This could also create a precedent for great powers to try to solve everything with populations transfer, the french could force the germans out of alsace lorraine, the germans could force the poles out of prussia, etc. A really grim timeline indeed.
What if the british transfered all the irish catholic population of Northern Ireland to the RoI?
This could also create a precedent for great powers to try to solve everything with populations transfer, the french could force the germans out of alsace lorraine, the germans could force the poles out of prussia, etc. A really grim timeline indeed.
You can't have forced population transfers without mass killing. 'Cuz people are pretty attached to their homes.
And as others have mentioned, the communities in Ireland were very close and intertwined. Religious persecution on this level would leave lots of protestants in Northern Ireland upset. And of course, there's all the protestants in Southern Ireland to think about. What happens to them if the British are persecuting catholics in the North?
This will also wreck relations between Ireland and the UK. While the republicans won independence for Southern Ireland, there were still plenty of people with an overall positive view of the British. Which would be a factor in the pro-treaty forces winning the Irish Civil War. If this is going on before or during the Irish Civil War, there's a very real danger that the anti-treaty forces win, which is to no-one's best interests. If it is after the Civil War, the British still lose alot of goodwill amongst the Irish population British business and diplomacy suffers accordingly.
And this won't help the British on the international stage. I predict the French and the American reactions will be especially important.
If you look at the legacy of forced migration in Europe, it is clear that the long-lasting traumatization of millions of people has not been worth the blood. Brutalizing real people in order to make populations conform to ethnolinguistic and religious ideals has resulted in whole populations who still suffer from the trauma generations later that also have consequences for the economic output of the populations that were so brutalized.
There are far better and far easier ways to avoid The Troubles of Northern Ireland.
fasquardon
Indeed, the French could force the Muslims out of Lebanon, the British force the Arabs out of Palestine, indeed it would be greem if such a precedent is settled.
Downunder it would cause real problems. During WWI, we had two referenda on conscription with the proposal being narrowly defeated twice. Just before the first referendum, the Easter Uprising happened and this hardened Catholic sentiment against the idea of sending Australians overseas to fight in Britian's wars. Archbishop Mannix was a key player in this debate, being an old Irishman hailing from the old country. My father met Cardinal Mannix (as he became) in the early 1950s. He believed he still harboured real resentment to what occurred in Dublin in 1916. Mannix was a bigger player again in the second referendum debate. Australia had a significant Catholic population (about 30%) of the total, most from Ireland. The Irish have long memories. I am part-Irish myself...
Exactly. Any enforced population transfer hasn't been nice event. People are not just leaveing their homes that easily. There would be much of violence even if government wants try keep that as minimised as possible. And due of logistical problesm it is really hard avoid deaths from starvations and illness. World was still recovering from WW1 and Spanish Flu. And government should be able either give some hard "justification" for such action or it has to be totalitarian regime which could give such terrible order. Czechs and Poles could hard expel Germans because there was much grudge against them and Soviets managed to do several expulsion because all were too much fear of Stalin and NKVD.
Normally a whole bunch of men are given extended paid leave and the armoury keys go missing. The results are more creative than usual. The other option is to involve paramilitaries. Again they’re more creative. A smaller population ends up being transferred.
to paraphrase the king above, “but who will dig the pits”
There isn’t a nice option here: it is a spectrum of repugnant acts by the state or on behalf of the state by men with commissions or other ranks to go back to.
10% of 3 million people is 300,000 and 7% is 210,000, which is more than I expected.
Does the Irish Civil War happen ITTL? I think it's more likely. And who wins ITTL? I think there will be a lot more support for the anti-treaty faction.
This is the Irish 1911 Census according to Wikipaedia.
The total population of Ireland according to the 1911 census was 4,390,219 of whom 2,192,048 were male and 2,198,171 were female.
