Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
organisation and gain credibility, but also militarism of the left-wing Otticials in the
to work out where (and for what) it stands. groups, fighting the British and Northern
early '70s left Saor Eire high and drv. In Ireland state, and organising robberies,
The problems INLA/IRSP laced when November 1971 one of its memberr, p.t.i
it split from the Officials in 1975 had with sizeable proportions of the proceeds
Graham, was found dead in a Dublin flai. 'going private'.
already been encountered, ruinously, by He had been bound and gagged and
the lirst attempt since the p.".r.ni The INLA's aspiration to be to the lelt
shot through the neck. e..or?li"g to tt. of traditional Republicanism became,
Troubles began to form a new left-wing police he had been tortured.
Republican group. It was a movement paradoxically, a lactor in its degeneration.
Aged 26, Peter Graham was a Trot_ Traditional Republicanism is a movement
calling itself 'Saor Eire (Free Ireland) Ac_ skyisL In theory he was highly critical of
tion Croup'. with a strong and honourable tradition.
the 'Guevarist' current tt,.n piorninent in For example, the idea that Protestant and
.
It was formed, or rather given shape international Trorskyi:m, and rejecred rhe
piecemeal, in the late '60s by dissident Catholic are equally Irish still has a real
idea thal socialism in Ireland could .ome grip, despite often
Republicans (premature provos, really) through 'permanent revolution, _ nul Catholic-nationalist
who resisted the drift of the Ofiiciai practice. Like anarchism, of which it is in
tionalist struggle ,growing over, into some respects an aberrant strain, Irish
Republican movement away lrom the socialism, He began his ,guerilla' careei
traditional militarism and towards Republicanism has been a highly moral
by believing was a goodthing ro L.i* movement.
Stalinism a drift that made the official aDout guns rn "ir
the Ireland ol 1969. But
movement- incapable of defendins the then he got drawn into the ,action,.
The left Republicans (and this is partly
Belfast Catholics during the prot6stant true of the new leadership of the provos
The alleged leaders of Saor Eire issued a around Gerry Adams, too) relate to this
pogroms of August i969 and led to the slalemenl lrom jail denouncing rhe re\r ot
Provo,/Official split a few months later. tradition in a contradictory way. The old
lhe organi5ation as a-political-gangsters. morality is dissolved by the supposedly
Guevarism IRSP/INLA started bigger, with a real higher principles of socialism and an
standing in the Republican milieus and a eclectic Marxism but, since the way to
.These dissident Republicans joined up place in the Republican spectrum as the socialism is seen -as proceeding through
with one or two people who called 'good' left-wingers resisting the apostasy nationalism first, the effect
themselves Trotskyists, but who, like is not io
of the Offlicials. It had a base in Belfast replace nationalist principles with socialist
many Trotskyists, had come under the in_ and Derry. It seemed to have prospects principles, but to replace nationalism with
fluence of Guevarism in the late '60s. Saor Eire couid never dream of. morality by nationalism without moralitv.
They believed in 'immediate armed strus_
_ That is why you can get ,left'
Yet within a year independent socialists
gle', and they believed that what ,the lriih former MP Bernadette Devlin and Repu.blicans acting like nihilist-s, people
Revolution'needed not having yet -
Eamonn McCann, lor example who believe in norhing. and recklessly kill
achieved national unity- - who
- was
tionalist slogans. The clashes
90go na-
in the Nor-
rallied to the IRSP after its break with
Officials, abandoned the organisation,
the Prol.estanls. Darkley was the most spec_
tacular case.
th, and the taking of direct control of rhe declaring it to be a mere glove-puppet of The 'left' Repubticans tend to have /ess
streets by the British Army in August the new militarists. concern for the protestant workers than
1969, convinced them that their hourivas old-fashioned right-wing Republicans.
