My Life

My Life - Oswald Mosleythe Irish because they regarded their way of fighting as immoral and blameworthy.Even among the regular army after 1916 I often found this attitude. Another youngofficer would say to me out hunting: 'Look at them all, smiling at us and offering usdrinks at the meet. Most of them will be out with a rifle tonight to put a shot in ourbacks.' It was the beginning of guerrilla warfare, and I remember even then havingsufficient insight to reply: 'How else can they fight our overwhelming force?—If theystand up to us in the open they haven't got a chance.' But this kind of thing is a greatstrain to discipline even in the best regular troops, and it turns second-rate troops orirregulars into a vengeful rabble.The large majority of the Irish guerrillas on the other side were idealists in the highestdegree, and few among them were there for any advantage of plunder or ignoblemotive of revenge. This was true even of those who committed the vilest crimes. Howelse can we regard the shooting of fourteen officers in one night while asleep in theirbeds, a crime which justly outraged English opinion and infuriated our troops? Yet themen who did this are credibly reported to have spent the previous evening prayingtogether in a chapel like medieval knights on a vigil before battle. We come to thevery crux of this matter when men who did such deeds, and who had foreknowledgeof them, fell into the hands of British troops, who were aware that they knew whatwas going to happen. This terrible clash enters the dimension of classic tragedy whenboth sides are initially inspired not by base but by ideal motives.This was the only occasion when I had first-hand information of such matters, butthey have occurred in most of the great nations of Europe, and are now reported to behappening in Asia; the whole tragedy has been the subject of so much discussion,clouded by so much passion and blinded by so much partisanship, that it is difficultfor anyone to take a clear view. In some political circles the point has now beenreached where any atrocity is permitted to our own side, but not even a misdemeanourto the other. In truth, nearly everyone on every side has committed atrocities whichhave certainly varied greatly in degree and in extent, but possibly only on account ofthe degree of temptation and the extent of the occasion.The killing or ill-treatment of prisoners or of anyone defenceless always seemed tome the most despicable crime known to man. It occurred on a great scale in theSecond World War and will be considered in a later chapter. Whether large or small, Ihave always condemned such acts and attacked them in my political life whenever ina position to do so. Another incident of this kind in the 1920 involved me in anotherbitter controversy. In 1919 General Dyer at Amritsar in India opened rapid andprotracted fire on an unarmed crowd which included women and children who had noimmediate means of escape. He afterwards claimed his action 'had a moral effectthroughout the Punjab'. I spoke on the subject in the Oxford or Cambridge Union —Iforget which—in very strong terms. During this period I spoke frequently inuniversity debates and I believe I was responsible for carrying the first motion infavour of socialism by twenty votes at one of them and just lost by four votes at aboutthe same time in the other.My speech against General Dyer caused considerable excitement both at theuniversity and at Westminster and evoked much controversy. One undergraduatepaper attacked me fiercely and published a complete travesty of my speech, allegingthat my peroration had 'amounted' to an appeal to the Indians 'to revolt against the136 of 424