oooh this could be a very, very long answer....You come up with some of the most righteous questions here! I'll have to do a bit of checking to be sure I have my facts straight and my ducks lined up....meanwhile the short answer would be.... Because they rather believed that they had the RIGHT to own EVERYWHERE..(Not alone in this belief by a long shot, but still..twas a firm belief! Although...from my understanding originally Ireland had more power OVER Briton after the Romans pulled out and Briton was yet to be united in their existence over all)

For me there are two view points to this question. The historic, for which I've provided assorted links because the information is lengthy to say the least, and rather interesting, although I think further research would provide additional sources from which to gleam more information from. And the OTHER VIEW.. No less historic in nature but from the consideration of HOW/WHY did the British WANT to possess so much. Doubtless, as with any other empire that seeks to own, to conquer, to possess another, there is the consideration of OWNERSHIP, GREED, to have and hold sway over, to control the wealth of another and use it to the owner's benefit. Ireland as a whole was a small nation, as was Briton. Yet the British, in history, has in fact sought to own a good many other nations and peoples...how and why, becomes part of my own quest. The simple answer of GREED hardly seems sufficient in nature even if it is the root cause. I think initially Ireland held more sway OVER Briton, before Briton was its self united. This changed once Briton became a united country. Was it simple "Tit for Tat?" You did it to us, so we'll do it to you? Ireland had strong people, who could be in-slaved to work their land to the benefit of the British Empire, their young men could be conscripted for additional wars against other neighboring countries, such as Wales, Scotland..and beyond. While much of Ireland is rocky and unsuited for large scale growing, plus their growing season is nothing to really boast about...what farm land they possess, IS fairly rich and produced fairly good crops. The lesser quality for farming land, was still opportune for raising sheep and the smaller cattle that existed in that time..goats too provided livestock suitable to the heavily grassed and rocky land. The growth too of the Catholic church supported the taking of other countries, "for the church." This part of history is clear, and repeated over and over. Take the country, convert the people, gain more worshipers AND support AND gold/workers/commodities/resources FOR THE CHURCH. This is NOT a new concept or effort, but on-going even into modern times! I think this could be answered "simply" by saying Briton had more people and resources and so overcame the (then) puny Irish, caught them at on "off" time. But in reality I think you've asked one of the most ONION-LIKE questions ever posted! I don't believe there is ONE, SIMPLE answer to be found..then again, maybe I'm just too enamored of the history to see the one, simple answer. http://freespace.virgin.net/andrew.randall1/europe.htm England first ventured into Ireland as long ago as 1172 but only much later was it formally bought under English rule. Wales was bought under English rule by Edward the First in 1282. As early as 1559 the Scottish congregation had formally proposed the union of the crowns of Scotland and England but in England the innovation met at first with great opposition. It was not until 1604 that Scotland united with England when James the Sixth of Scotland also became James the First of England after the death of Elizabeth the First in 1603. Scotland and England becoming Great Britain. However Scotland still had it's own parliament and it wasn't until 1707 that the England and Wales parliament formally joined with the Scottish parliament. Ireland continued to make it's own laws until 1801 when the Irish parliament united with that of Great Britain (Scotland, England and Wales) to become The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The name 'Great Britain' has it's origins in Britannia Major, the name given to the island to distinguish it from Britannia Minor or Brittany. During the middle 19th and early 20th centuries dissent with Britain grew to such an extent that Ireland, excepting six counties in the north was given self rule. 1922 saw the emergence of the Irish Free State, a dominion within the British Empire. It was not until 1949 that the Irish Free State ended it's links with Great Britain and became The Republic of Ireland. The six counties comprising Northern Ireland chose to remain within the United Kingdom. The official title of the UK becoming; The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. http://www.espionageinfo.com/Int-Ke/Ireland-Intelligence-and-Security.html Modern Security in Ireland http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_Ireland Union with Great Britain (1801-1922) Main article: History of Ireland (1801-1922) Daniel O'Connell. In 1800, after the Irish Rebellion of 1798, the British and the Irish parliaments enacted the Act of Union, which merged Kingdom of Ireland and the Kingdom of Great Britain (itself a union of England and Scotland, created almost 100 years earlier), to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. Part of the deal for the union was that Catholic Emancipation would be conceded to remove discrimination against Catholics, Presbyterians, and others. However, King George III controversially blocked any change. In 1823, an enterprising Catholic lawyer, Daniel O'Connell, known as "the Great Liberator" began a successful campaign to achieve emancipation, which was finally conceded in 1829. He later led an unsuccessful campaign for "Repeal of the Act of Union". The second of Ireland's "Great Famines", An Gorta Mór struck the country severely in the period 1845-1849, with potato blight leading to mass starvation and emigration. (See Great Irish Famine.) The impact of emigration in Ireland was severe; the population dropped from over 8 million before the Famine to 4.4 million in 1911. The Irish language, once the spoken language of the entire island, declined in use sharply in the nineteenth century as a result of the Famine and the creation of the National School education system, as well as hostility to the language from leading Irish politicians of the time; it was largely replaced by English. Outside mainstream nationalism, a series of violent rebellions by Irish republicans took place in 1803, under Robert Emmet; in 1848 a rebellion by the Young Irelanders, most prominent among them, Thomas Francis Meagher; and in 1867, another insurrection by the Irish Republican Brotherhood. All failed, but physical force nationalism remained an undercurrent in the nineteenth century. The late 19th century also witnessed major land reform, spearheaded by the Land League under Michael Davitt demanding what became known as the 3 Fs; Fair rent, free sale, fixity of tenure. From 1870 various British governments introduced a series of Irish Land Acts - William O'Brien playing a leading role by winning the greatest piece of social legislation Ireland had yet seen, the Wyndham Land Purchase Act (1903) which broke up large estates and gradually gave rural landholders and tenants ownership of the lands. It effectively ended absentee landlordism, solving the age old Irish Land Question In the 1870s the issue of Irish self-government again became a major focus of debate under Protestant landowner, Charles Stewart Parnell and the Irish Parliamentary Party of which he was founder. British prime minister William Ewart Gladstone made two unsuccessful attempts to introduce Home Rule in 1886 and 1893. Parnell's controversial leadership eventually ended when he was implicated in a divorce scandal, when it was revealed that he had been living in family relationship with Katherine O'Shea, the long separated wife of a fellow Irish MP, with whom he was father of three children. After the introduction of the Local Government (Ireland) Act 1898 which broke the power of the landlord dominated "Grand Juries", passing for the first time absolute democratic control of local affairs into the hands of the people through elected Local County Councils, the debate over full Home Rule led to tensions between Irish nationalists and Irish unionists (those who favoured maintenance of the union). Most of the island was predominantly nationalist, Catholic and agrarian. The northeast, however, was predominantly unionist, Protestant and industrialised. Unionists feared a loss of political power and economic wealth in a predominantly rural, nationalist, Catholic home-rule state. Nationalists believed that they would remain economically and politically second class citizens without self-government. Out of this division, two opposing sectarian movements evolved, the Protestant Orange Order and the Catholic Ancient Order of Hibernians. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northern_Ireland