Irish Republican Army (1919-1922)
The Irish Republican Army ( German Irish Republican Army ), short IRA , also called Óglaigh na hÉireann ( Irish for volunteers of Ireland ), was an Irish-Republican paramilitary underground organization in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland .
It was the predecessor organization to which all subsequent groups, which also call themselves Irish Republican Army (IRA) or called, refer. To differentiate it from these, it is also referred to as the Original or Old IRA . It emerged from the Irish Volunteers founded in 1913, a part of which was responsible for the failed Easter Rising in Dublin in 1916 , in which the Irish Republic was proclaimed.
The IRA was formed in 1919 after the formation of an illegal underground parliament called Dáil Éireann in Ireland , which unilaterally declared Ireland's independence from the United Kingdom and re-proclaimed the Irish Republic. As the army of this unrecognized republic, the Dáil determined the Irish Volunteers and renamed them the Irish Republican Army.
For her goal of an independent, Republican Ireland, she led the Irish War of Independence against the British security forces and institutions in Ireland between 1919 and 1921 . In doing so, she mainly used the methods of guerrilla warfare in order to destroy the previous political system and the internal constitution of Ireland as an integral part of British national territory.
After the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed in 1921, which ended the War of Independence, the IRA split into proponents and opponents. The nucleus of the Irish National Army, today's Irish Defense Forces of the Republic of Ireland , emerged from the proponents of the IRA . Members and other Irish Republicans who disagreed with the treaty that divided Ireland into the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland fought as the Irish Republican Army against their old comrades in the Irish Civil War from 1922 to 1923 and beyond for an independent, republican as well as united Ireland on.
root
The ideology of violent Irish Republicanism had a long tradition in Ireland before the IRA was founded. Starting with the two rebellions of the United Irishmen of 1798 and 1803 , until the uprising of the Young Irelander 1848 and the uprising of the Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB) in 1867. Moreover, there was in the 19th century militant rural secret societies like the Defenders , Ribbonmen and the supporters of the Irish Land League .
The term Irish Republican Army and the associated acronym IRA were first used by the IRB organization in the USA (also known as Fenian Brotherhood ). This Irish Republican Army of the 1860s comprised the paramilitary units of the American Fenians. The Fenians carried out several raids on Canadian forts near the border between 1866 and 1871 in order to put pressure on the British government at the time to withdraw from Ireland. In its current meaning, the term Irish Republican Army first appeared during the Easter Rising, as a common name for the units of the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army that took part in the uprising .
Home Rule and the Irish Volunteers
The political violence that erupted in Ireland between 1916 and 1923 had its origins in the demands of the Irish nationalists for Home Rule within the United Kingdom and the British Empire and the unionist opposition to these demands. As it became increasingly clear that the British government was ready to allow Ireland to self-rule, this led to the formation of the militant unionist Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) in 1912 to prevent Home Rule. In response, militant Irish nationalists formed the Irish Volunteers.
The Government of Ireland Act 1914 (also known as the Third Home Rule Act) was a law passed by the British Parliament in May 1914 to give Ireland regional autonomy within the United Kingdom. Although it also received royal approval in September 1914, its introduction was postponed until the end of World War I , fears that the continued resistance of the Irish Unionists to the Home Rule and the illegal arming of the UVF and Irish Volunteers would lead to a civil war could lead.
After the outbreak of the World War in August 1914, the Irish Volunteers split up. The more than 100,000 members of the new National Volunteers under the leadership of the party leader of the Irish Parliamentary Party John Redmond accepted the British Home Rule promise and so around 20,000 of them served in the British Army in the war . However, around 12,000 volunteers under Eoin MacNeill , who were dominated by the secret Irish Republican Brotherhood, refused to support the British war effort and continued to call themselves Irish Volunteers. While MacNeill intended to use force only if Ireland was to become a country of conscription or if its volunteers were to be disarmed, the radical IRB men planned an armed insurrection to achieve full Irish independence.
Since the small union militia called Irish Citizen Army under the socialist James Connolly also planned its own rebellion parallel to the IRB, Connolly was accepted into the highest body of the IRB in 1915 to coordinate the respective insurrection plans.
Easter Rising and Consequences
Some weapons for the Easter Rising were smuggled into Ireland from Germany under the supervision of civil rights leader Sir Roger Casement . However, when the British Coast Guard discovered the German ship Aud in question off the Irish coast on April 21, 1916, it sank itself together with its cargo to prevent the weapons from falling into British hands.
Despite this failure, the uprising broke out on April 24, 1916. However, Eoin MacNeill, the leader of the Volunteers, revoked the order to rebel at the last moment and ordered all units across the country to be quiet. As a result, only 2,000 volunteers out of a total of 12,000 took part in the uprising, which was also restricted to Dublin . The IRB's original plan was for the rebels to take downtown Dublin and carry out further surveys across the country at the same time. As a result, there was heavy street fighting in the center of Dublin, which lasted a week and severely destroyed the center. Among other things, the rebels occupied the General Post Office (GPO), hoisted a flag there that read "Irish Republic" and proclaimed independence for Ireland. In the end, they had to give up, as the British army with over 16,000 men, artillery and a gunboat possessed an oppressive superiority to put down the uprising. Over half of the approximately 500 dead were civilians who died in the fire on both sides. During the uprising, the term Irish Republican Army appeared for the first time in Ireland, as a common name for the units of the Irish Volunteers and the Irish Citizen Army involved in the uprising.
