VonTrapp: Interestingly, that was a real clause in the 37 Constitution. In a sense, it only formalized what is clearly present in the uncodified British constitution, but yes, having it in black and white leaves it open to abuse.
-
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.
Hopefully have 1938 up soon - what are everybody's thoughts? Any hints on how to improve it?
1938
Sean Lemass, Minister for Industry and Commerce in 1938, in later years
Irish Government, January 1938:
Taioseach: Eamon de Valera [FF]
Tanaiste: Sean T. O’Kelly [FF]
Minister for Agriculture: James Ryan [FF]
Minister for Defence: Frank Aiken [FF]
Minister for Education: Tomas O Deirg [FF]
Minister for Finance: Sean MacEntee [FF]
Minister for Foreign Affairs: Eamon de Valera [FF]
Minister for Industry and Commerce: Sean Lemass [FF]
Minister for Justice: Patrick J. Ruttledge [FF]
Minister for Lands: Gerald Boland [FF]
Minister for Local Government and Public Health: Sean T. O’Kelly [FF]
Minister for Posts and Telegraphs: Oscar Traynor [FF]
Ceann Comhairle: Frank Fahy [Neutral, from FF]
Irish Armed Forces:
British Military Attache: General Hubert de la Poer Gough [British Military Attache]
Chiefs of the Army: General Sean MacEoin [Fine Gael], General Richard Mulcahy [FG]
Chief of the Navy: Admiral A.T. Lawlor [Labour Party]
Chief of the Airforce: Air Marshal P.A. Mulcahy [FF]
1938 would see the second phase of the DEP, the militarization of Eire, and “Ireland in Europe”. Of more concern to the outside world, it also saw Nazi Germany’s ravening appetite become plain for all who cared to see.
Given that the second phrase of the DEP is the only one of these that is in any way separate from the greater chess board of world events, it seems best to start with it. On the 4th of January 1939, with Major General Costello announcing his team had finished their work on modernizing the army, Sean Lemass outlined the objectives of the second phrase: he sought to further support factories with government-subsidized tools, to set up a better logistical system for the army, to invest in mechanized agricultural tools, and to seek a contract for more modern interceptors.
The support given to the vast farming community of Ireland was a necessary one, both politically and industrially. The farmers, seeing in the first phase of the DEP governmental neglect of their interests, had threatened to stage rallies, and the second phase had been modulated with a way of forestalling that in mind. Furthermore, providing tractors and combine harvesters to farmers would spur industrial modernization in two ways: by providing a more efficient food supply, and by cutting the agricultural workforce, thereby increasing the available pool for secondary and tertiary industries. This built into the further provision of machine tools for Irish industry.
The other two objectives were military ones, and justified both by the perceived mandate granted to Fianna Fail in the election the previous year, and by rising foreign tensions. P.A. Mulcahy had demonstrated his needs amply to the Irish Cabinet in October when his minute air force’s 6 armed biplanes took to the sky in a display - two were forced to the ground within minutes due to mechanical wear. There being no sense in buying outdated interceptor models, he urged the government to look into the Hawker Hurricane, or one of the American models.
Here we may segue comfortably into the work of Costello, who simultaneously began refitting the Regiment of Rifle, and mobilizing varied former IRA units as the new 1st “Thunderbolt” Infantry Division. By April, the 1st “Republican Guard” and 2nd “Irish Volunteers” Rifle Regiments had been formed, giving Ireland divisional military strength for the first time since the Civil War. Lieutenant General Murphy, previous colonel-in-chief of the Regiment of Rifle, became commander of the division, and was given orders to form an umbrella headquarters for the “First Army Corps”.
The Regiment of Rifle, in turn, would form the core of the 2nd “Spearhead” Infantry Division, which Costello would command. This reorganization was completed in June, as the 3rd “Origin” and 4th “Connaught Rangers” Rifle Regiments mustered in Dublin, under Costello, who would command the “Second Army Corps”.
But the fairly minor military expansion based around new destroyers and the two new infantry divisions was dwarfed by de Valera’s plans. Just before the summer recess of Dail Eireann, in time for the first election held under the 1937 Constitution, Frank Aiken presented to the Dail proposals for a massive increase in strength for the Irish armed forces, hiding within the speech the mobilization of a mountain infantry division.
