Post by Wasp on Dec 19, 2010 17:10:55 GMT
A Fairly Secret Army
The Politics of Murdering Protestants
The republican movement under the leadership of Mc Guinness and Adams continued to fail in terms of producing a coherent and clear political strategy for the way a head. They had now off loaded the old guard of O’ Bradaigh and O’Connell, yet there remained within Sinn Fein/IRA a schizophrenic view of the world. Adams and Mc Guinness while adopting the twin track approach of the armalite in one hand and the ballot box in the other, they continued to be the political tail being wagged by the military dog that was the IRA. Adams and Mc Guinness had a janus face to their leadership, to the world they were trying to sell themselves as pragmatic political leaders yet at their core and on the streets they were driven by the sectarian murder of their Protestant neighbours.
Adams had said that he would prefer to see a situation where the armed struggle was unnecessary, yet Adams by his drift towards politics had already accepted that militant republicanism had failed. Adams was now accepting the fact, like Goulding before him, that militant republicanism had no long term future and was nothing more than an obstacle to any political settlement in the north. Adams and Mc Guinness were allowing their heart to rule their mind as they continued to revel in the IRA’s campaign against the Protestant community. They knew deep down that the ‘war’ was over but they also knew that the Protestants had to be unnerved if Sinn Fein were going to get a place at any political discussions.
On the 30th of January, 1915, IRA leader, James Connolly writing to The Worker stated:
We will fight for our cause with words when words are useful, and with arms when arms are needed.
However, James Connolly was talking about an IRA who was in open combat with the British Military, the IRA of 1986 was an IRA overtly targeting and murdering innocent Protestants. Adams and Mc Guinness now had control of the republican movement yet it remained anchored in sectarian violence. The leadership of Sinn Fein in its Ard Chomhairle in 1987 had thirty-one members who were almost exclusively from the north. Yet when one read the list of names on the Ard Chomhairle at that time one could be forgiven for believing that the leadership were being less than honest about the geographical make up of the Ard Chomhairle, IRA veteran, Joe Cahill (RIP) is represented on the official listing as being from County Louth in the Republic, when Joe was most certainly from Belfast.
The republican leadership continued to try and be all things to all people, if they moved too quickly in any one direction they could further split the organisation, this meant that pure militarists such as Kevin Mc Kenna and Thomas ‘Slab’ Murphy continued with business as usual. The June 1987 Westminster elections would see Sinn Fein offer the banner of ‘freedom, justice and peace’ to the people of Northern Ireland. However, such banner headlines could hardly disguise the on going campaign of murder against the Protestant community by the IRA. The Catholic community were losing patients with the republican leadership; it was the ordinary Catholic people who were at the brunt of loyalist reprisals for IRA attacks.
The Catholic community were not carried by banner headlines that meant nothing, the Sinn Fein vote went down from 13.4% in 1983 to 11.3% in 1987. This was a significant blow to the leadership especially as they had dropped abstentianism. Adams got re-elected in West Belfast, however even this measured success could not cover the reality of Sinn Fein’s failure to make further political gains. Catholics were turning to constitutional nationalism as opposed to what they seen as sectarian republicanism. The SDLP made significant gains and got three MPs elected to Westminster.
It is worth mentioning here that Sinn Fein had one of the most sophisticated vote rigging systems in the modern democratised world. The Sinn Fein electoral mantra was, ‘Vote Early, Vote Often’, it was no exaggeration to say that people who had died and were still on the electoral register had their vote cast. People who had left Ireland many years before had their vote cast for them; in areas controlled by the IRA they maintained tight controls on voting. Each political party is allowed to have one personating agent in the voting centres. This means that someone from Sinn Fein will sit in the voting centre all day with a list of the names of people who are to vote in that area, about an hour before the voting centres close Sinn Fein/IRA members will be told who has not voted and they will call to those houses. People will be taken to the voting centres in black taxis and if they cant go for any reason a Sinn Fein/IRA member would take their voting card and vote for them. To my shame, I witnessed it, I participated in it and I accepted it.
The Anglo Irish Conference had been established and this had allowed all the constitutional parties to participate in something that appeared pragmatic, the SDLP and John Hume were giving Catholics in the north hope of a new beginning where as the republican movement appeared stuck in their old ways. While sectarian murder was something glorified by so called republicans in the segregated ghettoes of Belfast and Derry, in the country side Catholics were much less sectarian in their out look and were inter-dependent on each other in daily life. Catholics and Protestants in small towns and villages had to work and live side by side, each had their own traditions but those traditions were mainly silent in the interest of community living. Yet the republican sectarian murder machine rumbled on.
On the 8th of November 1987, as Adams and Mc Guinness talked about ‘peace and justice’ the IRA planted a bomb in Enniskillen in County Fermanagh, where a war memorial service was being held at the Cenotaph in the town centre. This was a traditional gathering place for the family and friends of men and women who had fallen in the first and second world wars while fighting tyranny. The IRA bomb planted to maximise casualties killed 11 Protestants and seriously injured another 63 Protestants. The republican movement had once again shown its dark core, the republican movement just seemed unable or unwilling to move forward. It was alleged that this attack was revenge for the killing of eight IRA members at Loughgall in May that year; however, the mass murder of innocent men, women and children can not be retaliation for the killing of armed IRA members.