coming. Neave The mechanism heie ii partly
They started robbing banks mainly INLA killed Northern lreland 'securirv' p.ychological an urge ro be rough and
or exclusively in the South! so- that thev force personnel, including 'soft' targeti. realistic. and lo- take accounl ol rheiealirv
- What guns
would be able to buy guns. It attacked Ian Paisley, reckless of the of Protestant opposition to the national
they bought, or what they did with tliem, consequences of what Protestant workers struggle.
is not publicly known. But such an rvould be bound to see as a straightfor- The Protestant workers are seen not in
organisation, someof whose members wardly sectarian act. It pulled off surpris- social, class terms, but almost exclusivelv
were pernr-anently on the run, also needed ing coups like killing Mrs Thatcher's as a calspaw of Brirain and a: the embodi_
money to keep its members going; and if 'campaign manager' and personal friend ment of sectarianism. By a process ol
you can get money by robbing banks, you Airey Neave in the car park of the House redefining terms, non-sectarian socialism
don't need to stint yourself. of Commons in 1979. is.equated (in terms of immediate activity)
Saor Eire robbed man1, banks, caused No less a person than Enoch Powell has with a narrow nationalist militarism,
great alarm to the Southern government, in_
suggested that this was done by the CIA as capable ol laying any basis for class unitv.
and was eventually said ro have shol an part of a plot to get a united Ireland that Recklessness in relation to the protestant
unarmed policeman in Dublin during a would be useful to NATO. Take powell's workers is justified in terms of political in_
bank robbery in early 1970. Some of its claim seriously or not, some of the IN- transigence against Loyalism.
leaders were eventually put on trial for LA's activities were very odd indeed. Thus the 'socialist' element becomes a
murder. They r.vere acquitted but jailed on For example, in 1982 INLA killed the matter of sentiment, aspirations, and faith
other charges. pathological Loyalist minor politician in the nationalist struggle somehow ,grow_
It had become essentially a gangster John McKeogh just as he was being ex- ing over' into socialism. The immediate
organisation. It started with ideals. but posed for involvement in the scandal practice is nationalist or even Catholic-
the proporrion of idealism to gangsterism about sexual abuse of boys in the Kincora communalist, for the -Catholics are defin_
began to change. So did the proportion of boys' home. This was and is a major scan- ed as 'the nationalist communit1,,.
gangsters to politicians. The values and dal involving leading politicians in Nor- The objective conditions in Northern
skills needed to prosper or just to survive thern lreland. The evidence suggests that Ireland
became those of the soldier or it has been suppressed so that it can be us- - fundamentally
sion in the Irish people
those of a divi_
mean that the
cho.ic_c ol 'armed struggle- now against im-
gangster. Propaganda, open political ac- ed by the state to blackmail and control
tivity, trade union work, class struggle difficult politicians in Northern Ireland. It perialism' is inevitably a choice for com_
all that had to be left to vague -
sym- may yet blow up in the Establishment's munalism against class politics. That
pathisers, people who by definition were face. McKeogh's timely death helped holds both for the provo iocialists, with
in an inferior Caregory ro rhe praclitioners them keep it under control. their strong apparatus ancl high personal
of 'armed struggle'. The gun, and the ln the 'supergrass' trials, INLA was morality, and also lor the smalier ,left_
'hard man' wielding it, became decisive. shown to have been riddled with spies and rving' groups. But the Wolfe-Tone
Probably there were gangsters or semi- provocateurs. Lacking a coherent leader- Republican outlook of the latter dissolves
gangsters in Saor Eire from the beginning, ship, it became the receptacle for dissident more easily in the acid of an eclectic bre.,v
but in such cases the distinction betwee Republicans ol all sorts. As with Saor
political militant and gangster becomes Eire, its socialism came to mean nothing
blurred anyway. The development of the in practice.
