Why do all the troublesome countries start with I?

Just got back from seeing a movie at the Toronto Film Festival, Ken Loach's The Wind That Shakes the Barley. It's about the Irish war of independence and the Civil War that followed, with Cillian Murphy (you know, Scarecrow from Batman Begins) as the main character.

It tells the story of a young Irish student (Murphy) who, before he's about to go to London and practice medicine, has a few too many run-ins with the much hated Black and Tans. Radicalized, he joins up with the IRA and fights in the wars - first for national independence, second in rejection of the treaty which created the Irish Free State.

It's a fantastic movie, and you should all see it when you have the chance. But it did get me thinking about the nature of the Irish conflict, and what the debate in London must have been like back in the 1920s during the time the movie is set in.

If you were an imperialist, you could argue that London had brought the Irish democracy and free elections, and that the British Army should stay in Dublin to protect those civil liberties. The staunchly Catholic Irish were likely to restrict people's freedoms in the name of religion. You would be correct. All the same, today only an idiot would argue that the British should have stayed in Ireland.

You could - again, accurately - argue that if His Majesty's Army pulled out of Ireland, the most likely result was a devastating civil war. This in fact came to pass. Nevertheless, you would be an idiot to argue that the British should have stayed in Ireland.

You could even argue that the British had to fight the IRA "over there" so they didn't end up fighting them "over here" - that is, with bombs going off in London. Again, you would be correct. Still, you would be an idiot to argue that the British should have stayed in Ireland.

You could argue that negotiating with the IRA was only going to legitimize them, embolden them, and weaken the British Empire. Again, you would be correct. But even despite all this, you would be an idiot to argue that the British should have stayed in Ireland.

No British politician, cleric, aristocrat, or leader of any stripe today argues that, if only they'd stayed in Ireland everything would have been better. Similarly, nobody argues that if they'd just tortured those Fenian bastards a bit more thoroughly it all would have worked out. Most would probably concede that the Irish should have been negotiated with sooner, rather than have the war break out as it did. Giving Ireland Dominion status shortly after Canada invented the idea would have been a grand idea, but every single attempt at Home Rule failed politically thanks to Conservatives, which left the Irish no alternative to war.

It's been popular in books like Empire Lite or Colossus to argue that the history of the British Empire holds lessons for the American Empire today. Authors like Ignatieff and Ferguson write that the Americans have a role to play in the world today, and that role needs to be informed by history.

I thoroughly agree: learning from history is crucial. The question is, have our modern imperialists in fact learned anything?