The republican leadership quickly recognised that this overt attack on the Protestant community was a serious public relations mistake. Usually when the IRA committed an act of violence they claimed responsibility immediately through their pen name, ‘P. O’Neil’, however for thirty hours following the Enniskillen attack the republican movement fell silent. When the republican movement were finally forced to admit responsibility for this mass murder, their words were hollow among the words of the Father of one of the bomb victims. Gordon Wilson (now deceased) lost his young daughter, a nurse. His words of forgiveness and compassion were flashed across the world when he said:
I bear no ill will. That sort of talk is not going to bring her back to life. She was a great wee lassie. She loved her profession. She was a pet and she is dead. She is in heaven and we will meet again. Don’t ask me please for a purpose. I don’t have a purpose. I don’t have an answer but I know there has to be a plan. If I did not think that, I would commit suicide. It is part of a greater plan and God is good and we shall meet again.
Gerry Adams had little to offer in response when he said:
I do not think there can be more Enniskillens and I think the IRA in accepting responsibility for what happened and its explanation, signalled that they are going to ensure that there are no more Enniskillens.
These weasel words were for the cameras and the world audience, behind the scenes republicans including myself were jubilant about the Enniskillen bomb. It is widely believed that the Enniskillen bomb was at least constructed by an IRA bomb maker from Monaghan who was a close friend of IRA commander Jim Lynagh who was killed at Loughgall by the SAS. This bomb maker was close to IRA Chief of Staff, Kevin Mc Kenna and therefore this IRA bomb maker would face no sanction in relation to the civilian deaths incurred at Enniskillen even if the janus faced leadership wanted to try and distance itself from the atrocity at a politically sensitive time. Adams’ duality as Army Council member and Ard Chomhairle member meant that responsibility for the massacre at Enniskillen lay at his door step.
The media continued to speculate about hawks and doves within the republican movement, however, this was some what dishonest. I lived, eat, and was imprisoned with republicans; I knew the most prolific IRA killers and the most politically motivated members of Sinn Fein. In all my time in the republican movement I did not meet one republican who did not champion an IRA action and particularly when that IRA action was overtly directed at the Protestant community. The media in Northern Ireland is a small community and the republican movement like any other enterprise have their trolls in the media. It was a useful myth to suggest that there were doves and hawks in the republican movement. However, even in the aftermath of the Enniskillen massacre and the loss of tons of explosives and weapons on the ship The Eksund the republican movement was determined to continue with sectarian violence.
In 1988 John Hume, the SDLP leader began a process of secret talks with the republican leadership through Adams and Mc Guinness. The republican movement’s mandate faltering as it was, had found a level of support that seemed consistent and so Hume believed rightly or wrongly that engaging with Adams would not hurt the SDLP. It was clear to everyone that if there was to be some kind of settlement in the north it would have to be a settlement that included Sinn Fein. This certainty is summed up by Bishop and Mallie when they say:
At the end of the day, despite all the good intentions, politics in Ireland, as Adams discerned, was still a matter of tribalism. Whatever happened, the IRA and Sinn Fein had grown too permanent a feature of the political landscape of Ireland to be left out of any serious discussions about its future.[1]
The discussions between John Hume and Gerry Adams lasted from March until September, of 1988 and would become known as the Hume/Adams initiative. The secrecy that surrounded the Hume/Adams talks caused suspicion from both loyalist and nationalists. Talk began to emerge of a Pan-Nationalist-Front and this left Unionists/loyalists very un-easy. It is also worth noting that there are Catholic Nationalists in Northern Ireland who are as fundamentally opposed to Sinn Fein/IRA as are loyalists, so Hume was taking a real risk. Loyalist paramilitaries now began to target members of the SDLP as they seen them as giving legitimacy to the murderous activities of the republican movement. Loyalists wanted to insure that a Pan-Nationalist-Front would not emerge from the Hume/Adams initiative.
At the Sinn Fein Ard Fheis in 1989 Gerry Adams in his hypocritical duality criticised the IRA for its continued failure to ensure that civilians were not killed. We now know from Ed Moloney’s new book Voices from the Grave that Gerry Adams did himself allegedly order the murder of innocent civilians. As I explained when talking about Loughgall, from 1986 Protestants whether civilian or military were the undisputed targets of the IRA. Sinn Fein were facing into another election in May 1989 and so Adams was trying to cosmetically distance himself from on going IRA atrocities. Sinn Fein believed that they could poll well in the local government elections in Northern Ireland in May 1989 as a result of the Hume/Adams initiative. However, IRA atrocities continued to hold the Sinn Fein mandate almost static. Sinn Fein polled 11.3%, a fall from the previous local elections in 1985.