According to the 1911 census, religious profession broke down as follows:
Religious profession | Number | Percentage |
| Roman Catholic | 3,238,656 | 73.8% |
| Church of Ireland | 575,489 | 13.1% |
| Presbyterian | 439,876 | 10.0% |
| Methodist | 61,806 | 1.4% |
| Other Christian denominations | 57,718 | 1.3% |
| Jewish | 5,101 | 0.1 |
I was surprised to see that half of Irish protestants were Anglicans.
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Virtually all Southern Protestants are C of I in 1911 and the massive shifts away from the Cof I and Presbyterians to the Baptists and Pentecostals hasn't happened yet. The first Pentecostal missionaries don't arrive in Ireland until 1916
It wouldn't have been clear what the point of this was. Southern Ireland (which didn't become a republic until after WW2) remained within the empire in the interwar period and until the statute of Westminster in the 1930s it was subject to the UK parliament on many issues. Plus there was the common work and travel area between the UK and Ireland, so inhibiting the Catholic Irish from living and working in the UK is likely to deprive the UK of a significant share of its workforce (and some of its military manpower).
Also the British claim to the six counties is based on the wishes of the majority of the inhabitants. Overtly messing with the composition of the population pretty much destroys the legitimacy of the claim.
Obviously this is aside from the morality of it all.
Also the British claim to the six counties is based on the wishes of the majority of the inhabitants. Overtly messing with the composition of the population pretty much destroys the legitimacy of the claim.
Obviously this is aside from the morality of it all.
The source for the Wikipaedia article was this.
http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/
And I found this article on the internet that gives the religious statistics for Ireland in 1911 and 1926.
https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/ni/religion.htm#1a
http://www.census.nationalarchives.ie/
And I found this article on the internet that gives the religious statistics for Ireland in 1911 and 1926.
https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/ni/religion.htm#1a
I did some calculations with the information in the webstie that the second link goes to.
Provence of Northern Ireland
1911 - 768,059 Protestants 61.6%
1926 - 781,652 Protestants 62.2%
Irish Free State/Republic of Ireland
1911 - 311,461 Protestants 9.9%
1926 - 207,307 Protestants 7.0%
It would be interesting to see how many protestants lived in the 3 counties of Ulster that didn't become part of Northern Ireland. According to the 1911 Census the total populations were.
| Ulster | 1,581,696 |
| Northern Ireland | 1,250,531 |
| Difference | 331,165 |
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With all of Ireland in revolt the UK is in no position to enforce this, an attempt would lead to civil war and unification. And would lead to liberal outrage at home.
There was a civil war in Ireland IOTL, but this one will be far bloodier.
I don't believe that it would lead to unification. I think all the Catholics in the nine counties of Ulster would flee south, while all the Protestants outside Ulster would flee north, to the "Mainland" or overseas. So at the cost of tens of thousands of lives, the economic damage and the extreme hatred of each side would have for the other from then to the present day the objective of the OP would be achieved. That is a 100% Protestant nine-county Ulster within the United Kingdom and a 100% Catholic 23-county Republic of Ireland.
75% of Ireland was in revolt in the first place and the other 25% were loyal to the union with Great Britain. That's why Northern Irish Protestants call themselves Loyalists and Unionists. That's also why the 1921 Partition of Ireland happened in the first place.
The loyalty of the 25% to the union with Great Britain will be even stronger if an all-Ireland civil war breaks out instead of "only" the OTL civil war in the South. Therefore, it won't be all of Ireland in terms of popular support although I concede that it would be all-Ireland in geographic terms.
Indeed the unrest would be intense. Liverpool especially comes to mind as does Glasgow and both were problematic enough. Remember 1919 saw the Valiant sent to Liverpool to bombard the city "if necessary" and tanks and artillery deployed to Glasgow. Then there would be the reaction of the unions, a very significant force at the time and one whose tied to Ireland should not be underestimated; there would be rail strikes and sabotage to prevent troop movement, and propaganda to encourage desertion and disobedience, Likewise amongst dockers and yard workers.
Then there's the international reaction, which will be extremely negative; you'd undoubtedly find foreign Catholic volunteers getting involved (an early International Brigade?), serious diplomatic, trade and financial repercussions.
Given that OTL, one of the factors that drove the UK to accept was international pressure both externally by the US but also internally from the Dominions you''d have to have a major POD to convince the Cabinet to go down this route, and yeah there's a whole other question regarding the ramifications within the UK to such a major ethnic cleansing.
As suggested if this occurs during/around the Civil War expect a much larger support for Dev and those against the Treaty, but given the Ulster units of the IRA were some of the less capable during the War of Independence (given Ulsters position) how much material aid does that bring? On the other hand like that old TL from a now banned member, this might actually end such a Civil War as the Pro Treaty side may very well see this as breaking any agreement with the UK anyway and as such a resumption of national resistance to UK forces.
If this did go ahead, yeah expect the OTL's poor Anglo-Irish relations to be insignificant compared to this. The 2 remaining Treaty Ports would most likely be untenable due to widespread local resistance (passive or active), and I'd expect the Free State to cease any engagement with the Commonwealth pretty much immediately and refuse the transfer of the Land Annuities from the start. The Free State would be socially, economically and politically shattered by such action and be a running sore for the UK going forwards.
Interestingly enough, Michael Portillo has actually done a documentary on this period (the second show is on tonight on RTE) using the Government papers/Cabinet office memos from the UK side, and it's pretty clear while they were willing to shape NI to suit the Protestant/Unionist position (hence the 6 counties) there's no will to go any further as you can see from the King's Speech when he opened Stormont.
As suggested if this occurs during/around the Civil War expect a much larger support for Dev and those against the Treaty, but given the Ulster units of the IRA were some of the less capable during the War of Independence (given Ulsters position) how much material aid does that bring? On the other hand like that old TL from a now banned member, this might actually end such a Civil War as the Pro Treaty side may very well see this as breaking any agreement with the UK anyway and as such a resumption of national resistance to UK forces.
If this did go ahead, yeah expect the OTL's poor Anglo-Irish relations to be insignificant compared to this. The 2 remaining Treaty Ports would most likely be untenable due to widespread local resistance (passive or active), and I'd expect the Free State to cease any engagement with the Commonwealth pretty much immediately and refuse the transfer of the Land Annuities from the start. The Free State would be socially, economically and politically shattered by such action and be a running sore for the UK going forwards.
Interestingly enough, Michael Portillo has actually done a documentary on this period (the second show is on tonight on RTE) using the Government papers/Cabinet office memos from the UK side, and it's pretty clear while they were willing to shape NI to suit the Protestant/Unionist position (hence the 6 counties) there's no will to go any further as you can see from the King's Speech when he opened Stormont.
That depends on when it happens. If it's in the 1920s, probably just diplomatic bluster. The US and French Navies combined probably could give the Royal Navy trouble, especially since the Royal Navy tended to be spread pretty thinly maintaining far flung colonies but I doubt they'd actually go to war over it. If it happens during World War I, it would probably keep the USA from entering the war on the entente side.
Dublin spits in their face most likely... Sure as hell doesn't believe London would honour such a deal. Remember OTL the position was sold to Dublin as NI being "minor" hence the fallout when the Border Commission came back with their response. If this is done during the Treaty talks to end the War of Independence, I can't see any Irish side agreeing to it, even with the threat from London to resume military operations (and the weakness the IRA had at that stage). If it's post 1922 CnaG having just fought a Civil War would be in no position to accept such a "solution", nor would the nation as I've said be in position to accept/support the amount of population you are talking about.
Also if it's post 1922, then the Free State is a Dominion, will the other Dominions stay silent over such a huge action like displacing so many, when the Dominions are increasingly developing their own rights and positions within the Commonwealth, OTL as I've said more than once it's been the other Dominions that have intervened in Anglo-Irish relations from pushing the end of the War of Independence, to stopping the UK from punishing Ireland when we declared the Republic.