I felt like anything rather than rejoicing at
the downfall of a foe who had fought so long and valiantly, and had suffered so
much for a cause, though that cause was, I believe, one of the worst for which
a people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse.
 |
| Where's me bloomin' medal? |
Ulysses S. Grant, Thoughts Upon Accepting the
Surrender of the Confederacy
I never expected to be revisiting U.S. Grant’s
reminiscences on Appomattox when the new decade dawned, but thanks to a
completely inexplicable act on the part of the Irish government – here I am. In
fact, I’ve had a couple of occasions to be reminded of Grant in the last few
years, and Fine Gael’s ham-handed approach to the question of how to begin the
“celebration” of the centenary of Ireland’s War of Independence is just another
reminder of how the confusion of the individual with the institution is bound
to lead to trouble.
A brief reminder of the history behind this
most recent contretemps is in order. In 2016 Ireland celebrated the 100-year
anniversary of the uprising that is most often cited as the start of the
process that would eventually lead to Irish independence during the
1920’s. That centenary, however, was the celebration of a rather crushing
defeat. The Republic that was declared on Easter weekend of 1916 lasted but a
few days before the British war machine, then in the fullness of its WWI
related might, snuffed it out entirely, executed most of its leaders, marched
the others off to prison and resumed what it believed to be normalcy for
Ireland. “Normalcy” evidently was supposed to mean that the Irish would
go back to hating the British, particularly the English, but would do so
quietly, like German soccer fans do today, or, you, know – like Scotland. As we
shall see, this did not happen.
On the other hand the 2016 centenary
celebration went off splendidly. There were fireworks, and parades and speeches
and examples of great Irish food and drink (which meant halls full of beer and
whiskey and a food stand with, I don’t know, mussels or something). Everyone
had a great time, and – here’s the part that would come back to haunt Leo
Varadkar – everyone remembered to mention that during 1916 there was a war
going on and that plenty of Irish were serving in the British forces - so you
had to remember those folks as well. Other than a few muted voices on the
Sinn Fein side of the aisle – no one objected to that being said.
Fast forward to 2020. We are now on to
the celebration of a new centenary, one that is very, very different from that which
was celebrated in 2016. The Easter Rising was nasty, brutish and short.
It was also something that played out, in the words of those who fought and
observed it, as a “grand gesture”, an “act of martyrdom”. “Winning” was
secondary.
“Grandness” aside, 1916 was certainly a
gesture. What started in 1919-1920 was quite different. It was a damn war.
How best to describe this? In 1916 the leaders
of the rebellion wanted to “show” the British – show them they were serious,
show them things weren’t going to be the same, show them that Ireland couldn’t
be taken for granted. When, following a number of political developments,
the rebellion re-started in 1919, the point was no longer to just “show” the
British.
It was to kill them. It was to win.
The British answer to this was, beginning in
March of 1920, to ship thousands of British servicemen to Ireland to act as
“reserve police”. Owing to the rather mismatched status of their uniforms
these new police became known as the “Black and Tans”, and soon gained a
deserved reputation for butchery. The relative degree of the war crimes
committed by this force remains in some dispute, but suffice to say that while
the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded during the years the Tans were active in
Ireland, they were never considered a threat to win.
Of course, in order to be a part of a police
“reserve” you must be in reserve to something already there. In the case of the
Black and Tans the regular force they attached to was something known as the
“Royal Irish Constabulary” or “RIC”. The RIC was the crown’s policing
authority in Ireland, and while not exactly the gang of thugs that would soon
be so readily added to their numbers, they were also not, shall we say,
“beloved of the people”. In fact, the ease by which the Tans incorporated into
the RIC, and the willingness that some members of the original RIC showed to
take part in some of the atrocities, (e.g. one of them assassinated the mayor
of Cork) meant that the distinction between the forces became understandably
blurred. Suffice to say that amongst most Irish the term “RIC” remains a
dirty word for a most dirty organisation.
Well, most, it seems, is not “all”. Here we
come to modern day politics, or, to coin a Friends-type title “The One
Where Leo Gets A History Lesson”.
Here’s what happened. In order to kick off the
2020 end of the “Decade of Centenaries” the current Irish Government announced
that, on the 17th of January, the institutions of the RIC and DMP
(The Dublin Metropolitan Police, a branch of the wider force) would be
commemorated in a ceremony at Dublin Castle. Since the Black and Tans
were an adjunct of this force, it effectively meant that they too would be
commemorated. It was also announced that on the same day henhouses throughout
the country would be offering thanks to foxes for their service through the
ages.
Okay, that second one was a joke.
The first one wasn’t and it soon became
apparent that it was no laughing matter. Minister for Justice Charlie
Flanagan, the person responsible for scheduling the event, was immediately
assailed by members of opposition parties expressing outrage at the idea such
an event was being held. Such expressions are to be expected from the
opposition parties. However, when members of his own party began to voice their
displeasure Flanagan’s actions were stoutly defended by his party leader,
Taoiseach Leo Varadkar.
Varadkar, mustering maximum levels of
self-righteousness, stated that it was “regrettable” that the event was being
criticised. Then, obviously subscribing to the somewhat backwards theory
that when you’re digging yourself a hole the best advice is “keep digging”,
Varadkar went on to say:
“I remember 10, 15 years ago it was very
controversial to commemorate the deaths of soldiers in World War I because some
people felt that they shouldn’t be remembered because they fought for the
United Kingdom…, That has changed. We now all accept, or almost everyone
accepts, that it is right and proper to remember Irish people, soldiers who
died in the first World War,”.
