Ireland and Michael Collins

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…nasty cycle of attacks in which intentional brutal massacres of combatants were punctuated by episodes of inhuman treatment of non-combatants as well. The level of violence inflicted during 1920 was so extreme with neither side able to prevail that both the British and the Irish began to recognize they were trapped in a bloody stalemate. Thus, Ireland was granted her initial wish of existing free of British rule. Consequently, the nation was divided into two nations.