Early 20th Century Anti-Colonialism

I. National Aspirations and Self-Determination



A. Woodrow Wilson’s Fourteen Points--Wilson gave his Fourteen Points speech before a joint session of Congress, to assure them--and the American People--that the United States was entering the World War to ensure peace and freedom for all, and not to assist Great Britain and France of achieving their war aims.

1. Point 5--A free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the populations concerned must have equal weight with the equitable claims of the government whose title is to be determined.

2. Versailles Peace Conference--attended by representatives of many nations, seeking self-determination for their national aspirations.



II. Ireland



A. Home Rule Controversy

1. Home Rule--the political goal of most Irish people, particularly those who identified themselves as “nationalists.”

a) Parliamentary--a series of Irish politicians--Daniel O’Connell, Charles Stewart Parnell, and John Redmon, in particular--worked with the English parliamentary parties to achieve the goal of Home Rule. Parnell was especially adept at the maneuvers necessary to gain leverage with the Whigs and Tories

b) Irish Republican Brotherhood (IRB)--other Irish nationalists felt compelled to use the force of arms to achieve Home Rule--or, better yet, complete independence from Great Britain.



2. Orange Order--made up of Protestant Irish who considered themselves “loyalists”--that is to say, loyal to the Crown of England.

a) Orange Order threatened civil war if “forced” into Home Rule; proposed that northern counties of “Ulster” remain with England.

b) Orange Order purchased 25,000 rifles and 3,000,000 rounds of ammunition from Germany, which gave the slogan “Mauser or Kaiser, Any King Will Do” a special meaning--but seems a somewhat strange slogan for a group that identified itself as loyal to the King of England (and, presumably, his government).



c) Curragh Mutiny--the commander of the Curragh Barracks, home base of the British military presence in Ireland, was ordered by the British prime minister to prepare the troops at Curragh to much to Belfast should disorder break out. That commander, Sir Arthur Padget, “misunderstood” those orders to mean an immediate mobilization. However, rather than have his officer corps, solidly Irish Protestant, have to mobilize “against their own people,” he offered them a chance to resign; 57 of the 70 officers did so. This forced Prime Minister Herbert Asquith, to withdraw the order. Emboldened by making the British government back down, and confident the military would never move against them, the Orange Order became even more intransient.

3. War in 1914--put Home Rule on the back burner, but the Irish members of Parliament (MPs) backed the war effort anyway, and encouraged all Irish men to join the military.



B. 1916 Easter Rising



1. Revolutionary Cadre--while many Irish supported England during the war, a dedicated group around schoolteacher, barrister, and poet Padraig Pearse seized control of several public buildings (including the General Post Office--GPO) on Monday, April 24, 1916 (the Monday after Easter). Several members of the IRB, along with socialist labor leader James Connolly and his Irish Citizen’s Army.

2. Roger Casement--a leading figure with the Irish Volunteers (a paramilitary group not affiliated with the IRB--but which the IRB had infiltrated) attempted to procure rifles from Germany, but Germany was less sanguine about the chances for a successful rebellion, and did not supply anywhere near the number of weapons Casement requested.

a) German communications had already been compromised by the British, who knew where the arms were to be delivered, and when the rebellion was to take place.

3. The Rebellion Crushed--although it took nearly a week to accomplish, and lots of heavy artillery that destroyed much of central Dublin, the participants left at the end of the week, in order to save civilian lives and those of their comrades (the leaders expected to be executed), Pearse and Connolly surrendered under a white flag.



a) The leaders were executed during the next two weeks, after secret military tribunals. James Connolly was so badly wounded that the doctors only gave him a couple of days to live, so he was brought to Kilmainham Gaol on a stretcher and strapped to a chair so the rifle squad could shoot him before he died.



b) The actions of the British government in this instance turned those who died or were executed for the action into martyrs, and the survivors into patriots. Before the Rising, support for the IRB was largely among the poor; afterwards support for the rebels and against the British became more widespread.

