YES,THE U.S. IS STILL A DEEPLY DIVIDED NATION

During a recent visit to Ireland a young woman asked me, " Is America really a divided country?". I did not hesitate to answer yes, but I thought to myself, " America is no more divided than Ireland". I drove up the beautiful Irish coast and I thought about another visit I had made to Ireland several years ago. When I was a US Army officer in Germany I became friends with some British Army officers who were in Germany for a periodic NATO exercise known as REFOGER (Return of Forces to Germany) . The exercise is essentially a rehearsal of what the NATO forces would do if the Russians launched an invasion against Western Europe. My English Army buddies and I have exchanged visits over the years. We have pub crawled & attended weddings in London, Los Angeles, New York, Manchester & Washington, DC. On one occasion I was invited to visit with two of my English Army officer friends in Northern Ireland, where they were garrisoned, I eagerly accepted the invitation. During our time together in Germany we were used to seeing convoys of US, British and other allied troops moving around Germany. I was a bit surprised to see similar convoys of British soldiers moving through the streets of Northern Ireland. As it happened I was in Northern Ireland during the " Marching Season". The " Marching season" occurs during July every year. During the season Protestants, some of them English Army veterans put on orange English military sashes, carry the Union Jack and march through Catholic neighborhoods to " remind" the Catholics that there was a great conflict over the course of many years and the Protestants won and the Catholics lost. They do this every summer. When I left my host, I lied about my departure time and actually spent an additional day in Belfast. I went to pubs in Catholic neighborhood and in Protestant neighborhoods. The sectarian conflicts in Ireland are long and deep. Thousands of lives have been lost, including Lord Mountbatten, a member of the Royal family, not to mention hundreds of Catholic patriots, whose names are largely unknown. I was in Ireland again recently. The UK's stormy exit from the European Union has reminded us that there is something called order and that is a thing we all want and need. For the simple reason that it brings peace. The divisions in America are deep. They are as deep as those in Ireland, but I recall pints of Guinness I shared with a Catholic priest & a Protestant minister in Ireland. They reminded me that God does not condone murder & conflict and that if we do not find the road to peace & understanding, we will all perish. That is as true in Ireland as it is in America.

Roland Nicholson. Jr.

Dublin