Trotsky, by then in exile, to create a Fourth International in the 1930s to unite
all left-wing parties in an anti-fascistpopular front. This, however, came to
nothing, in part because the Third International itself gave orders in the mid-
1930s to forget ideological purity in the face of Soviet fears of a German
invasion, and to link up with other left parties. An example of how strong was
the control of the Soviet Union over the members of the Third International is
the way in which the French Communist Party would not oppose German
invasion of France, nor join the resistance, until Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet
Union in 1941 broke the non-aggression pact between Germany and that
country.
IRA
The acronym IRA tends to be applied rather loosely to various interconnected
organizations which oppose, both violently and politically, continued British
sovereigntyover Northern Ireland. The long tradition of ‘troubles’ concern-
ing British–Irish relations is among the strongest examples of religious
cleavage, with very long-lasting resentments over British/Protestant domina-
tion of Irish Catholics. The Irish Republican Army itself grew into an
undercover paramilitary, orguerrilla, organization after the abortive Easter
Rising of 1916 against British rule, but with ties to the political organization
Sinn Fe ́in (‘We Ourselves’) founded in 1905. From then onward, and parti-
cularly during the years 1918–22, Sinn Fe ́in and the IRA were major forces in
bringing about the creation, and British recognition of, the Irish Free State
firstly, in 1922, with dominion status, then with full sovereignty, from 1937,
within the Commonwealth, and ultimately becoming the Republic of
Ireland in 1949. Indeed, the British government was forced to create a special
paramilitary force, the ‘Black and Tans’, to contain the IRA during this
period. After the agreement over the Irish Free State in 1922 civil war erupted
among the nationalists between those prepared to accept the agreement, which
involved the partition of Ireland, with six northern and predominantly
Protestant counties remaining under full British jurisdiction, and the IRA
which insisted on full Irish unity. The IRA was defeated in 1923 by the Free
State army, commanded by Michael Collins, a former IRA leader. From the
1930s until the early 1960s the IRA mounted a sporadic campaign of violence
against the settlement, mainly on the British mainland but also in Ireland,
leading to the Free State declaring it illegal in 1939.
From the early 1960s the IRA shifted its emphasis from the campaign of
violence to one forcivil rights, and specifically against anti-Catholicdis-
criminationin Northern Ireland. However, this moderation was unaccep-
table to some elements who split from the main body, henceforth to be known
as the ‘Official IRA’, and created the ‘Provisional IRA’, often referred to as the
IRA