The proposal was that, by Midsummer 1940, two years hence, Ireland should be able to field the following formations:
*First Army Corps: Two regular infantry divisions, one equipped for mountain warfare, with attached brigades as the General Staff sees fit, headquartered at Dublin.
*Second Army Corps: One regular infantry division, with attached engineer brigade, available for deployment.
*Territorial Army: Two divisions modelled after the United Kingdom’s TA, based in Cork and Letterkenny.
*Irish Armoured Corps: One armoured group, headquartered in Galway. Additional independent battalions to be deployed to the other army units.
*Irish Navy: One cruiser, one frigate, and the present flotilla of destroyers, with provision for a further flotilla if called for by the General Staff.
*Irish Air Force: One squadron of short-range fighters, with provision for a further squadron of long-range fighters and a squadron of bombers if called for by the General Staff.
A stunned Dail dissolved and went back to stand for election in their constituencies. Whilst some might see this controversial move as ill-timed before an election, it must be remembered how popular Fianna Fail were; given their crushing victory in the previous year’s elections, they had little to fear. Moreover, Fine Gael, spurred by Cosgrave, MacEoin and Richard Mulcahy, firmly supported the measures.
Indeed, the bold timing of the policy was rather a challenge to the left wing of Fianna Fail. After the predicted election victory on July 1st, the 10th Dail convened. Fianna Fail had lost a few marginal seats, but given the further usurpation of support base from Fine Gael, it still held a strong ascendancy. The debates were fierce, but with the election having taken up the time of the anti-military TD’s, there was no united front.
Indeed, the most concerted opposition to the proposed policy was extra-political. A coalition of resources and manufacturing trade unions announced strikes on the 21st of September in protest at “de Valera’s militarism”. This din was soon added to by an opportunistic series of rallies organized by Church groups, echoing Cosgrave two years previous and accusing Fianna Fail of “soft Stalinism”.
The Great Strike of 1938-1939, here involving the Dockworkers’ Union
Indeed, it was all Lemass and MacEntee could do to keep the factories rolling for the next 8 days, until greater events at Munich intervened to allow the policy of military expansion to proceed, leading up the cessation of the “Great Strike“ over winter. It now falls to us to document this event, and those preceding it, on the international scene.
In February, Anthony Eden, the well-respected British Foreign Secretary, left office over a disagreement with his Prime Minister. That disagreement, as related by Irish peer and British politician Lord Moyne in a letter to W.T. Cosgrave, “[was] caused, fundamentally, by Neville’s refusal to take seriously the idea of that jumped-up corporal having ambitions beyond autobahns”. Eden’s replacement, Lord Halifax, whilst no fool, also hoped to keep the European peace via appeasement.
It was soon plain that Hitler did indeed have ambitions beyond autobahns, as he announced in the Reichstag that he knew “how to defend the 10 million Germans on our borders”, meaning in Austria and Czechoslovakia. Austrian Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg responded in the Bundestag declaring that this was “where we must call a halt and say: this far and no further.”
But as he announced a plebiscite on the matter of Austrian independence, Hitler sent troops across the German-Austrian border. On the 11th of March, Austria was taken under German control. Shortly thereafter, Hitler announced an “Anschluss”, or union, merging Austria into the Grossdeutchland proposed so long ago by Bismarck’s Austrian opponents. A delicate irony, as de Valera was not slow to pick up upon.
It was not so much the political standing of an Austro-German union that concerned him or his fellow Irish. Many of Austria’s people seemed genuinely pleased with the chain of events, at least for now. Rather, it was Hitler’s heavy-handed intervention and refusal to allow a democratic decision on the matter to be made that raised alarm bells in Dublin. Yet Chamberlain and his new Foreign Secretary seemed utterly blasé about the situation.
Giving due notice to the Dail, de Valera commenced, shortly after Anschluss, a series of important political visits across Europe. Meeting with Chamberlain in London, his impression from their previous dealings was only reinforced: a good man, but weak. His audience with Prince Albert of York - now King George the Sixth of the United Kingdom and Emperor of India - was rather more fruitful. He found in the stammering King a quiet courage and a notable suspicion of Hitler.
