Ex-IRA commander Martin McGuinness WILL be a guest of the Queen at Windsor Castle

Capt. FABULOUS! said:
Better, we'll all take names of Great Irishmen who took part in the 1916 Rising.
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I wonder if you know that many Dubliners were vehemently against the Easter Rising in 1916? There were many that had relatives fighting over in France and Belgium at that time and the thought that the IRB went to the Germans to get weapons and ammunition was too much. Indeed when the rebels were caught there were many people lining the streets and emptying chamber pots over their heads and throwing rotten fruit and vegetables. It was only when the British chose to execute the captured rebels that sentiment changed.
 
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Abraxas said:
I wonder if you know that many Dubliners were vehemently against the Easter Rising in 1916? There were many that had relatives fighting over in France and Belgium at that time and the thought that the Germans had given the rebels guns and ammo was too much. Indeed when the rebels were caught there were many people lining the streets and emptying chamber pots over their heads and throwing rotten fruit and vegetables. It was only when the British chose to execute the captured rebels that sentiment changed.
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While it is useful to explore historical studies contrary to popular wisdom, to become bogged down in them, or blow them out of proportion, is not. It prevents one from seeing the grander picture and puts one on a level with a conspiracy kook. There were many more tories in the American colonies during our revolution than in the Irish revolution, but that's not really a matter of great historical significance, is it?

Further, you are lumping opponents of republican revolutionaries in with loyalists. Any student of Irish history knows that there were sub-divisions within the independence movement; republicans, free-staters, home-rulers, etc. Maybe you should stop by a New York pub for some green beer and a few history lessons.

:awesome:

http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/apr/05/irish-soldiers-who-fought-for-britain

Why did a southern Irish Catholic voluntarily enlist in the British army? John Redmond MP, leader of the Irish party, pledged to support Asquith's Liberal party in return for the introduction of Home Rule. The Ulster Volunteer Army, based in Protestant-dominated Northern Ireland, promised to use "all means that may be necessary" to prevent Irish self-government. The Irish Volunteers in the south were also ready and armed. Ireland was on the brink of civil war at the outbreak of the first world war.

Redmond made a pivotal speech in Woodenbridge on 20 September 1914, two days after Home Rule had passed into law and six weeks after Britain declared war on Germany. With Home Rule on the cards, he pledged his support to the Allied cause and urged the Irish Volunteers to join the British army, proclaiming that: "The interests of Ireland – of the whole of Ireland – are at stake in this war." Of the 80,000 that enlisted in the first 12 months of the war, half were from Ulster and half from the south. Sylvester enlisted five weeks after Redmond's speech.

Others enlisted for adventure, "for no other reason than to see what war was like, to get a gun, to see new countries and to feel like a grown man," in the fiery words of the future IRA leader, Tom Barry. Poverty also featured. James Connolly, the socialist revolutionary, contended that "economic conscription" attracted a large number of recruits from the improvised tenements of inner-city Dublin. In Sylvester's case, his father was dead and his army pay was sent to his mother and young sister.
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-16287211

Five thousand Irish soldiers who swapped uniforms to fight for the British against Hitler went on to suffer years of persecution.

One of them, 92-year-old Phil Farrington, took part in the D-Day landings and helped liberate the German death camp at Bergen-Belsen - but he wears his medals in secret.

Even to this day, he has nightmares that he will be arrested by the authorities and imprisoned for his wartime service.

"They would come and get me, yes they would," he said in a frail voice at his home in the docks area of Dublin.

And his 25-year-old grandson, Patrick, confirmed: "I see the fear in him even today, even after 65 years."

Mr Farrington's fears are not groundless.

He was one of about 5,000 Irish soldiers who deserted their own neutral army to join the war against fascism and who were brutally punished on their return home as a result.

They were formally dismissed from the Irish army, stripped of all pay and pension rights, and prevented from finding work by being banned for seven years from any employment paid for by state or government funds.

A special "list" was drawn up containing their names and addresses, and circulated to every government department, town hall and railway station - anywhere the men might look for a job.

