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In Time of War: Ireland, Ulster and the Price of Neutrality 1939-1945
When the Union Jack was hauled down over the Atlantic naval ports of Cobh, Berehaven and Lough Swilly in 1939, the Irish were jubilant. But in London, Churchill brooded on the 'incomprehensible' act of surrendering three of the Royal Navy's finest ports when Europe was about to go to war. Eighteen months later, Churchill was talking of military action against Ireland. He demanded the return of the ports and the Irish made ready to defend their country against British as well as German invasion. In Northern Ireland, a Unionist Government vainly tried to introduce conscription. Along the west coast British submarines prowled the seas searching for German U-boats sheltering in the bays; British agents toured the villages of Donegal in search of fifth columnists while their German counterparts tried to make contact with the IRA. This is a fascinating study of Ireland during the Second World War. ""Anybody interested in Irish affairs will have to get Fisk's book.""-Literary Review.
580 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1983
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About the author
Robert Fisk
46 books793 followersRobert Fisk was an English writer and journalist. As Middle East correspondent of The Independent, he has primarily been based in Beirut for more than 30 years. He has published a number of books and has reported on the United States'war in Afghanistan and its 2003 invasion of Iraq. Fisk holds more British and International Journalism awards than any other foreign correspondent. The New York Times once described Robert Fisk as "probably the most famous foreign correspondent in Britain.
Fisk has said that journalism must "challenge authority, all authority, especially so when governments and politicians take us to war." He is a pacifist and has never voted.
Fisk has said that journalism must "challenge authority, all authority, especially so when governments and politicians take us to war." He is a pacifist and has never voted.
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Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews
September 5, 2021
While Ireland was politically separated nearly a century ago into two distinct regions, the extent of that separation has waxed and waned with events. And in surveying that divide, there was no time when it was greater than during the Second World War. For six years the northern quarter of the island that was still a part of the United Kingdom was engaged in battle with the Axis powers, while the independent remainder maintained a careful neutrality in the hope of avoiding any involvement in the fighting.
This neutrality, however did not mean that Ireland could avoid a conflict that was taking place right outside its borders. Just off the coast – sometimes within view of people on the shore – German U-boats sank merchant shipping and battled British escorts. German and British warplanes often flew overhead, and occasionally crashed onto Irish soil. Both sides pressured Ireland to join the war as an ally, while simultaneously threatening to invade the country with their forces. And while Ireland was able to avoid any formal commitment to the fighting, its citizens suffered from the German blockade and faced wartime restrictions that could be as stringent as those of any belligerent power.
Ireland’s handling of “the Emergency” (as it was termed) was so sensitive that nearly four decades after it ended many government files related to it were still classified. This did not deter Robert Fisk, though, from diligently exploring archives and interviewing survivors to construct a history of the island’s experience of the conflict. Primarily centered on the politics of the period, it tells the story of how three governments – Éamon de Valera’s in Dublin, Winston Churchill’s in London, and the Ulster Protestant regime in Belfast – responded to the demands of the war while pursuing agendas that were often at direct variance with each other and which reflected the perseverance of longstanding animosities on all sides.
Fisk begins his book by describing the transfer of the three “treaty ports” by the British to the Irish in 1938. A remnant of the British military presence in southern Ireland, it took place amid considerable controversy in Westminster, as Churchill and others questioned the wisdom of doing so at a time when war loomed in Europe. The transfer proved a sore point in British-Irish relations in the war, as the British repeatedly sought throughout the war to restore access to the ports, which would allow them to better protect British convoys crossing the North Atlantic. Though de Valera’s refusal to do so was prompted by the need to maintain Ireland’s neutral stance, Fisk underscores his ardent nationalism as an equally important factor, as having only recently gained Ireland’s sovereignty he was unwilling to risk it in service to Britain’s war with Germany.
Ireland’s reluctance to participate in the war is a recurring theme of Fisk’s book. Having won independence less than two decades previously, most Irish were uninterested in entangling their country’s fate with that of the British. This was especially true in the summer of 1940 when Britain’s fate looked its bleakest, at which point some British leaders even floated the idea of winning Ireland’s involvement by offering de Valera his heart’s greatest desire: the six counties that made up Northern Ireland. De Valera’s rejection of it was shaped by his memory of John Redmond’s decision as Irish Nationalist Party leader to support Britain’s involvement in the First World War in return for Irish home rule, a decision which ultimately cost his party the support of the Irish Catholic voters who made up its base. As the ultimate beneficiary of Redmond’s political error, de Valera was not about to repeat his mistake.
This suited the politicians in Ulster just fine. Fisk portrays the Stormont leadership in Belfast as surpassing even de Valera in their parochial concerns. Like him their approach to the conflict was shaped by the experience of the First World War, in which thousands of Ulstermen who volunteered to serve in the British Army were slaughtered on the Western Front. Worried that conscription would expose the shallowness of Ulster’s commitment to Britain, the Stormont government were only too happy to use de Valera’s reluctance to join the war as a contrast with their own loyal service to the empire, even if that service was only voluntary and their loyalty contingent on British support for the continued partition of the island.