“Dev”, as the Taioseach was popularly known, was much pleased by his contact with the King, and his meeting with Blum in Paris only helped further boost his morale. Already friends with the Popular Front Prime Minister, Blum’s increasing awareness of the precarious situation in Central Europe mirrored de Valera’s own. They resolved that after the summer elections they each faced, they would push Chamberlain into a harder stance. A groundbreaking visit by the Taioseach to Czechoslovakia, the first by a Dominion Prime Minister, to meet Edouard Benes, was not so promising; the Czech Nazi party, representing the Sudetan Germans, was agitating heavily against Czech rule.
De Valera’s plans, however, were to come to naught, as, whilst he survived his election, Blum did not manage likewise. Rather, the Radical Socialist Edouard Daladier entered office in France; whilst suspicious of Hitler, and genial enough, he lacked any political backbone, and de Valera found little common cause with the man. However, another meeting with the King reassured him a little.
Whilst concerns about Anschluss may be easily seen within Aiken’s proposal to the Dail just before its dissolution, it was Hitler’s further aggressive defence of “Germany” that led to the proposal’s success and the safety of Ireland’s industry, as mentioned above.
Since his success in Austria, Hitler had ever more loudly called for the independence of the Sudetan region of Czechoslovakia. On the face of it, this was in the interest of the ethnic Germans residing there; but looked at cynically, an observer might note that Czechoslovakia’s main fortifications were in the areas Hitler demanded independence for, and that the Morava region, also so marked, many of the fledgling nation’s most important industries made their home.
On September the 29th, 1938, in Munich, Hitler and his cohort, “il Duce” Benito Mussolini, Fascist premier of Italy, met with Chamberlain and Daladier. The next day, they announced that Czechoslovakia would surrender its Sudetan provinces to Germany. Czechoslovakia, one must note, had had no say in the Munich Agreement. Neville Chamberlain returned home and declared “peace in our time”.
Neville Knytling, you’re a genius.
The Dail was in uproar. MacEntee, repulsed by the move, loudly decried “British imperialism and French cowardice”; Richard Mulcahy, a guest speaking for the Military Chiefs, advised Dail Eireann of the Military Attache’s statement supporting the British Government’s position, before requesting personal permission for leave to lead volunteers to defend Czechoslovakia.
Whilst the Dail conducted week-long discussion of the matter, news arrived that on the 1st of October, the Chinese capital of Nanking had fallen to the Japanese aggressors, Germany’s friend. Thousands of civilians had been murdered in the sack of the city. An already simmering pot hit the boil.
Frank Aiken, the quiet, efficient Minister for Defence, not a man prone to speechmaking, responded to the matter in reference to the defence proposal from June:
“If the honourable deputies will listen to the world for a moment, they will hear the steady crackling of rising flames. I need only refer to recent events in Central Europe and China for all to know this is a troubled world, and all deputies here must understand the implications these events have. When we fought to become our own nation, we dismissed the Empire from the role of protector; to make our independence a worthwhile reality, we must become able to protect ourselves!”
This starkly simple speech led to overwhelming support for the proposal. This, coupled with de Valera’s next actions, won Ireland recognition as a power of the second rank, rather than as a rebellious satellite. That “Dev” commanded such widespread public support for what was to come may be partly explained by world events and by the Dail’s support, but may be more placed at the door of the series of speeches called “Ireland in Europe”.
Acting under the advice of his deputy O’Kelly, from January of 1938 De Valera began giving monthly addresses to the Irish people over the wireless. Each of these argued for an Ireland as a fuller partner in European politics, citing, amongst other ideas, continental co-operation as a vehicle to international standing, the moral obligation of Christians and of humankind in general to help defend their fellow man, and the disintegration of democracy in Central and Southern Europe. Relying on heavily emotivist methods, de Valera hoped to win the general public to his private opinion that the works of men like Hitler must be stopped.
At the public muster of the 3rd “Summit” Infantry (Mountain) Division in Dublin in mid-November, at the unveiling of the standards of the 5th “Giant” and 6th “Cuchulain’s Watchers” Rifle (Mountain) Regiments, de Valera addressed the watching soldiers, families and civilians.