Sinn Fein was to find no favour with the electorate in The Irish Republic either. The Irish Republic was in yet another economic recession and the public mood was to shift to a protest vote for left wing parties. The 1989 General Election in the Republic seen The Workers Party (this was official Sinn Fein from whom Adams split in 1970) win 5% of the national vote and giving them seven seats in the Irish Parliament, Dail Eireann. The Labour Party won 9.5% of the national vote and fifteen seats in the Dail. Sinn Fein’s vote was reduced to 1.2% of the national vote and they won no seats. The Sinn Fein vote was concentrated in small pockets such as Monaghan/Cavan, Donegal, Louth, Meath, Kerry and Dublin. Much of the Sinn Fein organisation in the Republic had been built by the efforts of Monaghan republican, Caoimhghin O’Caolain, who had been a traditional Fianna Fail supporter but had joined Sinn Fein in 1980 in support of the Hunger Strikers. However, even in the midst of such a political vacuum in The Irish Republic the people did not view Sinn Fein as offering any real alternative or political strategy.
The European Elections in 1989 were to be another barometer of Sinn Fein’s political fortunes, in The Irish Republic Sinn Fein’s vote was slashed from 5.2% in the previous European Elections to 2.9%. In Northern Ireland the Sinn Fein vote also slumped to 9.2% of the total, in 1984 Sinn Fein had received 13.4% of the total vote. The republican leadership continued to try and explain away their electoral failures with complaints about censorship and the elections coming too soon after the change in the abstentianism policy. But reality was staring the republican movement in the face; they had no coherent political alternative to offer the people. Sinn Fein’s brand of sectarian militant republicanism had no place in the democratic politics of The Irish Republic. Sinn Fein’s former comrades in Official Sinn Fein (Workers Party) had taken seven seats in the Dail. Goulding’s decision to go political in 1970 had paid dividends and Adams knew that only too well.
1990 would see the much hated Mrs Thatcher resign as British Prime Minister, she had over seen British policy in Northern Ireland for almost twelve years and she had earned herself number one spot on the IRA’s hit list of most wanted persons. Thatcher would never be forgotten for her role during the Hunger strikes. Adams and the northern leadership could only sit back and watch as their former comrades in Official Sinn Fein took seven seats in the Dail. Goulding had mixed views on his decision to go political in 1970 and the Provisional IRA/Sinn Fein to delay going political when he said:
We were definitely right, but right too soon. Adams may be right in pushing the provos towards politics, but he is too late and Ruari O’Bradaigh (Republican S/F) will never be right.[2]
As Thatcher left office there was some hope of political change in the north. However, within a few short months the IRA reasserted their campaign of economic and psychological coercion against the British Cabinet and British public when they welcomed Prime Minister, John Major to Number 10 with a mortar attack. None of the Ministers or the Prime Minister was injured as they meet in Number 10 but the attack reminded the British that Saddam Hussein was not their only enemy. The IRA campaign against the British Government and public was an attempt to convince them to become persuaders of the Protestant people to enter a united Ireland or a transition towards a united Ireland. On the ground in Northern Ireland far away from the media spotlight, the IRA continued with their criminality, children were being shot in the legs and beaten by IRA gangs because they had dared to tell a social worker that they had been raped or sexually assaulted by a Sinn Fein or IRA member. Armed robberies, smuggling, counterfeit goods, and licensing drug dealers were all part of what was now an IRA Mafia organisation.
Peter Brooke was the new Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and he set about arranging a set of talks about talks. The terrorists continued to murder at will, loyalists were now pro-active rather than reactive and in 1991 seventy-five civilians were murdered in cold blood in almost equal numbers by loyalist and republican murder squads. The republican movement could no longer claim that Protestant civilians were accidental casualties of ‘war’ as in 1991 there were only 19 military casualties. Loyalists were now matching the IRA sectarian body count almost death for death. The lie of ‘war’ was buried beneath the bodies of the innocent and Adams claim to have Protestant interests at heart were nothing more than a self deluding myth. Indeed as extensive survey was carried out by Livingston and Morison into party preference in Northern Ireland in 1991, they found that although there was a cross fertilisation between unionist and nationalist parties, not one Protestant said they would vote Sinn Fein.[3]
One of the most cowardly tactics used by the republican leadership and one which cost them a great deal of support at this time was the tactic of using Human Bombs (proxy). This tactic had been developed by a close associate of IRA leader, Martin Mc Guinness. Mc Guinness felt that he needed to take back some of the street power that had shifted in the IRA leadership to Mc Kenna and Murphy as they had taken a significant hit from the British and appeared to ordinary republicans to be fighting the 'war' on their own. The tactic was used for a short time during the 1990s, however, was eventually abandoned after public outrage. This Human Bomb tactic involved taking an innocent civilian and tying that civilian into a car or van and forcing them to drive that car or van packed with explosives into a British military installation, when that person arrived at the military installation the IRA would explode the bomb by remote control, killing the civilian and any one in the vicinity of the bomb. The person forced to drive the bomb to its destination was normally told that his family would be killed if he did not drive the bomb to its destination. Unlike the modern day Muslim terrorist who will volunteer to blow himself up in a suicide bomb attack, the IRA were too cowardly to carry out such attacks themselves.
