I usually don't engage in this sort of trivial nationalism. But I just have to inject that your retelling of this story omits the fact that Irish banks were obviously first in line to go belly-up.
It is true that those banks had various lenders in Germany/France/wherever, and that the consequences of an all-out collapse of the Irish economy would have had negative effects in those countries as well.
But presenting it as some sort of altruistic sacrifice to allow them to rescue Ireland from a potato-based future is just adding moral bankruptcy to the other.
This is not nationalism. There should be no pride in our creation or solution to our portion of this moronic mess.
The obvious was ommitted because it was obvious. The banks are only "Irish" in a nominal sense. The people or state as a whole didn't own them. Don't forget they are international commerical businesses and can and should be shut down when they fail like any other business.
Obviously they are a critical piece of modern infrastructure and there was already plans in place for their failure such as "deposit protection insurance" schemes etc. The big question is if those plans were/are robust enough in modern countries.
We _all_ need to be able to confidentaly able to "cull" bad components of our modern infrastructure without fear of causing wider problems.
Nothing about it was altruistic. Fear and panic very obviously gripped the politicians involved on all sides.
It is true that those banks had various lenders in Germany/France/wherever, and that the consequences of an all-out collapse of the Irish economy would have had negative effects in those countries as well.
But presenting it as some sort of altruistic sacrifice to allow them to rescue Ireland from a potato-based future is just adding moral bankruptcy to the other.