Noting the recent death of the Great Turk and Turkey’s burgeoning democratization, the Taoiseach echoed his “Ireland in Europe” speech earlier that month, calling for the democracies of Europe to protect Czechoslovakia from “further fascist ambition”. To foster this hope, he said, he had invited the Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom and France, as well as representatives from the Commonwealth, to attend a meeting in the city, to be held over new year.
And so, on the 29th of December, Neville Chamberlain, with his King’s stern advice still ringing in his ears, and Daladier, ashamed of his part at Munich, arrived in Dublin, along with representatives from Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and a special observer from the Indian National Congress. They sat down to negotiate the Treaty of Dublin, the most important event in Ireland’s history since independence.
Sean Lemass, Minister for Industry and Commerce in 1938, in later years
Irish Government, January 1938:
Taioseach: Eamon de Valera [FF]
Tanaiste: Sean T. O’Kelly [FF]
Minister for Agriculture: James Ryan [FF]
Minister for Defence: Frank Aiken [FF]
Minister for Education: Tomas O Deirg [FF]
Minister for Finance: Sean MacEntee [FF]
Minister for Foreign Affairs: Eamon de Valera [FF]
Minister for Industry and Commerce: Sean Lemass [FF]
Minister for Justice: Patrick J. Ruttledge [FF]
Minister for Lands: Gerald Boland [FF]
Minister for Local Government and Public Health: Sean T. O’Kelly [FF]
Minister for Posts and Telegraphs: Oscar Traynor [FF]
Ceann Comhairle: Frank Fahy [Neutral, from FF]
Irish Armed Forces:
British Military Attache: General Hubert de la Poer Gough [British Military Attache]
Chiefs of the Army: General Sean MacEoin [Fine Gael], General Richard Mulcahy [FG]
Chief of the Navy: Admiral A.T. Lawlor [Labour Party]
Chief of the Airforce: Air Marshal P.A. Mulcahy [FF]
1938 would see the second phase of the DEP, the militarization of Eire, and “Ireland in Europe”. Of more concern to the outside world, it also saw Nazi Germany’s ravening appetite become plain for all who cared to see.
Given that the second phrase of the DEP is the only one of these that is in any way separate from the greater chess board of world events, it seems best to start with it. On the 4th of January 1939, with Major General Costello announcing his team had finished their work on modernizing the army, Sean Lemass outlined the objectives of the second phrase: he sought to further support factories with government-subsidized tools, to set up a better logistical system for the army, to invest in mechanized agricultural tools, and to seek a contract for more modern interceptors.
The support given to the vast farming community of Ireland was a necessary one, both politically and industrially. The farmers, seeing in the first phase of the DEP governmental neglect of their interests, had threatened to stage rallies, and the second phase had been modulated with a way of forestalling that in mind. Furthermore, providing tractors and combine harvesters to farmers would spur industrial modernization in two ways: by providing a more efficient food supply, and by cutting the agricultural workforce, thereby increasing the available pool for secondary and tertiary industries. This built into the further provision of machine tools for Irish industry.
The other two objectives were military ones, and justified both by the perceived mandate granted to Fianna Fail in the election the previous year, and by rising foreign tensions. P.A. Mulcahy had demonstrated his needs amply to the Irish Cabinet in October when his minute air force’s 6 armed biplanes took to the sky in a display - two were forced to the ground within minutes due to mechanical wear. There being no sense in buying outdated interceptor models, he urged the government to look into the Hawker Hurricane, or one of the American models.
Here we may segue comfortably into the work of Costello, who simultaneously began refitting the Regiment of Rifle, and mobilizing varied former IRA units as the new 1st “Thunderbolt” Infantry Division. By April, the 1st “Republican Guard” and 2nd “Irish Volunteers” Rifle Regiments had been formed, giving Ireland divisional military strength for the first time since the Civil War. Lieutenant General Murphy, previous colonel-in-chief of the Regiment of Rifle, became commander of the division, and was given orders to form an umbrella headquarters for the “First Army Corps”.
