They left us when we needed them most

I write this in memory of my father and his comrades who served in the Irish Army during the Emergency.

It seems Justice Minister Alan Shatter is bringing forward a bill to give an amnesty and immunity to those who deserted during our fledgling State’s direst need to allegedly fight for the Allies.

A question if I may? The British with American help and Northern unionist connivance were prepared to invade our new state. Were these deserters prepared to engage in this invasion with an army who less than 17 years earlier had been kicked out of Ireland? Were they prepared to maim and kill a people who had courageously fought this same British army for hundreds of years, and its small army with its outdated weapons, of which, as I said, my father was a proud member of.