The Human Bomb attacks had been sanctioned by the IRA Army Council who were continuing to pursue a policy of ethnic cleansing against the Protestant people by both physical and psychological coercion. On the 24th of October 1990, an IRA active service unit lead by someone very close to Martin Mc Guinness, took the family of Patrick Gillespie hostage, warning Mr Gillespie that his wife and children would be murdered if he did not co-operate. Mr Gillespie was tied into a car that was packed with 1,000lb of explosives and told under threat of death to drive to the British Army installation at Coshquin. As he reached the British installation the IRA cowards detonated the bomb by remote control, Mr Gillespie and five others were murdered. Also on the 24th of October 1990, the IRA forced a pensioner to drive a bomb into a British Army checkpoint outside Newry. The brave pensioner managed to jump free at the last minute but one person was murdered and over a dozen injured as the bomb was exploded by remote control. In Omagh on the same day in 1990 the IRA held a man’s wife and little children hostage, while they strapped him into a car that was filled with explosives, on this occasion the bomb failed to explode. The IRA exported this cowardly tactic and on the 24th of April, 1993, the IRA forced two London Taxi drivers to drive bombs to Downing Street and New Scotland Yard, the two taxi men were able to abandon their vehicles in safe places and issue warnings to the public. This was the last time that the proxy bomb was used as it showed the IRA on a world stage for the cowards they were.
The car bomb, van bomb, lorry bomb, mortar bomb, proxy bomb were all developed by the IRA and are today used in terrorist campaigns all over the world. The close association between the republican movement and international/narco terrorism is often lost in the spin doctoring surrounding the peace process in the north, this is particularly so in the so-called Irish/American media who make their bread and butter from republican mythology. The reality is that the tactics used by groups such as ETA, FARC and Al-Qaida are tactics that were taught to them by the IRA operatives who were sent to those countries in exchange for weapons or in the case of FARC drug money.
The Irish Prime Minister, Mr Charles Haughey, was to be replaced by Mr Albert Reynolds, a man who had little political baggage and seemed ready and willing to do anything to help find a formula to the warring tribalism in Northern Ireland. Reynolds and the British Prime Minister, John Major, appeared able to talk easily with each other and they seemed able and willing to do business. However, the dark shadow cast by the republican movement would soon bring another dark day in Northern Ireland’s history. On the 17th of January 1992 it was proved once again, if proof were needed, that Protestants were the legitimate target of the republican movement when on that date seven Protestants were murdered and seven more injured by an IRA bomb that deliberately targeted the men as they travelled to work in Treebane, CountyTyrone. The hawk and dove theory was a nonsense, the central thesis of the republican campaign was to physically and psychologically coerce the Protestant people into a united Ireland, if that meant using a combination of murder and politics then that is what would be used.
In London talks about talks continued among the constitutional parties, Sinn Fein continued to exclude themselves from the talks due to continued republican violence. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) wanted the Irish Government to erase Articles 2 and 3 from the Irish Constitution (Bunreacht na hEireann), that had laid claim to Northern Ireland as part of the national territory. These meetings were being used by the British to tell Irish Americans that a process was in place to bring some type of settlement to the northern problem. In America, the 1992 Presidential elections were in full swing and the Irish American lobby were flexing their muscles, offering full support to Bill Clinton if he would agree to send a peace envoy to Northern Ireland. Bill Clinton played a pivotal role in the peace process and his peace envoy George Mitchell was a very able man.
The British Government continued to guarantee unionists that their constitutional right to remain British citizens would not be under mined by any deal. This position being maintained by the British continued to be a problem for those trying to remove the Unionist Veto on the north’s affairs. At the end of 1992 a General Election was called in The Irish Republic, and Albert Reynolds and his Fianna Fail Party were returned to office as coalition partners with the Labour Party. In March 1993 Albert Reynolds meet with American President, Bill Clinton and briefed him on developments in the north. Reynolds was leading a strong Government and was prepared to take risks to secure peace in the north. The Pan-Nationalism spoken of by unionists had now been strengthened by a strong and willing Irish Prime Minister who was supported by an interested and popular American President, Bill Clinton.
Adams and Hume had inclusive talks in 1988 and these talks would begin again in 1993 as a political momentum appeared thanks to Reynolds. Unionists were out raged as they could see that nationalism was taking on a new momentum, however, Reynolds and Hume were simply trying to submit Sinn Fein to constitutionalism. Sinn Fein was being offered the opportunity to be inside the political tent or outside it. Albert Reynolds had great faith in the abilities of John Hume in his handling of Adams and Sinn Fein when he said:
Mr Hume is a very experienced politician. It is for Mr Hume to judge whether something useful can come out of those talks.
The triangulation of Hume, Reynolds and Clinton would be the corner stone of what would become known as the peace process, Sinn Fein/IRA knew that this was the last stand saloon and they could either be in as constitutionalists or out as terrorists.
