Michael Collins and the Financing of Violent Political Struggle

Nicholas Ridley

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781315444901
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Irish History
• Index: History

Michael Collins was a pivotal figure in the Irish struggle for independence and his legacy has resonated ever since. Whilst Collins' role as a guerrilla leader and intelligence operative is well documented, his actions as the clandestine Irish government Minister of Finance have been less studied. The book analyses how funds were raised and transferred in order that the IRA could initiate and sustain the military struggle, and lay the financial foundations of an Irish state.

Nicholas Ridley examines the legacy of these actions by comparing Collins' modus operandi for raising and transferring clandestine funds to those of more modern groups engaged in political violence, as well as the laying of foundations for Irish financial and fiscal regulation.

Part I

Violent undercurrents

Pre-1914 Europe

1 Violence in pre-1914 Europe

It has been held that the attacks of 9/11 heralded in a new era of terrorism. However, in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century Europe experienced political turbulence and violence from clandestine liberationist and ideological groups.¹ The main groups were the anarchists and the revolutionaries.

The anarchists were ideologically spawned from the various revolutions of 1848, and the writings of the French socialist thinker Proudhon and his admirer the Russian Mikhael Bakhunin. At the core of their political philosophy was the minimum – and indeed near absence – of government and the abolition of all private property. Abolish all property ownership, the political logic ran, and no-one could exist due to the labour and travail of someone else and the role of the state would wither away. It would be replaced by voluntary cooperation between groups of individuals and the rule of law would be replaced by collective and communal common sense.

The idea was encapsulated by Proudhon’s twin maxims of, “All property is theft” and “Government of Man by Man is slavery”. To Proudhon and his followers, the way forward was the somewhat vague and esoteric abstract idea of rights which, when propounded and explained enough, would galvanise the human race to the ideal statelessness, through reason. Bakunin and his flowers shared this ultimate goal. However, from his upbringing and experience of Czarist Russia, Bakunin held that only violent revolution would achieve this.

The long-term revolutionary philosophy to emerge from Proudhon was Marxism, which developed and adapted into revolution through the industrial proletariat. This, it was held, would take time whilst the industrial masses trained and – in contradiction to anarchism – became organised and disciplined. Bakunin, whilst sympathetic to Marx’ long-term goal, was implacable in his doctrine of immediate revolution by immediate and constant violent attacks. If these attacks were perpetuated enough against countries which were at a certain stage of their economic development – Italy, Spain or Russia – then there would be large-scale risings by the poor masses who had nothing to lose.

Bakunin died disappointed that by the time of his death no substantial violence had erupted, but his cause was taken up by an unlikely figure. This was a former Russian Army officer and a distinguished explorer and geographer, Prince Peter Kuropatkin. Kuropatkin joined a secret revolutionary anarchist committee. Together with a group of French anarchists they produced the inflammatory publication La Revolte, issued from underground printing presses in Paris. By the late 1870s anarchist groups in the Russian Empire emerged through action. There was an attempted assassination of the St Petersburg police chief and the assailant, a 26-year-old female revolutionary, stood meekly by awaiting arrest. At her trial the prosecution evidence of intent to murder was overwhelming, but the jury insisted upon acquitting. Indulgent leniency was possible and common in this, the early days of the cycle of terror in imperial Russia.

In fact, the idealistic youth of Russia had not at this stage embraced violence, but rather sought to reach out and enhance awareness amongst the perceived exploited poor. Their guiding spirit was Lavrov, who formed from exile “Land and Liberty” and who wrote that the educated and privileged classes should go out to the poorer class and galvanise them into a reforming movement. Hundreds of well born and highly educated youths turned their backs on privilege and career paths and moved out to Russia’s vast countryside, educating the peasants of their “true situation” and their plight and persuaded them to concerted action and reforming movements and if necessary, eventual revolution.

They suffered a robust and often violent rejection by the peasants who were suspicious, sly and the most active of them, aggressive entrepreneurs who wished to increase their holdings at the expense of their neighbours. The peasants even reported them to the police, the very source of authority against whom the idealistic youths were attempting to turn the peasantry. The idealistic youths, rejected by the very strata they were trying to help, became bitter and looked to themselves as uncompromising. By this time, “Land and Liberty” had been taken over by a group of neo-anarchists, who adopted the more strident title for the movement, “The People’s Will”. Revolutionary acts followed.

In February 1878, a police spy who had infiltrated the St Petersburg anarchist group was murdered. Then in St Petersburg in broad daylight the head of the Third Section (Secret Service), General Metzensev, was killed by an anarchist who slowly shadowed his victim in a horse-drawn carriage then jumped down and inflicted several fatal stab wounds. In 1880 there was an attack which though unsuccessful caused extreme concern as the imperial Winter Palace had been penetrated and the target was the Czar’s brother. Ten palace guards were killed in the attack. There had already been three attempts to blow up the imperial railway carriage whilst the imperial train was transporting the Czar and his family from St Petersburg to the royal holiday in the Crimea. Now, with the Winter Palace itself penetrated, intensive anti-terror measures were implemented.

The government dispensed with jury trial in all cases of offences against imperial officials, and later all attacks against such officials were tried before military court martial. A strategic assessment was made, intelligence reports were studied, and the three most subversive areas identified and their centres – St Petersburg, Kharkov and Odessa – were placed under military rule. In the first two the military governors acted with harsh repression, whilst in the third, Odessa, there was a policy of firmness, restrain and moderation with even some measures of attempted relief to the population in times of hardship.

The Governor of Odessa, Loris-Melikov, was efficient. When initially engaged in anti-terrorism he himself was the target of an attempted assassination and he arrested the would-be assassin with his own hands. He was industrious and reflective and realised the folly of rigid repression and reprisal. His success in Odessa led to his being appointed as overall commander for internal security of Russia (including the protection of the imperial family) and part of his remit was to formulate a more effective way of dealing with subversion and countering attacks. His methods and his enlightened approach placed him ahead of his time, and arguably would have been instructive to the British authorities in in Ireland in the post-1916 period. Loris-Melikov’s approach, as fully in keeping with the Czar Alexander II himself who was attempting reforms, included the radical reform of freeing the entire serf population and turning Russian agriculture into various levels of landowning by the peasantry. Loris-Melikov was no ardent Liberal but saw the value of reform and any measures which alleviated the cause of subversion and violence. He cultivated the Liberal politicians and even had dialogue with some of the less extreme revolutionaries. The more extreme revolutionaries and anarchists accordingly felt threatened at that time, as reforms would alleviate and reduce the rebelliousness of the mass of the population, essential for revolution. Continuation and escalation of extreme action was necessary.

A group of determined conspirators planned a multiple attack on the Czar, involving mining the route of his carriage, together with individuals armed with bombs ready to throw and detonate if the mines did not succeed. The bombing attack was carried out, disabling the Czar’s carriage. Alexander, instead of being bundled into another carriage and driven away at speed, remained at the scene and another conspirator in the crowd stepped forward and threw his bomb on target; Alexander died shortly afterwards. Ironically, this was the same day in which he had signed the imperial ukase which freed all the serfs throughout imperial Russia. The anarchists in Europe had claimed their first head of state victim.

Alexander II was succeeded by Alexander III, a giant of a man and determined to confront terrorism, whilst presiding over significant, sweeping developments in the industrialisation of Russia, and a bullish foreign policy expanding Russia’s Asian territories. His reactionary Ministers eventually persuaded him to turn against Loris-Melikov who was obliged to resign and retire in April 1881. Loris-Melikov’s legacy was nullified in Russia, but in the post 1989 period, with the emergence of new states from the break up of the former Soviet Union, his example and his general principles are venerated by the Armenian Police. (His statue stands in a prominent place in the Armenian Central Police Academy.)

Alexander III’s reign saw industrial development, alleviating in some aspects the lot of the peasantry, who migrated to work in the towns, but there remained much poverty and squalor amongst large numbers of industrial workers, which proved to be fertile recruiting ground for extremist groups. However, the repressive counter-terrorism measures were generally effective and there were comparatively few attacks and isolated acts of terrorism. The Peoples Will movement had splintered and one group emerged which was to dominate; this was the Social Revolutionaries.

An unsuccessful attempt to kill Alexander III resulted in several of the perpetrators, including one Alexander Ulyanov, being hanged. Retribution also fell on his brother who was expelled from his law studies at university. His mother lobbied and appealed for several years for her son to be allowed to resume his studies. Finally her persistence paid off, and her son was allowed to re-enrol, study at home, sit his exams, which he passed and he gained his law degree. However, the damage had been done. The new graduate changed his name and joined the revolutionary movement. The world was to hear more of Nicoli Ulyanovic Lenin.

