He recalled how in 1941 Britain was threatened with strangulation, dependent as she was for food and materials on convoys of ships from America. Referencing the refusal of de Valera’s government to make available Irish ports as bases to protect the convoys he intoned: “the approaches which the Southern Irish ports and airfields could so easily have guarded were closed by hostile aircraft and U-boats. Even the then pro-British Irish Times felt Churchill had gone too far. It was so acclaimed throughout nationalist Ireland and long remembered here as one of Dev’s finest moments. There are reports that Churchill had regrets about his speech.

Source: The Irish Times May 13, 2020 01:52 UTC