IRA worship

[john x]

though I'm sure the Proddies have their experts too.

Kincora Boys Home?

john x

 

[Nigel Irritable]

The series was written by Socialist Democracy, Irish Section of the Fourth International

Gurrier's summary of these jokers is bang on the money. They spent years tailing the Provos, then amazingly tried a brief period of tailing the SWP when the Provos disappointed. Now the four of them spend their time moaning about anyone who actually does anything and arguing that every campaign on any subject should abandon whatever it is doing to picket Liberty Hall instead. Against the war - go picket the trade unions. Against the bin tax - go picket the trade unions.

There are certainly no leftist rose tinted spectacles about the provos here, and the Irish FI section has always remained independent of them and free to criticise. While I would agree there had been some uncritical mutterings about them by some leftists and trotskyists, particularly in the early 1970s, the formal statements and positions of the Fourth International in particular have always opposed individual terrorism and nationalism.

A remarkable rewriting of history. Not only did the USFI not oppose individual terrorism their international actually supported the establishment of a minor terror group, Saor Eire, resulting in the death of their then leading member in Ireland. Other than that interlude they stuck to cheering on the Provos from the sidelines until the fact that the Provos had given up and taken their ball home finally sank in. Since then they have sat around moaning as described above.

I can't remember what the section was called at that time though, I think it was the RMG, Revolutionary Marxist Group, though it later became the Movement for a Socialist Republic (MSR), fused with People's Democracy and is called Socialist Democracy today.

You are forgetting the period when these geniuses traded as the "Irish Committee for a Marxist Programme", one of my all time favourite sectarian names.

 

[gilhyle]

"Theres Winners and Loosers and don't get caught..."

The Republican Movement wasn't defeated - neither did it win.

Right, so the Troubles were just one of those 'non-competitive games' they do in schools now so noone learns what loosing is.

I don't think so. Call it as it is. Of course they were defeated. Adams & Co. just did the same thing Arthur Scargill did at the end of the Miners Strike, the same thing every manipulative political leadership does to protect itself against the consequences of defeat, they dressed it up as something else and Blair & Ahern helped them do that.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Right, so the Troubles were just one of those 'non-competitive games' they do in schools now so noone learns what loosing is.

I don't think so. Call it as it is. Of course they were defeated. Adams & Co. just did the same thing Arthur Scargill did at the end of the Miners Strike, the same thing every manipulative political leadership does to protect itself against the consequences of defeat, they dressed it up as something else and Blair & Ahern helped them do that.

This isn't even a matter of political debate - they weren't defeated. They had a functioning command and operations structure, with untold masses of arms - what is your definition of defeat?? Even without direct armed action they were functioning well up until the recent call to cease all activities.

It was quite clearly a stalemate, and had been so for sometime.

The defining moment were the hunger strikes. Not only did the British government realise that they were unable to smash the IRA as they had tried with internment, ect in the 70s, but also the possibility of a electoral strategy was opened up to the Republican Movement.

Gradually it became clear that a United Ireland by force of arms wasn't going to be possible. No there isn't a 32 County Irish Republic, and Loyalists in momements of false bravado have painted murals welcoming the IRA's 'surrender' - but who are they trying to kid??

 

[cemertyone]

Right, so the Troubles were just one of those 'non-competitive games' they do in schools now so noone learns what loosing is.

I don't think so. Call it as it is. Of course they were defeated. Adams & Co. just did the same thing Arthur Scargill did at the end of the Miners Strike, the same thing every manipulative political leadership does to protect itself against the consequences of defeat, they dressed it up as something else and Blair & Ahern helped them do that.

...

I think that`s all a bit of a simplistic reading of events.. But equally so when Blair and Ahern are no longer in the political frame...guess who will still be there for a long time to come and with very much increased political influence both North and South....Step forward Mr Adams...

 

[likesfish]

still probably was'nt worth 3000 odd deaths and countless ruined lives .
though could have been a lot lot worse

 

[cemertyone]

still probably was'nt worth 3000 odd deaths and countless ruined lives .
though could have been a lot lot worse

True...but then again it never needed to be that way in the first place. If Catholic`s and had been given an opportunity to be part of civil society in N-ireland with equal rights ( and responsibilites) and the dogmitism of unionist domination had been challenged by the myriad Westminister administrations we would not have found ourselves in the place that the last 25 years have resulted in.