This uprising later became a solemn event for the Irish nationalists. Initially, however, the critics outnumbered them as well, as the insurgents were on the one hand only a small faction, and on the other hand up to 200,000 Irish fought on the British side in the First World War. The numerous victims and the destruction caused by the uprising did the rest. There were even voices in the Irish Independent , the nationalist newspaper with the highest circulation, calling for the ringleaders to be executed . Some Dubliners also spat or pelted the prisoners with stones as they were being led off towards the transport ships that were taking them to the Welsh internment camps.
However, public opinion shifted dramatically in favor of the rebels over the next two years. Initially, the successive executions of 16 leaders of the uprising and others accused of complicity, as well as the massive internment of suspects who were not directly involved, led to some reluctance within the population. Public opinion turned once and for all when the British government tried to introduce compulsory military service in Ireland in 1918. Since 1917 the war had also become extremely unpopular in Ireland due to the great casualties.
After the uprising, the small Irish nationalist party Sinn Féin was mistakenly associated with the organization of the uprising in wide circles of the public. Her then party leader Arthur Griffith , for example, only spoke out in favor of a self-governing Ireland under a British-Irish dual monarchy . Only the released, surviving republican veterans of the uprising infiltrated the Sinn Féin under the leadership of Éamon de Valera and with the help of the IRB and took over its leadership in 1917. They then radicalized the party and geared it towards its goal of an independent Irish republic.
From 1916 to 1918, the two dominant nationalist parties of Sinn Féin and the constitutional Irish Parliamentary Party fought a series of tough campaigns in by-elections. Neither side managed to stand out from the other; it was not until the crisis surrounding compulsory military service that the decision was made in favor of Sinn Fein. The party won an overwhelming majority in Ireland in the 1918 general election to the British Parliament, with 73 out of a total of 105 Irish seats, 25 of which were won unopposed. The elected members of the Sinn Féin refused to enter the British Parliament and in turn proclaimed an Irish Republic with them as their legitimate government. They set up their own illegal underground parliament, which they called the Dáil . Irish volunteers had grown to 100,000 during the conscription crisis.
Establishment of the IRA and War of Independence
On January 21, 1919, a group of IRA volunteers under Dan Breen killed two members of the Royal Irish Constabulary . This event is widely seen as the beginning of the War of Independence. The following day, the Irish Volunteers were reorganized by the Dáil as the army of this new republic. Since then they have officially called themselves the Irish Republican Army . Secretary of Defense was Cathal Brugha , Michael Collins took on the role of chief intelligence officer and was considered the real head of the IRA.
For her goal of an independent, Republican Ireland, she led the Irish War of Independence against the British security forces and institutions in Ireland between 1919 and 1921 . In doing so, she mainly used the methods of guerrilla warfare in order to destroy the previous political system and the internal constitution of Ireland as an integral part of British national territory. Terror against the civilian population has been an agent of both the IRA and the British. Police officers and other members of the British administration were victims of attacks in Ireland. The retaliation of the probritic auxiliaries and the " Black and Tans " made the argument more and more brutal. A high point was November 21, 1920, the first Bloody Sunday in Irish history. In response to the killing of 12 British agents that morning, drunken auxiliaries fired into the crowd at a Gaelic football game in Croke Park that afternoon, killing 14 people.
The first half of 1921 saw a growing spiral of violence: 1,000 deaths (300 police officers / soldiers and 700 civilians or IRA volunteers) between January and July 1921. In addition, 4,500 IRA members (or suspected sympathizers) were arrested during this period. In May 1921, on the initiative of the Chief of Staff of the IRA Richard Mulcahy , IRA units captured the Custom House in Dublin and burned it down.
The war ended with an armistice on July 11, 1921, after the conflict had turned into a kind of "stalemate" situation.
Division and Irish Civil War
On December 6, 1921, the so-called Anglo-Irish Treaty was finally concluded, which provided for the establishment of an Irish Free State. As a result, the IRA split into supporters and opponents of the treaty. The nucleus of the Irish National Army , today's Irish Defense Forces of the Republic of Ireland , emerged from the proponents of the IRA . Michael Collins , who had become Commander in Chief of the New Irish Forces , was shot dead on August 22, 1922. Members of the IRA and other Irish Republicans who disagreed with the treaty dividing Ireland into the Irish Free State and Northern Ireland fought as the Irish Republican Army against their old comrades in the Irish Civil War from 1922 to 1923 and beyond for an independent, Republican and United Ireland continue.
Individual evidence
- ^ TP Coogan: The IRA. Fully revisited and updated. New York 2002, p. 15.
- ^ F. Cambell: Land and Revolution, Nationalist Politics in West of Ireland, 1891-1921 , New York 2005, p. 196 f.
- ^ CM Kennedy: Genesis of the Rising, 1912-1916: A Transformation of Nationalist Opinion. 2009, p. 274.
- ^ A b Joseph Lee: Ireland 1912–1985: politics and society. 1990, p. 24.
- ^ TP Coogan: 1916: The Easter Rising , 2005, p. 138.
- ↑ a b Easter Rising newspaper archive —from the BBC History website.
- ^ R. O'Donnell (Ed.): The Impact of the 1916 Rising: Among the Nations , Dublin 2008, pp. 196f.
- ↑ MECollins: Ireland 1868-1966 , 1993, p. 242.
- ^ Francis Stewart Leland Lyons: Ireland since the famine . Fontana Press, London, 10th ed. 1987, ISBN 0-00-686005-2 , pp. 408-409.
- ↑ An tÓglach, August 1918, from Coogan: The IRA , (1970), p. 41f.