The Politics of Murdering Protestants
The republican movement under the leadership of Mc Guinness and Adams continued to fail in terms of producing a coherent and clear political strategy for the way a head. They had now off loaded the old guard of O’ Bradaigh and O’Connell, yet there remained within Sinn Fein/IRA a schizophrenic view of the world. Adams and Mc Guinness while adopting the twin track approach of the armalite in one hand and the ballot box in the other, they continued to be the political tail being wagged by the military dog that was the IRA. Adams and Mc Guinness had a janus face to their leadership, to the world they were trying to sell themselves as pragmatic political leaders yet at their core and on the streets they were driven by the sectarian murder of their Protestant neighbours.
Adams had said that he would prefer to see a situation where the armed struggle was unnecessary, yet Adams by his drift towards politics had already accepted that militant republicanism had failed. Adams was now accepting the fact, like Goulding before him, that militant republicanism had no long term future and was nothing more than an obstacle to any political settlement in the north. Adams and Mc Guinness were allowing their heart to rule their mind as they continued to revel in the IRA’s campaign against the Protestant community. They knew deep down that the ‘war’ was over but they also knew that the Protestants had to be unnerved if Sinn Fein were going to get a place at any political discussions.
On the 30th of January, 1915, IRA leader, James Connolly writing to The Worker stated:
We will fight for our cause with words when words are useful, and with arms when arms are needed.
However, James Connolly was talking about an IRA who was in open combat with the British Military, the IRA of 1986 was an IRA overtly targeting and murdering innocent Protestants. Adams and Mc Guinness now had control of the republican movement yet it remained anchored in sectarian violence. The leadership of Sinn Fein in its Ard Chomhairle in 1987 had thirty-one members who were almost exclusively from the north. Yet when one read the list of names on the Ard Chomhairle at that time one could be forgiven for believing that the leadership were being less than honest about the geographical make up of the Ard Chomhairle, IRA veteran, Joe Cahill (RIP) is represented on the official listing as being from County Louth in the Republic, when Joe was most certainly from Belfast.
The republican leadership continued to try and be all things to all people, if they moved too quickly in any one direction they could further split the organisation, this meant that pure militarists such as Kevin Mc Kenna and Thomas ‘Slab’ Murphy continued with business as usual. The June 1987 Westminster elections would see Sinn Fein offer the banner of ‘freedom, justice and peace’ to the people of Northern Ireland. However, such banner headlines could hardly disguise the on going campaign of murder against the Protestant community by the IRA. The Catholic community were losing patients with the republican leadership; it was the ordinary Catholic people who were at the brunt of loyalist reprisals for IRA attacks.
The Catholic community were not carried by banner headlines that meant nothing, the Sinn Fein vote went down from 13.4% in 1983 to 11.3% in 1987. This was a significant blow to the leadership especially as they had dropped abstentianism. Adams got re-elected in West Belfast, however even this measured success could not cover the reality of Sinn Fein’s failure to make further political gains. Catholics were turning to constitutional nationalism as opposed to what they seen as sectarian republicanism. The SDLP made significant gains and got three MPs elected to Westminster.
It is worth mentioning here that Sinn Fein had one of the most sophisticated vote rigging systems in the modern democratised world. The Sinn Fein electoral mantra was, ‘Vote Early, Vote Often’, it was no exaggeration to say that people who had died and were still on the electoral register had their vote cast. People who had left Ireland many years before had their vote cast for them; in areas controlled by the IRA they maintained tight controls on voting. Each political party is allowed to have one personating agent in the voting centres. This means that someone from Sinn Fein will sit in the voting centre all day with a list of the names of people who are to vote in that area, about an hour before the voting centres close Sinn Fein/IRA members will be told who has not voted and they will call to those houses. People will be taken to the voting centres in black taxis and if they cant go for any reason a Sinn Fein/IRA member would take their voting card and vote for them. To my shame, I witnessed it, I participated in it and I accepted it.
The Anglo Irish Conference had been established and this had allowed all the constitutional parties to participate in something that appeared pragmatic, the SDLP and John Hume were giving Catholics in the north hope of a new beginning where as the republican movement appeared stuck in their old ways. While sectarian murder was something glorified by so called republicans in the segregated ghettoes of Belfast and Derry, in the country side Catholics were much less sectarian in their out look and were inter-dependent on each other in daily life. Catholics and Protestants in small towns and villages had to work and live side by side, each had their own traditions but those traditions were mainly silent in the interest of community living. Yet the republican sectarian murder machine rumbled on.
On the 8th of November 1987, as Adams and Mc Guinness talked about ‘peace and justice’ the IRA planted a bomb in Enniskillen in County Fermanagh, where a war memorial service was being held at the Cenotaph in the town centre. This was a traditional gathering place for the family and friends of men and women who had fallen in the first and second world wars while fighting tyranny. The IRA bomb planted to maximise casualties killed 11 Protestants and seriously injured another 63 Protestants. The republican movement had once again shown its dark core, the republican movement just seemed unable or unwilling to move forward. It was alleged that this attack was revenge for the killing of eight IRA members at Loughgall in May that year; however, the mass murder of innocent men, women and children can not be retaliation for the killing of armed IRA members.
