Hesitant Europeans, Self-Defeating Irredentists andSecurity Free-Riders? West German Assessments of Irish

Foreign Policy during the Early Cold War, 1949–59

Mervyn O’Driscoll*

School of History, University College Cork

ABSTRACT

Friendship is a motif often used to portray the state of West German-Irish relationsafter 1949. In several ways this characterisation is accurate, but it elides official WestGermany’s adverse estimation of many aspects of post-war Ireland. On closerexamination official West German commentators, particularly in the AuswärtigesAmt (AA), were decidedly critical of Irish insularity, neutrality, protectionism andirredentism. Bonn considered that Dublin was wrongheaded and failed to understandthe fundamentals of the Cold War world. In Bonn’s view, Irish state policies shouldbe impelled by the strategic need for Western economic and military solidarity andcooperation in the face of the Soviet behemoth rather than parochial nationalinterests. Thus, the AA’s internal dialogue critiqued key aspects of Ireland in the1950s even as Bonn valued Ireland’s benevolent attitude to West Germany and theIrish policy of supporting the reunification of Germany.

INTRODUCTION

It is true that the official Irish policy and the population of Ireland is of athoroughly friendly opinion regarding Germany. It should not be forgotten, in myopinion, that this friendliness is encouraged in part through the fact that Irishpoliticians strongly emphasise the tensions between Germany and England…I donot mean to distract from the friendly attitude of the country to Germany when Isay this. Alongside the political, cultural and economic solidarity with Germanythis motive does however play a certain role in the relations.1

*I am grateful to the Irish Research Council for the Humanities and Social Sciences (IRCHSS) forfunding the research for this article as part of a team project, ‘Ireland and European integration in acomparative international context’, led by Professor Dermot Keogh of UCC. I am also grateful to theproject’s industrious postdoctoral researcher, Dr Jérôme Aan de Wiel, for his assistance and helpfulcomments in the preparation of this paper.

1Report from Katzenberger [Dr Hermann Katzenberger, the first ‘minister plenipotentiary’ appointedby West Germany to Dublin] to the Foreign Ministry, 3 December 1951, AA 211–00/33. Cited in CathyMolohan, Germany and Ireland 1945–1955: two nations’ friendship (Dublin, 1999), 88.

Author’s e-mail: mervyn.odriscoll@ucc.ie

Irish Studies in International Affairs, Vol. 21 (2010), 89–104.

doi: 10.3318/ISIA.2010.21.89

Debates about Irish foreign policy, and indeed the national foreign policies of moststates, too often ignore the reception of, and reaction to, these policies by other states.Foreign policies are only successful if they convince other states that they arelegitimate, achievable and in their interests. For instance, the core declaratoryprinciple underlying Irish foreign policy between the 1920s and the 1960s—endingpartition— was a failure. Undoubtedly, the goal to end partition served as a domesticpolitical tool and a national unifying tenet, but it undermined Irish efforts to cultivatebetter relations with other states that recognised the prevailing regional powerbalance favouring Britain. With the onset of the Cold War, Britain was a lynchpin ofWestern security, regardless of its negative attitude towards European integration andits evident imperial decline.

This article investigates the Federal Republic of Germany’s (FRG) views andinterpretations of central aspects of Irish foreign policy during the first ten years ofthe FRG, between 1949 and 1959. Thus, it embarks on the relatively unexploredterritory of non-British and non-American diplomatic and political perceptions andevaluations of Irish foreign policy, by drawing heavily on the official archives of theFRG to complement the Irish archives.2 It also offers a corrective to theunderstandable, but nonetheless excessive, Anglo-American centrism that pervadesIrish historiography. Rather than speculating on the manner of the foreign receptionof Irish foreign policy, this piece methodically reconstructs the assessments of bothWest German diplomatic representatives based in Dublin and the Foreign Ministry(Auswärtiges Amt, or AA) officials in Bonn.3

The FRG (more commonly referred to as West Germany) was established in 1949.This was also the year that Ireland refused to join NATO and left the BritishCommonwealth. In 1959 Seán Lemass replaced Eamon de Valera as taoiseach, anda re-orientation of both the Irish economy and Irish foreign policy began to take off.A stark contrast existed between the international trajectories of FRG and Irelandduring this decade (1949–59). The newly created FRG, with its capital in Bonn,pursued re-unification, international rehabilitation and integration into the Westerndemocratic fold. The first chancellor of the FRG, Konrad Adenauer, relentlesslypursued a Western orientation and reconciliation with France and the other Westernwartime allies (the US and the UK). West Germany’s key strategic position in ColdWar Europe, her economic renaissance and the opportunities presented by Europeanintegration facilitated her relative normalisation within little more than a decade afterthe end of the Second World War. A decentralised and democratic West Germany

2Extensive use is made in this paper of the Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amts, Berlin. This isthe depository of the files of the FRG Foreign Ministry (AA) and its missions abroad. Diplomatic reportsfrom German diplomatic representatives based in Ireland and the correspondence of the AA desk taskedwith covering Irish matters were consulted in the preparation of this article. In addition, the Archives ofthe Christian Democratic Party at the Konrad Adenauer Foundation at Sankt Augustin, were consulted.These contain a useful collection of newspaper and periodical articles relating to Ireland that werepublished in Irish and FRG print media in the post-1949 period.

3The FRG, rather than France or Spain or Italy, was the primary Western European mainland countrywith which Ireland sustained the most substantial and tangible diplomatic and commercial ties in thedecades after Irish independence. The Vatican was also a particular focus of Irish diplomatic activity.Indeed, there were occasional efforts to cultivate a ‘special relationship’ between Dublin and the HolySee in the first five decades of Irish independence. These were impelled by confessional loyalties, butthat bilateral relationship was sui generis, reflecting the unique spiritual-cum-religious role of theVatican. The scope of ties between Ireland and the Vatican did not encompass traditional inter-statecommercial and economic relations to any great extent. For more on this unique, but nonethelessimportant, aspect of Irish diplomatic history, see Dermot Keogh, Ireland and the Vatican: the politicsand diplomacy of church-state relations, 1922–1960 (Cork, 1995). For more on the argument thatGermany has been undeservedly overlooked as a key foreign relations partner of independent Ireland,see Mervyn O’Driscoll, Ireland, Germany and the Nazis: politics and diplomacy, 1919–1939 (Dublin,2004).

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became a founding member of the European Coal and Steel Community (ECSC),European Economic Community (EEC) and European Atomic Energy Community(Euratom), and entered NATO in 1955. In effect, Bonn was transformed into a keyAmerican ally during the 1950s, and the core state in Western European economicvitality and security. The FRG was converted from an ostracised outsider into a keyinsider in Western Europe.

