Report by Conor Cruise O'Brien
'Report of Visit to the Federal Republic of Germany
September 3rd to 17th, 1954'

German political interest in Ireland seems to be more or less limited to gleaning examples of British misdeeds which can be used for a vos quoque¹ when English people are rude about Germany. Naturally, the Germans are too pre-occupied with their own problems to find much time to spare to consider ours (or indeed anyone else’s). As long as they are ‘working their passage’ in a Western alliance they seem unlikely to give us any support in relation to Partition nor, it may be added, would such support be very helpful to us even if they did give it. What they might do if, as conjectured above, they move into a more neutral position is problematical and, again, their support from such a position would probably be even less helpful to us than their support at present.

The sphere in which it appeared to me that relations between Ireland and Germany could be significantly and usefully improved is that of tourism. Everywhere I went I met people who had heard from friends how attractive Ireland was but could get no information through their local travel agent as to how to get there, how to bring a car, etc. The Germans are, of course, a great tourist people and Ireland has many attractions for them, not the least being the fact that it is one of the few nearby countries with which they have not recently been at war and that therefore German tourists are quite popular here. I know that the desirability of serious effort in Germany has many times been brought to the attention of Fógra Fáilte² and I have never been able to find out for what reason they did not embark on this. When the proposed reconstitution of Fógra Fáilte has taken place, I propose to urge the matter on their attention in more detail.