It was referred to in the Irish parliament - the Dail - at the time as a "starvation order", and for many of their families the phrase became painfully close to the truth.
Treated as outcasts

Paddy Reid - whose father and uncle both fought the Japanese at the battle of Kohima Ridge - recalls a post-war childhood in Dublin spent "moving from one slum to another".

Maybe one slice of bread a day and that would be it - no proper clothing, no proper heating.

"My father was blacklisted and away all the time, picking turnips or whatever work he could get. It's still painful to remember. We were treated as outcasts."

John Stout served with the Irish Guards armoured division which raced to Arnhem to capture a key bridge.

He also fought in the Battle of the Bulge, ending the war as a commando.

On his return home to Cork, however, he was treated as a pariah. "What they did to us was wrong. I know that in my heart. They cold-shouldered you. They didn't speak to you.

"They didn't understand why we did what we did. A lot of Irish people wanted Germany to win the war - they were dead up against the British."

It was only 20 years since Ireland had won its independence after many years of rule from London, and the Irish list of grievances against Britain was long - as Gerald Morgan, long-time professor of history at Trinity College, Dublin, explains.

"The uprisings, the civil war, all sorts of reneged promises - I'd estimate that 60% of the population expected or indeed hoped the Germans would win.

"To prevent civil unrest, Eamon de Valera had to do something. Hence the starvation order and the list."

Ireland adopted a policy of strict neutrality which may have been necessary politically or even popular, but a significant minority strongly backed Britain, including tens of thousands of Irish civilians who signed up to fight alongside the 5,000 Irish servicemen who switched uniforms.
Confidential list

Until I showed him the list - the size of a slim phone directory and marked "confidential" - John Stout had not realised his name was included.

But after the war it quickly became apparent that he could not get work and was not welcome in Ireland - so he returned to Britain.

"I feel very betrayed about how we were treated, it was wrong and even today they should say sorry for the problems we had to endure. We never even got to put our case or argue why it was unjust," said Mr Stout.

And the list itself is far from accurate, according to Robert Widders, who has written a book about the deserters' treatment called Spitting on a Soldier's Grave.

"It contains the names of men who were to be punished but who'd already been killed in action, but not the names of men who deserted the Irish army to spend their war years as burglars or thieves," he said.

In recent months, a number of Irish parliamentarians have begun pressing their government to issue a pardon to the few deserters who remain alive.

"What happened to them was vindictive and not only a stain on their honour but on the honour of Ireland," TD Gerald Nash said.

But for those nonagenarians who helped win the war but lost so much by doing so, time is of the essence, and it is running out fast.
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Abraxas said:
I posted something like this a while ago to demonstrate just how stupid many Irish were at that time. Did they really think that Hitler would have treated them with respect if the Nazis won? They would have used Ireland like they used Poland to set up many concentration camps and the IRA would have been the first ones in there followed by de Valera.
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So you think Hitler would have treated them as shabbily as the British did?

Fair point.
 
I get that you boys feel a connection to "the Troubles" it was a dark period to be sure. But I'm wondering if there is some point where it gets left in the past and no longer a handy stick to beat one another up with ?
 
Celticguy said:
I get that you boys feel a connection to "the Troubles" it was a dark period to be sure. But I'm wondering if there is some point where it gets left in the past and no longer a handy stick to beat one another up with ?
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That's the whole point, Martin McGuinness has many secrets that he is not sharing. He knows full well who were the perpetrators of the Real IRA Omagh bombing but has never revealed that information. To date, nobody has been charged in the criminal courts for it. Whatever you may think of the Queen I think it is amazing how she can sit down at the same table as the man that ordered the killing of her cousin Lord Mountbatten.

https://uk.news.yahoo.com/man-arres...ombing-remains-custody-105723907.html#n7ccNS4

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/ukn...r-of-Lord-Mountbatten-to-meet-McGuinness.html
 
Abraxas said:
I wonder if you know that many Dubliners were vehemently against the Easter Rising in 1916? There were many that had relatives fighting over in France and Belgium at that time and the thought that the IRB went to the Germans to get weapons and ammunition was too much. Indeed when the rebels were caught there were many people lining the streets and emptying chamber pots over their heads and throwing rotten fruit and vegetables. It was only when the British chose to execute the captured rebels that sentiment changed.
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The thoughts of traitors are irrelevant to me.
 