On the other hand, after the Second World War the Irish state failed to recognise orrespond to the new forces in operation in the Free World, including the US-sponsoredliberalisation of world trade. At best, post-World War II Ireland ‘emerged slowly andhesitantly’4 into ‘a new and vastly different world’.5 In sum, Ireland converted to themodel of regional integration and international liberalisation much later than herWestern European neighbours. The Irish rejection of NATO membership in 1949, ongrounds that signature of the treaty copperfastened partition (by requiring an explicitIrish affirmation of the territorial integrity of Britain), together with her failure tomodernise economically and to reduce protectionism in a liberalising economicclimate, prolonged Ireland’s virtual seclusion. In a sense, Ireland presented an enigmato many in the Western world: pro-Western, anti-communist and with a free economythat was neutralist, non-aligned and economically protected. The local (i.e., Anglo-Irish) factors animating Irish foreign policy choices were only dimly comprehendedor else were viewed as marginal, if considered at all, by external observers, whoconcentrated on operating in the context of the global ideological Cold War. However,Ireland participated in the Marshall Plan, was a member of the Organisation forEuropean Economic Cooperation (OEEC) and the Council of Europe, and gainedbelated entry into the United Nations in 1955.

This article reveals that the FRG found Irish foreign policy during the period 1949to 1959 to be fundamentally flawed and self-defeating. This official FRG attitude wasnot mitigated by Ireland’s wartime policy of neutrality, its non-demonisation of theGerman people after the horrors of the war, the relatively good public reception thatGerman visitors received in Ireland, or Dublin’s strong declaratory policy ofsupporting German reunification. From an official German perspective, Irelandpossessed an unhealthy fixation with the partition question and Anglo-Irish relations,to the detriment of Ireland’s wider political and strategic responsibilities to the fellowdemocracies of the West. Furthermore, from the German perspective, Ireland’s onlyfeasible means of achieving economic development was to join the mainstream bytaking up aggressive economic liberalisation and contemplating regional economiccooperation. Personal, diplomatic and cultural relations between the FRG and Irelandwere undoubtedly close and excellent, or ‘friendly’ as Cathy Molohan hascharacterised them,6 but on fundamental foreign policy matters there was a dialoguedes sourds for much of the decade. Ordinary German people with some knowledge ofIreland evinced sympathy and understanding for Ireland’s predicament. Privately,German officials and members of the government often expressed similar sentiments,but intellectually and officially they tended to view Ireland’s postures with displeasure.Ireland, for them, self-defeatingly clung to outdated pre-War notions of the nation-state, economy and the international system, which were fed by ancient and potentiallyself-destructive national animosities. In addition to the necessity for a conceptualrevolution within Ireland, German commentators recognised that an Irish shift towardsregional interdependence and integration was to a large extent reliant on Britain, byvirtue of Ireland’s economic dependence thereon.

4D. Dinan, ‘After the “Emergency”: Ireland in the post-war world, 1945–1950’, Éire-Ireland, vol.24 (1989), 85–103: 86.

5F.S.L. Lyons, Ireland since the Famine (London, 1973), 558.6Molohan, Germany and Ireland.

O’DRISCOLL—Hesitant Europeans 91

A GOOD START

Normal diplomatic and trade relations with Ireland were not possible in theimmediate post-World War II period. As in the pre-War period, trade and diplomaticrelations went hand-in-glove from an Irish perspective. The Irish revealed a stronginterest in exploiting the German market for agricultural produce as early as 1946.Allied occupation and general post-War chaos, however, prevented a rapidresumption of normal trade relations. The regularisation of Irish-German relationshad to wait until the passing of the Basic Law in 1949 and the establishment of theFederal Republic of Germany.7 By June 1949 Irish and German officials werenegotiating a new Irish-German trade agreement, resuming formal bilateral traderelations for the first time since the commencement of World War II. The agreementwas duly signed in July 1950 and John Belton was appointed ‘General Consul’ toWest Germany to handle trade relations and to conduct any official relations withGerman ministers. In late 1950 the West German government expressed its interestin establishing a Consulate-General in Dublin.8

The West German government finally received the right to initiate and conductnormal diplomatic relations. On 13 March 1951 the German Cabinet established aforeign ministry and decided to pursue formal relations with Dublin. Belton wasimmediately called to attend a meeting at the German consular office to be informed,‘You are now actually sitting in the German Foreign Office and I am very glad to beable to tell you that you are our first visitor particularly so as you are a friend of ours’.9West Germany preferred to appoint a minister plenipotentiary rather than a consul-general if Dublin was agreeable, which it proved to be.10 Full diplomatic legationswere rapidly established in the respective capitals.11 Ireland was the first state toappoint a minister to the new German state, with the exception of those countries thathad appointed representatives to the Allied High Commission to Germany.

Bonn selected its first minister to Ireland, Dr Hermann Katzenberger,12 and keymembers of the new German legation carefully. The establishment of full diplomaticrelations with Ireland was an important symbol of renewed statehood. Genuine‘friends’ of Germany were lacking in the aftermath of the War, and thepreponderance of evidence points to West German efforts to acknowledge andreciprocate Irish goodwill and generosity. Bonn realised that Ireland was favourablydisposed to the German people, in spite of the Holocaust and the Nazi interlude. Ithad been a noted donor of humanitarian aid to devastated Germany and CentralEurope after the war. Confessional, political and personal affinities were employedin appointing German diplomats to Ireland in 1951 as a means to enhance German-Irish relations. Notably, the 60 year old Katzenberger was nearing the end of hiscareer, but he possessed very distinguished credentials calculated to appeal to hisIrish hosts. His selection appeared to signify that West Germany held Ireland in high

7The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany (Grundgesetz für die BundesrepublikDeutschland) is the constitutional law of Germany. It was formally approved on 8 May 1949 and cameinto effect on 23 May that year as the constitution of West Germany. Those who drafted the Basic Lawregarded it as a provisional constitution for the provisional West German state; they were anxious notto prejudice any decision by a future unified Germany to adopt a constitution for the entire country.

8Molohan, Germany and Ireland, 67–9; ‘New exports pact with W. Germany’, Irish Times, 13 July1950, 1; ‘Irish trade with West Germany’, Irish Times, 15 June 1949, 1.

9National Archives of Ireland, Dublin (hereafter cited as NAI), Department of Foreign Affairs series(hereafter cited as DFA), Confidential Reports, P12/3A: Bonn, Belton to Nunan, 12 March 1951.

10NAI DFA, Confidential Reports, P12/3A: Bonn, Belton to Nunan, 12 March 1951.11‘Mr. Belton’s new post in Germany’, Irish Times, 5 June 1951, 1; ‘Exchange of diplomats’, Irish

Independent, 5 June 1951, 7.12In 1959, when Irish-German diplomatic relations were upgraded from envoy to full ambassadorial

level. See: ‘Envoy accredited’, Irish Independent, 17 December 1959, 1; ‘President receivedambassador’, Irish Times, 17 December 1959, 6.

