Sir, - Your Editorial of November 1st, "Europe's Rapid Reaction Force", was a model of clarity and logic. It is devoutly to be wished that the "neutrality" lobby, to which so much space has been granted under its many abbreviations, takes note, as also should the contributor of an article, published in the same edition, purporting to reveal a "breach" of this neutrality.
Such brittle arguments have been floating in the plastic logic of "peace studies" for years. While the writer's description of war simply stresses the obvious (horror, mud, blood) the honour of nations and individuals must also be given due respect. As the Irish Government does today with its contribution to Europe's Rapid Reaction Force, so did John Redmond judge that Ireland's honour demanded an acceptance of its responsibilities as a European nation in a European war. He also hoped that these disciplined Irishmen would eventually become the army of an independent Ireland. He fell between British bumbling over conscription and the so-called "physical force" conspirators who led Ireland astray into a century of Irish horror, mud, blood. etc., from Soloheadbeg to Omagh.
The National Volunteers who remained loyal to their elected political leader (170,000 out of 180,000) were upholders of the constitutional nationalism to which the vast majority on this island adhere. They accepted their perceived responsibilities. Many today accept theirs, which is to remember their dead and remind others of them by wearing the poppy. The mistaken view that it is solely a British/ Unionist emblem is to be respected, if sincerely held. But those volunteers were at the heart of our constitutional nationalism as tens of thousands of "martyrs for Old Ireland" in a much more honourable way than many of the shadowy figures whose baleful influence from the grave prolongs our current horror, mud and blood. - Yours, etc.,
Patrick Goggin, Glenageary Woods, Dun Laoghaire, Co Dublin.