The Daily News. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1922. IRELAND’S SORRY PLIGHT.

Taranaki Daily News, 30 November 1922, Page 4

The Daily News. THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 30, 1922. IRELAND’S SORRY PLIGHT.

It can readily be understood that throughout the British Empire there is but one sentiment felt with regard to the guerilla warfare in Ireland —a feeling of intense sorrow and disappointment, that it still drags on, and that side by side with the wanton destruction in innumerable instances, there is “inhumanely spiteful cruelty.” That it should have been deemed necessary by the Free State Government to proceed to extreme measures in the case of Childers, who is said to have inspired armed resistance, emphasises the serious nature of the internecine struggle, as the result of which members of the Government have to take their lives in their hands, not knowing when they may be the victims of a violent death. The pity of this horrible and harrowing business is that those who are responsible for the rebellion are comparatively few ■ in number—desperate men with desperate methods of making war on their countrymen, and virtually compelling the Free State Government to resort to the extreme penalty known to the law. Deplorable as such a state of affairs must be to all right-minded people, yet it is unthinkable that armed and ruthless rebellion can be allowed to hold sway for a moment longer than can be helped. Mr. Cosgrove, in a recent interview, stated that the policy of the execution of rebels was the only safeguard, and would be carried out rigorously, nor does any other course appear possible if the peace of Ireland is ever to be secured. The picture of the existing conditions in Dublin, as drawn by a Press correspondent, is lurid in its terrible suggestion of cruelty and bloodshed. “Machine guns on the roofs of houses, the continuous rapping of snipers’ rifles going on night after night, slowly blotting out the smiles and wearing out the nerves of the inhabitants,” while organised raids and murders are constantly terrorising the people. Probably many will consider that the worst feature in this inferno is the part that some of the women are taking, recalling the horrors of the, French revolution. The people of the Dominions cannot forget that Ireland is part of the Empire. At the same time they cannot understand the inhumanity of these Irish rebels. The Irish people met with in the Dominions are I mostly honored and respected, possessing a capacity for good citi- [ zenship. It is, therefore, almost i impossible to conceive there are I men and women of the same race | in their native land who appear ! to be brutally savage, who can only see “red,” and whose hand I is uplifted against their kith and I kin. In the end the rebellion : must be stamped out, and the re- • Leis compelled to conform to law , and order. Ireland is now a selfj governing unit of the Empire, .just ; as much as New Zealand. The p?o--j pie demanded self-government, and it was conceded on most generous terms, yet a small but determined section are doing all in their power to c: 11 forth martial law and all that it stands for. To what further depths of madness the rebels will descend can only i be conjectured, but no fact is more I certain than that in the end law and order will prevail. It is to be hoped that a change for the better will soon be apparent. Meanwhile justice must be done, fearlessly and firmly, for when the lives and property of law-abiding citizens are at stake there is a duty to perform, and though that duty is repellant to the authorities and the people, unless it is executed in the way it should be. nothing but chaos will result.