Forum Lurker. Please, get your facts right. Ireland was a republic during WWII, so why would they want a shot at freedom? Many Irishmen came over to Britain to fight the Nazies. But let us look at British rule in Ireland. If Britain was so oppressive, why did Irishmen have exactly -EXACTLY- the same rights as other British people? They voted politicians into the House of Commons. Would the Nazies allow that? Hardly. There was the famine, of course. Britain's fault, certainly; but the problem was one of absentee landlords who had become detached from the land. After the famine, the UK government took steps to make sure that it didn't happen again. Hardly the action of an oppressive state. It wont happen in my lifetime, but future generations of Irish historians will look upon Ireland's incorporaton into the UK state as being the golden age of Irish history and wax nostalgically about it. As for Brits charging into countries and practicing genocide...where did this happen? We very went into countries like India or parts of Africa and liberated it from tyranny. We introduced concepts such as justice, fairness, christianity...and countless other benefits too numerous to mention. As for the Industrial Revolution, it rescued us from being peasants scraping an existance from the land. I can see where you are coming from, Lurker, but don't let yourself be too influenced by Feinian papist spin doctors who are very successful in the USA.