 

[likesfish]

apprantly after world war two the unionists were left to get on with running the place and when it all blew up in 1968 or so there was nobody in westminister knew what the hell was going on

 

[oi2002]

...Is the northern working class better off? I would argue that the nationalist section of it is. Take a look around some of the housing estates around Belfast and you will see that the nationalist community has much better housing now while a lot of the unionist community are still living in slums. While Loyalists were defending their 'orange shitholes' (please don't take offence at that description), nationalists were busy lobbying for better housing and learning to work the system to their advantage. This was all part and parcel of the general resistance to British rule.

The single biggest problem the Prod working class have is the same as workers all over Europe: industrial production has moved to China and working in a government subsidized call center does not give a man the same sense of dignity as building ships.

When I grew up N.Ireland had some of the worst housing in Europe. The troubles did change that. Many easily defended slums were bulldozed and modern HE spec'd housing that made for simple riot control replaced it. Housing is one area were conditions have improved immensly for both communities in N.I.

The biggest affect of the Troubles was we never experienced the Thatcherism. The 6C still has a Social model economy with a very heavy layer of government, lots of cushy government jobs, one of the best educational systems in Europe, an empty leisure center on every corner etc. All this is propped up by very generous funding based on largely English tax revenue.

That is all going to be dismantled by the way; now the croppies have finally laid down and the English see no reason their taxes should continue to pamper the 6C. Republicans would do better to confront that than indulging in the sort of vacuous triumphalism which has traditionally been a Protestant vice.

 

[gilhyle]

Remembering 1972 - 'The year of Victory'

...

I think that`s all a bit of a simplistic reading of events.. But equally so when Blair and Ahern are no longer in the political frame...guess who will still be there for a long time to come and with very much increased political influence both North and South....Step forward Mr Adams...

It is simplified, but it is not simplistic. Look, an 'army' was established to defeat the British army militarily using guerilla tactics - to make N.I. ungovernable. The price of the establishment of that army was the demobilisation of the civil rights movement - the two could not coexist. The justification for that at the time was that there could be no civil rights under British rule and that the IRA could win a military victory. Both claims proved wrong.

The military campaign proceeded in two key waves:

urban bombing campaign 71-74

Rural brit free zones 84-87, meant to lead up to an all-out assault on barrracks etc.

Both campaigns failed, as did the other half-baked UK bombing campaigns and the desperate late 1970s RUC assasination wave etc.

In military terms it was all a failure - a complete failure which has proven, once and for all, that an Irish guerilla army CANNOT defeat the British Army in a long war.

That the IRA were not smashed is beside the point in both military and fundamental political terms. Their continued existence was a blot, not a military threat. WHat happened then is about whether it all gets tidied up or whether it festers.

The war was over in 1988 and the IRA lost. The subtleties are there, but they don't change the fundamentals. So I ignore them.

 

[oi2002]

True...but then again it never needed to be that way in the first place. If Catholic`s and had been given an opportunity to be part of civil society in N-ireland with equal rights ( and responsibilites) and the dogmitism of unionist domination had been challenged by the myriad Westminister administrations we would not have found ourselves in the place that the last 25 years have resulted in.

I'd agree with that but it was the cause of a United Ireland that PIRA fought for not civil rights.

Peaceful change could have happened in the 6C there was nothing inevitable about the Troubles its simply a matter of having elected a lousy bunch of politicians and malign figures like Big Ian. The Prods fear of united Ireland was always a bigger thing than their desire to oppress Catholics.

It's a great shame that the civil rights movement failed and it failed mainly because it was perceived by Prods as a nationalist project. Prod's were not entirely wrong in that but were fools (Big Ian) to oppose T.O'Neils attempt to rectify the system. The sectarian inequity of the 6C in the early 70s gave PIRA a base wide enough to support the blood sacrifice. The Prods were fools again in 73 to oppose Sunningdale.

I've just been reading The Sling And The Stone by Hammes.

In discussing the Sandinistas Hammes makes an interesting point on guerilla movements: often a long period of futile and sacrificial fighting seems necessary to galvanise a movement into one that can mount an effective political struggle. That's how I'd try to understand what was happening to SF between 1975-1992.

I still think PIRA were dunderheaded eigits to keep the Milltown gravediggers so busy but that at least makes some sense of it.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

It is simplified, but it is not simplistic. Look, an 'army' was established to defeat the British army militarily using guerilla tactics - to make N.I. ungovernable. The price of the establishment of that army was the demobilisation of the civil rights movement - the two could not coexist. The justification for that at the time was that there could be no civil rights under British rule and that the IRA could win a military victory. Both claims proved wrong.

The military campaign proceeded in two key waves:

urban bombing campaign 71-74

Rural brit free zones 84-87, meant to lead up to an all-out assault on barrracks etc.

