Irish America expects better than the Government's lukewarm, half-heartedbacking for the US and the despicable posturing of the Opposition on Iraq,writes Patrick Hurley
Recent weeks will be remembered as the nadir of the Irish-American dimension. With few exceptions, the A to Z of the Irish political spectrum has displayed a pusillanimity in its relationship with the US that has caused Irish Americans to recoil with incredulity and ultimately disgust.
A recent letter to the Wall Street Journal entitled "Europe and America Must Stand Together" scripted the following truths: "The real bond between the US and Europe is the values we share: democracy, individual freedom, human rights and the Rule of Law Thanks in large part to American bravery, generosity and farsightedness, Europe was set free from the tyranny that devastated our continent in the 20th century The Iraqi regime and its weapons of mass destruction represent a clear threat to world security " The letter was signed by Spain, Britain, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Hungary, Italy, Poland, and Portugal. Ten other European countries, former communist states, have subsequently endorsed it. But not Ireland.
At the White House, on March 13th, the Taoiseach, Bertie Ahern, was a trove of vacuous, jingoistic- sounding quotes. His statement indicating that the Government is prepared to allow the US continued use of Shannon was no doubt greeted with loud applause. But far from being an announcement of a bold departure it was hedged with allusions to "public opinion" and was merely a glossed-up statement of the status quo.
Such half-heartedness was prompted by a political chameleon's eye on contrived polls, the recent "peace" rallies of the usual assortment of Yankee-bashers, and the vocal anti-Americanism of the Dublin 4 intelligentsia. Voluminous anti-American invective spews forth on a daily basis from D'Olier Street to Montrose.
There come defining moments in history when the times demand that elected leaders step forward and lead. We are at such a moment. Bertie Ahern and Brian Cowen should emulate President Bush and Secretary of State Colin Powell, who have chosen arduous principle over ephemeral popularity. Their example should be the political courage of Tony Blair and José María Aznar. Their inspiration should be the fledgling democracies of eastern and central Europe.
Where is the Taoiseach's defining, forthright address to the Irish nation, evoking the historic blood relationship between Ireland and America, citing the essential underpinning of the economy by US investment, explaining the criticality of Irish-American tourist dollars, recollecting how Ireland has prospered under the gratuitous US security umbrella, and expounding on the integral Irish-American component in crucial endeavours, from the peace process to immigration relief?
Mr Ahern needs to emphasise that the values of Western civilisation do not come cost-free. Sometimes war is the only resort to preserve them. That may be a difficult concept to grasp for an establishment, which has spent the last 30 years revising, sanitising and marginalising the history of the Irish freedom struggle, such that a new generation almost believes that the southern State magically evolved on the whim of some Brussels bureaucrat. Ireland's infatuation with the UN has always smacked of hypocrisy.
While the establishment fed its chimera of moral superiority by dispatching troops to defend Congolese, Cypriots and Lebanese, 60 miles north of Dublin, Irish nationalists were living as Kaffirs in an ideologically apartheid statelet. The rights of Northern nationalists were never in vogue in the sanctimonious salons of Dublin 4. As an additional stimulant to an illusory moral and intellectual superiority over the "American Cowboy", the sophisticates are now prepared to recklessly consign Iraq and the international order to an insecure, volatile future.
One of the few redeeming figures in this gutless morass has been Fianna Fáil's Willie O'Dea. In the Dáil debate on the Left's motion demanding that the Government immediately deny Shannon to US military aircraft, O'Dea emphatically declared himself "unashamedly" for the US. He, and other rural Fianna Fáil TDs, understand that the anti-American sentiment effusing from the Dublin 4 Utopia is diametrically opposed to the opinion of the "plain" people of Ireland - those people who traditionally have had no resort but to send their sons, daughters, nephews and nieces to prosper in the US.
As for Sinn Féin, a creature of Irish-American munificence, its conduct has been perfidious. Following its flirtation with the anti-American FARC narco-terrorists, its fawning liaison with Castro's Cuba, and now its major role as an assertive enabler of the anti-American movement, the party's extreme socialist agenda is glaringly exposed. Irish America expects Sinn Féin to be about Ireland's business. How the coddling of FARC, Fidel or Saddam can facilitate the demilitarisation of south Armagh or the defence of the Short Strand is a mystery indeed.
As we picture Tony Blair standing shoulder to shoulder with the United States, it is ironic that those who enthusiastically join in the anti-American jihad are among the first to whine about the special Anglo-American relationship overshadowing the Irish-American dimension.
The most despicable actor in this Celtic jihad has been Fine Gael. For a party that is so quick to adopt the moral high tone in lecturing others about their "flawed pedigree", its support for the Left's Dáil motion is repulsive.
Failed taoisigh Garret FitzGerald and John Bruton have treated us to pompous, stultifying newspaper columns of boilerplate, clichéd Eurospeak, as they endeavour to rationalise their party's duplicity. They arrogantly wag the finger at the "American Cowboy" at the behest of les enfants de Vichy and der kinder of the Reich. How ironic to observe John Bruton lecture George Bush and Tony Blair about having "no sense of history or its lessons".
Mr Bruton's academic career clearly never included a study of the disastrous appeasement policies of the 1930s. "The US has no better friend in Europe than Poland," said President Bush recently. Would that he could say the same of Ireland.
The ouster of Saddam will be followed by a major realignment of US foreign policy. The Cold War alliances have been consigned to history. The UN, which, in the words of former senator Patrick Moynihan, has always been "a theatre of the absurd, a decomposing corpse, and an insane asylum", has propelled itself into irrelevancy.
The warm sentiment recently expressed towards Ireland in the Oval Office will quickly evaporate, unless Bertie's shamrock diplomacy translates into moral and tangible support. Dublin can no longer evade the question: will it be Boston or Berlin?
As grim economic reality intrudes upon the Celtic Tiger fantasy, the Irish-American community will invariably go back to Congress. Let's hope that accusations of Irish perfidiousness are not ringing in our ears. We know that the Green Card will be going to Willie from Warsaw. Will there be one for Paddy from Ballydehob?
Patrick Hurley is president of the Regular Republican Club, 30th AD, in Woodside, New York City.
He is an officer of the County
Cork Association of New York
and contributes regularly to
the Irish Echo