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Michael Collins: The Man Who Made Ireland Coogan Amazon UK ref: | Amazon US ref: 0312295111 (Review based on earlier hardback version, Michael Collins: A Biography).
"It's my considered opinion that in the fullness of time, history will record the greatness of Collins and it will be recorded at my expense."
- Eamon de Valera
This book is essentially a biography of the Irish patriot, revolutionary and soldier, Michael Collins, but also an account of the first modern guerilla war. A survivor of the 1916 Rebellion, Collins became the leading figure of the Irish War of Independence but lost his life at the hands of his own countrymen in the ensuing Irish Civil War.
As leader of the Squad, a revolutionary counter-intelligence group, Collins led a brave and charmed life, openly cycling round Dublin on a bicycle whilst directing the neutralisation of British power through espionage and assassination.
In contrast to the tradition of romantic but futile gestures, Collins appreciated the overriding importance of the intelligence war. Achieving a
stalemate in the military situation, Collins' achievement was to bring the British Empire to the negotiating table.
Learning that the British would oppose republican status and the inclusion of the north-east counties, the Irish leader, Eamon de Valera, insisted that Collins should go to London in his place in order to negotiate the settlement. The rest proceeded like a Greek tragedy. Collins brought back the compromise deal and de Valera repudiated it.
The majority of the Irish people welcomed the Treaty, but the Dail (the revolutionary parliament) and the Volunteers (the revolutionary army) were split down the middle. Rallying diehard republicans, de Valera provoked the Civil War during which Collins was killed in an ambush.
© armed-combat.com - 20 May 2001
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