96 Cromwell, Oliver In August 1649, Cromwell landed his army in Dublin against the Irish rebels, who had proclaimed Charles II, the son of Charles I, their new sovereign Within a year, Cromwell defeated the rebels in their strongholds of Drogheda and Wexford In the following years, the New Model Army devastated all of Ireland, where about one-third of the people were killed either as a result of the war, the persecution of Catholics, the forced ethnic relocation of the Celts, or starvation In May 1650, after assigning Henry Ireton to govern Ireland, Cromwell marched to Scotland, where Charles II had been crowned king Since Lord Fairfax refused to be involved in the Scottish campaign, Cromwell was commissioned the general of the New Model Army, and thus assumed the highest leadership position of the commonwealth Cromwell first defeated the Scottish army at Battle of Dunbar in 1650, and then crushed the Scottish monarchists led by Charles II at the Battle of Worcester in northern England in September 1651 The subjugation of Scotland finally concluded the civil war in the British Isles and resulted in the expansion of the Commonwealth to include both Scotland and Ireland However, added to the 600,000 Irish victims of the war were 60,000 Scottish and 200,000 English deaths In Europe, such a death toll was unprecedented at the time and might have only been exceeded during the world wars of the 20th century domestic policy At home, Cromwell was preoccupied by the restoration of law and order in England He imposed restrictions on uncompromising Catholics and Anglicans, and at the same time promoted a policy of toleration toward all non-Anglican Protestants and Jews However, a Puritan himself, he did not give Protestants freedom to materialize their sectarian claims in the Commonwealth He excluded Ranters and Quakers from the policy of toleration, because they were too ecstatic and mystic in practicing their faith and too defiant of the state authority Of his fellow Puritans, he first dispersed the diggers for their radical demand for land reform, he then destroyed the rebellious levellers in the New Model Army for their mutinies and advocacy of equal right to both men and women, and, finally, he suppressed the militant fifth monarchists, who attracted many Puritan officers and soldiers in the army, for their accusation that he “took the crown off from the head of Christ, and put it upon his own.” Cromwell was an ardent providentialist, inspired by the faith in divine wisdom to guide his policies He was also a pragmatist, who sought to organize different reli- gions within the framework of a Puritan-styled Church of England Therefore, he sincerely hoped that his moderate policy of religious tolerance would ultimately ease the century-long religious frictions among his people and transform their inner religious conscience into a civil obligation of obedience of authority in the name of public order Some of his fellow Puritans, though in the minority, were determined to establish a godly kingdom on earth The constant clashes between Cromwell and his power base often rendered his policies impracticable in the Commonwealth foreign policy Cromwell’s foreign policy was brilliantly designed and executed A staunch antipapist, he did not execute English diplomacy in hopes of a lasting peace with its Catholic rivals on the Continent However, the Navigation act of 1651 redirected English foreign policy from settling old scores with Catholic France and Spain to meeting new challenges from Calvinist Dutch dominance of international trade and commerce The act required all international trade of England, both imports and exports, be carried in English ships with one exception: Ships of a country exporting its native-produced goods might be permitted This act eventually excluded all foreign ships, especially the targeted Dutch ships, from trade profits from the emerging British Empire The First Dutch War broke out in 1652 Within two years, the antagonistic navies fought nine battles In 1653, Cromwell ordered a blockade of the Netherlands, and forced the Dutch to agree to a peace dictated by England A peace treaty was signed in 1654, which recognized English supremacy in the Channel While the Dutch War was in progress, unrest at home continued to mount with a growing demand for extending voting rights and redistributing property In April 1653, Cromwell dissolved both the Council of State and the Rump Parliament, replacing them with a new council and the so-called Barebone’s Parliament, comprising 140 members from the New Model Army and local congregations This government survived for about nine months and was abandoned in December 1653 Soon, the army leaders drafted a new constitution, the Instrument of Government, which entrusted the state authority to Cromwell as Lord Protector, eventually enabling the general to exercise his personal rule over England with the support of the military elites In next five years, despite English victories over the Dutch in 1654 and over the Spanish island of Jamaica in the West Indies in 1655, Cromwell’s personal rule garnered less and less popular support from the English people He made a few attempts to restore a parliamen-