4. Public Outcry--against the heavy-handed treatment (particularly the execution of Connolly) led Great Britain to imprison the rest of those they arrested (except Roger Casement, who was executed in Great Britain); the executions were also halted because the British were still hoping to persuade the United States into entering the war, and the Irish lobby in the US was particularly vociferous in the attacks against this action (in part, it is believed the reason that Eamon De Valera avoided execution was because he was still a US citizen).



C. Anglo-Irish War (1919-1921)

1. 1918 Irish Election--a separatist political party, Sinn Fein, ran promising to boycott the British Parliament, and instead establish a parliament in Dublin, the Dial. This group also encourage a boycott of British courts, and the non-payment of taxes to the British, as well. Sinn Fein when the election by an overwhelming margin, and the party followed through on their promises, electing De Valera the first president.



2. Establishment of the Irish Republican Army (IRA)--from the ashes of the IRB, and led by a former clerk by the name of Michael Collins, who developed the tactics the IRA used against the British--all the while bicycling around Ireland while the British pursued him in a massive manhunt.



3. British response--imprisoning Irish political leaders, hanging alleged rebels. The British government recruited former soldiers to supplement the Royal Irish Constabulary--known for their makeshift uniforms, the Black and Tans. These men were responsible for murdering civilians in retaliation for attacks on the army and police, burning villages and parts of towns and cities.

a) The reality of the death and destruction wrought by British-aligned forces made David Lloyd-George’s threat of the “scorched-earth” response in Ireland real, and it would have affected more than just the Irish middle class.



D. Irish Civil War (1921-1923)



III. Zionism

A. Definition--the belief that Jews, as a distinct people, should have a homeland in what they believe to be their ancient land, Judea/Israel.

1. Judaism a religion or a nationality--most Jews would answer that it is both. “Throughout the middle ages and into the 20th century, most of the European world agreed that Jews constituted a distinct nation. This concept of nation does not require that a nation have either a territory or a government, but rather, it identifies, as a nation any distinct group of people with a common language and culture. Only in the 19th century did it become common to assume that each nation should have its own distinct government; this is the political philosophy of nationalism. In fact, Jews had a remarkable degree of self-government until the 19th century. So long as Jews lived in their ghettos, they were allowed to collect their own taxes, run their own courts, and otherwise behave as citizens of a landless and distinctly second-class Jewish nation.” (http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Judaism/jewnation.html).

a) This definition begs the question, is there a difference between a nation and an ethnic group--and should all ethnic groups be considered nations?

B. The Diaspora--recall that the migration of Jews throughout the Mediterranean predates any conflict with the Romans, but that Jews did retain, during this entire time period, an attachment to their homeland.

1. Bar Kochba Revolt (135)--revolt led by Simon Bar Kochba, who actually ruled parts of Galilee for two years before the Romans crushed the revolt. As part of the sanctions in retaliation for this revolt, Jews were prohibited from entering Jerusalem (admittedly a harsh penalty)--but they were not “expelled” from Israel.

2. Establishing Palestine--the Roman ruler Hadrian abolished the use of the name Judea, naming the country instead Palestine, to recall the Philistine people the Jews fought for control of the country with in ancient times.

3. Palestine under the Arabs--Jews maintained a steady, if small, population in Palestine, with few of the discriminatory issued they faced in the Christian world--but scratching a living out of the land there was very difficult.



C. Labor Zionism--advocated settling Jews in Palestine, working in Kibbutzim (communal farms) and as workers in cities. Political Zionism, on the other hand, relied upon appeals to the European powers (especially Great Britain immediately after the end of World War I, when that country assumed political control over Palestine. Jews began moving to Palestine in larger numbers, although their population never was greater than the Muslim population in the region.



1. Greater numbers of Jews--living in the country made the fantasy of establishing a Jewish state a greater reality for Jews--and a threat to those people already living there, who responded with greater hostility toward Jews. This became particularly true during the mandate period, after the Balfour Declaration, when Great Britain proclaimed support for the creation of a Jewish homeland.

IV. Conclusion--What Creates a Nation?