Letters to Editor, Irish News. Belfast. Wednesday, November 14, 2018

Patrick Murphy (November 10) penned a column about the First World War. Although I rarely agree with Mr. Murphy’s positioning on Irish affairs, I must commend him for that particular piece of writing.

The ‘Great’ War was anything but. It was an unnecessary slaughter of the gullible; an imperial debacle that hoodwinked a multitude into giving their precious lives to appease the bloated egos of a callous few. Redmond’s Volunteers were fools, brave fools but fools nonetheless. It’s sickening to realize how courageous Irishmen died fighting on behalf of the foreign government that was at that time oppressing the Irish people and in brutal occupation of Irish land.

Redmond called upon Irishmen to ‘… risk their lives together and spill their blood together’. He did so from the safety of his ivory tower. Although his bother, Willie, died in Flanders, Redmond faced no danger, but the blood of thousands lay upon his soft hands. His futile attempts to ingratiate himself with the English establishment is indicative of the colonial conditioning that existed then and exists today in the Free State as evidenced by the groveling approach of southern ministers to WW1 events. Neither Redmond nor Coveney seems to have heard of Perfidious Albion.

There was nothing honorable or laudable in giving your life to put a smirk of the faces of generals, or the financial elite who controlled them. Today, a cult of specious reasoning has formed around this dirty historical conflict. Perhaps young men and women are again insidiously conditioned to prepare for a terrible war. Global warmongers appear to be prepping us for such.

Yet, as John-Paul Sartre said, ‘When the rich wage war, it’s the poor who die.’

So kudos to Patrick Murphy for telling it like it is, on this occasion.