14 March 2012: Establishment of Land and Armies

As with the American Civil War, the country was not unified under a single banner or allegiance. There were people from both sides of the fighting who adamantly believed that they were correct and were willing to fight and die in order to preserve the ideals that they believed in. One major difference between the Irish Civil War and the American Civil War was the in Ireland, there were not defined areas that were unified. For example, in the American Civil War, it was pretty much the north against the south. This was not so in Ireland. There were sections of support for each group spread throughout the whole country, as shown by the map to the right. The anti-treaty forces essentially maintained a perimeter around the border of Ireland while the pro-treaty forces occupied the central area of the country. It is fairly apparent that the anti-treaty forces had the advantage in this situation. These divisions were derived from the pro-treaty and anti-treaty forces choosing a side and leader to support, as I talked about in the last post. People who supported the treaty officially formed the National Army, which was perhaps more commonly known as Free State Army. Their opponents often called them "Staters." People who were anti-treaty named themselves Republicans while the members of the Free State Army preferred to call them "Irregulars." The Republicans claimed that they were defending the Irish Republic, which was created after the Eater Rising in 1916. The were defending it because of how it had been seemingly abandoned when the Free State was accepted, as I discussed in the last post. Michael Collins and Éamon de Valera were the primary players in this action. These two groups emerged from the IRA, a once unified force that secured independence and secession from Britain for Ireland during the Irish War of Independence. The IRA was now split into pro-treaty and anti-treaty forces.

As shown in the map above, the anti-treaty forces enjoyed both tactical and numerical advantage. They outnumbered the pro-treaty forces by over 2 to 1. Neither army was very strong because the IRA had sustained losses in the Irish War of Independence as well as many soldiers being recruited by the British. While the anti-treaty forces had tactical and numerical advantage, they were at a great disadvantage because of the lack of a defined command structure. As a result, they had no clear strategy and insufficient arms. They did not have enough rifles for each soldier so most soldiers were armed with handguns or shotguns. Not only did they not have sufficient arms for the soldiers, they did not have a substantial amount of armored vehicles. They managed to acquire a few armored cars from the British as they were withdrawing from the country, who were anticipating trouble. Despite all of these troubles, perhaps the most damning aspect of the anti-treaty forces' troubles was the fact that they had no artillery. This meant that they were at a severe disadvantage while attacking. In fact, because of having no artillery, they were forced to take a defensive approach during the course of the war.

While the pro-treaty forces were at first at a numerical disadvantage, this problem was quickly solved by Michael Collins and his commanders, who were able to secure help from many forces, as well as supplies from Britain. Not only did Collins secure munitions and other supplies from Britain, he was able to recruit British officers for their tactical knowledge. The Republican forces used this propaganda to claim that the Free State Army was just a proxy for Britain. This was simply not true though, as most soldiers had no combat experience  in either the First World War or the Irish War of Independence. As the opposing sides organized themselves and started to acquire munitions and supplies, an ugly was imminent. Next week, I will discuss the various methods and tactics employed by both sides as the war progressed.