Abraxas said:
The real traitors were the Irish that preferred the Germans to win both WW1 and WW2.
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I don't suppose you've ever heard ever the old saying "The enemy of my enemy is my friend"?

It's not always logical, but it's usually understandable.
 
Celticguy said:
I get that you boys feel a connection to "the Troubles" it was a dark period to be sure. But I'm wondering if there is some point where it gets left in the past and no longer a handy stick to beat one another up with ?
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It can all end with a united Irish Republic. When the archaic notion of "empire" can finally take a backseat to what is right and just.

And I frankly find it insulting that only white people would be told to "just shut up and forget it," in a manner that would never be used to descendants of slaves, the Holocaust, the Rape of Nanking, Armenian genocide, or any other deliberate atrocity, particularly one that is still on-going....

Or is the belief that white people can't be victimized somehow behind this? Or that only inter-racial or inter-ethnic factors being involved makes such concerns legitimate?

Political correctness, apparently, has very deep roots in our society.
 
Celticguy said:
I get that you boys feel a connection to "the Troubles" it was a dark period to be sure. But I'm wondering if there is some point where it gets left in the past and no longer a handy stick to beat one another up with ?
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Tell that to this father whose son was killed by the Real IRA.

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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...ent-arrives-Britain-historic-state-visit.html
 
First fatality of "The Troubles" was Francis McCloskey, a 67 year-old Catholic farmer, clubbed to death by the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
 
Taft2016 said:
First fatality of "The Troubles" was Francis McCloskey, a 67 year-old Catholic farmer, clubbed to death by the Royal Ulster Constabulary.
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The Omagh bombing happened three weeks after the Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998 when all hostilities were supposed to have ceased. To date no one has been charged with any offence although somebody was arrested yesterday for questioning.

As for Francis McCloskey, he had been found unconscious on 13 July near the Dungiven Orange Hall following a police baton charge against a crowd who had been throwing stones at the hall. It is still a matter for debate as to whether he was clubbed or hit by a stone.
 
Abraxas said:
The Omagh bombing happened three weeks after the Good Friday Agreement was signed in 1998 when all hostilities were supposed to have ceased.
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That was sort of the point, wasn't it? Opposition to the Good Friday Agreement?

And as you conveniently omitted, the bombing wasn't carried out by the Provisional IRA, but rather a splinter group that the Provos cracked down upon afterwards. Even the BBC attributed it to elements in opposition to the efforts of Gerry Adams and McGuinness.

As for Francis McCloskey, he had been found unconscious on 13 July near the Dungiven Orange Hall following a police baton charge against a crowd who had been throwing stones at the hall. It is still a matter for debate as to whether he was clubbed or hit by a stone.
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Like there was doubt, that maybe it was the IRA that shot all the protesters in Derry?

Like there was doubt, that maybe it was the IRA that exploded the bomb in McGurk's Pub?

Like there was no doubt that the Guildford Four were guilty?

British doubts are virtual indictments.
 
And as to the allegations that McGuinness knows something about Omagh, there is this:

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-northern-ireland-24071335

Northern Ireland's deputy first minister has criticised a government decision not to hold a public inquiry into the Omagh bomb.

Martin McGuiness said he believed it was "a mistake" for Northern Ireland Secretary Theresa Villiers to rule out an inquiry into the Real IRA attack.

There were "insufficient grounds" for a further inquiry, Ms Villiers said.

First Minister Peter Robinson said her decision "does not stop us from having a more thorough investigation".

The first and deputy first ministers were speaking in New York, during their joint investment trip to the United States.


"There are a lot of areas that have been raised by the families that need to be thoroughly investigated.”

Mr McGuinness said: "I think it's a mistake. I think Theresa Villiers has closed down a demand that the families have had for many years, and a real hope that the families have had that they would get a proper investigation into what happened at that time."
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And why won't the Brits look into it? Because there's been a nagging accusation for years that they had advance warning from an undercover and completely dropped the ball.
 
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