Irish Republicanism & the Germans.

 

The Irish nationalist and Protestant, Roger Casement, accepted a knighthood from the British for his humanitarian work. He exposed the atrocities that were taking place in the Congo that was colonized by the Belgians. Casement was hanged for treason because he collaborated with the Germans during WWI. While in custody, Casement offered to use his influence to get the planned Easter Rising called off. The British authorities declined his offer and let the 1916 Easter Rising take place. I think they saw it as an opportunity to lance the boil.

When the Rising took place, Home Rule for Ireland was already on the cards and James Connolly, a Scottish-born Irish Republican, who was one of the leaders of the Rising, knew that they were going out to be slaughtered. Connolly, who had something of a martyr complex, took his fourteen-year-son, Roddy, with him. Most of the people in Dublin hardly understood what the Rising was about and neither were they sympathetic to the rebels. The 'Allowance Women', who had husbands serving with the British army couldn't draw their allowance because the post office had been occupied by the rebels. Many of the people who got killed during the Rising were innocent Dubliners who got caught in the crossfire or were killed by English artillery.

In WWII, Sean Russell, the IRA chief of staff collaborated with the Nazis and so did the IRA man Frank Ryan, who fought with the International Brigades in Spain. The IRA leader foolishly believed that if the Nazis won the war, Hitler would have given Ireland its independence. I don't think that either Frank Ryan or Sean Russell were sympathetic to the Nazis, but they seemed to have thought that England's enemies were Ireland's friend. I suspect that if Germany had won the war, somebody like the fascist Blackshirt, Oswald Mosley, or William Joyce, aka Lord Haw-Haw, would have been put in charge of running Ireland for the Nazis. As for the IRA men like Sean Russell, they would have been sent to the concentration camps.

Eamon de Valera who took part in the Rising but wasn't executed, would later imprison and hang some members of the IRA when he got into political office. Some IRA men died on hunger strike while imprisoned by de Valera's government. On hearing of Hitler's death, Eamon de Valera sent condolences to what was left of the German government.