Extracts from a confidential report from Charles Bewley to
Joseph P. Walshe (Dublin)
(13/34)

[matter omitted]

As regards the question in the last paragraph of your minute of 28th October (21/574),¹ as to what aspects of Government policy have given rise to the conclusion that Irish policy is assimilated to that of England, it will be necessary for me to reply at some length in order to give the Minister a correct impression of German opinion.

As the attitude of Saorstát Éireann in international affairs is mainly evidenced by its policy at the meetings of the League of Nations, it is natural that German opinion should judge it accordingly. The most important activity of the League of Nations in the last two years has of course been the decision to apply sanctions against Italy. The fact that this policy was supported by Saorstát Éireann has not been understood in Germany, and the only explanation offered is that it is acting under English influence. It is quite useless for me to suggest that Irish policy was dictated by the desire genuinely to support the principles of the League: I am met by the reply, 'Yes, of course - the English policy.'

[matter omitted]²

The same considerations apply to a certain extent to the attitude expressed about the neutrality observed by the Irish Government in the war in Spain. Many notices have been published in the German Press of the force alleged to have been raised by General O'Duffy, and I have been questioned as to their accuracy and as to the attitude of the Government. My answer that I know nothing of General O'Duffy's activities except what I have read in the papers, and that the Irish Government, like the German, is bound by the Pact, has met with the reply that the German Government has clearly manifested its sympathy, not only in public speeches but in the telegram sent by the Minister Hess on the relief of the Alcazar, and will certainly recognize General Franco's Government at the earliest moment possible.

[matter omitted]

Another matter which is regarded in Germany, though not in Saorstát Éireann, as a part of Government policy, and which is not calculated to increase our reputation for mental independence in a national sense, is the attitude taken up by the press in Ireland on foreign affairs in general, and on German affairs in particular. It is true that Irish papers are very little read in Germany, but unfortunately the few people who read them are either the officials of the Foreign Office or the very Germans who are interested in and sympathetic to Ireland.

[matter omitted]

So far as I can judge, the attitude of the Irish papers has not changed since 1933.

I am of course aware that the Irish government cannot be held responsible for anything written in organs of the Opposition, and also that it is its policy not to interfere even with those which support the Government. Unfortunately this is a point of view which the German Government and German opinion in general absolutely refuse to accept. When the French Government refused to check attacks on Germany some years ago on the ground that they had no control over the press, the German press merely stated that a Government was not entitled to avoid its proper responsibility by references to the freedom of the press. Thus when an article appears in the Irish Press in 1936 accusing the German Government or members of it of the crime of burning the Reichstag in 1933, it is not merely the paper in question but the Irish Government which is here held responsible; and no arguments on my part will carry conviction that such charges could appear except with the consent of the Government.