Fisk tells this story in a book that is less a single coherent narrative than it is a series of interconnected essays focused on particular aspects of his subject. This occasionally results in a degree of repetition and some bouncing around in the chronology of events. The main problem with his book, however, is with its age, as there has been considerable scholarship on the Ireland and the war since its original publication in 1983 (such as Clair Wills’s superb That Neutral Island on the cultural history of Ireland’s wartime experience), much of which has drawn upon the documents unavailable to Fisk when he originally conducted his research. That a more up-to-date study has yet to be written speaks to the quality of Fisk’s book, which despite its age remains the best overview of Ireland’s involvement in the Second World War.
This neutrality, however did not mean that Ireland could avoid a conflict that was taking place right outside its borders. Just off the coast – sometimes within view of people on the shore – German U-boats sank merchant shipping and battled British escorts. German and British warplanes often flew overhead, and occasionally crashed onto Irish soil. Both sides pressured Ireland to join the war as an ally, while simultaneously threatening to invade the country with their forces. And while Ireland was able to avoid any formal commitment to the fighting, its citizens suffered from the German blockade and faced wartime restrictions that could be as stringent as those of any belligerent power.
Ireland’s handling of “the Emergency” (as it was termed) was so sensitive that nearly four decades after it ended many government files related to it were still classified. This did not deter Robert Fisk, though, from diligently exploring archives and interviewing survivors to construct a history of the island’s experience of the conflict. Primarily centered on the politics of the period, it tells the story of how three governments – Éamon de Valera’s in Dublin, Winston Churchill’s in London, and the Ulster Protestant regime in Belfast – responded to the demands of the war while pursuing agendas that were often at direct variance with each other and which reflected the perseverance of longstanding animosities on all sides.
Fisk begins his book by describing the transfer of the three “treaty ports” by the British to the Irish in 1938. A remnant of the British military presence in southern Ireland, it took place amid considerable controversy in Westminster, as Churchill and others questioned the wisdom of doing so at a time when war loomed in Europe. The transfer proved a sore point in British-Irish relations in the war, as the British repeatedly sought throughout the war to restore access to the ports, which would allow them to better protect British convoys crossing the North Atlantic. Though de Valera’s refusal to do so was prompted by the need to maintain Ireland’s neutral stance, Fisk underscores his ardent nationalism as an equally important factor, as having only recently gained Ireland’s sovereignty he was unwilling to risk it in service to Britain’s war with Germany.
Ireland’s reluctance to participate in the war is a recurring theme of Fisk’s book. Having won independence less than two decades previously, most Irish were uninterested in entangling their country’s fate with that of the British. This was especially true in the summer of 1940 when Britain’s fate looked its bleakest, at which point some British leaders even floated the idea of winning Ireland’s involvement by offering de Valera his heart’s greatest desire: the six counties that made up Northern Ireland. De Valera’s rejection of it was shaped by his memory of John Redmond’s decision as Irish Nationalist Party leader to support Britain’s involvement in the First World War in return for Irish home rule, a decision which ultimately cost his party the support of the Irish Catholic voters who made up its base. As the ultimate beneficiary of Redmond’s political error, de Valera was not about to repeat his mistake.
This suited the politicians in Ulster just fine. Fisk portrays the Stormont leadership in Belfast as surpassing even de Valera in their parochial concerns. Like him their approach to the conflict was shaped by the experience of the First World War, in which thousands of Ulstermen who volunteered to serve in the British Army were slaughtered on the Western Front. Worried that conscription would expose the shallowness of Ulster’s commitment to Britain, the Stormont government were only too happy to use de Valera’s reluctance to join the war as a contrast with their own loyal service to the empire, even if that service was only voluntary and their loyalty contingent on British support for the continued partition of the island.
Fisk tells this story in a book that is less a single coherent narrative than it is a series of interconnected essays focused on particular aspects of his subject. This occasionally results in a degree of repetition and some bouncing around in the chronology of events. The main problem with his book, however, is with its age, as there has been considerable scholarship on the Ireland and the war since its original publication in 1983 (such as Clair Wills’s superb That Neutral Island on the cultural history of Ireland’s wartime experience), much of which has drawn upon the documents unavailable to Fisk when he originally conducted his research. That a more up-to-date study has yet to be written speaks to the quality of Fisk’s book, which despite its age remains the best overview of Ireland’s involvement in the Second World War.
June 5, 2012
It's difficult to believe that Fisk has such an encyclopaedic knowledge of all the subjects he's covered in such a lustrous career. Nevertheless, this book's a masterpiece if a tad dry in parts. A great source book if you're interested in Irish history.
March 12, 2015
Fisk researched the hell out of this subject and it it's all in this book. It's a prototype Fisk book, his thesis on Irish neutrality during WWII. At its best, he unearths an interesting story that he skillfully ties into the modern day (at the writing, a time when both Ireland and Germany were partitioned). At worst, he buries the reader in unnecessary details that grind the narrative to a halt. Fortunately, in his later books he doesn't do that.
October 9, 2018
A great book that is really well researched, but there are more than a couple of points and quotes that are repeated.
November 6, 2025
This is a big, well written and impeccably researched book. The book contains fascinating information about Ireland during the 2nd world war and the difficulties encountered trying to remain neutral. Lots and lots of details that I wasn't aware or fully aware of. This is highly recommended for any fans of history, politics, Ireland and even more so if a proud Irish man like myself. 4.5 stars.
July 3, 2011
I like Carroll better
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews