Massacre at La Mon — 30 years on

[Jim]

I'm not saying they arent secterian, and I'm not saying they are. The ex IRA members I know or have known over the years aren't secterian but i'm sure many are, and I'll not deny that. Its not an issue for me.

Bombs differ to guns in that you don't target individuals, you target buildings, so I won't compare it to the LVF.

[Wasp]

Bombs targeted people Jim, not just buildings. Many bombs were designed to kill and maim civillians and not to destroy buildings.

[Jim]

Not denying that either, but surely they would have used guns for civilian targets?

[Bilk]

you can kill a hell of a lot more with a bomb thatn a gun

[Jim]

Would be nice if AFD could give his views on this, I'm in no position to argue it.

[Wasp]

Not only that bilk, planting a bomb can give you the time to run away knowing unsuspecting people are walking right into a bomb.

[earl]

jim said:

bilk said:

To be fair setanta, I think your answer to this is a little churlish. "A baddly planned economic target"? Can you name me an "economic target" that the provos hit that didn't cause the loss of innocent lives. A seiries of bombs going off in the center of Belfast in the middle of the day on bloddy friday, was that a baddly planned economic target? There were few if any bombs detonated by the provos that did not result in the loss of innocent lives. So don't try to convince this sceptic that that was not their intention, I don't for one minute believe it.

Manchester

Was the best thing to ever happen to the City.

I heard one English guy once say, 'The micks blew it up, and then we got the micks to come in and rebuild it again'.

[earl]

wasp said:

Many of the ira bomb attacks were planted and planned in such a way that maximum damage and loss of life and injury to people were caused as possible. Why plant one bomb so that when people run from it they run straight into the path of another.

I'm going to pedantically disagree with this statement. I'm not saying that the IRA never wanted to kill with their bombs, as in planning a bomb and the time you plan to let it off you would have to accept a certain amount of 'collateral damage' (such a cold and callous phrase). But if the IRA wanted maximum loss of life, there would have been no warnings at all. I believe that a certain amount of loss of life was acceptable, and possibly even planned, but they made sure to have an out in the propaganda war with their warnings. Some warnings were better than others, so it could be argued that this was a way in controlling the amount of 'collateral damage'. Of course, in certain instants, the IRA could turn around and state that the security forces didn't act accordingly. This is a whole other debate that I'm not going to get into!

[He_Who_Walks_in_The_Wilderness]

i have heard the same argument used with loyalists i.e. if they really wanted just to murder catholics they could have murderd thousands of them and the death toll would have been in the 10's of thousands, i don't expect republicans to swallow that excuse so please do me the same courtersy

[Bilk]

earl said:

wasp said:

Many of the ira bomb attacks were planted and planned in such a way that maximum damage and loss of life and injury to people were caused as possible. Why plant one bomb so that when people run from it they run straight into the path of another.

I'm going to pedantically disagree with this statement. I'm not saying that the IRA never wanted to kill with their bombs, as in planning a bomb and the time you plan to let it off you would have to accept a certain amount of 'collateral damage' (such a cold and callous phrase). But if the IRA wanted maximum loss of life, there would have been no warnings at all. I believe that a certain amount of loss of life was acceptable, and possibly even planned, but they made sure to have an out in the propaganda war with their warnings. Some warnings were better than others, so it could be argued that this was a way in controlling the amount of 'collateral damage'. Of course, in certain instants, the IRA could turn around and state that the security forces didn't act accordingly. This is a whole other debate that I'm not going to get into!

You're right Earl, to plant a bomb in the town center crowded with people, in the middle of the day, and then blame someone else for the loss of innocent lives is a stupid argument. Surely people didn't swallow that crap? "The authorities deliberstely let people die to take support away from the terrorists"
Even if I could sit back and take that argument seriously for one moment, it is still a lame excuse. The one thing the authorities didn't do was plant a bomb in the center of town in the middle of the day, the IRA did that.
That's like a drunk driver killing someone on the road, then in court arguing that that person died because the health service is crap. The ambulance didn't get there in time, that's why he/she died, I am not guilty.

[Wasp]

Earl your post is absolute crap to say the least. The ira knew it would lose support with continuing no warning bombs so to try to sell it to republicans and their supporters they were still able to kill by giving inadeaquate warnings and misleading warnings. Now they knew fine well what the results would usually be and that is why they done it. Do we need to go through a list of these bombs as well as sectarian shootings such as Bloody Friday, Enniskillen, Kingsmill and Tullyvallen etc???

If anything while you are entitled to your opinion it is downright insulting to those who suffered.

[earl]

WASP, you've obviously read my post wrong. So I'll try again.

You previously stated that the IRA wanted a maximum loss of life. I have disputed this using the fact that the IRA would not have used warnings in their campaign if they wanted to maximise their casualties.
I never stated that the IRA never wanted to kill anyone. They wanted to kill alright, but this was tempered with a propaganda war. You cannot win a propaganda war with no warning bombs. Simple as.
So what the IRA probably did was much more planned and devious. When planning a bomb, they picked their target and studied it. They then planned what time of day to have it go off, and had an idea as to how many people would have been around. The timing of their warnings also could be used as a way of controlling the amount of collateral damage they wished to cause.

This way, they could get their economic target (if there was one) AND get a certain amount of collateral damage, but still be able to save some kind of face in the propaganda war by blaming the authorities for screwing up the warnings, or by keeping the collateral to a minimum, depending on what time of day it was.

What they did was far more devious and tactical (but not as devastating) than a suicide bomber.

[Wasp]

WASP, you've obviously read my post wrong. So I'll try again.

Ok.

You previously stated that the IRA wanted a maximum loss of life. I have disputed this using the fact that the IRA would not have used warnings in their campaign if they wanted to maximise their casualties.

I still stay with my statement, you fail to recognize the fact if the ira continued with no warning bombs even brainwashed Americans would have dropped there support as well as people here. They did do no warning bombs, so to try and cause maximum death without losing alot of support they gave insufficeint warnings etc which would help them save face the fact a warning was given. Then they can blame the security forces for failing to react etc. Why did they not continually bomb mainly nationalist areas and why did they plant bombs in such a way that people ran from one bomb straight into the path of another? Why were there so many inadeaquate warnings and misleading warnings given???

I never stated that the IRA never wanted to kill anyone. They wanted to kill alright, but this was tempered with a propaganda war. You cannot win a propaganda war with no warning bombs. Simple as.

That is waht I said and mean. But they did want to kill as many as possible while at the sametime keeping an eye on the propaganda war.

So what the IRA probably did was much more planned and devious. When planning a bomb, they picked their target and studied it. They then planned what time of day to have it go off, and had an idea as to how many people would have been around. The timing of their warnings also could be used as a way of controlling the amount of collateral damage they wished to cause.

Busy Saturday afternoons would be a good place to maximize casualties while at the sametime giving some kind of warning, that way they can cause as much injury and death as possible while at the sametime keeping control of the propaganda war by giving somekind of warning.

This way, they could get their economic target (if there was one) AND get a certain amount of collateral damage, but still be able to save some kind of face in the propaganda war by blaming the authorities for screwing up the warnings, or by keeping the collateral to a minimum, depending on what time of day it was.

Again what I said above. At least you know I am reading your post bit by bit rather than read it all then reply.

What they did was far more devious and tactical (but not as devastating) than a suicide bomber.

Yes I agree but lets not forget they did use suicide bombers or should I say forced people to become suicide bombers. IMO they picked Catholic man Patsy Gillespie as counter propaganda to distance themselves from factual claims of their sectarian campaign.

[Wasp]

Ok setanta start a thread on the ira's bombing campaign.