Page:Roger Casement - The crime against Ireland and how the war may right it.djvu/9



The following articles were begun in 1911 under the title, "'Ireland, Germany and the Next War," and were intended for private circulation only among a few interested friends of both countries.

Part I was written in August, 1911, Parts II to VI were written at odd moments, between the end of 1912 and November 1913; Part VII in December 1913. Part VII under the title of "The Elsewhere Empire" was published in January 1914 in a Dublin monthly review.

The whole seven parts furnish in outline the case for a German-Irish alliance as this presented itself to the writer's mind when the world was still at peace; and in Part VII the intrigues of Great Britain to induce an antiGerman policy on the part of the United States are touched on.

It was the writer's intention to show in succeeding chapters how the vital needs of European peace, of European freedom of the seas and of Irish National life and prosperity were indissolubly linked with the cause of Germany in the struggle so clearly impending between that country and Great Britain.

The war has come sooner than was expected. The rest of the writer's task must be essayed not with the author's pen, but with the rifle of the Irish Volunteer. As a contribution to the cause of Irish freedom this presentment of the case for Germany, friend of Ireland and foe of England, is now published.

It was written on the assumption that a war between Germany and Great Britain might be localized between those two Powers alone. Rh