I don't know mate what I would have done. I would not feel comfortable hanging about with gangland figures. Cos I know that to get where they are most will have had to do pretty anti-social and barbaric things. They are also usually shrewd businessmen and have fucked over many people to get where they are(usually).
Beating the Fascists: The authorised history of Anti-Fascist Action
- Thread starter cogg
- Start date
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
At least part of the problem is that RA/IWCA is not an identified entity. And as someone else mentioned previously BTF is perfectly candid about Mr Noonan's involvement. The same question was also answered on another thread.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Jack 'The Spot' Comer , anti fascist and gangland figure. History of defending Jews in the East End , involved in violent attacks on the British Union of Fascists including Cable Street. Whether its true or not it was said that he knocked out Mosley's body guard Tommy Moran.
RIP Dessy, your(sic) not on your own.
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
Dessie was not much interested in money as such. He was really suited to another age, maybe even another century. For instance running a bar on somewhere like the Barbary Coast (the rougher end natch) wearing a fancy waistcost with a pistol stuck in his belt and blunderbuss under the counter would have suited him down to the ground.
Red Storm
M14
Fantastic.
icebreaker
New Member
Could not resist to give my opinion on Dessie. Although there is no doubt that he was a republican socialist and a good antifascist and his heart was in the right place. There were/are rumours about in Manchester that he was a police informant. I mean with the prospect of doing time or turning an informant I know what many people would choose. This is the problem when you let someone like Dessie into an organisation/structure such as AFA. Although I don't know if he might have grassed on AFA/Red Action folk. I've heard that Red Action knew about these allegations many years ago, and were confident that it was a load of bull. But if Dessie was an informant it does not look good for Red Action. I'm sure I heard that his brother was going on awhile back about on a tv programme how Desmond was actually a sleeper cell in the provos which is probably crap but if true might scare a few republicans if he was an informant. Anyway, I've got that off my chest. Don't mean to smear a dead man's name, but the truth or rumours will come out eventually about this.
Thanks,
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
How would you be aware of these rumours about in Manchester Icebreaker?
icebreaker
New Member
I live there.
Red Storm
M14
I've heard the rumours.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
Don't we all mate. And what was the impact of these 'rumours'?
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
Yeah, you do. Your sole purpose in coming on here was to do precisely that. And by weasly implication extend the smear to the politicos with whom he is associated.
icebreaker
New Member
No. I have a huge amount of respect for Red Action and AFA. But some people in Red Action stuck their heads in the sand and didn't believe the intel when this first broke. The police even gave Dessie a codename.
So this icebreaker person is just recycling old gossip? Or is there something in it?
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
When did the intel first break? Who was the source for it? And what did you personally do about it when it was brought to your attention?
SpineyNorman
Inappropriate content removed
Hang on, a minute ago it was just a rumour, now you're saying the old bill gave him a nickname? And you only signed up today?
I'm suspicious of your motivations and I never even met the bloke.
bamalama
don't do that
First off i've not been here long but i think discussing this stuff on a public forum is bollox,and frankly anyone pushing for info to be made available about this on a public forum is either naive or out of the loop.Dessie Noonan wasn't afa and afa wasn't Dessie Noonan.I know that and I was never in afa, so I assume that it's pretty well known what his role was.Just because you're met with a deafening wall of silence when you ask a question doesn't mean it can't be answered.Maybe the people you're asking, find,in the general scheme of things,your question to be irrelevant/peripheral...
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
miktheword
Well-Known Member
I seem to recall some desparate paranoid searchlight stooge posting up a similar 'rumour to discredit' on that indymedia thread before BtF came out.
Btw, just seen an advert for 'At Home With The Noonans' next Sunday 22/4 part 1/6 exclusive to The Crime Channel on sky.
(For those who like their politics sanitised, there's always The Parliamentary channel)
Btw, just seen an advert for 'At Home With The Noonans' next Sunday 22/4 part 1/6 exclusive to The Crime Channel on sky.
(For those who like their politics sanitised, there's always The Parliamentary channel)
icebreaker
New Member
The intel first broke I believe around 92'. I'm not a mong and I won't answer the next two questions. I only wrote on this thread because it particularly annoyed me that some people were treating a murdering gangster/probable police informant as some sort of later day saint. How did someone with so many murders to his name not get banged up? Charges in West Midlands dropped etc. I won't post again on the subject. I believe the rumours should be looked at and it seems some people here are scared to/too stubborn to. I don't blame Red Action for not doing anything about them at the time. Dessie was a dangerous guy to fuck about with and they probably genuinely believed the intel to be false. But should it not be looked at? I've had my say.
