krtek a houby
Merry Xmas!
Divisive Cotton said:
Well said. Thank you.
IRA worship
- Thread starter In Bloom
- Start date
Well said. Thank you.
krtek a houby
Merry Xmas!
cemertyone said:
And thank you,also. That's a point most people seem to gloss over.
jer said:
Some of the actions carried out by the IRA were despicable. There's no doubt about that. For many of the early years they were far from the effecient organisation that they seem to have become famous for. Mistakes were made. Innocent people were killed. But that, as far as I'm concerned, is the price of war. And it was a war forced upon them, not the other way around.
(Divisive Cotton)
I think this is an example of the IRA worship seeping through.
'oh dearie me, some people have been killed who weren't British soldiers or political leaders dearie me, well, mistakes do happen, that's the price of war, ahh, the war was forced upon those brave lads, the british were worse, blah blah blah.'
Crap. Planting bombs in cities may have been a strategic error, but it was done on purpose. You can't excuse it or explain it away, even obliquely.
Putting bombs in pubs is a vile wankers trick of the lowest order. No-one forced the evil bastards to do any such thing.
If they wanted to fight the british they knew full well it was only ever going to be symbolic. See my earlier posts. So why kill Brummie drinkers or Warrington schoolkids? They had 4 or 5 decent snipers and a few skilled bomb-makers. Stick to high-profile pops at the occupying forces. Jobs a good 'un.
They might even, then, have deserved the title 'freedom fighters' rather than the one they've got, 'psycho cowardly murdering contempt magnets'
None of my rant-ette, above, is intended to imply support for the Unionist loony tunes or the wilder elements of the British forces.
Divisive Cotton
Now I just have my toy soldiers
foggypane said:
I didn't mean that comment as a celebration - just a comment on war, whether in Northern Ireland or not. That's the path you take, then there's consequences to it. Yes, you can highlight individual acts and condemn them - without also withdrawing support for the wider campaign.
The Stickies faced up to it very early on and abandoned the armed struggle, but by doing so abandoned the political struggle in Northern Ireland too.
Nigel Irritable
Five, Ten, Fifteen Years
Fisher_Gate said:
This is false.
Not only did the USFI majority actively encourage guerrillaism in Latin America, it also actively encouraged individual terrorism in Ireland. In both cases this mostly took on the form of cheerleading for other organisations, but at least on occasion it went a bit further than that. Are you familiar with the republican armed group Saor Eire and the death of Peter Graham, at that time the USFI's leading figure in Ireland?
Divisive Cotton said:
Sorry, DC, but I think you are wrong. It's the nature of the IRAs, and others', campaign that was wrong. Much as it sticks in my throat, there is a difference between 'collateral damage' and deliberate murder of passers-by for political effect.
Believe me, I hate saying this, especially now when the argument is being used to excuse the hateful way in which the US, and to a lesser extent the UK, are going about their business in Iraq.
The point remains though. War is one thing, terrorism is another.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
where does the difference lie?foggypane said:
what're yr definitions?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
so the second world war was in fact largely terrorism?foggypane said:
according to your definition there's been very little war and very much terrorism in things commonly described as war.
.. lets put it like this .. in 1984/5 the state attacked vicously the mining communities of this country .. the working class were defeated .. ok so what are people saying .. that yorkshire/south wales miners should have taken up the armed struggle??? .. the state of w/c resistance is small now but how much worse would it be if some fools had done this ..
yes this is an analogy with NI .. yes it was evil/wicked ( the street burnings etc) what was happenning in the defeat of the civil rights movement .. BUT was an armed response neccessary and tactically right ??? .. i would argue it was self defeating .. the community lost thousends of lives anyway over the years .. and now in 2005 is no more 'empowered' .. and MUCH MORE segregated ... you could say this is from hindsight .. but plenty of people pre '69 had warned of the dangers or armed struggle
DC also asked me to explain something .. check Eamon macanns book again .. he is quite clear that 1) the eire m/c pushed the situation toward nationalism 2) the eire middle class pushed for the old methods of armed struggle ..
i will say again .. the IRA and its US and m/c backers ( it wasn't paid for by people dole cheques
) .. stopped the development of a w/c movement in NI as much as the loyalists did .. and equally hamstrung the w/c movement in this country as the state used the situation against all the w/c ..
yes this is an analogy with NI .. yes it was evil/wicked ( the street burnings etc) what was happenning in the defeat of the civil rights movement .. BUT was an armed response neccessary and tactically right ??? .. i would argue it was self defeating .. the community lost thousends of lives anyway over the years .. and now in 2005 is no more 'empowered' .. and MUCH MORE segregated ... you could say this is from hindsight .. but plenty of people pre '69 had warned of the dangers or armed struggle
DC also asked me to explain something .. check Eamon macanns book again .. he is quite clear that 1) the eire m/c pushed the situation toward nationalism 2) the eire middle class pushed for the old methods of armed struggle ..
i will say again .. the IRA and its US and m/c backers ( it wasn't paid for by people dole cheques
) .. stopped the development of a w/c movement in NI as much as the loyalists did .. and equally hamstrung the w/c movement in this country as the state used the situation against all the w/c ..Pickman's model said:
yep. Now obviously if I were in charge of the planet things would be very different (if that comes about would you like a job as Foreign Minister btw?).