Both campaigns failed, as did the other half-baked UK bombing campaigns and the desperate late 1970s RUC assasination wave etc.

In military terms it was all a failure - a complete failure which has proven, once and for all, that an Irish guerilla army CANNOT defeat the British Army in a long war.

That the IRA were not smashed is beside the point in both military and fundamental political terms. Their continued existence was a blot, not a military threat. WHat happened then is about whether it all gets tidied up or whether it festers.

The war was over in 1988 and the IRA lost. The subtleties are there, but they don't change the fundamentals. So I ignore them.

Good post gilhyle.

'an Irish guerilla army CANNOT defeat the British Army in a long war.' But, likewise the British Army cannot defeat an Irish guerilla army in a long war - see Operation Motorman and the Emergency Provisions Act, 1973 and The Prevention of Terrorism Act, 1974 - re: internment and also collusion.
For one of the worlds major military powers this is quite obviously an embarrassment at the very least.

Expanding upon the definition of defeat, the 1916 Easter Uprising has now entered popular history as a glorious military campaign - but one that was without doubt a failure. Likewise the United Irishmen uprising of the late 18th century. But nobody would regard these events as defeats in the traditional term and certainly they are regarded as worthy events to remember and even to celebrate. They are viewed in a much longer context of anti-imperial struggle.

'The price of the establishment of that army was the demobilisation of the civil rights movement - the two could not coexist.' I would argue that revolutionary Republicanism replaced the civil rights because the latter proved in practice not to be a viable force for change. It simply could not survive the onslaught of the Unionist machine. So the price of the failure of the civil rights movement was the re-establishment of the IRA, not the other way around.

'That the IRA were not smashed is beside the point in both military and fundamental political terms. Their continued existence was a blot, not a military threat.' To who is it viewed 'beside the point'? There did come about in the 80s an 'acceptable level of violence' in Ulster, but this stalemate could only be a temporary conclusion in a modern capitalist economy. In the end, a negotiated settlement was reached. But one which has left the Republican Movement much politically stronger.

 

[cathal marcs]

dunderheaded eigits .

Haven't heard that term in a log time

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Icepick and Kropotkin... and other @'s... there's a good article on the IRA here by the Workers Solidarity Movement

The armed struggle is not something that republicans took up because they have a fascination with violence or some innate love of armalite rifles, despite what some media commentators would have us believe. IRA volunteers are brave men and women who want to hit back at the forces that have been sticking the boot into their community. They risk jailing, torture and death. If bravery was enough the British Army would have been defeated years ago. Clearly bravery is not enough.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Also, everybody should read Oliver's Army - A History of British Soldiers in Ireland and Other Colonial Conflicts by Aly Renwick here

 

[Fisher_Gate]

Gurrier's summary of these jokers is bang on the money. They spent years tailing the Provos, then amazingly tried a brief period of tailing the SWP when the Provos disappointed. Now the four of them spend their time moaning about anyone who actually does anything and arguing that every campaign on any subject should abandon whatever it is doing to picket Liberty Hall instead. Against the war - go picket the trade unions. Against the bin tax - go picket the trade unions.



A remarkable rewriting of history. Not only did the USFI not oppose individual terrorism their international actually supported the establishment of a minor terror group, Saor Eire, resulting in the death of their then leading member in Ireland. Other than that interlude they stuck to cheering on the Provos from the sidelines until the fact that the Provos had given up and taken their ball home finally sank in. Since then they have sat around moaning as described above.



You are forgetting the period when these geniuses traded as the "Irish Committee for a Marxist Programme", one of my all time favourite sectarian names.

I've got a copy of the Tenth world congress resolutions somewhere I'll dig out, but I don't think it ever endorsed individual terrorism, which was one of the reasons the guevarist organisations in latin america were so hostile.

And for all their faults, I don't think the FI in Ireland ever finished up licking the arse of one of the most bourgeois social democratic parties in the world, unlike some...

 

[foggypane]

Good post gilhyle.

'an Irish guerilla army CANNOT defeat the British Army in a long war.' But, likewise the British Army cannot defeat an Irish guerilla army in a long war - see Operation Motorman and the Emergency Provisions Act, 1973 and The Prevention of Terrorism Act, 1974 - re: internment and also collusion.
For one of the worlds major military powers this is quite obviously an embarrassment at the very least.

Sorry to butt in on this thread (which seems well informed if a little bad-tempered)

Divisive Cotton equates the lack of an all-out defeat of Irish Republican terrorist groups with an inability by the British Army to bring one about.

Wrong.

