-
We have updated our Community Code of Conduct. Please read through the new rules for the forum that are an integral part of Paradox Interactive’s User Agreement.
Yeah, the UK has acted in immoral ways since time immemorial and continues to do so (like most countries). There's plenty of ammo to be used against imperialism for what it did do, so there's no need to attack it over what it hypothetically could have done but didn't.
No expert on this particular subject but why not let them go on their way ? 1918 Election clearly shows the Irish wanted independence. It would be best for Ireland but of course not for the interest of British Empire.
In this version of reality, the Republic of Ireland became independent in 1922.
After a war though. I think that's his point, that it was basically inevitable after the 1918 election, so we should have just been let go then.
In which case the answer is obvious. No government thought that way in 1918. Most don't these days.
The Swedish did, but I take your point. Nonetheless, if, as I keep hearing, they were prepared to offer de facto independence, it seems pretty stupid to have fought a war to war if it was inevitable anyway.
The question OP asked was could it have been handled better. Yes, the obvious best handling would be to allow the Irish to go independent after 1918 Election; no bloodshed and a just solution. Of course, we knew the British would never do such a thing. The British didn't respect the will of majority of Irish people, so what could i say here, "the better handling" would be to RESPECT it.
Agree completely, but the Irish side could have handled things better too.
from the Easter Rising?
the brits got the best deal they could have gotten.
before then, they fumbled and fumbled and fumbled.
But you'd have got your war anyway. It would have been the Ulster Unionists, and maybe even Crown loyalists and Protestants elsewhere in Ireland, fighting the Irish government - almost certainly with covert financial support and illegal arms shipments and maybe even volunteers from elements in the UK. There'd be a legacy of bitterness to this day, quite possibly ongoing terrorism in the south from people in the north demanding independence. It wasn't as simple as "we" wanted independence and "they" refused to give it without a fight.
Okay but at the very least one can surely say the South should have been let go. The exact boundaries would be up for debate of course.
Except "the South" fought a war to get the whole, and then fought a civil war against people who still wanted to get the whole when given the South.
The first part is confusing me. We're saying why the British should have took action to avoid the South fighting war, and your counter to this is to state that the South fought a war?
As to the second part, about the whole, that's a fair point. But, if it had been given democratically, and without bloodshed, the South might have been more inclined to reach a settlement where parts of the North remained part of the U.K. In civil wars, wars of independence and revolution, extremists have a tendency to rise to the top in the respective factions, more so than at peace.
The problem was that a lot of people still thought it would be possible to reach a compromise that both north and south could agree on, involving some form of autonomy short of independence. Partition was seen as a desperate, unwanted solution that was only resorted to when it was decided that both sides were too intransigent to compromise. Maybe with hindsight they should have proposed it earlier? But would the nationalists have accepted it in 1918?
They definitely wouldn't have accepted it immediately. But if the Brits held fast and made clear there would be handing over of the North under any circumstances, I'd say eventually, after a while of dangling partition as the only decent option, public opinion would have become in favour of it and the more moderate elements of Sinn Fein would win over. That's just a guess though.
I think they wouldn't accepted it no matter how much time has passed and i may understand them for doing so. To be honest, i wouldn't be content with my island being divided by a stupid sectarianism that was brought and bolstered by the British.
Yes, the British were behind both Catholicism and Martin Luther's protest. True story.
If you want a ultimate cause of sectarianism, try looking at the way that the Catholic church dealt with those with a different opinion. Not met any Cathars recently, I'd imagine. The conflict in Ireland was a microcosm of the religious wars in Europe between Catholics and Protestants. Protestants had no choice but to be anti-Catholic because Catholicism viewed them as heretics that needed to be stamped out much as they had with previous heresies.
Last edited: