The Troubles in a United Ireland

Ryker of Terra

Ryker of Terra

What would the Troubles look like in a United Ireland? How would Dublin respond to a low-level insurgency from the Protestants in Ulster? Would there even be an insurgency, or would the loyalists move to Britain instead to stay with the crown?

As for how this United Ireland might come about, I don't really know. I recall reading that the British left out some of the Ulster counties from NI because adding them would have resulted in a Catholic majority which could then conceivably vote for unification. Otherwise, no idea.

Apologies for not contributing more ideas, but I know little about this topic.
 

nezza

A mass-scale immigration to the UK is likely. The Protestant areas of Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow would see an influx of highly pissed off loyalists who would be a constant pain in the side of successive governments.

Those cities would also be hotspots of anti-Irish feeling with the Old firm derby in Glashow becoming even more inflamed. A more worrying possibility would be that Manchester and Liverpool could be launching posts for attacks on the Republic.
 
Ryker of Terra

Ryker of Terra

nezza said:
A more worrying possibility would be that Manchester and Liverpool could be launching posts for attacks on the Republic.
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You mean the loyalists would be carrying out terrorist attacks from Britain? How could they, I doubt London will turn a blind eye to it?
 
BELFAST

BELFAST

A united Ireland could have a Unionist party holding the balance of power in the Dail.
The troubles otl started after long-term gerrymandering and discrimination against nationalists.
A lot depends on what leads to the problems.
a unified Ireland would probably still have a Reginal government in Ulster and its own police force.
 
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sparky42

Ryker of Terra said:
What would the Troubles look like in a United Ireland? How would Dublin respond to a low-level insurgency from the Protestants in Ulster? Would there even be an insurgency, or would the loyalists move to Britain instead to stay with the crown?

As for how this United Ireland might come about, I don't really know. I recall reading that the British left out some of the Ulster counties from NI because adding them would have resulted in a Catholic majority which could then conceivably vote for unification. Otherwise, no idea.

Apologies for not contributing more ideas, but I know little about this topic.
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When are you suggesting Unification would happen? Different periods would mean different capabilities and willingness from both Loyalists and the Republic for violence.
 
BELFAST

BELFAST

There was the offer by the British during ww2 to reunify Ireland if Ireland declared war on Germany.
Any conflict would probably happen before or during the transition.
 

sparky42

BELFAST said:
There was the offer by the British during ww2 to reunify Ireland if Ireland declared war on Germany.
Any conflict would probably happen before or during the transition.
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If that offer happened, then the Loyalists are likely to have significant issues, first I’d imagine the British Government would look “poorly” at any disruption during war and secondly unlike OTL if Ireland is in the war post war it will have a large, trained, experience and equipped military that will be larger than what the Loyalists could field.
 
colonel

colonel

Donor
BELFAST said:
A united Ireland could have a Union party holding the balance of power in the Dail.
The troubles otl started after long-term gerrymandering and discrimination against nationalists.
A lot depends on what leads to the problems.
a unified Ireland would probably still have a Reginal government in Ulster and its own police force.
Click to expand...
You could possibly avoid or at least diminish any troubles if in reunification the Brits demand Eire and Ulster retain separate Assemblies for local issues, while the Dail guarantees minority rights of Protestants in the South and Catholics in the North. If it happens before Ireland declares itself a Republic you also keep it as a Dominion — otherwise have them join the Commonwealth.
 
BELFAST

BELFAST

colonel said:
You could possibly avoid or at least diminish any troubles if in reunification the Brits demand Eire and Ulster retain separate Assemblies for local issues, while the Dail guarantees minority rights of Protestants in the South and Catholics in the North. If it happens before Ireland declares itself a Republic you also keep it as a Dominion — otherwise have them join the Commonwealth.
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Eire Éire is the name of the whole island of Ireland in the Irish language not English.
Ulster is 9 counties and northern Ireland has only 6 counties.
270px-Ulster_counties.svg.png
 
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sparky42

colonel said:
You could possibly avoid or at least diminish any troubles if in reunification the Brits demand Eire and Ulster retain separate Assemblies for local issues, while the Dail guarantees minority rights of Protestants in the South and Catholics in the North. If it happens before Ireland declares itself a Republic you also keep it as a Dominion — otherwise have them join the Commonwealth.
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How do you figure that works? If local matters are separate how do you stop the gerrymandering that went on in the North? Or the abuses of state power? To stay in the Commonwealth is easy, just have India become a Republic first, the rules get changed and then Ireland wouldn’t have to withdraw on declaring a Republic, assuming of course that happens while dealing with integrating NI.
 
Godot

Godot

colonel said:
You could possibly avoid or at least diminish any troubles if in reunification the Brits demand Eire and Ulster retain separate Assemblies for local issues, while the Dail guarantees minority rights of Protestants in the South and Catholics in the North. If it happens before Ireland declares itself a Republic you also keep it as a Dominion — otherwise have them join the Commonwealth.
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This is basically the Éire Nua proposal which even SF abandoned. Really no party favors that level of autonomy, since most Nationalists favor remaining a centralized state while most Unionists can't even stand the thought.
nezza said:
A mass-scale immigration to the UK is likely. The Protestant areas of Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow would see an influx of highly pissed off loyalists who would be a constant pain in the side of successive governments.

Those cities would also be hotspots of anti-Irish feeling with the Old firm derby in Glashow becoming even more inflamed. A more worrying possibility would be that Manchester and Liverpool could be launching posts for attacks on the Republic.
Click to expand...
This is almost certainly true yeah. Particularly an early union, or a unified island from the get-go, seeing as how reactionary de Valera became on religious issues. Hardcore Protestants would be miffed about being in a majority Catholic state, and moderate Protestants would be alienated pretty damn quick (assuming the cultural route undertaken by FF early on isn't butterflied, anyway).
 

sparky42

Assouf said:
This is basically the Éire Nua proposal which even SF abandoned. Really no party favors that level of autonomy, since most Nationalists favor remaining a centralized state while most Unionists can't even stand the thought.

This is almost certainly true yeah. Particularly an early union, or a unified island from the get-go, seeing as how reactionary de Valera became on religious issues. Hardcore Protestants would be miffed about being in a majority Catholic state, and moderate Protestants would be alienated pretty damn quick (assuming the cultural route undertaken by FF early on isn't butterflied, anyway).
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I would say it’s highly likely that an early or from the start unified island has so many butterflies that assuming Dev and FFs OTL policies is a bit of a stretch, you are talking about massive changes to the very nature of the state.
 
Godot

Godot

sparky42 said:
I would say it’s highly likely that an early or from the start unified island has so many butterflies that assuming Dev and FFs OTL policies is a bit of a stretch, you are talking about massive changes to the very nature of the state.
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Yeah I suppose so. It really depends on how and when independence is brought about. Hell, with single island it wouldn't shock me if Dominion status stuck around, with the Protestants to the North fighting back any rolling back of the Treaty. Dunno, though.
 
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