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esteem. He had impeccable anti-Nazi credentials, was a founding and leadingmember of the Christian Democratic Party (or CDU) and rose to becomeAdministrator-Director of the Bundesrat (Federal Upper House) in 1950. Eventhough Katzenberger was close to retirement, he cut a high-profile figure in Germandemocratic politics. The second secretary of the German legation to Dublin, DrAlbert Kölb, also possessed close affinities with Ireland.13

Ireland also assisted in the ‘normalisation’ of Germany in the post-War world inother ways. In 1951 Dublin was the venue for several contests involving Germannational teams in some of their first international outings since the War. PerhapsIreland was viewed as a suitable and safe venue, promising receptive and non-hostilesporting audiences to re-introduce West German teams to international competition.14For West Germany, engagement in international sporting competitions was considereda way back into the civilised world. In July 1951 the German mission reported on thewarm welcome the German national athletics team received from the Irish crowd, andtellingly observed that it was gratifying to witness that the Irish were starting toidentify Germans not as war criminals but as perfectly ordinary people, in contrast tothe prevailing negative international perception of Germany.15

The West Germany–Ireland soccer match held in Dublin on 17 October 1951 wasvery significant for German self-confidence, even if Ireland won by a slim margin.The match was part of Germany’s return to the world of international sports(particularly football), through engaging in friendly internationals in the build-up toparticipation in international competition. No German team had been allowed tocompete in the FIFA World Cup of 1950. The match against Ireland signified an earlystep in the build-up to the FIFA World Cup of 1954, in which the unfancied WestGermany went on to beat the favourites Hungary in the final, in what Germans nowrefer to as ‘Das Wunder von Bern’ in Berne, Switzerland. Thus, the fixture againstIreland in 1951 was of psychological import to West Germany. Katzenberger attachedsignificance to the attendance of the Irish president, minister for defence and ministerfor external affairs at the match, and he was extremely pleased at the positivereception of the West German team in the Irish press and by Irish spectators.Notwithstanding the Irish 3–2 victory, Katzenberger stressed the positive post-contestresults, which illustrated that sport could create and re-inforce bonds betweennations. Of course, he contended that a German equaliser should have stood, andimplied that the goal being disallowed was the fault of the British referee!16

Thus, German diplomats and those Germans who came into contact with Irelandgained a generally favourable impression of Ireland’s predisposition towardGermany. Katzenberger quickly formed the view that the Irish minister for externalaffairs, Frank Aiken, retained a ‘certain liking’ for Germany and the German people,despite the fact that he had only visited Germany once (in 1928).17 As a formerneutral state not directly involved in the hostilities of the Second World War, the Irish

13Dr Alfred Kölb’s aunt was married to the professor of English at UCC, William Stockley, who wasthe nephew of William Smith O’Brien. Kölb had spent 18 months studying in UCC during the inter-warperiod. See Irish Times, ‘An Irishman’s Diary’, 24 July 1951, 5.

14‘Irish boxers’ task to-morrow’, Boxing Correspondent, Irish Times, 15 February 1951, 2; ‘Germanswill be a big attraction’, Irish Times, 2 July 1951, 2; ‘German athletes beat crusaders’, Irish Times, 6July 1951, 2; ‘Ireland beat Germany 3–2’, Irish Independent, 18 October 1951, 10.

15Politisches Archiv des Auswärtigen Amtes, Berlin (hereafter cited as AA-PA), B31, vol. 63, ‘Irisch–deutscher Sportwettkampf’, Report, Achilles to AA, 6 July 1951.

16AA-PA, B31, vol. 63, ‘Fußball-Länderkampf Deutschland–Irland in Dublin’, Report, Katzenbergerto AA, 19 October 1951; W.P. Murphy, ‘Ireland’s chances are slight but—Not so young Germans maynot last pace’, Irish Independent, 17 October 1951, 10; ‘Ireland will be lucky to avoid defeat’, IrishTimes, 17 October 1951, 2; ‘Ireland’s great win over Germany’, Irish Times, 18 October 1951, 2.

17AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Charakteristik irischer Persönlichkeiten’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 21April 1952.

O’DRISCOLL—Hesitant Europeans 93

population as a whole was viewed as even-handed, perhaps even uniquely so inWestern Europe, in its perceptions and reception of Germany.18 The UK remainedthe never-ending national enemy from the Irish perspective. The several hundredGermans living in Ireland were well pleased by the benign Irish official and popularstance towards Germany.19 However, as the decade progressed, West Germansdetected disturbing aspects of the Irish outlook. Although West German publicdiplomacy maintained a constant message of ‘excellent relations’ between the twocountries, and formal diplomatic relations and social relations between the twocountries were of a high order, internal correspondence reveals that the AA heldgrave reservations about Ireland’s international posture on grounds of realpolitik andsentiment/ideology.

IRISH STATE AND NATION

German commentators in the 1950s, both official and unofficial, revealed mixedviews regarding the Irish state and nation. On the one hand, the healthy functioningof Irish democracy was considered highly positive. Katzenberger noted that the Irishaffinity for democracy would not allow for a ‘Führerkult’, even in the case of arespected figure such as de Valera.20 Conversely, West German officials and diplomatstended to view the Irish people and state as conservative, even pre-modern, inoutlook. Successive reports by German diplomats depicted Ireland as irredentist,nationalist, introspective and exceedingly anti-British. In this respect, Germancommentators were quick to detect what seemed, to German eyes at least, to beincomprehensible, illogical or counter-productive paradoxes in the Irish collectivementality and in its foreign policy.

For instance, Irish language policy and the position of the Irish language wereviewed as peculiar. Officially, Irish was the national language. To all intents andpurposes official documents and signs suggested a bilingual population, but Irish wasnot a living language. In reality the politics of symbolism prevailed, whereby thelanguage was viewed as part of national identity, but the Irish state and people foundit pragmatic and commercially advantageous to speak English.21 It was also notedthat despite Ireland’s general political aversion to the UK, economic realities ensuredcontinued Irish dependence on Britain.22 Approximately 93 per cent of Irish exportswere destined for the UK despite efforts at trade diversification.

The official appellation of the Irish state generated comment. The German missionnoted the politics, confusion and acrimonious debate reigning in Irish andinternational circles surrounding the uses of the terms ‘Éire’, ‘Ireland’, ‘Republic ofIreland’ and other designations. Non-Irish nationalist circles in Northern Ireland andBritain commonly used the terms ‘26 counties’ and ‘Southern Ireland’, althoughthese terms possessed no constitutional basis. The British state used the term ‘Éire’in all official correspondence in referring to the Irish state. Thus, any appellation byany party designated to the state was viewed as an adoption of a political position onthe independent Irish state.23

18AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Eindrücke aus Irland’, Report, Author unknown (probably a West Germantraveller or journalist) to AA, c. 30 July 1953; AA-PA, B31, vol. 61, ‘Zahl der deutschenStaatsangehörigen’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 21 April 1952.

19AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Eindrücke aus Irland’; AA-PA, B31, vol. 61, ‘Zahl der deutschenStaatsangehörigen’.

20AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischer Bericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 25 January 1954.21‘Eine “Landessprache“, die kaum jemand spricht’, Mannheimer Morgen, 15 September 1955.22AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischer Bericht’.23AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Amtliche Bezeichnung des Staates Irland’, Report, Von Richthofen to AA,

13 July 1953.

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In the summer of 1953 the Irish government issued a policy document to correct thenumerous and loaded appellations applied to the Irish state. It directed that ‘Éire’should be used only in the Irish language, ‘Ireland’ in English, and the correspondingword in other languages. It cautioned against the use of the term ‘Republic of Ireland’,as this could be interpreted as accepting the existence of another Ireland, meaningNorthern Ireland, thus tolerating partition and conveying the impression of theabandonment of Dublin’s claim over Northern Ireland. Dr Oswald Freiherr VonRichthofen of the German Consulate-General concluded that de Valera was thearchitect of this policy. The Irish government wanted to retain the ‘fictitious identity ofthe State appellation with the geographical unity of the entire island’.24 Richthofenrecommended that the AA and the German press exclusively use the term ‘Irland’ inall papers, in line with Dublin’s policy direction.25 The AA, on studying the matter,concluded that the ‘Republic of Ireland’ was the more correct name.26 This is a tellingfinding on the part of the AA, and it indicates a general German-Irish divergence onkey matters relating to the appropriate role and outlook for Ireland in post-War Europe.

Naturally, German officials, politicians and diplomats quickly recognised thatpartition and consequently relations with the UK were overriding priorities in theconduct of Irish foreign policy.27 However, German official and popularcommentators’ comprehension of the Northern Ireland question and Anglo-Irishrelations was inclined to be incomplete and stereotypical. German press coverage wasgenerally considerate to Irish anti-partititionist arguments, in spite of the fact that mostof the information available on the topic of Northern Ireland originated from pressagencies in London. This led to some concerns on the Irish side that an unfortunateimpression might be generated in the German public that the Dublin government lentsome support to the IRA border campaign.28 German press and official attitudes lackeda sophisticated understanding of the roots of the Northern Ireland question. Germanobservers accepted that irredentism was of overriding political importance to the Irishstate and nation.29 They tended to view the dispute as insoluble and expended littlesustained analysis on the complexities of Irish partition.

In the absence of an ability to fully comprehend the dispute, German officialstended to fall back on the explanation that religion was the root of the problem. TheGerman minister to Dublin, Dr Felician Prill, suggested in 1958 that in NorthernIreland the Stormont government played one religion against another to rule, andexaggerated the Catholicity of the Irish Republic and its anti-Protestantism. ‘Onefeels back in Cromwellian times’, Prill observed despairingly.30 German officialcommentators regularly noted the religiosity of Irish people, the considerablepresence and power of the Catholic Church in Irish society and, as a result, theconstraints this placed on Irish governments’ freedom of action.31 German newspaper

24AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Amtliche Bezeichnung des Staates Irland’.25AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Amtliche Bezeichnung des Staates Irland’.26AA-PA, B31, vol. 60, ‘Betr.: Staat Irland’, Internal AA note, 29 July 1953. Whereas the AA may

have formed this view internally, a crisis arose in Irish-Australian relations just a few months later thatcautioned against proceeding against the stated policy of the Irish government. In January 1954 the Irishrejected the accreditation of the Australian ambassador to the ‘Republic of Ireland’. See AA-PA, B31,vol. 64, ‘Politischer Bericht’.

27AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 31 January 1955.28NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10C, ‘West German press on IRA raids’, Report, Warnock to

Murphy, 22 January 1957; NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10D, ‘German publicity on IrishPartition’, Holmes to Cremin, 10 April 1958.

29AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’.30AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, ‘Irland unter der dritten Regierung de Valera’, Report, Dr Felician Prill, to

AA, 5 May 1958.31AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Irland unter der dritten Regierung de Valera’; AA-PA, B31, vol. 131, ‘Irland

und die NATO nach der Pariser Konferenz’, Irland 1958/59, Report, Prill to AA, 10 January 1958; AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Irland 1958/59, Prill to AA, 15 May 1959. Admittedly, the anti-Communism intrinsic

O’DRISCOLL—Hesitant Europeans 95

and broadcast journalists continued to report what they viewed as a stranglehold ofCatholicism on all aspects of Irish society, to the irritation of Irish official observersas the 1960s progressed.32 German officials repeated variants of this religionhypothesis from the 1950s onwards. According to German diplomatic assessmentsof the problem of Irish partition, German ministers and ambassadors tended to reportto Bonn that the Irish might be tempted to resort to the use of force to achievenational unification in the late 1940s and early 1950s. The appraisal began to changewith the onset of the IRA border campaign after 1956. Then it began to become clearto German observers that Irish governments of all hues were distressed by theviolence of the IRA and the disturbance it engendered in Anglo-Irish relations.Nonetheless, as late as June 1959, Prill voiced his apocalyptic fears that the Irishsituation might spiral out of control, just like Cyprus.33 Only in 1961 did AmbassadorReifferscheidt inform the AA that the Irish, in his estimation, would never use forceto end partition.34

The German state was embarrassed by the Irish obsession with partition, andviewed its repeated efforts to draw parallels between Irish partition and Germanpartition as awkward at minimum. Initial signs of German unease were palpable asearly as 1953. Insistent and repeated Irish anti-partitionist rhetoric and publicitylinked Irish and German partition and threatened to embroil Germany in a sensitiveAnglo-Irish issue, which she poorly comprehended and was loathe to contribute tofor pragmatic and strategic reasons. The AA, with striking regularity, instructedGerman diplomats and ambassadors to sustain good German-Irish relations, but notat the cost of damaging German-British relations. For example, in 1963,Reifferscheidt was advised not to tolerate any comparisons between Northern Irelandand the GDR; the UK was an ally and a vital partner in the Atlantic securitycommunity. Furthermore, he was bluntly instructed:

I am asking you however to practice restraint with regard to occasional Irishcomparisons of the partition of the Irish and German peoples. The population ofMiddle-Germany is robbed of all liberty and political and personal rights, againstthat the population of Northern Ireland had the opportunity in a free election toexpress their opinions, and they live in conditions which cannot be compared withthose in the Soviet occupied zone.35

The FRG demonstrated an unwavering continuity in its policy towards the keyIrish national question of partition. All Western governments openly supported theGerman demands for reunification against the Soviet Union and the Warsaw Pact,even if some privately favoured the division of Germany. By contrast, most WesternEuropean states and members of the Western alliance system clearly viewed Irishpartition as a peripheral and local Anglo-Irish dispute, of no relevance to thesettlement of the life-and-death issues at stake in the Cold War. Rather, the bestinterests of the West, including the FRG, were to be served by containing theNorthern Ireland territorial dispute as a specifically Anglo-Irish issue, so as not to

in Catholicism played to the advantage of West Germany: the Irish state and much of its media stronglysupported the FRG and its uncompromising policy on Berlin against the Soviet Union. See: AA-PA,B31, vol. 256, ‘Einstellung des Erscheinens der Dubliner Sonntagszeitung Sunday Review’, Report, vonTrützschler to AA, 4 December 1963.

32Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, Sankt Augustin, Pressedokumentation, file: Staaten, Irland, 1951–1983,Press cutting, Der Tagesspiegel, 21 April 1949; NAI DFA, embassy series, Bonn, PP/1/4/B, ‘Irenwandern nicht mehr aus’, Report, Secretary to McCann, 17 September 1965.

33AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Irland 1958/59, Prill to AA, 15 May 1959, 14.34Tara Casserly, ‘Irish-German relations, 1949–1972’, unpublished MA thesis, University College

Cork, 1994, 13–15.35Casserly, ‘Irish-German relations, 1949–1972’, 10.

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distract the UK from its role as a key defender of the West. The maintenance ofBritish troops in the FRG was viewed as a key guarantee to the Western Europeanstates that Britain would act as a stabiliser of the region and protect West Germanyfrom Soviet penetration, or as a means to ensure that the FRG remained in thestaunchly pro-Western democratic fold. Thus, Northern Ireland was an irritant, butnot a focal problem requiring solution in the interests of the Atlantic Alliance. It wasa structurally unimportant territorial issue and it should be left to the players directlyinvolved to find a resolution. It might even recede over time. Moreover, the UK wasthe only party to the dispute possessing significant, even pivotal internationalleverage and influence at various junctures in the early Cold War.

Nonetheless, the Irish government and its organs persisted in seeking during the1950s to link the partition of Ireland to the division of Germany. No propagandaopportunity was neglected.36 All German public and press comment on Irish partitionwas carefully monitored for indications of a favourable German disposition towardsDublin’s position.37 German officials heavily resented the problematical parallelsdrawn by Dublin. They feared the potential negative repercussions of any officialWest German affinity with or signification of approval of the Irish government’sanalogical arguments. Thus, the FRG upheld a studied diplomatic silence in theinterests of friendly relations.38 Notwithstanding this unsupportive policy, the AA stillcanvassed for Irish support for German reunification, which it readily receivedunconditionally.39 After the Irish accession to the UN in 1955, Ireland possessedmembership of a global forum that the FRG lacked, and any propaganda on behalfof the injustice of German partition was welcome, as long as it was not linked tooclosely with Irish irredentism.40 Ireland refused to recognise the legitimacy of theGDR throughout the 1950s and 1960s. It did not support its membership of the UNuntil the process of East-West détente assured membership of the UN for both theFRG and the GDR in 1973.41 The FRG was grateful for Irish support of itsinternational position, but as was normal practice it tactfully held back fromextending a comparable consideration to Dublin’s claims on Northern Ireland.

Irish diplomats understood the German requirement to maintain very goodrelations with Britain, as Bonn relied upon Britain’s support for its place in theexisting European and Atlantic framework. However, Irish diplomats and policy-makers failed to appreciate the degree to which the West Germans sought directionfrom their British colleagues on sensitive matters relating to Irish partition andAnglo-Irish relations, especially during the 1950s.42 Perhaps only Conor CruiseO’Brien, the head of press information in External Affairs, formed a realisticassessment of Germany’s stance on Irish partition as a foreign policy issue in the1950s. Following a trip to West Germany in 1954 he decisively concluded that the

36For a detailed assessment of Irish propaganda activities, see Molohan, Germany and Ireland, 87–95.

37For example, NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10D: Bonn, ‘German publicity on Irish partition’,Report, Denis Holmes, secretary Irish legation in FRG, to Cornelius Cremin, secretary DEA, 10 April1958.

38For a development of this argument, see Casserly, ‘Irish-German relations’, 9–11.39AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, ‘Beitrage der Abteilung 2 für die Instruktion des neuen Gesanten des

Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Dublin’, Report, von Puttkamer to new German consul-general inIreland, 25 July 1956.

40NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10E: Bonn, ‘German reaction to minister’s speech to UN on23rd September’, Report, Holmes to Cremin, 28 September 1959; Casserly, ‘Irish-German Relations’,5.

41AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 31 January 1955. For a full account of Irishnon-recognition policy of the GDR see Paula L. Wylie, Ireland and the Cold War: diplomacy andrecognition 1949–1963 (Dublin, 2006), 117–48.

42NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10A, Belton to Murphy, 14 June 1955.

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FRG was too constrained by its own fragile situation to offer a small, marginal statesuch as Ireland any moral or material backing to resolve partition.43

Indeed, by the mid-1950s the afterglow of the honeymoon following the re-establishment of Irish-German diplomatic relations was fading. German appreciationof the even-handed Irish acceptance of the FRG as a normal state in the international‘family of nations’ receded as German confidence was restored. The FRG wasincreasingly accepted by its immediate Western neighbours, particularly thestrategically axiomatic France, as a vital part of the economic and defenceinfrastructure of the West. By the mid-1950s also, the German economic miracle waswell underway. The FRG was permitted to join NATO. It was allowed to re-arm forthe collective benefit of the ‘Free World’, and it became a central player in theEuropean integration process. Normal diplomatic bargaining ensued, and divergentGerman and Irish perspectives on matters such as trade, Britain, NATO and Europeanintegration became apparent. Meanwhile, Ireland remained relatively isolated in theWest, most notably during Frank Aiken’s stewardship of Irish foreign policy at theUnited Nations during de Valera’s final government between May 1957 and June1959.44 The Irish and German positions during this particular period starklycontrasted, reflecting very different worldviews and mentalities. Prill and Germanofficial commentators were convinced that Irish foreign policy in terms of itsdefence, political and economic orientation were completely at odds withdevelopments in the Western world and the realities of the Cold War.

ANGLO-IRISH RELATIONS, PARTITION, NEUTRALITYAND WESTERN SECURITY

Germany understood that all Irish foreign policies tended to flow from the unabashedHibernia Irredenta or ‘sore thumb’ stance of Dublin. This was a festering issue inthe Anglo-Irish relationship, and the relationship or the history of relations betweenthe two peoples had a major effect on Irish foreign relations more generally. The AAappreciated that the history of Irish nationalist struggle against Britain ensured thatIreland possessed a prima facie unique and perhaps critical perspective on the‘Anglo-Saxon’ influenced alliance of the ‘Free World’. In addition, Ireland’sfortunate off-shore position protected by Britain, Western Europe and NATO madeneutrality feasible. Nonetheless, partition was Ireland’s formally stated reason foradopting a policy of neutrality, and it was the principal stumbling block to Dublin’splaying a full role in Western defence.45 It accounted for her regrettable refusal toaccede to NATO.46 Otherwise, Germany considered that Ireland should have been amember of the Atlantic Alliance as a Western European state with strong democraticcredentials, vigorous Catholic confessionalism and a pronounced anti-Communistsocietal ethos. Ireland was an informal member of the West from the West Germanperspective.47

In 1954 the eminent and influential German foreign policy journal Aussenpolitikmade a number of telling observations in relation to Irish neutrality:

It is a matter not of a constant foreign policy, and still less of an attempt to buildup a lasting neutrality, but of an aspect of Irish foreign policy towards Great

43Molohan, Germany and Ireland, 96–7.44See Joseph Morrison Skelly, Irish diplomacy at the United Nations, 1945–1965: national interests

and the international order (Dublin, 1997), 83–5; 145–8.45AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, Instructions from the German foreign ministry for Prill, 27 October 1956.46NAI DFA, embassy files, Bonn, 19/3I, Belton to Nunan, 15 June 1954; AA-PA, B31, vol. 64,

‘Politischer Bericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 25 January 1954.47AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’ , Report, Katzenberger to AA, 31 January 1955.

