Appalling attack on Connolly

■ Grzegorz Kolodziej makes an appalling attack on one of the greatest Irish/ Scotsmen of all time, James Connolly (‘The truth about Connolly’, Letters, Irish Independent, June 7).

Mr Kolodziej rails against Connolly for his Marxism by pointing to abhorrent views held by Friedrich Engels – ironically citing Engels’s views on Scots, and presumably the Irish (Mr Kolodziej is seemingly unaware that Scots and Irish are ethnically the same people, and Connolly was himself a Scot).

It seems Mr Kolodziej has difficulty separating ideology and theory from human character flaws in the case of Engels and seems to conflate the East European totalitarianism (1917-1990) with Marxism.

To do so is intellectually wrong. Connolly aspired to free Ireland from British tyranny and to implement social justice to the greatest extent possible, which he felt was best and most completely described by Marx’s ideology.

Other nations’ misuse and hijacking of the term Marxism – such as what was imposed on Mr Kolodziej’s ancestral homeland of Poland – does not change the core truisms of Marxism.

These are namely that the workers of the world should own the businesses they work in and that this ultimately empowers all citizens.

Whether that can be achieved in the real world is another matter.

But I say to Mr Kolodziej that those who fought and died for Irish liberty, like those who fought and died for Polish liberty, should be afforded the respect they deserve and not be falsely lumped in with the tyrants that afflicted his homeland.

As for Nazi collaboration, “our enemy’s enemy is our friend” is a maxim that has held since the wars of ancient Greece.

Many of the Polish partisan groups sided with Stalin against Hitler, only to be decimated by Stalin.

I, for one, say three cheers to the great James Connolly.

Caoimheann O’Faolain