Paschal Mooney (Fianna Fail) | Oireachtas source

Cuirim fáilte roimh an Aire. I welcome and commend the Minister who I know has a particular interest in this period of history. This is an extraordinarily generous gesture on the part of the Government at this remove. It might not seem like a lot, but it is. I know that the Minister has spoken out somewhat critically against the actions of the Irish Government after the Second World War, particularly with regard to those who survived the Holocaust. I share his view. It was a shameful episode.

It is appropriate in this context to consider the dynamic entrepreneurship and creative energy that our immigrant population has brought to this country. As a former emigrant, I have worked in the environment in which one makes a contribution to the country of one's adoption that is far in excess of that one might make at home. To a degree, I can understand from where the Minister is coming. I should declare an interest in so far as I am a member of the Connaught Rangers Association. I have visited the battlefields of northern France and Belgium and been to the very spot where Francis Ledwidge was killed. It was a most random act. As Senators will recall, he had worked as an engineer with Meath County Council and his expertise was being put to good use because he was leading a group of soldiers who were widening a road when a shell randomly landed in the middle of them. It was a terrible tragedy.

I would like to mention one little quibble I have. I appreciate that two thirds of the Minister's speech was in defence of the proud contribution the Defence Forces made during the Second World War. I do not want to quibble with this in any way, other than to say I found one paragraph rather interesting. He said:

From the remove of 2013 it is not easy to imagine the difficult decisions that people made when they consciously decided to leave Ireland to join the Allied Forces during the course of the Second World War. During that period Ireland decided to remain neutral but it is safe to say that at the time anti-British feeling was still running very high.

I do not dispute that analysis, but it should also be mentioned that Ireland was not the only country to declare neutrality. The Low Countries also declared neutrality. Holland, Belgium and Luxembourg were all invaded by Nazi forces and dragged into the war as a result. The British spent two fruitless years trying to get the United States to enter the war, but it refused to do so, although it did bring the Lend-Lease system into operation. In fairness, President Roosevelt did a lot to help the British war effort surreptitiously. Official America was, however, totally opposed to getting involved in the European war. It was not until the attack on Pearl Harbour that the United States engaged with it. Japan had become part of the Axis powers and aligned with Hitler and Nazism. I mention this because I always consider a certain revisionism is creeping into the history of Ireland's neutral position. As a small island off the shore of mainland Europe, Ireland was still in the throes of trying to declare its separate identity having come out of the Civil War 17 years earlier. The Irish should not have been neutral, but that is neither here nor there. As a student of Second World War history, particularly the enormous horrors Nazism imposed on the peoples of Europe, I am conscious of the circumstances of the time. During the period about which we are talking Britain stood alone against the forces of fascism. In that context, one can understand why people left the Defence Forces.

I am grateful to Dr. Bernard Kelly whose book, Returning Home, about the lack of welcome those who had fought during the Second World War received when they returned home, I commend to all Members of the House. I am also grateful to Dr. Michael Kennedy, the executive editor of the Royal Irish Academy's documents on Irish foreign policy, who has written widely on Ireland and the Second World War. According to Dr. Kelly's book, some 60,000 Irish men and women joined the British forces to fight against fascism. Some 9,000 Irish citizens died during the war. In this debate we are talking about the 12,000 who returned to Ireland. As the Minister indicated, it seems that the rest wisely chose to stay in the United Kingdom. Returning Home outlines the massive economic, social and psychological problems that these veterans faced for the rest of their lives.

For the 5,000 men who deserted the Defence Forces to join the British Army, poverty, joblessness and social exclusion were their reward. The book explores how Irish ex-servicemen coped with the frosty welcome they received when they came back to Ireland, the difficult task of reintegration, economic difficulties and psychological problems.

Dr. Kennedy raises a number of interesting questions. Who were the deserters? How many of them fought with the Allies is still unknown. Who they were is also a mystery. We know them only as a category. Apart from the voices of one or two individuals who have gone on record, we cannot and perhaps never will be able to tell which of them joined the Allies from the list of names and deserters published by the De Valera Government after the war. This was not known in 1945 and it is not known now. It is often assumed, according to Dr. Kennedy, that all of the deserters on the list fought on the side of the Allies, but his research suggests they did not.