The republican leadership quickly recognised that this overt attack on the Protestant community was a serious public relations mistake. Usually when the IRA committed an act of violence they claimed responsibility immediately through their pen name, ‘P. O’Neil’, however for thirty hours following the Enniskillen attack the republican movement fell silent. When the republican movement were finally forced to admit responsibility for this mass murder, their words were hollow among the words of the Father of one of the bomb victims. Gordon Wilson (now deceased) lost his young daughter, a nurse. His words of forgiveness and compassion were flashed across the world when he said:
I bear no ill will. That sort of talk is not going to bring her back to life. She was a great wee lassie. She loved her profession. She was a pet and she is dead. She is in heaven and we will meet again. Don’t ask me please for a purpose. I don’t have a purpose. I don’t have an answer but I know there has to be a plan. If I did not think that, I would commit suicide. It is part of a greater plan and God is good and we shall meet again.
Gerry Adams had little to offer in response when he said:
I do not think there can be more Enniskillens and I think the IRA in accepting responsibility for what happened and its explanation, signalled that they are going to ensure that there are no more Enniskillens.
These weasel words were for the cameras and the world audience, behind the scenes republicans including myself were jubilant about the Enniskillen bomb. It is widely believed that the Enniskillen bomb was at least constructed by an IRA bomb maker from Monaghan who was a close friend of IRA commander Jim Lynagh who was killed at Loughgall by the SAS. This bomb maker was close to IRA Chief of Staff, Kevin Mc Kenna and therefore this IRA bomb maker would face no sanction in relation to the civilian deaths incurred at Enniskillen even if the janus faced leadership wanted to try and distance itself from the atrocity at a politically sensitive time. Adams’ duality as Army Council member and Ard Chomhairle member meant that responsibility for the massacre at Enniskillen lay at his door step.
The media continued to speculate about hawks and doves within the republican movement, however, this was some what dishonest. I lived, eat, and was imprisoned with republicans; I knew the most prolific IRA killers and the most politically motivated members of Sinn Fein. In all my time in the republican movement I did not meet one republican who did not champion an IRA action and particularly when that IRA action was overtly directed at the Protestant community. The media in Northern Ireland is a small community and the republican movement like any other enterprise have their trolls in the media. It was a useful myth to suggest that there were doves and hawks in the republican movement. However, even in the aftermath of the Enniskillen massacre and the loss of tons of explosives and weapons on the ship The Eksund the republican movement was determined to continue with sectarian violence.
In 1988 John Hume, the SDLP leader began a process of secret talks with the republican leadership through Adams and Mc Guinness. The republican movement’s mandate faltering as it was, had found a level of support that seemed consistent and so Hume believed rightly or wrongly that engaging with Adams would not hurt the SDLP. It was clear to everyone that if there was to be some kind of settlement in the north it would have to be a settlement that included Sinn Fein. This certainty is summed up by Bishop and Mallie when they say:
At the end of the day, despite all the good intentions, politics in Ireland, as Adams discerned, was still a matter of tribalism. Whatever happened, the IRA and Sinn Fein had grown too permanent a feature of the political landscape of Ireland to be left out of any serious discussions about its future.[1]
The discussions between John Hume and Gerry Adams lasted from March until September, of 1988 and would become known as the Hume/Adams initiative. The secrecy that surrounded the Hume/Adams talks caused suspicion from both loyalist and nationalists. Talk began to emerge of a Pan-Nationalist-Front and this left Unionists/loyalists very un-easy. It is also worth noting that there are Catholic Nationalists in Northern Ireland who are as fundamentally opposed to Sinn Fein/IRA as are loyalists, so Hume was taking a real risk. Loyalist paramilitaries now began to target members of the SDLP as they seen them as giving legitimacy to the murderous activities of the republican movement. Loyalists wanted to insure that a Pan-Nationalist-Front would not emerge from the Hume/Adams initiative.
At the Sinn Fein Ard Fheis in 1989 Gerry Adams in his hypocritical duality criticised the IRA for its continued failure to ensure that civilians were not killed. We now know from Ed Moloney’s new book Voices from the Grave that Gerry Adams did himself allegedly order the murder of innocent civilians. As I explained when talking about Loughgall, from 1986 Protestants whether civilian or military were the undisputed targets of the IRA. Sinn Fein were facing into another election in May 1989 and so Adams was trying to cosmetically distance himself from on going IRA atrocities. Sinn Fein believed that they could poll well in the local government elections in Northern Ireland in May 1989 as a result of the Hume/Adams initiative. However, IRA atrocities continued to hold the Sinn Fein mandate almost static. Sinn Fein polled 11.3%, a fall from the previous local elections in 1985.