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Britain…Ireland has never agreed to the separation of her Six Northern Countiesand makes use of all available means to exert pressure on England, directly or onthe wider political scene, to cause her to satisfy her Ulster policy.48

Aussenpolitik concluded that Irish neutrality was simply a ‘Tauschmünze’ (meaning‘a coin for bargaining with’) and the Irish government would abandon it if partitionwas terminated.49As Katzenberger noted, Ireland and her minister for external affairs,Frank Aiken, were not neutral for reasons of conviction comparable to otherlongstanding neutral states. Ireland’s policy of neutrality was viewed as quite unlikethat of Sweden and Switzerland, in that Ireland was prepared to abandon neutralityif partition ended. It was not a principled neutral.50

The FRG was a vital part of the Western defences against Soviet Communism,which was viewed as the overriding threat to international peace and freedom. Thisperspective, as the vulnerable yet strategically important cockpit of the Cold War,coloured West Germany’s interpretation of Irish neutrality. The AA was particularlyanxious to have its diplomats in Dublin report on any shifts in public opinion infavour of joining NATO. It worried that Ireland was virtually defenceless bycontemporary standards and it would not be able to resist any major aggressor.51 Itgreatly regretted the Irish unwillingness to participate, but reluctantly accepted thatIrish entry into NATO was impossible without a satisfactory solution to the partitionproblem. Prill considered that it was in the collective interest of NATO and theAtlantic Alliance to ensure that the ‘Irish partition question’ did not degenerate intoviolence, creating a perilous and diverting weakness behind the Western front as itfaced the Iron Curtain. To German eyes, especially Prill’s, Irish non-membershipcreated a dangerous gap in NATO’s defences in north-Western Europe, but there wasno easy solution.52

INTERNATIONAL ORIENTATION AND EUROPEAN INTEGRATION

During the early and mid-1950s, internal German assessments of Ireland’s foreignposture and economic situation were generally good natured, but nonetheless critical.Katzenberger, the first FRG minister to Ireland, noted that the Irish economyexperienced persistent problems, namely a foreign trade deficit. Despite Ireland’spolitical aversion for Britain, 93 per cent of the country’s exports still went to theBritish market in 1954. Efforts to gain a foothold in other markets had not provedsuccessful.53 The electorate was clearly dissatisfied with the poor economic andfinancial condition of the country, and this contributed to the defeat of de Valera’sgovernment in the general election in 1954. Katzenberger opined that the secondinter-party government formed by John A. Costello lacked economic ideas, andconsequently the deleterious economic situation persisted, leading to massemigration.54

However, the criticisms and assessments of Ireland by Bonn and the second FRGrepresentative, Prill, grew more pointed and negative towards the end of the decade.These were coloured by the fact that when Prill arrived in Dublin in the autumn of

48NAI DFA, embassy files, Bonn, 19/3I, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’, Report, Belton to Nunan, 15June 1954.

49NAI DFA, embassy files, Bonn, 19/3I, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’.50AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischer Bericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 25 January 1954.51AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, ‘Beitrage der Abteilung 2 für die Instruktion des neuen Gesanten des

Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Dublin’, Report, von Puttkamer to new German consul-general inIreland, 25 July 1956.

52AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Irland 1958/59, Report, Prill to AA, 15 May 1959.53AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, ‘Politischer Bericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 25 January 1954.54AA-PA, B31, Vol. 64, ‘Politischen Jahresbericht’, Report, Katzenberger to AA, 31 January 1955.

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1956 the FRG had transformed into the bedrock of Western European economicintegration and Western European security. Combined with the Atlantic Alliance’srecognition of the FRG as a key player in the West, the German economicrenaissance ensured a revival in German self-belief. Chancellor Adenauer and manyGermans highly prized these achievements and were determined to consolidate themby furthering Franco–German reconciliation through the means of Europeanintegration. In January 1956 Adenauer directed that the political dimension ofEuropean economic integration should be recognised and embraced by the FRG.55European integration, combined with the Atlantic Alliance, became the prism throughwhich the FRG analysed the whole European situation.

The Irish minister to the FRG, T.J. Kiernan, was fully cognisant of this Germangoverning concept, or Gesamtkonzept,56 as early as April 1956. He noted that

the official German attitude is based on the strong personal attachment of both theChancellor and the Foreign Minister to the ultimate aim of European integration.(There may be, and probably is, a basic belief that in such a Europe, Germany willbe primus inter pares and that her primacy would be pronounced).57

At this early stage, as the negotiations to establish the EEC and Euratom between theECSC Six were underway, a prescient Kiernan advised his superiors:

It may be worth considering whether we cannot aim at reconciling our de factoposition, as governed by economic factors, with a longer-term policy of wider co-operation, in the interests of European integration, with the broad ideologicalpurposes of which we must agree. The best way to avoid fragmentation [ofEuropean institutions turning into blocs of countries] (and it is worth noticing thatthe Soviet favours the OEEC plan of co-operation on atomic research) is tobroaden co-operation with small successful practical organisations, such as theECSC, and not to stand completely apart from them. This issue may arise withfurther developments of the ‘Messina’ group towards stages of economicintegration.58

This option was not pursued in the mid-1950s and Ireland belatedly adapted to thenew regional and international framework. It only applied for membership of theEEC in 1961, in anticipation of a British application.

The AA recognised that Ireland lacked the autonomy to choose a Europeandestiny, as this route was blocked by the geographic and economic realities,contributing to a narrow, nationalist mindset. It was une île derrière une île, and anyengagement with European integration would require a fundamental alteration inthe Eurosceptical attitude of the British. The AA noted that Irish membership of theSterling Block and traditional trade dependence on Britain was the pivotalconstraining factor in this attitude. This economic dependence on Britain waspolitically unpalatable in Irish domestic circles and contradicted its foreign policyof counter-dependence in political matters. The AA judged that Ireland could onlygain from membership of a European federation. From the German perspective,Ireland was both poorly developed and starved of the capital required to achieveeconomic modernisation. In 1956 the AA instructed the new German envoy toIreland that only a more positive British policy toward European integration would

55Hans-Peter Schwarz, Konrad Adenauer, vol. 2, The statesman, 1952–1967 (Oxford, 1997), 231.56W.R. Smyser, How Germans negotiate: logical goals, practical solutions (Washington, DC, 2003),

60.57NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10B, ‘German attitude to European integration’, Report,

Kiernan, to Murphy, 30 April 1956.58NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10B, ‘German attitude to European integration’.

