Terrytoon
"look forward not BACKWARDS."
British policy down the centuries has effected the lives of every country they have ever ruled over, usually adversely.
It has destroyed existing cultures and manipulated economies to suit the Empire's interests rather than those of the people they ruled.
In the case of Ireland, an enforced and permanent partition has been the cause of inequality, persecution, ongoing violence and death - in the seventies and eighties, that spread to mainland Britain.
You're "forgive and forget" plea doesn't hack it and it won't begin to until the past is acknowledged and matter put right - it's called 'coming to terms with your history'.
Following the Famine, Ireland was left with a legacy of massive depopulation caused by avoidable death and enforced emigration.
The 'gunpoint' 'treaty' led immediately to civil war and a divided Republic on one side of the border and viciously violent sectarian riots and demonstrations on the other, lasting to the present day.
Your behaviour on this forum and your open defence of the 'good old days of Empire' is a perfect example of why that period of history is a thing of the past and why it was necessary to end it - you display all the strutting mannerisms of the Empire at its worst - and long may you continue to do so as an example of what it represented.
As with Keith, your contempt for the Irish and the other ex subjects is manifest.
Keith has at least had the balls to articulate his contempt even to the point of demonstrating how he believes it is not even necessary to seek knowledge or be interested in the subject in order to dismiss Irish history as "a contetible joke"
You, on the other hand, strut around, declaring that the world was better off as loyal subjects of her Maj.
You have Ballsed up big-time here - on The Treaty, on mutiny. on the fitting-up of Tom Kent, the kangaroo courts, the breaches of laws and rues by the British authorities...... on virtually everything you have claimed.
You declare rather than attempt to actually prove what you say; you put up your statements without evidence and expect them to be accepted without question, and when they are questioned, you sneer at those who don't accept what you have to say - a bit of a mess really.   
You have convinced nobody and now appear to have given up trying to, resorting to "go read a history book" - when you obvousley never have.
Think you're done here, don't you?
Keith - "Not before, not during, and not after the rising.." was what I was responding to - your addition alters that not one iota
Dishonest of you to have denied it and stupid for you have to done so publicly, as is your present attempt top extract yourself from it.
Jim Carroll