The Regiment of Rifle, in turn, would form the core of the 2nd “Spearhead” Infantry Division, which Costello would command. This reorganization was completed in June, as the 3rd “Origin” and 4th “Connaught Rangers” Rifle Regiments mustered in Dublin, under Costello, who would command the “Second Army Corps”.
But the fairly minor military expansion based around new destroyers and the two new infantry divisions was dwarfed by de Valera’s plans. Just before the summer recess of Dail Eireann, in time for the first election held under the 1937 Constitution, Frank Aiken presented to the Dail proposals for a massive increase in strength for the Irish armed forces, hiding within the speech the mobilization of a mountain infantry division.
The proposal was that, by Midsummer 1940, two years hence, Ireland should be able to field the following formations:
*First Army Corps: Two regular infantry divisions, one equipped for mountain warfare, with attached brigades as the General Staff sees fit, headquartered at Dublin.
*Second Army Corps: One regular infantry division, with attached engineer brigade, available for deployment.
*Territorial Army: Two divisions modelled after the United Kingdom’s TA, based in Cork and Letterkenny.
*Irish Armoured Corps: One armoured group, headquartered in Galway. Additional independent battalions to be deployed to the other army units.
*Irish Navy: One cruiser, one frigate, and the present flotilla of destroyers, with provision for a further flotilla if called for by the General Staff.
*Irish Air Force: One squadron of short-range fighters, with provision for a further squadron of long-range fighters and a squadron of bombers if called for by the General Staff.
A stunned Dail dissolved and went back to stand for election in their constituencies. Whilst some might see this controversial move as ill-timed before an election, it must be remembered how popular Fianna Fail were; given their crushing victory in the previous year’s elections, they had little to fear. Moreover, Fine Gael, spurred by Cosgrave, MacEoin and Richard Mulcahy, firmly supported the measures.
Indeed, the bold timing of the policy was rather a challenge to the left wing of Fianna Fail. After the predicted election victory on July 1st, the 10th Dail convened. Fianna Fail had lost a few marginal seats, but given the further usurpation of support base from Fine Gael, it still held a strong ascendancy. The debates were fierce, but with the election having taken up the time of the anti-military TD’s, there was no united front.
Indeed, the most concerted opposition to the proposed policy was extra-political. A coalition of resources and manufacturing trade unions announced strikes on the 21st of September in protest at “de Valera’s militarism”. This din was soon added to by an opportunistic series of rallies organized by Church groups, echoing Cosgrave two years previous and accusing Fianna Fail of “soft Stalinism”.
The Great Strike of 1938-1939, here involving the Dockworkers’ Union
Indeed, it was all Lemass and MacEntee could do to keep the factories rolling for the next 8 days, until greater events at Munich intervened to allow the policy of military expansion to proceed, leading up the cessation of the “Great Strike“ over winter. It now falls to us to document this event, and those preceding it, on the international scene.
In February, Anthony Eden, the well-respected British Foreign Secretary, left office over a disagreement with his Prime Minister. That disagreement, as related by Irish peer and British politician Lord Moyne in a letter to W.T. Cosgrave, “[was] caused, fundamentally, by Neville’s refusal to take seriously the idea of that jumped-up corporal having ambitions beyond autobahns”. Eden’s replacement, Lord Halifax, whilst no fool, also hoped to keep the European peace via appeasement.
It was soon plain that Hitler did indeed have ambitions beyond autobahns, as he announced in the Reichstag that he knew “how to defend the 10 million Germans on our borders”, meaning in Austria and Czechoslovakia. Austrian Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg responded in the Bundestag declaring that this was “where we must call a halt and say: this far and no further.”
But as he announced a plebiscite on the matter of Austrian independence, Hitler sent troops across the German-Austrian border. On the 11th of March, Austria was taken under German control. Shortly thereafter, Hitler announced an “Anschluss”, or union, merging Austria into the Grossdeutchland proposed so long ago by Bismarck’s Austrian opponents. A delicate irony, as de Valera was not slow to pick up upon.