Joe Reilly
Well-Known Member
"...there is no doubt that he was a republican socialist and a good antifascist and his heart was in the right place." (icebreaker Post 2497)
Evidently you suffer from a split personality - both of them stupid.
intersol32
Well-Known Member
Just about everyone who has been involved in Irish Republican politics over so many years has been called a 'police informer' at one point or another, so it's hardly revelatory to hear the same old shite trotted out again. Funnily enough it's the kind of people who jump about and hysterically point the finger at others who are quite often themselves up to no good.
To give an example of this, Anthony MacIntyre (ex-IRA prisoner and author) was quite often over the years the target of such finger pointing. When I asked about this a while back, he just laughed and said "the last person to ever call me a tout, was at a public meeting in West Belfast...it was Denis Donaldson!" (who later admitted to being a British State agent).
I remember a Green Anarchist article from the early '90's that laid claim to Red Action being a "State run" organization. Complete crap which I seem to remember a member of GA being confronted with in Trafalgar Square one day, after which he shat himself and lost all of his papers.
Banding about gossip and rumour on a public forum hardly gives your opening statements any form of credibility. On this matter it's interesting that you ("icebreaker") should anonymously present such accusations on a forum where you know some close personal friends of Dessie Noonan congregate (and who by your own admission knew him better than you did).
If we ever thought an obligation to investigate every snide little underhanded jibe about being agent provocateurs or touts that was aimed at AFA or Red Action we'd have had precious little time for anything else (and then perhaps that's the point?). Rest assured that any organization worth its salt always had its own procedures for internal investigations and the like, but due to its very nature most of it (along with its findings) would be kept out of the public domain.
Red Storm
M14
Just wanting to give a little update on the AFA Archive (means I can procrastinate a little longer too
)
It's running on its own now without me having to put links up. It gets around 100 views a day.
What's been encouraging is that I've received a few emails from people saying thanks because its helped with with their research. Had a couple of undergrads from the UK, a PhD student in Germany and Dr Evan Smith from Flinders University in Australia.
)It's running on its own now without me having to put links up. It gets around 100 views a day.
What's been encouraging is that I've received a few emails from people saying thanks because its helped with with their research. Had a couple of undergrads from the UK, a PhD student in Germany and Dr Evan Smith from Flinders University in Australia.
Red Storm
M14
What were the four stations closed at the Battle of Waterloo? I've scowered BtF, No Retreat and the relevant Red Action. I can't find them for the life of me. The only one named seems to be Charing Cross.
I remember the line 'AFA closed more tube stations than the IRA' but I cant find that either. Have I made that up?
I remember the line 'AFA closed more tube stations than the IRA' but I cant find that either. Have I made that up?
Red Storm
M14
http://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1154&context=sportslaw
I thought I'd draw this article to peoples attention.
The title is 'When the Whites Go Marching In': Racism and Resistance in English Football. I don't recall it being in BtF so I thought I'd bring it to peoples attentions in case its not widely known.
Quiet a good article which uses Red Attitude and concludes that physical confrontation is the best way to stop fascism gaining a foothold.
I thought I'd draw this article to peoples attention.
The title is 'When the Whites Go Marching In': Racism and Resistance in English Football. I don't recall it being in BtF so I thought I'd bring it to peoples attentions in case its not widely known.
Quiet a good article which uses Red Attitude and concludes that physical confrontation is the best way to stop fascism gaining a foothold.
Red Storm
M14
Just accidentally finished my dissertation. Had to miss out absolutely loads! Wrote 17,000 words but needs cutting down to 14,000 before submittal so I'll be leaving even more out!
Ended up with the title: On the Principles of Political Violence and the Case of AFA.
I hope its done AFA justice.
Ended up with the title: On the Principles of Political Violence and the Case of AFA.
I hope its done AFA justice.
Red About Town
Well-Known Member
Are you going to put it on the archive site at any stage?
Would love to read it.
Would love to read it.
Red Storm
M14
Once marked I'll decide. If its shit it wont go up.
I would like to put up any good academic works by students or anyone on the archive. I think it would be a good resource for anyone studying anti-fascism.
bignose1
Searchlight Spoiler
You can put my Political Soldiers and Nationalist Unity disser up and the baby one I did for my Dip HE on Mosley in the North West. Got v gd marks
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