Was it justified? Why did it fail so horribly?
Irish Rebellion of 1798
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>Justified
Yeah, as was every other rebellion. That said, the reason it's lionised so much, a reason not really acknowledged, is that it's basically the only time that Protestants in significant quantities rebelled in the name of separatism from the UK, and supported equal rights for Catholics.
If it was Catholics or Gaels rebelling in the name of those specifically aggrieved causes, it would not be trumpeted as much as an Ulster-centric Protestant rebellion, even though the specifically national and religious questions aren't the same in such a rebellion as the real issues of Irish history.
If one wanted to be particularly uncharitable, the rebellion can be seen less as an Irish rebellion and more of a Franco-American style liberal revolution which drew on the conditions within Ireland to effect itself.
>Why did it fail so horribly?
Because Britain was in the middle of a war with the French, who Tone got to attempt an invasion of Ireland.
In general, rebelling to take advantage of a war is a bad move, because the enemy will have mobilised to a far greater extent than they would be able to justify just by reference to your rebellion, and what damage you can do will be far outweighed by the damage that fully mobilised nation states will be able to inflict on your enemy. Compare the amount of Brits killed in the five days of 1916 (143) to the amount of Brits killed in five days of World War One, assuming an equal amount of dead every day (2378).
Guerrilla war is useful to interrupt peacetime, but during total war it becomes an annoyance.
>The newly sited British artillery opened up on the advancing French and Irish and cut them down in droves. French officers, however, quickly identified an area of scrub and undergrowth in a defile facing the centre of the artillery line which interfered with, and provided some cover from, the British line of fire.
>The French launched a bayonet charge, the ferocity and determination of which unnerved the units stationed behind the artillery. The British units began to waver before the French reached their lines and eventually turned in panic and fled the battlefield, abandoning the gunners and artillery. Some soldiers of the Longford and Kilkenny militias ran to join the republicans and even joined in the fighting against their former comrades.
>In the headlong flight of thousands of British soldiers, large quantities of guns and equipment were abandoned, among which was General Lake's personal luggage. Although not pursued a mile or two beyond Castlebar, the British did not stop until reaching Tuam, with some units fleeing as far as Athlone in the panic. The panic was such that only the arrival of Cornwallis at Athlone prevented further flight across the Shannon.
en.wikipedia.org
Ladies and gentleman, the British army
>Yeah, as was every other rebellion
Jew spotted
most irish rebellions seemed pretty justified m8
>Was it justified?
The majority of the population were heavily discriminated against for not converting to a different religion and suffered limited rights because of it. 90% of the people were forbidden from owning land and had to rent from absentee landlords. Catholics couldn't vote or were allowed an education. Adding to that very few Irish at the time could speak English and Irish had no legal status.
Even if you take out the past history of bloodshed between Ireland and England the circumstances at the time were intolerable.
>Why did it fail so horribly?
The main French landing with Tone failed and France was reluctant to send more, it was a miracle they managed to avoid the Royal Navy the first time. The rebellion had some successes, Battle of Castlebar being the big one, but simply put they didn't have the numbers, supplies or experience to take on the British army.
Britain was always fearful of Ireland breaking away as it would leave their west coast susceptible to invasion and with the war with France not going as they'd hoped this intensified their fear that a French-allied independent Ireland would be a massive risk to their security. Simply put even if the rebels defeated the Brits at every turn, the British government wasn't going to give up that easily.
>m8
What makes you think otherwise? Most Irish rebellions were either in response directly to something shitty that their current overlords did to them, or were attempts to secure the right to essentially have more authority over themselves to avoid more shitty things happening at the hands of careless overlords.
England in particular never did a very good job of ruling Ireland, considering that at one point even the protestants wanted them to fuck off and stop meddling.
>the only time that Protestants in significant quantities rebelled in the name of separatism from the UK
That ended pretty quickly,when 100 Protestants suspected of being loyalists,were rounded up on Wexford bridge and were run through with pikes and thrown into the river.
It failed because of how open the "secret" society of the united Irishmen was, there were lots of spies and informers. Because of this the Brits found out their plans early and managed to arrest all of the serious leaders of the rebellion before it had even kicked off. Also in Ulster they rose at different times allowing the brits to pick them off one at a time.
1798 >>> 1916
It was the impetus for England to divide and conquer, really work to drive a wedge between the Protestant and Catholic communities of Ireland. Before 1798 anti-English sentiment was about equal, but after it England started to crack down harder on Catholics and showing preferential treatment to Protestant communities to divide them into two groups, the 'favoured elite' and the underclass. It's a colonial tactic they would go on to use to great success in Africa and India.
Ireland was a testing ground for the colonial tactics that would turn Britain into an empire, which makes sense since it was essentially Britain's first colony.
> which makes sense since it was essentially Britain's first colony.
that'd be wales m8
>England=Britain
Well done for figuring out the code.
"Britain" was a meme first used to ease the accession of James VI/I to the English throne, and later used by the Georgians and English to justify imperialism against other white people.
Can anything really be justified by un-involved parties in retrospect?
It says militia you dope. Untrained British militia vs French regulars is hardly a fair fight.
It says "British soldiers"
British redcoats vs the few of France's peasant army (muh levy en mass) that survived the strom + some ragtag Irish rebels
i suppose you're right in a way, that ireland was a collaborative effort by all british. welsh normans invaded ireland, scots settled northern ireland, and english settle there and administer everything.
that said, english were settling in wales after the conquest there and any "british" colonialism was always under the aegis of england.
>Hurr durr this one battle proves the Irish are horrendous at fighting
The "United Irishmen" weren't really proper soldiers, nor were they really well trained or equipped. Their entire rebellion was based on France helping them. There was never a time when Ireland was going to go toe to toe with Britain in 1798. The entire rebellion was "France and USA did these sickass revolutions, why don't we have one? We've been dicked over too!" and then France didn't manage to get enough support over and thus the rebellion failed.
The reason people obsess over the 1798 rebellion and Wolfe Tone is more about the significance and the tragedy. The rebels were fighting for a just cause and really threw themselves at it. It isn't a display of how bad the Irish were or how good the British were, but rather how tragically unorganised and doomed it was from the moment France failed to properly land.
Hugh O'Neills rebellion is a similar one, with potentially devastating results for England were it not for the failure of promised foreign aid.
Very true, but my gripe was with how the person I was responding to claimed one failure by a militia was representative of the overall quality of the British Army.