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induce Ireland to reconsider its attitude. At this early stage in 1956, the influentialPolitical-Directorate 2 of the AA held the view that Ireland was important to Europefrom both a strategic and transportation perspective. Thus, the EEC Six would bewilling to provide the necessary capital Ireland urgently required in return for‘political benefits’.59 The AA, particularly Political-Directorate 2, was anxious thatthe German envoy should report any shift in Irish public opinion away from itsnegative attitude regarding NATO membership, towards a recognition that the activesafeguarding of Irish independence demanded Irish co-operation with NATO inview of East-West tensions.60 However, the possibility of Irish identification withthe political position of Western Europe and the Atlantic Alliance was limited, asIrish members of the Council of Europe repeatedly and overwhelmingly critiquedand rejected a succession of proposals and efforts to co-ordinate the foreign policyof the Council of Europe, including those of German members. Irishparliamentarians were singularly allergic to any suggestions that the Council ofEurope might be subsumed under a broader ‘Atlantic community’.61

Germany revealed its concerns about Ireland’s economic isolationism whenIreland presented its case for special consideration during the discussions to establishan OEEC Free Trade Area in mid-1957. The articulation of major Irish reservationsto opening up the Irish economy to free trade occasioned a German response thatdeprecated Ireland for possessing an overly protectionist outlook, an excessivelypessimistic mindset and a lack of enthusiasm. The Federal Republic observed in aformal response to the Irish submission and Irish special pleading that Ireland ‘shouldhave greater confidence’ in its ‘ability to overcome the difficulties’ entailed in joininga pan-European Free Trade Area. In order to become a member of the proposed FreeTrade Area, the FRG argued that Ireland had to accept the principles of non-discrimination and reciprocity.62

After 1956 Prill noted the growing Irish awareness of the potential repercussionsfor the country of the prolonged discussions about the economic organisation ofWestern Europe. The Irish, however, were hesitant Europeans, who lacked anideological attachment to European unity and regional integration. The Irish responsewas one of slow and reactive adaptation to the new realities. The Irish mentality stillperceived the European continent as distant and the lay Irish person lacked anydetailed knowledge about Germany, although was knowledgeable about the UK,France and Spain to some degree. The Irish were ignorant about Eastern Europeanissues, in Prill’s estimation. In 1958 he reported to his superiors that Ireland couldonly survive economically if it opened up to the world and embraced free competitionand European integration.63

By March 1959, after five years of bruising German-Irish bilateral tradenegotiations, he was openly criticising Irish government foreign trade policy. In atalk to the luncheon of the Dublin Rotary Club, he opined that trade discriminationwas an ‘anachronism in a time in which the nations of the free world should standtogether, facing the same dangers from the unfree world, even in the economic field’.

59AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, ‘Instruktion für den Gesandten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Irland’,AA for Dr Felician Prill, 27 October 1956, 17–18; AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, ‘Beitrage der Abteilung 2 fürdie Instruktion des neuen Gesanten des Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Dublin’, by von Puttkamer, 25July 1956.

60AA-PA, B31, vol. 62, ‘Instruktion für den Gesandten der Bundesrepublik Deutschland in Irland’, 9.61AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, Report, ‘Irlands Haltung in der UNO und im Europarat’, Prill to AA, 6

November 1957, 2. See also Michael Kennedy and Eunan O’Halpin, Ireland and the Council of Europe:from isolation towards integration (Strasbourg, 2000), 120–1; 125; 146; 151.

62NAI DT, S15281J, ‘Free trade area–working party no. 23–Consideration of the Irish case’,McCarthy report, n.d. (c. 28 May 1957). I am grateful to Dr Paul Loftus for bringing this reference tomy attention.

63‘“Mistake” to think all Germans rich’, Irish Times, 9 April 1957, 4.

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Additionally, he argued that ‘discrimination would always be to the disadvantage ofthe retaliating country’.64 Such public outspokenness by diplomats, even the usuallydirect-talking Germans, is rare, normally unwise and frowned upon by fellowdiplomats. However, Prill and the AA were aware that by 1959 the mood of the Irishgovernment was undergoing a transformation. The recently appointed taoiseach,Seán Lemass, who was ably assisted by leading civil servant Ken Whitaker, wasstealthily dismantling old Irish shibboleths in the field of economics and trade. Prill’sexhortation to Irish producers and exporters to compete on the basis of qualityresonated closely with Lemass’s desires to make Irish producers competitive.

Ironically, in 1958 prior to Lemass’s succession of de Valera as taoiseach, Prillmisread Lemass as both ‘doctrinaire’ and a ‘die-hard protectionist’.65 Prill noted thatas long as de Valera remained in charge, a more outward orientation in Irish economicpolicy and foreign policy generally was unlikely.66 Contrary to Prill’s expectations,however, Lemass provided the requisite political leadership to re-orient Irish foreignpolicy towards Europe and the West. He countered and blunted the outmodednationalist and neutralist policies of Frank Aiken, a devout follower of de Valera, whoremained in power and retained the External Affairs portfolio.67 The FRGdisapproved of the general direction and conduct of Irish foreign policy under Aikenduring this period, not only in terms of Ireland’s refusal to join NATO. The Irishenvoy in Bonn, William Warnock, might dutifully report to his minister that the pro-SPD Frankfurter Rundshau considered that his initiatives at the UN introduced a‘fresh wind’ into the ‘stuffy atmosphere’ of the UN.68 In practice, however, the AA,official Germany and the Christian Democrats were perturbed by the strikingsimilarity between Ireland’s Cold War policies and those of the neutralist, pacificGerman opposition, the SPD.69

De Valera’s Ireland demonstrated a disturbing lack of common cause with theWest in general at the UN. In particular, Aiken failed to identify with the Westernpowers on high-profile controversies relating to Cyprus, Algeria and apartheid. Itproposed troop withdrawal from Central Europe, self-determination for Algeria,Chinese admission to the UN; and it condemned South Africa’s racial politics.70 Theadoption of such a ‘moral’ and neutralist or non-aligned foreign policy by Ireland atthe UN appeared fanciful and ineffective from the point of view of the hard-headed

64‘Trade discrimination “an anachronism”’, Irish Times, 24 March 1959, 4.65AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland unter der dritten Regierung de Valera’, Prill to AA, 5 May

1958.66AA-PA, B31, vol. 131, Report, ‘Irland und die NATO nach der Pariser Konferenz’, Prill to AA, 10

January 1958.67AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland unter der dritten Regierung de Valera’.68NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10C, Warnock to Murphy, 26 October 1957.69Dennis L. Bark and David R. Gress, A history of West Germany, vol. 1, From shadow to substance

1945–1963 (Oxford, 1993), 303–4; Ronald J. Granieri, ‘Political parties and German-Americanrelations: politics beyond the water’s edge’, in Detlef Junker (ed.), The United States and Germany inthe era of the Cold War, 1945–1968: a handbook, vol. 1 (Cambridge, UK, 2004), 141–8; DianeRosolowsky, West Germany’s foreign policy: the impact of the Social Democrats and the Greens (NewYork, 1987), 13–36; L.R. Muray, ‘Adenauer’s Germany–(2) neutrality and NATO’, Irish Times, 9October 1957.