It was not so much the political standing of an Austro-German union that concerned him or his fellow Irish. Many of Austria’s people seemed genuinely pleased with the chain of events, at least for now. Rather, it was Hitler’s heavy-handed intervention and refusal to allow a democratic decision on the matter to be made that raised alarm bells in Dublin. Yet Chamberlain and his new Foreign Secretary seemed utterly blasé about the situation.
Giving due notice to the Dail, de Valera commenced, shortly after Anschluss, a series of important political visits across Europe. Meeting with Chamberlain in London, his impression from their previous dealings was only reinforced: a good man, but weak. His audience with Prince Albert of York - now King George the Sixth of the United Kingdom and Emperor of India - was rather more fruitful. He found in the stammering King a quiet courage and a notable suspicion of Hitler.
“Dev”, as the Taioseach was popularly known, was much pleased by his contact with the King, and his meeting with Blum in Paris only helped further boost his morale. Already friends with the Popular Front Prime Minister, Blum’s increasing awareness of the precarious situation in Central Europe mirrored de Valera’s own. They resolved that after the summer elections they each faced, they would push Chamberlain into a harder stance. A groundbreaking visit by the Taioseach to Czechoslovakia, the first by a Dominion Prime Minister, to meet Edouard Benes, was not so promising; the Czech Nazi party, representing the Sudetan Germans, was agitating heavily against Czech rule.
De Valera’s plans, however, were to come to naught, as, whilst he survived his election, Blum did not manage likewise. Rather, the Radical Socialist Edouard Daladier entered office in France; whilst suspicious of Hitler, and genial enough, he lacked any political backbone, and de Valera found little common cause with the man. However, another meeting with the King reassured him a little.
Whilst concerns about Anschluss may be easily seen within Aiken’s proposal to the Dail just before its dissolution, it was Hitler’s further aggressive defence of “Germany” that led to the proposal’s success and the safety of Ireland’s industry, as mentioned above.
Since his success in Austria, Hitler had ever more loudly called for the independence of the Sudetan region of Czechoslovakia. On the face of it, this was in the interest of the ethnic Germans residing there; but looked at cynically, an observer might note that Czechoslovakia’s main fortifications were in the areas Hitler demanded independence for, and that the Morava region, also so marked, many of the fledgling nation’s most important industries made their home.
On September the 29th, 1938, in Munich, Hitler and his cohort, “il Duce” Benito Mussolini, Fascist premier of Italy, met with Chamberlain and Daladier. The next day, they announced that Czechoslovakia would surrender its Sudetan provinces to Germany. Czechoslovakia, one must note, had had no say in the Munich Agreement. Neville Chamberlain returned home and declared “peace in our time”.
Neville Knytling, you’re a genius.
The Dail was in uproar. MacEntee, repulsed by the move, loudly decried “British imperialism and French cowardice”; Richard Mulcahy, a guest speaking for the Military Chiefs, advised Dail Eireann of the Military Attache’s statement supporting the British Government’s position, before requesting personal permission for leave to lead volunteers to defend Czechoslovakia.
Whilst the Dail conducted week-long discussion of the matter, news arrived that on the 1st of October, the Chinese capital of Nanking had fallen to the Japanese aggressors, Germany’s friend. Thousands of civilians had been murdered in the sack of the city. An already simmering pot hit the boil.
Frank Aiken, the quiet, efficient Minister for Defence, not a man prone to speechmaking, responded to the matter in reference to the defence proposal from June:
“If the honourable deputies will listen to the world for a moment, they will hear the steady crackling of rising flames. I need only refer to recent events in Central Europe and China for all to know this is a troubled world, and all deputies here must understand the implications these events have. When we fought to become our own nation, we dismissed the Empire from the role of protector; to make our independence a worthwhile reality, we must become able to protect ourselves!”
This starkly simple speech led to overwhelming support for the proposal. This, coupled with de Valera’s next actions, won Ireland recognition as a power of the second rank, rather than as a rebellious satellite. That “Dev” commanded such widespread public support for what was to come may be partly explained by world events and by the Dail’s support, but may be more placed at the door of the series of speeches called “Ireland in Europe”.