But, yeah, dropping bombs on cities is terrorism in my book. I recall my grandad, a WW2 veteran, on this subject. He joined as a private soldier in 1939 and refused all promotion, feeling it to be a class betrayal to take any command position. He fought in North Africa and Italy, against determined enemies who he respected to his dying day. He would say that the enemy is the man who stands in front of you in a uniform with a gun. The enemy is not that man's wife, kids or parents back home. If you can't beat him face to face that doesn't give you the right to bomb his house.
Grandad felt bitterly that many of the acts carried out by his own side were terrible crimes. He visited bombed German cities in the aftermath of the War and never forgave the RAF.
He - and I agree with his position wholeheartedly, it being one arrived at by an intelligent humane man with the experience to back it up - hated the way that the German attacks on Coventry were crimes, while ours on hamburg were heroism.
I may have wandered off the thread here, but IRA worshippers tend to ignore the shoddy, cowardly, murderous nature of their psycho heroes in just the same way as the flag-wavers in UK tend to romaticize the whole of WW2 as some sort of glorious noble endeavour.
Your enemy declares him/herself, and is fair game. How is a Warrington schoolboy the enemy of Republicanism? How can anyone defend his murder?
Divisive Cotton
Now I just have my toy soldiers
durruti02 said:.. lets put it like this .. in 1984/5 the state attacked vicously the mining communities of this country .. the working class were defeated .. ok so what are people saying .. that yorkshire/south wales miners should have taken up the armed struggle??? .. the state of w/c resistance is small now but how much worse would it be if some fools had done this ..
yes this is an analogy with NI .. yes it was evil/wicked ( the street burnings etc) what was happenning in the defeat of the civil rights movement .. BUT was an armed response neccessary and tactically right ??? .. i would argue it was self defeating .. the community lost thousends of lives anyway over the years .. and now in 2005 is no more 'empowered' .. and MUCH MORE segregated ... you could say this is from hindsight .. but plenty of people pre '69 had warned of the dangers or armed struggle
DC also asked me to explain something .. check Eamon macanns book again .. he is quite clear that 1) the eire m/c pushed the situation toward nationalism 2) the eire middle class pushed for the old methods of armed struggle ..
i will say again .. the IRA and its US and m/c backers ( it wasn't paid for by people dole cheques
I don’t know why you have made this reference – please explain. I don’t see you can make a direct comparison like this.
I would state that the Republican w/c communities are more confident and so consequently are more empowered. The Republican Movement isn’t demoralised – quite the opposite, it is dynamic and forwardthinking. As for Loyalist working class communities – well, they seem in an awful state – insecure and paranoid, the peace dividend hasn’t brought them much in return. But then neither did the war dividend – I suspect that being involved and supporting Loyalist paramilitaries gave some return of importance and playing an important part, even if it was politically illusionary - how much have they gained for their loyalty??!
Okay, you’ve got me there – I haven’t read it, so can’t comment on its contents. But anyway, you point being?
You say that it was the IRA that stopped the ‘w/c movement in NI’. I presume you mean Loyalists and Republicans in a united movement. For starters, there is little history of this happening – apart from radical Presbyterianism and for a brief time with the Revolutionary Workers Groups in the 30s. So it’s not as if their was any continuity in solidarity that was smashed by the arrival of the Provisionals. Besides anyway, everybody on the left – from the SDLP to the anarchists – declared that the root of the problem was partition – not message that has or never will ever go down well in the Skankill Road.
Of course, politically you are absolutely right – there does need to be a political working class movement in the Six Counties regardless of the religious make up or national allegiance (internationalism) or of its participants. But there is also reality – and a rather ugly one at that. The Sinn Fein Workers Party were an avowdley class-based Marxist party that never achieved a support of note in Northern Irish Republican communities, let alone in Loyalist ones.
In many ways of course, your point is just political fantasising – what if? Even if this hyperthetical ‘what if’ doesn’t have much evidence to suggest that this route was ever plausible.
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
wrong as usual care to comment on the black and tans and when the ira ever introduced something as violent as that... ever... then when you have totally failed please also apologise for that disgusting and frankly nasty slur... no ones sayign the ira done good but what the did do was a fraction of what was purpatraited upon them...tobyjug said:
Divisive Cotton
Now I just have my toy soldiers
absinthe said:
Is that your birthday?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
STFC Loyal said:
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
are you suggesting that a few bombs and the organised gangs are worse than the systematic attacks by the black and tans which activly destoryed entire communities by wiping them from the face of the earth....STFC Loyal said:
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
STFC Loyal said:
GarfieldLeChat said:
A few bombs? Dear me.
http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/sutton/tables/Organisation_Responsible.html
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
of course, 1,006 of the provie total were security forces and mps and the like...STFC Loyal said:
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
sorry can you explain how they are comparible to organised genocide by the british goverment i'm still at a loss...STFC Loyal said:
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Garf - you're confusing the IRA with 'the Irish people' (horrible term i know)here.
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
btw in two years the BnT killed around 1,300 ... which if we compare over the near 100 years of the ira and their total
GarfieldLeChat
fucking awesome but wrong
erm i don't think so the black and tans as i understand it attacked indiscriminately and killed indiscriminatly the RIC mainly attacked the IRA and the IRA mainly the RIC, the ransacking of cork amongst other things is a prime example of the BnT going out for all out attacks i think that regardless of the IRA's killings which were also deplorable the BnT's had a far more destructive impact on ireland... and caused from what little i know a far more wide reaching act of terrorism and ultimatly death than the ira ...butchersapron said:
Similar threads