70AA-PA, B31, vol. 64, Report, ‘Irlands Haltung in der UNO und im Europarat’, Prill to AA, 6November 1957; AA-PA, B31, vol. 131, Report, ‘Irland und die NATO nach der Pariser Konferenz’.For an account of Irish policy at the UN, see Joseph Morrison Skelly, Irish diplomacy at the League ofNations 1945–1965: national interests and the international order (Dublin, 1996), chapters 2 and 3;Till Geiger, ‘A belated discovery of internationalism? Ireland, the United Nations and the reconstructionof Western Europe, 1945–60’, Rory Miller, ‘Ireland and the Middle East at the United Nations, 1955–2005’, and Aoife Bhreatnach, ‘A friend of the colonial powers? Frank Aiken, Ireland’s United Nationsalignment and decolonisation’, in Michael Kennedy and Deirdre McMahon (eds), Obligations andresponsibilities: Ireland and the United Nations 1955–2005 (Dublin, 2005), 25–53; 54–78; 182–200,respectively.

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realism that impelled the Federal Republic. German realpolitik believed that theseIrish positions exemplified a complete disregard for its European neighbours, whichlay prostrate before, and divided by, the Red Army.

Professor William G. Grewe, director of the political division of the AA, was notconvinced by Irish explanations that, as a neutral, it was obligated to raise importantinternational issues at the UN and ‘to speak her mind freely without hesitation’.71Grewe, an international law professor and an advisor to Adenauer,72 critiqued thecomplete lack of realism attaching to Aiken’s search for a comprehensive peace inthe Middle East and Central Europe. Aiken had not consulted with the FederalRepublic before putting forward his proposals. Aiken’s overly ambitious plans,involving full troop withdrawals and the effective neutralisation of the regions, werecompletely impractical and diplomatically unwise. Dublin was to discover that itsfailure to consult with the Western affected parties beforehand was deleterious toIreland’s relations with these parties, such as the FRG. Grewe straightforwardly toldthe Irish envoy that even if the USSR withdrew its army from East Germany and theUS withdrew from the FRG, the Red Army would still occupy most of EasternEurope, including the strategically vital Poland and Czechoslovakia. This wouldensure the USSR could hold Germany hostage. The political director at the AAindicated that Aiken’s proposals ‘stood no chance of being implemented’.73 Thejournalist L.R. Muray, who was undertaking an extensive tour of West Germany,reported in the Irish Times that the German government’s attitude to Aiken’s CentralEuropean plan was ‘distinctly cool’.74 As for Aiken’s proposal that the UN shouldintervene and provide an international solution to the Franco-Algerian conflict,Grewe simply stated that the Federal Republic ‘would steer clear of the controversyabout Algeria’ as it was ‘cautious in all matters concerning relations in France’.75 Inother words, reconciliation with France was a key goal of the FRG, and Europeanintegration was built on the still tender plant of the Franco-German Axis, whichshould not be sacrificed under any circumstances. So the FRG was fundamentallydissatisfied with many of the UN policies of Aiken and considered them to be badlyinformed, unwise and potentially disastrous.

CONCLUSION

It was not surprising, therefore, that Prill speculated that the final government that deValera led lacked any special affection for the Federal Republic.76 Regardless ofIreland’s desire and need for greater economic collaboration with the West, Prillconcluded that de Valera’s foreign policy would remain unaltered. It would continueto avoid any association with the West.77 Even as Prill recognised this paradox, henonetheless recommended that the FRG should ameliorate Ireland’s economicdifficulties as far as possible, in an effort to build relations between Ireland and theWest.78 This fitted into the emerging post-War German paradigm of utilisingeconomic statecraft, particularly economic inducements, to alter the behaviour of

71NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10C, Report, ‘Attitude of the Irish delegation at the UnitedNations Assembly’, Warnock to Murphy, 3 October 1957.

72Rainer A. Blasius (translated by Sally E. Robertson), ‘The ambassadors of the Federal Republic ofGermany in Washington, 1955–1968’, in Junker, The United States and Germany, 157–64: 158.

73NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10C, Report, ‘Attitude of the Irish delegation at the UnitedNations Assembly’.

74L.R. Muray, ‘Adenauer’s Germany’.75NAI DFA, confidential reports, 313/10C, Report, ‘Attitude of the Irish delegation at the United

Nations Assembly’.76AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland unter der dritten Regierung de Valera’.77AA-PA, B31, vol. 131, Report, ‘Irland und die NATO nach der Pariser Konferenz’.78AA-PA, B31, vol. 131, Report, ‘Irland und die NATO nach der Pariser Konferenz’.

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other states in a positive direction.79 However, there were signs of hope when Prillnoted in his annual report for 1958 that Aiken’s ‘escapades in foreign policy,especially in the United Nations’, had made him unpopular domestically.80 Catholiccircles found Aiken’s support for communist China’s admission to the UN disturbingand incomprehensible. Irish circles also heartily disapproved of Aiken’s generalpolicy of negotiating with the Soviet Union. The problem from a German perspectivewas that Aiken and Lemass were in competition to replace de Valera as taoiseach.Jack Lynch, the minister for education and a relatively young ‘rising politician’,appeared more European in outlook and more interested in Germany than either thedoctrinaire and apparently neutralist protectionists Aiken or Lemass.81 Prill wasprescient in identifying a taoiseach in the making (Lynch), but he was fortunatelyincorrect in his assessment of Seán Lemass, de Valera’s immediate successor astaoiseach. In addition, Prill’s pessimistic speculation that the poor economic state ofIreland combined with irredentism might lead to political radicalisation and a crisisover partition was not fulfilled.82 Lemass proved to be a forward-looking taoiseachfrom the Federal Republic’s perspective, and Irish-German relations drew closer.Lemass ‘mainstreamed’ Irish foreign policy away from the ‘traditional nationalistand insular outlook’.83

79See Smyser, How Germans negotiate, 51–2; 55; 179–81.80AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland 1958/59’, Prill to AA, 15 May 1959.81AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland 1958/59’.82AA-PA, B31, vol. 128, Report, ‘Irland 1958/59’.83Lyndon Johnson Papers, Lyndon B. Johnson Presidential Library, Austin, Texas, Report, ‘Ireland’,

Vice-Presidential Security File, Box 3, cited in Maurice FitzGerald, ‘The “mainstreaming” of Irishforeign policy’, in Brian Girvin and Gary Murphy (eds), The Lemass era: politics and society in theIreland of Seán Lemass (Dublin, 2005), 82–98: 97. See also: Maurice FitzGerald, Protectionism toliberalisation: Ireland and the EEC, 1957–1966 (Aldershot, 2000), chapter 1.

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