In the final years of Alexander III and the first years of Nicholas I, Russian industrial development intensified and expanded, with increasing numbers of industrial workers living in harsh conditions. The expansionist foreign policy continued, resulting in disastrous war and defeat by Japan. In January 1905, there occurred the infamous “Bloody Sunday” massacre when a large crowd of industrial workers, peacefully demonstrating in St Petersburg were fired on by troops. This then sparked off a mutiny of the Black Sea fleet in Odessa, and mass industrial unrest.

However, during this period Russia produced two outstanding statesmen Count Sergei Witte and Peter Stolypin. Their wisdom and farsightedness ensured a period of relative stability. By the early 1900s the country, whilst still extremely autocratic, had taken on a new dimension in societal terms. The 97 million agrarian peasants also worked seasonally in the factories or in cottage industries. There was now a small bourgeoisie of 13 million small shopkeepers, tradesmen and skilled artisans.² Order was maintained by provincial governors being given increased powers of arrest and punishment, and the police were given increased resources, whilst the Secret Service had been given wide powers to infiltrate agents provocateurs, investigate, gather intelligence and carry out preemptive operations.

Nonetheless subversion and evolutionary activity advanced in stages. Though opposed by Lenin and the Bolshevik group the Social Revolutionaries continued their individual attacks. In the early years of Nicholas II’s reign the Minister of Education, Nicoli Bogolapev, was assassinated followed by the assassinations of Minister of Interior, Sipyagan, in 1902 and then in 1904 Sipyagan’s successor as Minister of the Interior, Plehve, was assassinated. The following year the Czar’s brother Grand Duke Sergei was killed.

In the same period of 1905–1906 there was an outbreak of mass insurgency in Moscow which lasted three weeks when whole suburbs rose up in revolt. Individuals armed with smuggled rifles and home-made bombs fought police detachments and troops until being suppressed with much bloodshed. Russian troops returning from the disastrous Russo-Japanese War mutinied and took possession of large stretches of the Trans-Siberian Railway and had to be quelled by two loyal Army corps advancing from either end of the long railway, gradually restoring order and taking back possession of this communications artery so vital to the Russian Empire.

Between 1906 and the beginning of 1908 there were over 35,000 murders of provincial governors, police, civil servants and imperial officials. All were carried out by another group of the Social Revolutionaries, the Maximalists. The Maximalist doctrine was that all those in uniform, or serving the régime in any sort of official capacity, were “excluded from the human race”³ and it was an obligation and a duty to exterminate them.

The new Prime Minister, Peter Stolypin, met violence with violence, sanctioning court martials and executions. He continued and expanded proactive police operations, infiltration of revolutionary groups and full use of agents provocateurs. However, this was also accompanied by a period of economic and political reform. A Russian parliament or Duma, based on a limited electoral franchise, was established and met. A series of five enactments completed the transformation of the peasant from being indebted to the state to a small-scale landowner, and replacing poverty-stricken and inefficiently run farming communities into more advanced agricultural practice, giving more scope for individual effort and enterprise. The economic benefits were enormous, and combined with Russia’s increasing industrialisation and growth of the railway network, significantly advanced the Russian economy.

The Social Revolutionaries, alarmed at the possibility of the populace becoming more prosperous and therefore more contented under the régime, were implacable and in 1911 Stolypin was murdered whilst attending the Kiev Opera house. The Czar and his family were present in the royal boxes, whilst the murder took place below.

Thus there was continuous subversion and assassination in pre-1914 Russia by the Social Revolutionaries, rounding off a generation of sporadic terrorism in Russia. The murders of a Minister of Education, the murders of two Ministers of Interior, the assassination of a member of the imperial family, the brother of the Czar, a disastrous mishandling of a mass peace...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright page
• Table of Contents
• Preface
• PART I Violent undercurrents: pre-1914 Europe
• PART II Michael Collins and the struggle for Irish independence
• PART III The sinews of war
• PART IV Later political violence and insurgency and their financing
• PART V Michael Collins
• Appendix I: historians and de Valera’s US funds
• Appendix II: Collins and Connolly
• Bibliography
• Index