Irish Army Deserters who Fought For British Army in WW2

Before you tell me they all should be pardoned ( I'm assuming the UK members would agree with this), ask yourself this, if the UK was "neutral" during WW2, would you want your defence force members deserting to join another army ( albeit an honourable thing to do)

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If they had been just Irish citizens that had joined the British Army they would have been honoured for their bravery, it was the fact that they 'deserted' that is the issue and I cannot understand why so many did this 5000 is a hell of a big number to desert. I would need to understand the reasons behind why they did it before saying whether or not they should be pardoned. It would seem that if they went to fight an enemy they did nothing wrong, but being stopped from getting 'state jobs' seems like the proverbial sledgehammer to crack a nut or are the powers that be hiding something more sinister?

We are talking Irish and they may have been told they were going to the Desert.

I was in Dublin recently and signed a petition outside the GPO for these lads.
These lads went to fight Fascism and should have their name's cleared.
Nationalism should have went out the window in this war as it was a war to save humanity from Fascism,de Valera actually sent a condolence message when Hitler died...plus harboured many Nazi criminals after the war,so these lads done nothing compared to that.

The Irish government should do the right thing and exonerate these men.

They had their names blacklisted so they couldn't get jobs...smacks of McCarthyism. They should have got a medal! Is there an online thing people can sign?

The Lone Ranger wrote:They had their names blacklisted so they couldn't get jobs...smacks of McCarthyism. They should have got a medal! Is there an online thing people can sign?

Mate here is a link here...sign it and pass it on please.

http://www.forthesakeofexample.com/index.htm

Regarding the blacklisting,it also happened to the lads who fought for the International Brigades in Spain...as you say,it was an early form of McCarthyism carried out by the state at the behest of the Catholic Church...Ireland then and now is very conservative.

CaribeCelt wrote:

The Lone Ranger wrote:They had their names blacklisted so they couldn't get jobs...smacks of McCarthyism. They should have got a medal! Is there an online thing people can sign?

Mate here is a link here...sign it and pass it on please.

http://www.forthesakeofexample.com/index.htm

Regarding the blacklisting,it also happened to the lads who fought for the International Brigades in Spain...as you say,it was an early form of McCarthyism carried out by the state at the behest of the Catholic Church...Ireland then and now is very conservative.

I've taken a snippet of the form Barry, seems like it's closed now...

Wouldn't say Ireland is conservative any more. The power of the Church has been slowly but surely eroded since the 70's. It is even handing over patronage of the majority of schools now. ( Long overdue I might add)

3rdforum wrote:Wouldn't say Ireland is conservative any more. The power of the Church has been slowly but surely eroded since the 70's. It is even handing over patronage of the majority of schools now. ( Long overdue I might add)

Politically it is very conservative.
imo Fine Gael and the Tory party in Britain are very similar...even the political parties in the south and the DUP in the north are very similar in their political and economic outlook.

At last,common sense prevails and these lads get exonerated.
At a time when Fascism was killing millions these lads went to fight,instead of sitting on their hands.

http://www.rte.ie/news/2012/0612/govt-pardon-for-former-soldiers.html

About time too. Better late than never though most will be dead and won't know about a pardon

100 of them still alive Cam

3rdforum wrote:100 of them still alive Cam

Yeah, that's what I mean...one out of every forty five.