There was never a moment from about 1971 onwards when the entire Republican armed membership could not have been wiped out/rounded up over a 24 hour period. You shouldn't kid yourself that this is not so.

It did not happen because of it's obvious political (and legal) disadvantages, not because the British Army couldn't have done it. (are there too many negatives in that sentence or what?)

Don't get too wrapped up in your romanticized view of the balaclava boys; they lived only at the grace and pleasure of HMG.

I don't know if that fact changes anything for you.

 

[gilhyle]

There did come about in the 80s an 'acceptable level of violence' in Ulster, but this stalemate could only be a temporary conclusion in a modern capitalist economy. In the end, a negotiated settlement was reached. But one which has left the Republican Movement much politically stronger.

I disagree with you on one point, possibly a key point. The level of violence achieved by the IRA in the 1980s was an acceptable level of violence for Britain.

This was particularly since they were then able to mobilise loyalist paramilitaries to terrorise nationalist communities, creating a level of violence in nationalist areas which was becoming unacceptable to those communities in the 1990s.

This pincer movement put critical pressure on the military leaderships in the IRA regions to accomodate to Adams policy. [I won't speculate along the lines of 'The Secret History' account that tries to suggest that critical to this combination was the role of a VERY senior republican mole in pushing the IRA to some crucial defeats. It seems to me that the outturn probably reflected the fundamental military realities and speculation about moles doesn't change that.]

What then happened was the Republican Movement faced a choice - opposition politics along the lines of a left-wing Nationalist Party or Power sharing politics alng the lines of the SDLP. Adams wanted to use the arms dumps to achieve power sharing. He used manipulation to exclude all alternatives.

The choice between these alternatives is not fundamental. But there is a difference. In terms of building a movement of any political significance from the point of view of a socialist, the power-sharing route was a deeply undesirable route to take. Where it has led, is leading and will lead the republicans can be seen in the record of republicans on local councils all around Ireland over many years.

They are now very like Fianna Fail in the late 1920s and I don't share the Peadar O'Donnell approach on that one.

I would have preferred if they had dumped arms, refused power sharing, refused to do any deal at all and just turned to oppositional politics.

In the 32 county terms, that would have turned the Republican Movemnt into a much more promising entity. As it is, the culture of Blairism suffuses their senior bodies completely. So it really doesn't help much that they are stronger.

 

[fishfingerer]

There was never a moment from about 1971 onwards when the entire Republican armed membership could not have been wiped out/rounded up over a 24 hour period. You shouldn't kid yourself that this is not so.

It did not happen because of it's obvious political (and legal) disadvantages, not because the British Army couldn't have done it. (are there too many negatives in that sentence or what?)

Internment should have been introduced?

 

[bolshiebhoy]

Divisive Cotton equates the lack of an all-out defeat of Irish Republican terrorist groups with an inability by the British Army to bring one about.

And as with most colonial attitudes yours misses the fact that this 'terrorist group' could not have been wiped out without taking on the tens of hundreds who would have come from the host community north and south to make the perpatrators pay in blood.

 

[foggypane]

And as with most colonial attitudes yours misses the fact that this 'terrorist group' could not have been wiped out without taking on the tens of hundreds who would have come from the host community north and south to make the perpatrators pay in blood.

Colonialist? Moi?

What makes you think that mate?

I simply stated a cold fact. The republican fighters - who I think it is fair to label 'terrorist' even if only for the Brum bombings, Warrington and the London campaign, and the shooting of those poor Aussies in Germany - could have been eliminated with ease at any point from about 1971 on. The UK state chose, for it's own reasons, not to do so.

Those of us who wouldn't mind, would quite like, or really really really want a united Ireland*, would be well-advised to keep that little fact on board when laying plans.

The romantic notion of fighting off the Brits, I am afraid, is just that.

Your saliva-flecked post is exactly the sort of nonsense I expect from the dreamers who think they could ever accomplish anything lasting with guns and bombs in NI/6Cs/Ulster.

I personally stay out of the political arguments - the situation over there was expressly designed to be a running sore and has worked as planned.

From a technical point of view I am right in my original post; I suspect that wiser heads than yours, further up the Republican food chain, long since realised it and hence the current relatively fluffy situation.

You may not like it, but then again, you don't know what you are talking about.

*I am on that continuum

 

[fishfingerer]

From a technical point of view I am right in my original post;

No you are not.

 

[Dilzybhoy]

I grew up there.

So I know what the reality is - and I know who the romantics are.

