon the deserters.

The online campaign (which used lies and distortions throughout) has now taken down it's internet petition :

http://www.forthesakeofexample.com/

Have the Defense Forces organizations commented ?

Have the news papers been asked ?