Varadkar continued, stating he believes the
same thing applies to “police officers who were killed, Catholic and
Protestant alike, who were members of the RIC and the DMP, many of whose
families are still alive and remember them”.
Oh boy. Here’s where we go back to Ulysses S. Grant and
confusing the individual with the collective.
When Grant made his statement he was quite careful to
differentiate his feelings for a person (Lee) from the collective “cause” (the
Confederacy) that he represented. Grant let Confederate soldiers retain
their mounts so that they could work their farms, because as individuals they
might, in time, become good citizens when they got back home. He did not, it
should be noted, allow them to march to that home under the flag of the
despicable Confederacy.
Similarly, the Ku Klux Klan started as a benign social club in
Pulaski, Tennessee. It’s fairly certain that some of its members simply
wanted someplace to play cards at night. Unfortunately for those upright
individuals the group they formed turned out to be exceptionally susceptible to
exploitation as a white supremacist terror organization. So while those
quiet bridge players may be fondly remembered by their families, that fondness
should not extend to their membership in the KKK (even if their families are OK
with that).
The same holds true for those supposed “good people” who Donald
Trump cited as having been unfairly besmirched just because they happened to
express their concerns for public art in the course of a murderous Neo-Nazi
rally in Charlottesville, Virginia.
Varadkar was correct in that individual officers who were simply
caught in a crossfire may have suffered a cruel fate, but their membership in
the collective of the RIC is not why their service is notable, or their demise
regrettable. Individuals may have served “valiantly” (Grant’s words) in the RIC,
but the RIC was not a valourous establishment. More to the point, the RIC
policies were, during the time which this centenary commemoration marks, “one of the worst for which a
people ever fought, and one for which there was the least excuse”.
The susceptibility of the RIC and its adjunct branches to these
worst elements disqualify it from commemoration. It was far too easy for
the police forces of Ireland to suddenly become the home for an assortment of
war criminals and semi-official thugs. This is distinctly different from
the allied armed forces of the First World War, which, while lead by a
collection of dolts and having certain instances of improper behavior, was by
and large an honourable force. Equating membership in the British Army with the
collective institution that served as a vehicle for inserting the Black and
Tans into Irish history is an improper interpretation of history. It’s
also lazy. The idea that we should just lump all the members of the RIC into
one big bundle of forgiveness is unfair to both their victims and, funnily
enough, to those members who actually did join the group on the assumption it
would be a force for good only to end up being duped into supporting the effort
to suppress Irish freedom.
I don’t think Varadkar or his government were being intentionally
cruel, or even attempting to rehabilitate the reputation of the RIC or British
forces in Ireland when they announced this commemoration. I do believe,
however, that they were being lazy. “Let’s have a day for the RIC.”, they
thought, “It’s just the same as standing up for those Irish who volunteered to
fight the Germans during the war. What could possibly go wrong?”
What indeed. Here’s a very basic statement that I challenge people
to contradict. The British army, attempting to fight and kill Germans
serving the Kaiser in France does not equate with an Irish based British police
force attempting to fight and kill Irish people fighting for Irish independence
in Ireland. Yes, I know there were some members of that police force who
thought they were attempting to simply maintain civil order. They were
well intentioned. They were also wrong. The group to which they found
themselves bound in service had been subverted, rather easily, into a terror
machine. I hope they maintained their individual integrity – but it is simply a
fact that their organisation, as a collective, had slipped in to the abyss that
also contains the Confederate Army, the KKK and the Nazi
party.
Here’s a more intellectually difficult, but, I believe, better
example of how to deal with the question of individual membership in a
collectively disreputable institution. When it comes to U.S. history I
believe that every veteran who served in the American Civil War, North or
South, deserves the honour of having an American flag placed on their grave on
Veteran’s Day. Each one of them, in their own way, forged the country
that today is sovereign in the land where they lie. Every one of them contributed
something to that tapestry. Of course, if their families choose not to display
that symbol, that is their right. Conversely, I do not, I am afraid, believe
that Confederate veterans should be allowed to have the rebel flag displayed on
their gravesite if that is found in a public place. That is a hateful
symbol that disparages the rights of those citizens, particularly those of
colour, that live and have lived in that same country. The individual veteran
deserves respect and recognition. The cause they represented, the organisation
to which they belonged, I am not sorry or afraid to say, does not.
The same basic equation should, I propose, apply in Ireland.
Those Irish people who served, on whatever side, in furtherance of their
beliefs should be honoured and respected. That instrument of respect
should be expressed via the symbols of the state that was forged from the
struggles in which they participated.
The tricolour.
The harp in the coat
of arms.
Amhrán na bhFiann.
Individuals should not be excluded from respect and
consideration for the role they played in the evolution of the state simply
because they belonged to a dishonourable organisation. If they, as a
person, were doing their best as they saw it then that should be acknowledged.
The organisation, on the other hand, does not get rehabilitated just because
the individuals caught in its web have been cut loose.
The RIC, the Black and Tans, the DMP and the like do not make the
cut as collectives. There are no commemorations that should be held for such
groups, no more than people should mourn for the “lost cause” of the
Confederacy. These groups were not just “on the wrong side of history” –
they were wrong. If saying so offends some – too bad – some things are worth
being offensive about.
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