Anti Treaty Forces win the Civil war?!

magick

Just a Theory, but what would Ireland be like today,and our constitution be like today if the Anti Treaty Forces won the civil war?!

A lot of my more Republican ancestors would have partied for years afterwards anyway...;)

Zombrex

magick wrote:

Just a Theory, but what would Ireland be like today,and our constitution be like today if the Anti Treaty Forces won the civil war?!

Impossible to tell, though I would imagine it would have sparked another war of independence that probably would have gone on a lot longer, and even if we had won 32 counties we would have had a terrorist war in the north from the get go.

On an international stage, a lot of the dismantling of the Commonwealth was done by Irish diplomates, so Ireland not accepting the Treaty would probably had large knock on effect to other British Empire countries.

Zombrex

Deleted User wrote:

A lot of my more Republican ancestors would have partied for years afterwards anyway...;)

If they weren't shot by the British

seamus

Much like the North, I would say the British would probably have gone back on the idea of an Irish Free State. In fact, I think that eventually we would end up with the same situtation that we have now - a separated country. At some point, the Anti-Treaty crowd would have realised that the bulk of the Northern six counties didn't want to join the United Ireland (at the time), and would probably have agreed on partition.
Since this would have taken a good deal longer, we would probably still be poor, heavily Catholic and about a thousands steps behind in the peace process.

Wicknight

Wicknight wrote:

If they weren't shot by the British

Ah the Brits weren't so bad, they 'only' executed 16 after the 1916 Rising. The Free State, on the other hand, executed 77 during the Civil War, including the 8 who died at Ballyseedy, 4 who were shot and blown up at Killarney a few days later and 5 who were shot and then placed on a mine in Caherciveen. In fact more were executed in a few days in Kerry by their own countrymen than were shot by the British after the Rising...

LostinBlanch

And it was the Dublin Guard that were sent down to do the job by General Richard Mulcahy. On a lighter note, could that have been the start of the Dublin Kerry rivalry?

LostinBlanch

LostinBlanch wrote:

On a lighter note, could that have been the start of the Dublin Kerry rivalry?

No no, that was due to the fact that Kerry people are natural athletes and the Dubs were jealous...when I think of it, maybe that's why they were so nasty in Ballyseedy...;)

gurramok

Deleted User wrote:

Ah the Brits weren't so bad, they 'only' executed 16 after the 1916 Rising. The Free State, on the other hand, executed 77 during the Civil War, including the 8 who died at Ballyseedy, 4 who were shot and blown up at Killarney a few days later and 5 who were shot and then placed on a mine in Caherciveen. In fact more were executed in a few days in Kerry by their own countrymen than were shot by the British after the Rising...

Jayzus, thats horrific placing them on a mine.
Hard to believe that old Fine Gael(Pro-treaty)were involved in murderous activites, just as bad as the anti-treaty side.

hill16

And the [mod edit] on this board think its funny that the Free State carried out such terrible acts.

Hill 16 read the charter -you may not refer to other posters on this board other than by their username.
You must be civil at all times and deal with the post and not the poster.

Zombrex

gurramok wrote:

Hard to believe that old Fine Gael(Pro-treaty)were involved in murderous activites, just as bad as the anti-treaty side.

Why? These were the same people as the anti-treaty side, they only split on that issue. Before that they were both waging the same war against the British Army

hill16 wrote:

And the [mod edit] on this board think its funny that the Free State carried out such terrible acts.

