Left: Father Edward Daly waving a blood-stained white handkerchief while trying to escort the mortally wounded Jackie Duddy to safety. Right: Potato Famine Memorial. Lower: Carnage in Hyde Park.
Nearly 50 years ago I was having a drink with an Irishman – as you do when you are in Cork – and the conversation moved on to ‘the troubles’. This was the time when the Provisional IRA had begun the campaign in Ulster that was to lead to more than two thousand deaths of ordinary civilians , terrorists, British soldiers and Northern Irish Police officers. The man from Cork said something I have never forgotten when one looks at the sad history of Ireland: “The problem is that we Irish should learn to forget a bit and you English should learn to remember.”
If we had both taken this advice a hundred years or more back then many of the confrontational problems – and they never were all Protestant vs Catholic – would have been solved, or at least nullified and we would still be one nation, together with Scotland and Wales. If I can be pardoned for riding my old hobby horse, perhaps in the future a Confederation of sovereign European nations could include a United Ireland alongside the United Kingdom.
Having said that (and I am not a Catholic or of Irish origin) I join in with those who have expressed their disgust over the main suspect, John Downey, of the Hyde Park murder of four British Soldiers being allowed to escape prosecution. At least six horses were slaughtered and 23 other people badly injured in this IRA strike in July 1982. As has been well reported in the media, as recently as 2007 Downey has received at his home in Donegal a “letter of assurance” through the Police Service of Northern Ireland and on behalf of the Attorney General saying he was no longer wanted by the police. Nearly 200 other Republican former terrorists, including those “on the run” were handed the “comfort letters” of effective immunity.
Downey had visited the UK at least seven occasions between 2010 and 2012 without being stopped. But in May last year he was arrested at Gatwick airport and charged over the bombing. That almost wrecked the game being played by the British establishment. A legal battle then ensured in private at the Old Bailey where the QC for Downey said his client’s letter was an “unequivocal assurance” that he was no longer wanted by police. “Now to prosecute him in violation of that promise is a grave breach of trust with incalculable consequences for the peace process”.
Roy Greenslade, the leading Guardian writer, was one of Downey’s bail guarantors.
This betrayal of the dead of Northern Ireland is down to Tony Blair, aided by Peter Hain – who was ‘outraged that Downey had even been arrested – in forcing through the Good Friday Peace Agreement. Let us not forget the words of that self-seeking deceiver of the Labour Party’s worthy voters when Blair stood smirking at Stormont and said: “Now is not the time for soundbites, but I can feel the hand of history on my shoulder”. Meanwhile there was concern among the Ulster Unionists about the team he had chosen to front the negotiations. Mo Mowlam, for instance, enjoyed a relationship; with Martin McGuiness that was fawning and over-familiar.
In a recent article for the Daily Telegraph Colonel Tim Collins, who was the Commanding Officer of the Royal Irish Regiment in East Tyrone, said the Agreement was in fact a peace at any price deal. “A militarily defeated IRA and the chaotic so-called loyalist paramilitaries were given the working class populations of their respective communities as a blood dowry, to do with as they pleased in exchange for keeping the violence off the TV screens. The knee-cappings and beatings carried on out of sight.”
Neither John Downey nor any other key IRA terrorists will ever be brought to trial whatever version of the Lib-Lab-Con is in power. In consequence we must give support to all those now campaigning to ensure that the proposed trial of those British soldiers even vaguely present at the events of “Bloody Sunday” in Belfast in 1972 never comes to court. For if it did, no credence would be given to the fact that it was armed Provisional IRA supporters who first used firearms on that dreadful day for Ireland.
No British Loyalist has any interest in a “United Ireland alongside the United Kingdom”. Definitely not a vote winner. That includes me, Belfast 1969. This would be the ultimate betrayal of Our Dead.
I am sure that is correct. The BDP wouldn’t support the idea of forcing NI to join the Republic against the will of the majority of NI’s people. That can only happen by majority consent to it.
Ireland can only be reunited if the majority of those in NI and in the Republic give their consent to it. That is what the Good Friday Agreement says and both governments stand by it. Any other form of reunification would probably lead to a great deal of blood being split and anyway the Republic can’t afford to take-on NI.