Sinn Fein was to find no favour with the electorate in The Irish Republic either. The Irish Republic was in yet another economic recession and the public mood was to shift to a protest vote for left wing parties. The 1989 General Election in the Republic seen The Workers Party (this was official Sinn Fein from whom Adams split in 1970) win 5% of the national vote and giving them seven seats in the Irish Parliament, Dail Eireann. The Labour Party won 9.5% of the national vote and fifteen seats in the Dail. Sinn Fein’s vote was reduced to 1.2% of the national vote and they won no seats. The Sinn Fein vote was concentrated in small pockets such as Monaghan/Cavan, Donegal, Louth, Meath, Kerry and Dublin. Much of the Sinn Fein organisation in the Republic had been built by the efforts of Monaghan republican, Caoimhghin O’Caolain, who had been a traditional Fianna Fail supporter but had joined Sinn Fein in 1980 in support of the Hunger Strikers. However, even in the midst of such a political vacuum in The Irish Republic the people did not view Sinn Fein as offering any real alternative or political strategy.
The European Elections in 1989 were to be another barometer of Sinn Fein’s political fortunes, in The Irish Republic Sinn Fein’s vote was slashed from 5.2% in the previous European Elections to 2.9%. In Northern Ireland the Sinn Fein vote also slumped to 9.2% of the total, in 1984 Sinn Fein had received 13.4% of the total vote. The republican leadership continued to try and explain away their electoral failures with complaints about censorship and the elections coming too soon after the change in the abstentianism policy. But reality was staring the republican movement in the face; they had no coherent political alternative to offer the people. Sinn Fein’s brand of sectarian militant republicanism had no place in the democratic politics of The Irish Republic. Sinn Fein’s former comrades in Official Sinn Fein (Workers Party) had taken seven seats in the Dail. Goulding’s decision to go political in 1970 had paid dividends and Adams knew that only too well.
1990 would see the much hated Mrs Thatcher resign as British Prime Minister, she had over seen British policy in Northern Ireland for almost twelve years and she had earned herself number one spot on the IRA’s hit list of most wanted persons. Thatcher would never be forgotten for her role during the Hunger strikes. Adams and the northern leadership could only sit back and watch as their former comrades in Official Sinn Fein took seven seats in the Dail. Goulding had mixed views on his decision to go political in 1970 and the Provisional IRA/Sinn Fein to delay going political when he said:
We were definitely right, but right too soon. Adams may be right in pushing the provos towards politics, but he is too late and Ruari O’Bradaigh (Republican S/F) will never be right.[2]
As Thatcher left office there was some hope of political change in the north. However, within a few short months the IRA reasserted their campaign of economic and psychological coercion against the British Cabinet and British public when they welcomed Prime Minister, John Major to Number 10 with a mortar attack. None of the Ministers or the Prime Minister was injured as they meet in Number 10 but the attack reminded the British that Saddam Hussein was not their only enemy. The IRA campaign against the British Government and public was an attempt to convince them to become persuaders of the Protestant people to enter a united Ireland or a transition towards a united Ireland. On the ground in Northern Ireland far away from the media spotlight, the IRA continued with their criminality, children were being shot in the legs and beaten by IRA gangs because they had dared to tell a social worker that they had been raped or sexually assaulted by a Sinn Fein or IRA member. Armed robberies, smuggling, counterfeit goods, and licensing drug dealers were all part of what was now an IRA Mafia organisation.
Peter Brooke was the new Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and he set about arranging a set of talks about talks. The terrorists continued to murder at will, loyalists were now pro-active rather than reactive and in 1991 seventy-five civilians were murdered in cold blood in almost equal numbers by loyalist and republican murder squads. The republican movement could no longer claim that Protestant civilians were accidental casualties of ‘war’ as in 1991 there were only 19 military casualties. Loyalists were now matching the IRA sectarian body count almost death for death. The lie of ‘war’ was buried beneath the bodies of the innocent and Adams claim to have Protestant interests at heart were nothing more than a self deluding myth. Indeed as extensive survey was carried out by Livingston and Morison into party preference in Northern Ireland in 1991, they found that although there was a cross fertilisation between unionist and nationalist parties, not one Protestant said they would vote Sinn Fein.[3]
One of the most cowardly tactics used by the republican leadership and one which cost them a great deal of support at this time was the tactic of using Human Bombs (proxy). This tactic had been developed by a close associate of IRA leader, Martin Mc Guinness. Mc Guinness felt that he needed to take back some of the street power that had shifted in the IRA leadership to Mc Kenna and Murphy as they had taken a significant hit from the British and appeared to ordinary republicans to be fighting the 'war' on their own. The tactic was used for a short time during the 1990s, however, was eventually abandoned after public outrage. This Human Bomb tactic involved taking an innocent civilian and tying that civilian into a car or van and forcing them to drive that car or van packed with explosives into a British military installation, when that person arrived at the military installation the IRA would explode the bomb by remote control, killing the civilian and any one in the vicinity of the bomb. The person forced to drive the bomb to its destination was normally told that his family would be killed if he did not drive the bomb to its destination. Unlike the modern day Muslim terrorist who will volunteer to blow himself up in a suicide bomb attack, the IRA were too cowardly to carry out such attacks themselves.
