Dear Spaniards,

After witnessing your recent fracas with some of your people, I would like to offer you two pieces of advice based on our experience with the Irish.

  1. When the Irish would get roused up for little rebellions, we easily subdued them. This was chiefly thanks to our superior arms, but was also due to the fact that the Irish are a people who are fit for tyranny. Amongst a people like this you will always find a spy or a traitor to help you catch the villains before they strike. Wolfey, Emmid and all the others were betrayed by those they hoped to free. So that is the first piece of advice I give to you. Find the traitors, and use them. They will save you vast amounts of money by ruling their fellow citizens just as you have done. They will also, after a while, believe themselves to be superior to the others, and thus help to divide and conquer the land with ease.
  2. Just when the Irish situation seemed hopeless and it appeared that we might have to forfeit Ireland to the Irish, we came up with a great idea. We pretended to want peace with them, declared a truce and opened civil negotiations. In late 1921, we offered them a free state government (with limited control of their own affairs but ultimately under our control) and told them we would keep the most valuable part of their country. They agreed and then began fighting each other. Although they declared a ‘Republic’ later on, we still own the top part. What’s amusing is that when the undesirables in our part started acting up a few years later, the Irish in the south helped us catch them and even came to despise the very people they had come from. So I suggest this, to best deal with Barcelonia and those damn Barcelonians, you must stifle their movement by offering them a limited form of what they want, and then you can sit back and enjoy watching them tear each other to shreds. You may lose the battle, but you’ll win the war. Long live Empire!

Yours Sincerely,

John Bull