IRELAND AND GERMANY

Wairarapa Times-Age, 11 September 1939, Page 6

IRELAND AND GERMANY

GREAT BRITAIN’S INFLUENCE.

There were many Irishmen who had little enough love for England in 1914; yet, at a very modest figure, 150.000 Southern Irishmen fought with the British forces against Germany in the Great War, remarks the “Irish Times” in answering the question recently raised by Herr Hess, the Fuehrer’s deputy, concerning Eire’s attitude in a future war. Today there are new, and more cogent, reasons why they should take arms against Germany, rather than on her side, in • the next war—if there is a next war—and even ampler reasons exist why Ireland should refuse to “conclude pacts directly” against Great Britain, or to “prepare bases for general air- attacks” against her. In the first place, while the friendship between the 26 counties and Great Britain may not be perfect, it certainly is more intimate than any conceivable friendship between the 26 counties and Germany. In the second place, Mr de Valera, who speaks for a majority of the "people, has given an unconditional promise that he will not permit any part of Irish territory to be used as bases for an attack upon Great Britain—and we prefer his promise to Herr Rudolf Hess’s suppositions. In the third place, Ireland, South as well as North, retains a useful tincture of common sense. The 26 counties constitute a democratic State —the most democratic State, perhaps, in every sense of the adjective, in the entire world —and they have few illusions about a world dominated by Teuton ideas. Great Britain’s influence upon Ireland may be bad, from the point of view of Irish extreme Republicans, but the influence of Germany, if she should overcome the Western democracies in a major war, is likely to be a great deal worse. There have been many whispers concerning the circulation of “German gold” among the extremists of the 26 counties. We do not think them deserving of great credit, and we doubt, in any event, whether Germany would have'much good out of them. The independence of the 26 counties has begotten a new sense of pride and of self-reliance among Irishmen which is proof against German gold, German flattery or German threats.