A History of Ireland in International Relations. Owen McGee

102 Nevertheless, he was trusted by Michael MacWhite, who managed to cultivate some pro-Irish sympathies in southern France, including Lyon, after he addressed a French republican assembly in Bordeaux, a one-time home to fairly influential Irish merchants. MacWhite also attempted to encourage debate on the question of direct Franco-Irish trade in northern France. Yann Goblet of the University of Rennes, which also produced French publications on Ireland, supported this work and also organised regular public meetings in sympathy with Ireland in Brittany. This was probably not a potential source of strength for Ireland, however, due to Parisian antipathy to all Breton nationalists.103

Upon assuming direct personal responsibility for the Dáil’s department of foreign affairs in February 1921, de Valera gave a French press interview in which he contrasted alleged British state support for sectarian riots in Belfast with the full civil and religious liberties offered to Irish citizens by the Irish republic. He also emphasised his belief, however, that the Anglo-Irish dispute ‘can be solved definitely and completely by any of the general formulae about the rights of small nations which received almost universal recognition during the war, and were particularly approved of by the responsible statesmen of Britain’.104 De Valera’s determination to allow Ireland to adapt fully to the emerging European political order, whether it was influenced unduly by Britain or not, was reflected by his subsequent promotion of MacWhite to a diplomat in Switzerland, with the job of keeping Ireland fully informed of all developments surrounding the League of Nations initiative at Geneva.105

Before leaving the French capital, MacWhite together with Joseph Walshe, an ex-Jesuit now appointed to the Parisian consulate office, decided to launch an Irish cultural mission in France to ‘project a distinct image of the country’.106 This was done through the promotion of Irish arts and culture, and was based on an understanding of ‘how closely intellectual esteem is related to social and trade relations’.107 Some inspiration for this idea was drawn from a prior Canadian suggestion that a ‘World Conference of the Irish Race’ should be held in Montreal.108 A new Irish organisation that was founded in South Africa to support the Irish White Cross offered to host such an occasion.109 De Valera, however, preferred Paris as a choice of location. This was possibly because the American Relief Association had its headquarters in Paris. Certainly, the Dáil had some hopes that the separate ‘American Committee for Relief in Ireland’ initiative could help to encourage a process of American foreign direct investment in Ireland.110 It seems, however, that Paris was favoured simply because of its much closer proximity to Dublin. To boost support for the Irish White Cross, Laurence Ginnell was sent to Argentina, where historic Irish émigrés had traditionally been of British imperial sympathies. Perhaps for this very reason, Ginnell was allowed to meet the Argentinian foreign minister and to organise a Buenos Aires convention in support of both the Irish White Cross and the idea of sending South American representatives to the proposed Parisian conference.111 It was also announced that this was to become the occasion for launching a new global Irish organisation with a focus upon the world of international trade. The value that the Dáil placed in this initiative was reflected by the fact that its foreign affairs department would spend £6,000 in planning the event.112

Symbolically, the ‘World Conference of the Irish Race’ was planned to take place in January 1922 on the third anniversary of the formation of Dáil Éireann and the initial Irish republican declaration of independence. To a significant extent, however, this obscured the reality that the original Irish diplomatic mission to seek foreign powers’ formal recognition of an Irish republic had already reached an unsuccessful conclusion. The evident impossibility of convincing the republican countries of America and France to defy Britain by recognising the Irish government can explain why Irish political debate now became focused almost exclusively on attempting to convince British public opinion of the justice of Irish demands. The best illustration of this trend was Aodh de Blacam’s dedication of his book What Sinn Féin Stands for: The Irish Republican Movement, Its History, Aims and Ideals, Examined as to Their Significance to the World (Dublin, 1921) to all ‘men of goodwill’ throughout the British Empire.113 It was also reflected by de Valera’s suggestion to an Australian interviewer that while ‘Australia, Canada and New Zealand might, in a sense, put forward a plea that they enjoy something more than independence [by being partners in a British Empire] … we in Ireland, in claiming the republic, seek simple independence and nothing more.’114 Griffith had encouraged Irish merchants or journalists in Denmark, Italy and Argentina to affiliate themselves with the Irish department of foreign affairs, while de Valera persuaded a couple of individuals to launch diplomatic work in Spain. However, such candidates could only report on the tenor of journalism in their host countries.115 Egyptians who sought Irish contacts were rebuffed, while the Middle East, Africa and Asia were ignored entirely. In central Europe, a couple of journalists or academics offered to do propaganda work,116 while Gerald O’Kelly, an Irish-born Austrian count, could be said to have launched the Irish mission in Switzerland.117 St John Gaffney, a former American consul in Munich, had expressed support for an Irish republic, but he could not be recruited for diplomatic purposes because he was an American citizen.118 Finally, Patrick MacCartan, a former member of the IRB who visited the United States frequently, tested the possibility of receiving recognition from the USSR. After initial and seemingly positive contacts were made, the Russians decided that they valued the prospect of a British trade agreement more, and so they sent MacCartan away from Moscow without granting any recognition to the Irish republic.119

These diplomatic dead ends increased the relevance of British foreign office personnel in seeking to broker an Anglo-Irish understanding. Having first offered to do propaganda work for the Dáil, by February 1921 Erskine Childers had managed to persuade de Valera to employ him as a political advisor. For a time, this led John Chartres, a former colleague of Childers’ in the British labour ministry, to nominally assume the responsibility of attempting to set up an Irish diplomatic office in Berlin.120 Through Irish organisations in South Africa, British army personnel such as Maurice Moore and Tom Casement (a brother of Roger Casement’s) managed to persuade de Valera to enter into communications with Jan Smuts en route to the signing of a truce-like agreement in July 1921. Under its terms, restrictions on the bearing of firearms by Irishmen were applied and secret liaison officers were appointed between the British and Irish governments for both military and policing matters. The Irish liaison officers for the army were Eamon Duggan and Robert Barton, who were also the Dáil’s ministers for home affairs and agriculture respectively. The Irish liaison officers for the police were Emmet Dalton, a former British soldier, and Eoin O’Duffy, an increasingly outspoken figure regarding disturbances in Ulster, both of whom now became associates of Michael Collins.121 Rather than reflecting on these details, Irish public opinion was inclined to simply celebrate the cessation of British coercion in July 1921. Meanwhile, notwithstanding the compromises involved, the liaison situation appeared to most Irish republican volunteers to be a welcome ‘first sign of