FREE STATE ARMY.

Auckland Star, Volume LIV, Issue 110, 10 May 1923, Page 5

FREE STATE ARMY.

DEMOBILISATION AT HAND. FIGHTERS IN GREAT WAR. MAT BE FIRST TO GO. (By Cable.—Press Association.—Copyright.) (Received 0.30 a.m.) LONDON, May 9. The special correspondent of the Australian Press Association at Dublin states that the question of the demobilisation of the Free State Army is causing grave concern among ex-British service men in Ireland. Sixty per cent of the National Army fought for the Empire in the Great War, and it is now reported that the Free State Government proposes to demobilise exactly that proportion at the earlieet possible moment. It ia rumoured that ex-soldiers will be the first to go, and the appointment of I General Murphy to the poet of Chief Commissioner of the Dublin police gives colour to the rumour. General Murphy 19 a young man, being only 31 years of age. He ww a colonel in the British Army, winning the D.S.O. and the Military' Cross in the field. He. is the only real soldier in the higher command of the Free State Army, and while the Army Council could not afford to do without him during the fighting, he is a constant thorn in its side.General Murphy's appointment to an ornamental post is regarded as a. clever move to get rid of him. The Gaelic League party is now in supreme command of the army. Its ideals, expressed repeatedly by General Mulcahy, are hardly the ideals of the British Army, and ex-British soldiefe are hardly the men to carry them out.— (A. and N.Z. Cable.)