Provos in the North and the competitive It became a loose conslomeration of
Continued on p.36
North of Ireland
- to seeinthe
conflict religious terms. No,
mutual slaughter'? Well, without
going into the blood bath discus-
testants has not stopped Socialist
Organiser from siding with Irish
Republicanism does not want to sion yet again, it is now fairly ob- Republicanism against the British
smash Protestantism or drive vious, given the current disarray state, or dampened its enthusiasm
Protestantism into the sea. What within Unionism, that the Protes- for demanding British withdrawal
it does want to do is smash tant community has neither the from lreland. This was not evi-
Unionism and Loyalism. It also confidence, enthusiasm nor dent at the recent AGM of the
autonomy wouldn't amount to wants to smash Brilish im- singleness of purpose to indulge Labour Committee on lreland
very much. lf they would, then perialism and the Free Statism of in the mass slaughter which has when S0 supporters distinguished
how are we to be sure that what the rich and powerful in the 26 been so often predicted, themselves by two interventions.
happened before in terms of anli- One was to argue against a
counties. Since 1968 Unionism has been
Catholic discrimination wouldn't conference motion calling for the
happen again? All lhese are very uorthy divided. It can say'no'with one
voice but it cannot agree on its disbandment of the murderously
This is a very practical ques- endearours, bul lhe reason in seclarian LJlster Defence Regi-
tion. and a rather obvious one. It particular socialists seek the 'solution' to the'troubles', It
is a pity the pamPhlet refuses to destruction of Unionism and always has been a gross insult to ment
proposed- ainstead.
'discussion' on this was
go into this and prefers instead to Loyalism is because its str€ngth the Protestant community to say
that hundreds of thousands of The other was to disagree with
give over half of its pages to erec- has come from its conscious the view that members of the
iing slraw argumenls in a fic- policy of seeking to divide the them are just waiting'for the
chance to wipe out all the Fenians Orange Order should be banned
tionalised discussion. in which the working class of Ireland, and of from membership of the Labour
O'Mahony supporters come over the North of Ireland. As a conse- the] can; but it is even crazier
still to say they would do so for Party. The Orange Order, said
as clever, serious and good quence it has reduced the Protes-
purely sectarian reasons. Like all one SO supporter, was nothing
socialists and the others come tant working class 1o what James but 'a social club'.
over as simpletons and Connolly called'slaves in sPirit communities, the Protestant one
It is not worlh a single sentence
sloganizers. The caricaturing is so because they have been reared uP in the North of Ireland needs
something positive to fighl for, to answer this reactionary rub-
over the top that it is not even among a people whose conditions bish, Far better to ask comrades.
good fiction. of servitude were more slavish and because they are split on this
they are all the more weakened. is this where your 'rights for Pro-
But the fiction is not confined than their own', testants' takes you?
Accordingly, no concession lo As the old Orange slogan puts it defence of
to this section. The substantial the Protestant terror -of the
argument that is advanced is that the politics and practice of 'United We Stand, Divided We
Fall', and a political strategy UDR? The right for the bigotry
the semi-autonomy for Pro- Unionism/Loyalism can be sanc- of th€ Orange Order to be given a
testants is the only alternative to tioned. which seeks to exploit the divi-
sions within Unionism weakens il voice in the Labour Party?
seeking to smash the Protestants, In the event of an uncondi- Well comrades. if that is the
drive them into the sea or subiect tional British withdrawal does to the point of collapse.
One further point must be road Iou wish other socialists or
them to Catholic nationalism' this mean, as the British media Irish Republicans to travel then
Sad to say, the error being and O'Mahony tells us that there made. It is claimed in the pam-
the answer must surely be
made here is that made only too will be 'a civil war, involving big phlet that its advocacy of some
an inch. - not
often by trourgeois commenlators forced population movements and sorl of Home Rule for Pro-
Note by the editor: At the LCI AGM the
heads I win, tails you lose, they issue was the call to disband the UDR
implied more British froops (in order to
add: "The defeat of Argentina, carry it out), and therefore conlradicted
nevertheless. resulted in the ad- 'Troops Out', SO supporters were not
vance of the revolution in the 'against' disbanding the sectarian forces.
Some of the best militant miners in the