Daniel Finn is the associate editor of the New Left Review, and aregular columnist for the radical leftist site Jacobin. He offers us inthis book, a political history of the paramilitary organization : theIrish Republican Army, the IRA. ---- In this book, based on numerousarchives and testimonies, he devotes himself to a rigorous treatment ofhis sources, while maintaining a distance with the subject, which wasalso that of his university thesis. By Gunpowder and by the Pen istherefore a very documented work, which helps to better understand thisperiod made up of multiple tensions between Ireland and the UnitedKingdom, but also between the different Irish republican components.The history of the IRA is a tumultuous one, made up of repressions,political manipulations and multiple ruptures. It is the singular storyof an organization bloodless at the beginning of the 1960s, followingthe guerrillas unleashed in 1956 to restore the unity of Ireland, of anorganization bruised by deep internal differences which, after themarches for civil rights from August 1968, regained full vitality.The author delves into the historical roots of the IRA, the internalconflicts within this organization, the complexity of the interweavingsbetween political activity and guerrilla warfare, between the republicantradition and socialism (often obscured in journalistic accounts ), withalways, in the background, the English colonialist policy. It crossestestimonies and analyzes to try to shed light on these dark decades,made up of dead and wounded, this very strange theater of a latent warand continues, over decades, a war without battles, sieges, or bombings.In the introduction, he measures the intensity of these clashes withapparently relatively low losses, but which, compared to the population,represents half of the British victims of the Second World War. The IRAsaw at least ten thousand people pass through its ranks, representing avery high proportion of the adult male population of Northern Irelandafter 1969.With this book, we travel through the history of Irish republicanism,and question the relationship between the struggle for independence andthe struggle for socialism. Are the Protestant workers proletarianbrothers or do they serve the interests of the settlers? Always topicaland relevant questions that agitate many current struggles.An important book, complete with a glossary and a chronology that runsfrom 1791 to 2022, far from emotional and sensationalism. A verydocumented and synthetic work, to get a more precise idea of thisconflict of these complex issues and to get rid of imprecise, eveninaccurate ideas. To browse, read and reread.Dominique Sureau (UCL Angers)Daniel Finn, By gunpowder and by the pen, political history of the IRA,Agone, May 2023, 440 pages, 24 euros.https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Lire-Finn-Par-la-poudre-et-par-la-plume-histoire-politique-de-l-IRA_________________________________________A - I N F O S N E W S S E R V I C EBy, For, and About AnarchistsSend news reports to A-infos-en mailing listA-infos-en@ainfos.ca
Geen opmerkingen:
Een reactie posten