The Human Bomb attacks had been sanctioned by the IRA Army Council who were continuing to pursue a policy of ethnic cleansing against the Protestant people by both physical and psychological coercion. On the 24th of October 1990, an IRA active service unit lead by someone very close to Martin Mc Guinness, took the family of Patrick Gillespie hostage, warning Mr Gillespie that his wife and children would be murdered if he did not co-operate. Mr Gillespie was tied into a car that was packed with 1,000lb of explosives and told under threat of death to drive to the British Army installation at Coshquin. As he reached the British installation the IRA cowards detonated the bomb by remote control, Mr Gillespie and five others were murdered. Also on the 24th of October 1990, the IRA forced a pensioner to drive a bomb into a British Army checkpoint outside Newry. The brave pensioner managed to jump free at the last minute but one person was murdered and over a dozen injured as the bomb was exploded by remote control. In Omagh on the same day in 1990 the IRA held a man’s wife and little children hostage, while they strapped him into a car that was filled with explosives, on this occasion the bomb failed to explode. The IRA exported this cowardly tactic and on the 24th of April, 1993, the IRA forced two London Taxi drivers to drive bombs to Downing Street and New Scotland Yard, the two taxi men were able to abandon their vehicles in safe places and issue warnings to the public. This was the last time that the proxy bomb was used as it showed the IRA on a world stage for the cowards they were.
The car bomb, van bomb, lorry bomb, mortar bomb, proxy bomb were all developed by the IRA and are today used in terrorist campaigns all over the world. The close association between the republican movement and international/narco terrorism is often lost in the spin doctoring surrounding the peace process in the north, this is particularly so in the so-called Irish/American media who make their bread and butter from republican mythology. The reality is that the tactics used by groups such as ETA, FARC and Al-Qaida are tactics that were taught to them by the IRA operatives who were sent to those countries in exchange for weapons or in the case of FARC drug money.
The Irish Prime Minister, Mr Charles Haughey, was to be replaced by Mr Albert Reynolds, a man who had little political baggage and seemed ready and willing to do anything to help find a formula to the warring tribalism in Northern Ireland. Reynolds and the British Prime Minister, John Major, appeared able to talk easily with each other and they seemed able and willing to do business. However, the dark shadow cast by the republican movement would soon bring another dark day in Northern Ireland’s history. On the 17th of January 1992 it was proved once again, if proof were needed, that Protestants were the legitimate target of the republican movement when on that date seven Protestants were murdered and seven more injured by an IRA bomb that deliberately targeted the men as they travelled to work in Treebane, CountyTyrone. The hawk and dove theory was a nonsense, the central thesis of the republican campaign was to physically and psychologically coerce the Protestant people into a united Ireland, if that meant using a combination of murder and politics then that is what would be used.
In London talks about talks continued among the constitutional parties, Sinn Fein continued to exclude themselves from the talks due to continued republican violence. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) wanted the Irish Government to erase Articles 2 and 3 from the Irish Constitution (Bunreacht na hEireann), that had laid claim to Northern Ireland as part of the national territory. These meetings were being used by the British to tell Irish Americans that a process was in place to bring some type of settlement to the northern problem. In America, the 1992 Presidential elections were in full swing and the Irish American lobby were flexing their muscles, offering full support to Bill Clinton if he would agree to send a peace envoy to Northern Ireland. Bill Clinton played a pivotal role in the peace process and his peace envoy George Mitchell was a very able man.
The British Government continued to guarantee unionists that their constitutional right to remain British citizens would not be under mined by any deal. This position being maintained by the British continued to be a problem for those trying to remove the Unionist Veto on the north’s affairs. At the end of 1992 a General Election was called in The Irish Republic, and Albert Reynolds and his Fianna Fail Party were returned to office as coalition partners with the Labour Party. In March 1993 Albert Reynolds meet with American President, Bill Clinton and briefed him on developments in the north. Reynolds was leading a strong Government and was prepared to take risks to secure peace in the north. The Pan-Nationalism spoken of by unionists had now been strengthened by a strong and willing Irish Prime Minister who was supported by an interested and popular American President, Bill Clinton.
Adams and Hume had inclusive talks in 1988 and these talks would begin again in 1993 as a political momentum appeared thanks to Reynolds. Unionists were out raged as they could see that nationalism was taking on a new momentum, however, Reynolds and Hume were simply trying to submit Sinn Fein to constitutionalism. Sinn Fein was being offered the opportunity to be inside the political tent or outside it. Albert Reynolds had great faith in the abilities of John Hume in his handling of Adams and Sinn Fein when he said:
Mr Hume is a very experienced politician. It is for Mr Hume to judge whether something useful can come out of those talks.
The triangulation of Hume, Reynolds and Clinton would be the corner stone of what would become known as the peace process, Sinn Fein/IRA knew that this was the last stand saloon and they could either be in as constitutionalists or out as terrorists.