Its all fun and games till someone gets executed. Then it fecking hilarious ... :rolleyes:

Ajnag

On an international stage, a lot of the dismantling of the Commonwealth was done by Irish diplomates,

Wicknight, Would you have any links or further reading on this?
Cheers.

netwhizkid

IMO if the Anti Treaty Forces won the Civil war, De-Valera and his cronies would have made a massive attempt on the north and drawn the entire British Army who were well honed from WWI and were rearing to go. We'd be massacred. Simple as that. The Mistake that was made by the Republicans/SF/FF was they didn't trump Britain during WWII, they'd neither have had the men/logistics nor firepower to resist. We'd be fully united today if they invaded the north then. Some people even argue we should have actually joined the war on the Allies side Churchill had offered a United Ireland..... a nation once again if i remember him saying correctly. no I'm not over 80 but I heard a tape of it once. Whatever way you look at it the FF bandwagon has thrown away our independence at least 5 times. Firstly they tried it by fighting during the Civil War and Killing Collins. Secondly that they didn't Invade the north during WWII or joining the Allies either way would have secured it. Haughey and Blainey got notions of Invading during the 70's that would have brought the British as far south as Cork before a defensive could be mounted. They should have just trumped Blair and screwed him out and forced a United Ireland during the Good Friday accord. Whatever way you look at it Fianna Fail have failed miserably to bring about a United Ireland, No wonder the Unionist are taking a shining to Bertie Ahern. The best hope I'd say that ever existed was JFK had he not been shot he'd have secured a United Ireland without a doubt.

gurramok

Wicknight wrote:

Why? These were the same people as the anti-treaty side, they only split on that issue. Before that they were both waging the same war against the British Army

Because i was taught in school that ONLY the anti-treaty side was involved in murderous activities and the pro-treaty side were white as daz white!

Capt'n Midnight

netwhizkid wrote:

The Mistake that was made by the Republicans/SF/FF was they didn't trump Britain during WWII, they'd neither have had the men/logistics nor firepower to resist. We'd be fully united today if they invaded the north then. Some people even argue we should have actually joined the war on the Allies side Churchill had offered a United Ireland.....

naw would not have happened. Look at the other interventions around the place Russia , Ottoman etc. Earlier in the war it would have been treated more seriously, later in the war there was plenty of manpower what with the Yanks and all the other countries coming on board.

The old IRA was too small to win more than 26 counties especially after they revealled who they were at the time of the treaty negoations. This was around the time of the wars in Poland and Greece so I'd reckon the Brits wouldn't be a walk over. Look at how they behaved in Iraq around the same time.

I've posted before about that united Ireland deal. FF would not have kept thier majority in the Dail and the unionists could easily hold the balance of power. It was a non-starter politically for Dev & co for selfish reasons, that and the whole nastiness of war.

Zombrex

Ajnag wrote:

Wicknight, Would you have any links or further reading on this?
Cheers.

Just my Leaving Cert history book. There is a good book about it (our history teacher tried to get us to read it at the time), but I can't for the life of me remember what it is called .. if I remember I'll PM you

rsynnott

netwhizkid wrote:

They should have just trumped Blair and screwed him out and forced a United Ireland during the Good Friday accord. Whatever way you look at it Fianna Fail have failed miserably to bring about a United Ireland, No wonder the Unionist are taking a shining to Bertie Ahern. The best hope I'd say that ever existed was JFK had he not been shot he'd have secured a United Ireland without a doubt.

Forced a UI? How, precisely?

And I have no words to describe the JFK thing. No polite words, anyway.

In any case, the Anti-Treaty side did not have popular support. Ultimately, it would have only won in principle; an invasion would have been out of the question.

Fine Gaeler

Both sides did terrible, shameful things during the civil war.That incident in Kerry is something that I'd be ashamed of.However, to be fair,that did happen in retaliation to a shameful deed that was done by the anti- treatyites to a Free State soldier.It was a dirty vicious conflict.

Had the others won we'd be all living under British sovereignty with Home Rule parliaments and no thriving economy......yuk

DublinWriter

I would imagine that Churchill would have lost his patience (remeber he gassed the Kurds just like Saddam did!), and doubled, if not tripled the military presence in the Island post 1922 and declared marshall law for a good few years.

I reckon by the late 40's, our political history would have been very similar to India (and Pakistan), with the Brits losing the ability to hold in unwilling members of the Commonwealth resulting in a violent internal conflict between North and South that would have defined the border.

I think we'd still be roughly where we are today, give or take a few border counties.