History meant that Ireland would always have conflict.
...al measures and some were using physical force to achieve their goal. During Easter week an armed rising attempted to overthrow the government, but failed. Their leaders were killed, creating sympathy for the IRA and Sinn Fein, its political wing. In the 1918 election, Sinn Fein replaced the old Irish parliamentary parties, and established its own Irish parliament. The following War of Independence between Britain and the IRA was eventually ended by a treaty signed in 1920. The treaty also confirmed the northern counties of Ulster as protestant land. Now, roughly speaking, the Catholics lived in the southern parts of the country and the Protestants in the northern. 1969 By the 1950s there were growing signs that some Catholics were prepared to accept equality within Northern Ireland. This, despite of the unfair treatment they had received from the Protestants during the last decades. In 1967 the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association was formed to state the Catholic’s demands. The campaign copied the civil rights campaign in the United States, involving protests, marches and sit-ins. The government was unable to handle the growing civil disorder, and in 1969 the British government sent in troops to restore order. As a protest IRA began a campaign of violence against the army. By 1972 it was clear that the local Northern Irish government was unable to handle the situation and the Westminster parliament suspended the Northern Ireland government and replaced it with direct rule from Westminster. This situation continued into the 1990s. The violence reached a peak in 1972, when 468 people died. Since then it has gradually declined to an annual average of below 100. Despite taking steps towards peace, the situation in Belfast has worsened since the IRA ceasefire in 1994, according to Northern Ireland academic, Peter Shirlow. PARTITION Ireland, in particular Northern Ireland, has been plagued with hate and anger for the past 100 years. The problems stem from a lack of understanding between two cultures, the Catholic Northern Irish and the Protestant Northern Irish. The Catholics feel that when the country was partitioned in 1920, they were on the wrong side of the border and were therefore done out of their political heritage. In retrospect, the Protestants have a history in Northern Ireland that dates back to the 17th century, with the plantation in Ulster. As a result, there are two sides, both unwilling to negotiate and both with a strong sense of history in which they believe themselves to be victims. As long as they have a selective sense of history, then what ever they do, no matter how inhumane or unreasonable, will always be justified with that history. In 1920, Britain faced what was called than, ‘Britain’s biggest ever colonial problem’. This was the ever-growing difficulties in Ireland – the riots, the bombings, the public outcry. Britains only solution was partition. Although the complete withdrawal from Ireland, perhaps, because of the financial drain and affect on it’s international reputation may have been the more ideal resolution, Britain owed allegiance to those still loyal to the crown, it’s kith and kin in the north of Ireland. This Protestant preponderance said they would fight to maintain the birthright to be British. The best solution was a qualified partition, because built into the Government of Ireland Act was the prospect that at some future date, the island co...