It is a real tragedy that Ireland wasn’t given Home Rule in 1914. The Bill to give it self-government (ie devolution) within the United Kingdom was passed eventually in that year but was suspended for the duration of what was expected to be a very short European war.
Perhaps, if the then Liberal government of the United Kingdom had decided not to involve us in what became WW1 Home Rule of Ireland would have come into effect and we might have avoided partition and many of the subsequent difficulties, tension and violence. As we remember the 100th Anniversary of WW1 this year perhaps we should reflect that Ireland’s history since that time might not have been so tragic but for that conflict and the United Kingdom’s involvement in it intervening.
(Party Member) We support the Loyalists of Northern Ireland and this is not for religious reasons.
From our Policy Statement: “We would oppose absolutely any move to break up the United Kingdom by independence for Scotland or the ceding of Northern Ireland to the Republic of Ireland.”
Of course it is exceedingly unlikely to ever happen but if the Republic ever does become tired of being ruled by Brussels and we in the United Kingdom remove ourselves from the EU’s control perhaps we could offer them the chance to reunify with the rest of the British Isles and they could have a powerful Home Rule parliament just like the Scots do?
This thorny issue has been fudged for years by the Establishment, The blood that was spilled in a fruitless effort to find an agreement was all but wasted when Bliar and his cronies gave Adams & his henchmen the Province on a plate. Sadly the Loyalist population betrayed by their Leaders acted in typical British fashion, they surrendered. Everyone was aware that the IRA was so compromised by the security forces its days were numbered the British governments Provo supporters offered them a face saving deal that was too good for them to reject.
That is how the rest of Ireland became independent in the first place. The British government had very nearly crushed the IRA in 1921 and then suddenly offered a truce. Indeed, it is said the IRA were just a few weeks from running out of bullets ect.
The tragic history of atrocities committed by both our countries against each other has meant that there is going to be bitterness on both sides for many years to come. However, the cycle of violence had to stop and this meant that there should be forgiveness and amnesty. I remember vividly the carnage of the Hyde Park bombing, and my own disgust at the IRA for doing such a terrible thing to bandsmen, horses and innocent members of the public that included women, children and babies. I’m sure the IRA believed that this was justified in some way, but hatred and violence can only breed more hatred and violence.
If we are to forgive the wrongs committed by one side then the other side must be forgiven equally. The British soldiers who were there on ‘Bloody Sunday’ must be given the same amnesty that has been given to IRA members. Enough is enough. There must be a willingness to forgive on both sides or there will never be a lasting peace.
Geoff judges the historical influence of Anglo-Irish relations exactly in my view. He no more makes a plea for the IRA than I do, who I have been accused of supporting by a few still carrying an understandable hatred of the murderous campaign they conducted.
Sadly, anyone who wants to find a lasting peace with the IRA is often seen as an apologist or closet supporter of Irish republicanism. There must be forgiveness between Britain and Ireland in the same way that we and the Germans have forgiven each other for the carnage inflicted by all the bombings during the second world war. We have very good relations now with Germany, as we now have good relations with the Irish Republic. Northern Ireland continues to have difficulties though, and the Loyalists quite rightly feel somewhat betrayed by the British government.
I’m sure that a British Democratic Party government would not wish to see the breakup of Britain and Ireland. I believe that John Bean feels the same way as myself, that we could have a much closer union based on mutual respect. We are fundamentally the same people, with a sad history of fighting each other, but are in a modern world where we must unite or see our nations changed beyond all recognition forever by mass immigration. We English, Welsh, Scottish and Irish people have far more in common than we have differences.
Agreed. It is a shame the Irish Free State as it then was decided to become a Republic as that further distanced it from the United Kingdom. The Queen’s visit in 2011 to the Republic seemed to have gone down well amongst the majority there. Perhaps, it may not be long before the Republic seeks to build-upon closer relations between us by choosing to rejoin the Commonwealth? I would have no objection to that.
(Party Member) Decent people in the Republic detest the I R A and fear them in equal measure. The thought of having to absorb the north with its teeming population and awful problems is too much for them to even imagine. Tour the south and you will also see how friendly they are. Especially to the English!
Forgiveness must be for all, otherwise there will never be peace.