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78th Anniversary of the Donegal Corridor

A lot of merchant seamen came from coastal towns in Ireland, and quite a few perished in the convoys when ships got sunk.
It was a peculiar time - a lot of Irish had sympathies with the UK due to family members being in various services ( bombing of Dublin didn't help ) but there were also deep seated "memories" in the corridors of power which weren't pro Brit.
What helped the UK was the entry of the US into the war. Once American sailors and crews started to suffer casualties in the battle for the Atlantic, not being a little helpful was not an option.
 
Ireland's neutrality in the War is often a bone of contention with many people in Britain but curiously other neutral states never seem to evoke the same hostility, thus you will never hear people mention Sweden's neutrality or Swiss neutrality or the neutrality of Turkey or Spain in the same way.

This is odd given that of all the neutral countries only Ireland was a "pro-Allied" neutral, the only country from which tens of thousands of citizens went to join Allied forces (just for the record, as I am sure it will be brought up, the only Irish servicemen who suffered penalties for joining Allied forces were men who had deserted the Irish Defence Forces, desertion in a time of national emergency is regarded as a pretty serious offence in the UK too, the last time I checked), one of the few neutral countries (not sure about Sweden) that returned downed Allied airmen, the only neutral country to provide active aid to the Allies through the Donegal corridor and through weather forecasts, the only neutral country that provided a pleasant base for R'n'R for Allied service personnel and unlike Sweden and Spain (who shipped goods to the Nazis) Ireland exported all the commodities it could send to the Allies.

Meanwhile the same tired old lies about U boats being succoured in Ireland, which is nonsense, will be trotted out while people will happily laud Sweden's "progressive" system, which saw them export iron ore to the Nazis, go on holiday in Spain, a genuinely fascist state and don't get me started on what favours the Swiss were doing Hitler.
 
Ireland's neutrality in the War is often a bone of contention with many people in Britain but curiously other neutral states never seem to evoke the same hostility, thus you will never hear people mention Sweden's neutrality or Swiss neutrality or the neutrality of Turkey or Spain in the same way.

This is odd given that of all the neutral countries only Ireland was a "pro-Allied" neutral, the only country from which tens of thousands of citizens went to join Allied forces (just for the record, as I am sure it will be brought up, the only Irish servicemen who suffered penalties for joining Allied forces were men who had deserted the Irish Defence Forces, desertion in a time of national emergency is regarded as a pretty serious offence in the UK too, the last time I checked), one of the few neutral countries (not sure about Sweden) that returned downed Allied airmen, the only neutral country to provide active aid to the Allies through the Donegal corridor and through weather forecasts, the only neutral country that provided a pleasant base for R'n'R for Allied service personnel and unlike Sweden and Spain (who shipped goods to the Nazis) Ireland exported all the commodities it could send to the Allies.

Meanwhile the same tired old lies about U boats being succoured in Ireland, which is nonsense, will be trotted out while people will happily laud Sweden's "progressive" system, which saw them export iron ore to the Nazis, go on holiday in Spain, a genuinely fascist state and don't get me started on what favours the Swiss were doing Hitler.
I didn't think it would be long before you turned up Mike. Has Michael Collins returned home yet ?
 
Meanwhile the same tired old lies about U boats being succoured in Ireland,
A few of the boyos went on Atlantic cruises though didn't they. And anyway it was a good story. And anyway wasn't the McKenzie Break filmed in Ireland with the IDF dressed as evil british tommies. That involved a U-Boat.
 
None of which addresses the point I raised in my opening sentence PA. Why single out Ireland, alone of the neutrals, for the vitriol that Sweden, Spain or Switzerland deserve far more and never get?
 
None of which addresses the point I raised in my opening sentence PA. Why single out Ireland, alone of the neutrals, for the vitriol that Sweden, Spain or Switzerland deserve far more and never get?

What vitriol?

Have only ever been aware of the tacit support given to the allies during the war.
 
None of which addresses the point I raised in my opening sentence PA. Why single out Ireland, alone of the neutrals, for the vitriol that Sweden, Spain or Switzerland deserve far more and never get?
Because with Ireland perceptions can change irrevocably due to one small event. For example, executing a handful of rebels following the Easter Rising, or conversely de Valera signing the condolence book at the German embassy after Hitler died. Both may have been the "correct" thing to do, but in terms of perception and public relations in that they overturned the good work of thousands of people they were certainly not the "right" thing to do.
 
This is now a well known secret agreement, this ist has additional "bending of the rules" information

I was once stationed at 'St Angelo' a small one time air station on Lough Erne, it was during the lovely summer of 1976, there was a plaque on a wall there regarding a young pilot who took off on his first operational flight and sunk a German submarine. Flying over the lough in choppers one could see the remains of one or two aircraft at the bottom of the lough.
 
Hmm, Sweden.

From Wiki: Sweden made efforts to help the Allied Forces. From May 1940, a large part of the Swedish merchant navy that found itself outside the Baltic, totalling about 8,000 seamen, was leased to Britain.[53] 300 Swedes traveled to Norway to fight the German invasion.[54] German telegraph traffic to occupied Oslo went through Swedish-leased cables which the Swedes intercepted. The traffic was encrypted with Germany's Geheimschreiber device, but the cypher code was broken by Swedish mathematics professor Arne Beurling[21] in early summer 1940 and the results from this espionage were sent to the Allies through the Polish resistance movement. When the German battleship Bismarck embarked on her voyage to attack the Atlantic convoys, Swedish intelligence informed the British of her departure from port. Swedish businessmen and diplomats were also actively spying for the Allies, in Berlin and in the occupied territories.[citation needed]

In 1945, as the Allies were planning to liberate Denmark and Norway, the United States wanted Sweden to co-operate in this action. Sweden began preparing for "Operation Rädda Danmark" (Operation Save Denmark), in which Sweden was to invade Zealand from Scania. After Denmark had been liberated, Sweden was to assist the Allies in the invasion of Norway. This proved to be unnecessary, but US planes were allowed to use Swedish military bases during the liberation of Norway, from spring 1944 to 1945, and the Allies were also collaborating with the Swedish Military Intelligence and Security Service. Sweden allowed Allied spies to listen to German radio signals from a station on Öland.[55] A radio beacon was also established in Malmö for the British military to guide bombing of Germany.[citation needed] Additionally, from 1943 onward, Norwegian and Danish soldiers (Den danske Brigade) were trained at Swedish military bases. Sweden had also set up a series of training camps along the Norwegian border for the Norwegian resistance movement. Toward the end of the war Swedish intelligence cooperated with US air transport in relief efforts directed toward areas liberated by the Red Army.
 
Just had a holiday in Lisbon, which led me to read up on Salazars actions in WW2. Theres a lot more to being a neutral than meets the eye.
 
I was once stationed at 'St Angelo' a small one time air station on Lough Erne, it was during the lovely summer of 1976, there was a plaque on a wall there regarding a young pilot who took off on his first operational flight and sunk a German submarine. Flying over the lough in choppers one could see the remains of one or two aircraft at the bottom of the lough.
There was a WW2 P51 Mustang or some such single engined fighter in the hoggin off the coast in Shakelton Barracks, Ballykelly.
 
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