Ditto
And Ditto - Ditto.
Romantics

 

[Divisive Cotton]

And as with most colonial attitudes yours misses the fact that this 'terrorist group' could not have been wiped out without taking on the tens of hundreds who would have come from the host community north and south to make the perpatrators pay in blood.

No, I don't think he's saying that.

Despite all the underhand tactics - which I'll doubt we'll ever truly know the extent of - the British government was operating from a position of being a liberal democracy. Compared to a country like Burma which doesn't have to worry about a. breaking its own human rights laws b. domestic opposition to its own policies c. international condemnation.

Although they did come very close to breaking the IRA in the 70s through internment.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

What then happened was the Republican Movement faced a choice - opposition politics along the lines of a left-wing Nationalist Party or Power sharing politics alng the lines of the SDLP. Adams wanted to use the arms dumps to achieve power sharing. He used manipulation to exclude all alternatives.

The power-sharing arrangement that came from the GFA was always going to be one of the most odd coalition governments in Europe. I presume that the participants knew that this form of regional government was only going to be a temporary fixture until stability through the peace process filters down through all of society.

When the Green party entered into a coalition with the Tories and the Lib Dems in Leeds everybody went, What a load of wankers. And rightly so. (This is the nearest anology I can think of).

If Sinn Fein had declared their intention of not entering power-sharing in the six counties, that would have left, what – a Unionist majority, which is back to a pre-1969 status quo. This, clearly, would not have been acceptable to their consituency, and many people would have wondered what the hell the sacrifice had been for. It doesn’t mean they automatically become, by association, the SDLP.

 

[cathal marcs]

It doesn’t mean they automatically become, by association, the SDLP.

Erm their economic policies seem like the SDLP and quite happily used PFI when given the chance. Apart from that the GFA is a side step from the republican agenda and cpper-fastens partition.

 

[Divisive Cotton]

Erm their economic policies seem like the SDLP and quite happily used PFI when given the chance. Apart from that the GFA is a side step from the republican agenda and cpper-fastens partition.

Well, no, the Good Friday Agreement is not a Republican document is it. There's no doubt about that.

 

[cathal marcs]

Well to many the provisiponal kovement dressed it up as one and hoodwnked them up the garen path hinting at 2016 unifiation somehow I dont see it.

Normalisation/Ulsterisation/Criminalisation alive and well in the 6counties now imposed by republicans. Although I think the new Fianna Fail is a better comparison to SDLP.

 

[bolshiebhoy]

I personally stay out of the political arguments - the situation over there was expressly designed to be a running sore and has worked as planned.

That's not really possible though is it as the rest of your post demonstrates. It was of course technically possible but what that ignores is the fact that the provos didn't exist in a vacuum. They had a massive hinterland that gave varying degrees of support practical and moral to the volunteers. The brit securocrats knew that only too well. Which is why despite shoot to kill etc they never did as you suggest they could have done.

In passing I'm not a republican and I've never accepted that the armed struggle was the way to achieve anything in Ireland. But I did recognise that the provos were one expression of a popular movement against oppression.

 

[foggypane]

That's not really possible though is it as the rest of your post demonstrates. It was of course technically possible but what that ignores is the fact that the provos didn't exist in a vacuum. They had a massive hinterland that gave varying degrees of support practical and moral to the volunteers. The brit securocrats knew that only too well. Which is why despite shoot to kill etc they never did as you suggest they could have done.

In passing I'm not a republican and I've never accepted that the armed struggle was the way to achieve anything in Ireland. But I did recognise that the provos were one expression of a popular movement against oppression.

Of course the Provose were an expression of a popular movement. And yes, the British never did wipe out the IRA.

Divisive Cotton got what I was saying (and, annoyingly, put it rather better than I did). The British government has always fought the Republicans - well, post 1969 - with what frustrated gung-ho killer types in the forces and their sympathisers call 'one hand behind their backs'. I would call it more an attempt, with widely varying degrees of honesty, to present the State side of the Struggles as being the one on the side of law, order, that sort of thing.

Very arguable point, obviously. But, the thread being about IRA worship, I thought my admittedly narrow original point was relevent: the British forces could have, at any time, militarily defeated the IRA and other Republican groups.

I would suggest that some of the IRA worship comes from the perception that the IRA fought off the Brits for all those years, and there is of course some truth in it. Fact remains though, that the situation was as it was 1969-present because, to the British state, annihilation of the IRA remained a worse option than any at the time.

It's a little like watching Hulk Hogan get beaten up by kids in that crappy film. He could have snapped their irritating little necks for them but didn't. That doesn't make the little brats WWF champs.

I am a little concerned about that analogy, perhaps I need a cup of tea and a biscuit.