Evening Post. TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 1921. THE OFFER TO IRELAND

Evening Post, Volume CII, Issue 40, 16 August 1921, Page 6

Evening Post. TUESDAY, AUGUST 16, 1921. THE OFFER TO IRELAND

The general impression produced by the Irish impasse reported yesterday was probably regret that negotiations should ever have been opened with men who have shown themselves so stubborn, so , perverse, so blind to the fundamental faftts of the position. The British Government made a truce which was in itself a. sign of weakness, made an offer which is probably the most generous ever made by one nation to another, but which was merely interpreted as another sign of weakness, and has received its reward in the shape of a refusal. " It courted humiliation," says the Morning Post, " and received its full measure." This, however, is fortunately not the whole story. Whatever may be thought of the ethics and the policy of bargaining at all under the conditions prevailing in Ireland when the truce was made—a point on which the Morning Post was vehemently opposed to the Government from the outset —the Government has really got something better than a snub and a deadlock'for its pains. The record of Britain's dealings with Ireland is stained by many blunders and even crimes. The last thirty years have witnessed an immense improvement —an improvement which, if the administration had been in Irish hands, would have made Ireland one of the happiest and most prosperous countries in the world. But, this essential condition being absent, the points of difference have been so .inflamed and exaggerated, and all the great and beneficent work so obscured, that British rule in Ireland has been held up, to the execration of the world as' though it were 'comparable to the German administration of Al-sace-Lorraine or Prussian Poland before the war. What Britain has gained by the humiliation which so troubles the Morning Post is that she has for the first time ,put herself absolutely right and Ireland absolutely wrong at the bar of the world's opinion. Not the Morning Post but the Daily News and General Smuts represent the real state of-the case. As one who once fought for the independence of his country against the British Empire, but after defeat became, through-the masjc of selfgovernment, a leader 'of Imperial forces in the war against Germany, General Smuts has fought and governed where .Sinn/Fein has merely dreamed and plotted. In the strongest possible terms he has urged the Sinn Feiners to accept the Government's offer, v and it is largely upon South Africa's experience that his argument is based. For Irishmen to say to the world' (he wrote to Mr. de Valera) that they will not be satisfied with Dominion status would be to alienate that sympathy which has been the mainstay of the Irish cause. ... It is far more than was offered the Transvaal and the Orange Free State. . . . It will be the gravest reflection on our statesmanship if this auspicious moment be allowed to pass. You, and your friends have a unique opportunity such as Parnell and his predecessors never had to secure a lasting >peace. , It is not' surprising to learn that the publication of this letter simultaneously with that of the rejection of the writer's advice has " caused a great sensation in Ireland." "The keen resentment in Sinn Fein circles " indicates that it has hit them hard. The Daily News is as far removed as General Smuts from any sympathy with coercion or Jingoism, or Castle rule, or from any ( enmity to Ireland. It has a strong pacifist tinge ; it preferred the risks of German rule to those of conscription ; in peace as in war it has vehemently opposed the Lloyd George Government; and it seems now to have more faith in the League of Nations than in the British Empire. The Daily News has not even dissented, so far as we are aware, from Mr. Asquith's extraordinary idea of giving an Irish Government the control of both naval and military defence. Yet this is what the Daily News has to say on the rejection of the British Government's offer: If Ireland desires the opinion of the civilised world on the choice presented by the British Cabinet, she has it in General Smuts's letter. It is a perfectly consistent attitude for Irishmen. to 'take up that Ireland would be happier, and therefore ought to have sovereign independence ; but that attitude ignores every -consideration of practical politics, and puts the shadow before the substance. The British proposals certainly carry concessions to the very limit of what is compatible with the safety of the United Kingdom and the Empire, and far beyond anything that the American Union, which is the stronghold of Irish sympathy, has ever dreamed of conceding to its component Spates. The offer to Ireland includes " the status of a Dominion enjoying complete autonomy on taxation and finance, maintaining her own Courts of Law, Judges, constabulary; and her own police; to take over the Irish postal services and , all matters relating to education, land, agriculture, mines, minerals,

forestry, housing, labour unemployment, transport, trade, public health, insurance, and the liquor traffic." The most important reser-" vations are those of naval and air defence, without which Britain could not guarantee the maintenance of Irish liberties nor even of her own. But the whole offer is rejected on the ground that these reservations derogate from " the separate nationhood and right to self-determination " which Ireland can only realise on the footing of complete independence. Ireland, says Mr. de Valera, "is prepared to hazard her independence on the basis of moral right, and is confident that, as she would threaten no nation or people, they (sic) Would be free from aggression themselves." Britain might allow this fatuous confidence to be put to the test if the destiny of Ireland only were at stake, but as her own destiny would be submitted to the same hazard the concession would be tantamount to suicide.