National and Ethnic Challenges 975tion in Ireland in 1918 had angered Irish who felt no allegiance to the
empire. The Irish Republican Army, which was organized from remnants
of the rebel units disbanded after an ill-fated Easter Sunday insurrection
in 1916, gained adherents amid high unemployment, strikes, and sectarian
violence between Catholics and Protestants in largely Protestant Ulster (the
six counties of northeastern Ireland). In a mood of mounting crisis, British
Liberals wanted to begin negotiations as soon as possible with Irish political
leaders. Conservatives, in contrast, wanted to crush the Irish Republicans.
In the 1918 elections to the House of Commons, Irish voters elected a
majority of members of Sinn Fein (“We Ourselves” in Irish Gaelic), the
Irish Republican political organization. Sinn Fein members refused to take
their seats in Parliament and then unilaterally declared a republic. Parlia
ment finally passed the Government of Ireland Act in 1920, dividing Ire
land into two districts. The Catholic district in the south—most of the
island—was to become a crown colony. Largely Protestant Ulster remained
part of Britain.
Most Catholic Irish, however, wanted nothing less than complete inde
pendence. The British government kept about 50,000 troops and 10,000
police in Ireland, including the “Black and Tans,” a special police force that
terrorized the Irish population supporting the Irish Republicans. More than
a thousand people were killed in fighting during 1921, half of whom were
British policemen or soldiers ambushed by the Irish Republican Army. In
January 1922, the British Parliament went a step further, creating the Irish
Free State, a Dominion within the British Commonwealth, although many
Irish Republicans demanded the severance of all formal ties to Britain and
the creation of the Irish Republic (which would come in 1948). Ulster, or
Northern Ireland, remained within the United Kingdom. Continuing spo
radic sectarian violence in Ulster proved that tensions between the Protes
tant majority and Catholic minority, which did not accept British rule, would
not subside.
The Great War accentuated other nationalist movements for indepen
dence. Total war had brought the mobilization of men and resources from
the colonies. This led to considerable resentment among indigenous
peoples. In Egypt, following the arrest of an Egyptian nationalist, more than
a thousand people were killed in the repression that followed an uprising. In
India, which the British viewed as the key to sustaining the Empire (provid
ing a vast reservoir of soldiers for the army), a growing Indian national move
ment developed. It was led by Mahatma Gandhi, who merged Hindu religion
and culture with peaceful political resistance. Gandhi adapted Western-style
propaganda techniques to the Indian struggle. Unlike the Indian National
Congress, which had since the 1880s sought greater autonomy for India
within the British Empire, Gandhi and his followers, who included many
Indian Muslims, sought outright independence. Following riots in 1919,
Indians held a protest in Amritsar in Punjab against the Rowlatt Acts, which
allowed the government to forgo juries in political trials. The British army