Acting under the advice of his deputy O’Kelly, from January of 1938 De Valera began giving monthly addresses to the Irish people over the wireless. Each of these argued for an Ireland as a fuller partner in European politics, citing, amongst other ideas, continental co-operation as a vehicle to international standing, the moral obligation of Christians and of humankind in general to help defend their fellow man, and the disintegration of democracy in Central and Southern Europe. Relying on heavily emotivist methods, de Valera hoped to win the general public to his private opinion that the works of men like Hitler must be stopped.
At the public muster of the 3rd “Summit” Infantry (Mountain) Division in Dublin in mid-November, at the unveiling of the standards of the 5th “Giant” and 6th “Cuchulain’s Watchers” Rifle (Mountain) Regiments, de Valera addressed the watching soldiers, families and civilians.
Noting the recent death of the Great Turk and Turkey’s burgeoning democratization, the Taoiseach echoed his “Ireland in Europe” speech earlier that month, calling for the democracies of Europe to protect Czechoslovakia from “further fascist ambition”. To foster this hope, he said, he had invited the Prime Ministers of the United Kingdom and France, as well as representatives from the Commonwealth, to attend a meeting in the city, to be held over new year.
And so, on the 29th of December, Neville Chamberlain, with his King’s stern advice still ringing in his ears, and Daladier, ashamed of his part at Munich, arrived in Dublin, along with representatives from Canada, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and a special observer from the Indian National Congress. They sat down to negotiate the Treaty of Dublin, the most important event in Ireland’s history since independence.
Last edited:
There we go, 1938 posted - getting into the juicy bits now. Please guys, comments on style, criticisms, advice, whatever - all appreciated!
Interesting choice of CountryLordAumerle said:
Style is a personal type of choice. It boils down to how you want to write and how you feel comfortable writing. If you are not comfortable then your AAR will probably suffer for it. Your style is fine with me, I read all types of AAR's equally, it will not necessarily appeal to everyone but thems the breaks.
I have no critisms. Your doing a fine job and it is easy to read which is pretty important with this type of AAR. The only thing I would caution against is making an update too big as people tend not to like reading a large update when it is mostly writing. So far you have it about right though so not to worry.
Keep up the excellent work and do not worry too much about lack of comments early on as people like to see where an AAR is going, and if it will continue.
The fact that you chose to play a rarely played country is in your favour
This is really good, I dig the historical "text-book" type delivery you have. The "non-game" photos you display add a measure of realism to the AAR (and of course, they fit nicely on the page - whereas mine are too big, or small).
You go into some detail with the different cabinet members and politicians => further enhancing the "realism/historical" presentation style!
Keep it up!
You go into some detail with the different cabinet members and politicians => further enhancing the "realism/historical" presentation style!
Keep it up!
Ireland becoming a major player on the stage of Europe? Interesting...Can't wait to read about this "Treaty of Dublin" Keep up the good work!
Remble, omegasranger: Your advice and kind words are very reassuring, thanks. I enjoy doing the historical style; I personally like immersion into serious games (so I doubt I could evere sincerely write a gameplay AAR, because there are only a handful of those I truly enjoy), and immersion via textbook is a nice way to do it.
Guangxi: Nope, all "vanilla" (though patched), plus gameplay. Any serious event has an event or a gameplay decision at its core; the rallies and trade union strikes were event driven, but formulated through my narrative. Why would trade unions strike at that precise point, etc. Treaty of Dublin is based on gameplay decisions.
VonTrapp: Ireland is a major player more in a narrative than a practical gameplay sense, but that seems fair artistic license!
Sorry for the delay to anyone who has been interested, but I was in Palestine for two and a half weeks (and would have been away longer, were it not for a bereavement back home), helping disabled kids.
Guangxi: Nope, all "vanilla" (though patched), plus gameplay. Any serious event has an event or a gameplay decision at its core; the rallies and trade union strikes were event driven, but formulated through my narrative. Why would trade unions strike at that precise point, etc. Treaty of Dublin is based on gameplay decisions.
VonTrapp: Ireland is a major player more in a narrative than a practical gameplay sense, but that seems fair artistic license!
Sorry for the delay to anyone who has been interested, but I was in Palestine for two and a half weeks (and would have been away longer, were it not for a bereavement back home), helping disabled kids.