User:Jnestorius/Irish official condolences on the death of Hitler

Irish neutrality during World War II
Ireland maintained a public stance of neutrality to the end by refusing to close the German and Japanese Legations, and the Taoiseach Éamon de Valera signed the book of condolence on Adolf Hitler's death on 2 May 1945, and personally visited Ambassador Hempel, following the usual protocol on the death of a Head of State of a state with a legation in Ireland. President Douglas Hyde visited Hempel separately on 3 May. The visits caused a storm of protest in the United States. Irish envoys in other nations did likewise, but no other Western European democracies followed Ireland's example.

The Emergency (Ireland)
On the occasion of the death of Adolf Hitler, de Valera paid a controversial visit to Hempel to express sympathy with the German people over the death of the Führer. This action has been defended as proper given the state's neutrality. Sir John Maffey, the British Representative, commented that de Valera's actions were "unwise but mathematically consistent". Douglas Hyde, Ireland's president, also sent condolences, an action which enraged the United States minister as no similar action had taken place on the death of the United States President, Franklin D. Roosevelt. Yet all flags in Dublin were lowered to half-mast out of respect.

Éamon de Valera
Controversially, de Valera formally offered his condolences to the German Minister in Dublin on the death of Adolf Hitler in 1945, in accordance with diplomatic protocol. This did some damage to Ireland, particularly in the United States – and soon afterwards de Valera had a bitter exchange of words with Winston Churchill in two famous radio addresses after the end of the war in Europe.

Eduard Hempel
Eduard Hempel (1887–1972) was the Nazi German Minister to Ireland between 1937 and 1945 &mdash; in the buildup to and during The Emergency (Second World War). When he was first appointed to the post he was not a Nazi party member but a short while after his appointment, the Berlin regime put him under extreme pressure to join.

Prior to his appointment, the Irish External Affairs ministry had specified that they did not want a Nazi party member as diplomatic representative; the solution to this requirement appears to have been that at the time he took up his position he was not a member of the party, but joined the following year, his NSDAP card being dated 1 July 1938.

In the Irish Times Correspondence of 10 March 2011, the late Charles Acton is quoted, ' Dr Hempel was I am convinced an old fashioned, career civil service diplomat, caught in the terrible dilemma of his times. Loving his country but hating the regime that had taken control of it, he felt he could do more good in the long run and mitigate the harm of the regime by remaining Minister and pursuing a course of utter correctness, than by resigning and thereby risking the Legation being run by a real Nazi.'

Michael Drury, on 25 February 2011 in a letter to the Irish Times wrote, "Official circles in Ireland recognised that Dr Hempel behaved correctly throughout his mission, given the narrow limits of his position. For example, he respected Ireland’s neutrality better than the American minister did. If he were regarded as having been “Hitler’s man”, I would not have been instructed, as an official of the Irish Embassy in Bonn, to attend his funeral in 1972." In further correspondence on 8 March 2011 he wrote, 'I agree that Dr Hempel ought to have resigned when pressured to join the Nazi party, but not all of us are endowed with heroic virtues. He had no need to use the “classical excuse” that he followed orders: he was not accused of war crimes.'

Drury's assessment of Hempel was however challenged by several other Irish Times readers, who pointed to evidence of the German minister's pro-Hitler, pro-Nazi and anti-Semitic outlook.

Hempel's time in Ireland is particularly noted for the incident at the end of his term of office when the Taoiseach, Éamon de Valera and Joe Walshe, Secretary of the Department of External Affairs, paid a visit to his home in Dún Laoghaire on 2 May 1945 to express their official condolences on the death of German dictator Adolf Hitler. Hempel was described as being distraught at the news, wringing his hands in anguish, although after his death his wife, Eva, accounted for the incident by saying that he was suffering from eczema. According to official papers released in 2005, President Hyde also visited Hempel, the following day.

In his eight years in post, Hempel sent thousands of reports to Berlin by telegraph and shortwave radio (the latter until he surrendered his radio transmitter in December 1943 at the insistence of the Department of External Affairs, and under pressure from the United States and United Kingdom). Some historians have stated that Hempel was involved in undermining the 1942 allied raid on Dieppe to failure by reporting Canadian troop movements on the south coast of England although this charge has been disputed.

In a 'Documents on Irish Foreign Policy 1941-1945' a letter from de Valera is quoted defending his contentious visit to Hempel following the death of Hitler. He wrote,"So long as we retained our diplomatic relations with Germany, to have failed to call upon the German representative would have been an act of unpardonable discourtesy to the German nation and to Dr Hempel," he said in a letter.

De Valera granted Hempel asylum at the end of the war. He returned to Germany in 1949.

Reference:

Joseph Walshe
On 2 May 1945, he and Taoiseach Éamon de Valera visited Hempel at home in Dún Laoghaire to express the Irish Government's official condolences on the suicide of Adolf Hitler.

Reference:

Draft
Events
 * De Valera and Walshe visit Hempel at private residence on 2 May 1945
 * Hyde visits 3 May 1945
 * What action did Irish ambassadors abroad take?
 * in Germany
 * other neutrals
 * Allied states
 * Walshe, FF supported; lower DFA officials, opposition parties opposed it
 * Asked what other neutrals had done, but after the fact.
 * Irish reaction
 * Foreign reaction
 * US almost campaigned for allies to withdraw ambassadors

Analysis
 * Compare with FDR reactions
 * Compare with other neutrals (govt asked for their reactions, but after the event)
 * affected foreign view of state; UN membership refused.
 * why did Dev do it?
 * fastidious neutrality
 * personal liking for Hempel / dislike of Gray
 * symbol of independence
 * did he know how unpopular it would be?

In 2005, after President Mary McAleese compared Northern Irish "irrational hatred" of Catholics to Nazi hatred of Jews, she avoided answering questions about whether the government ought to apologise for de Valera's actions. The government said it had not advised her on the question. Michael McDowell, the Minister for Justice, said the apology reflected de Valera's "excessive zeal" to protect neutrality.