I keep forgetting that the Northern Bank robbery and the murder of Robert McCartney never happened.

After a 30 year armed campaign, not every IRA member is going to become law abiding over night whatever their Army Council orders. The fact remains that the IRA's armed campaign was called off in 1997, the bad behaviour of some individual volunteers notwithstanding.
 
After a 30 year armed campaign, not every IRA member is going to become law abiding over night whatever their Army Council orders. The fact remains that the IRA's armed campaign was called off in 1997, the bad behaviour of some individual volunteers notwithstanding.

Exactly. I think the PIRA blundered in Birmingham in 1974, but got back the plot from there on.
 
Exactly. I think the PIRA blundered in Birmingham in 1974, but got back the plot from there on.

I think everybody blundered in Birmingham in 1974, and "blundered" is a diplomatic description. Not quite as mealy mouthed as "appalling vista" but diplomatic all the same.
 
I think everybody blundered in Birmingham in 1974, and "blundered" is a diplomatic description. Not quite as mealy mouthed as "appalling vista" but diplomatic all the same.

I tell ya' something really sad. Birmingham was done with evil intentions: the gratuitous and useless indulgence in cruelty. However, in the big scheme of a war - from inception to 1998, the PIRA fought a very clean fight compared to most states.

And that's war. No matter how clean it is, someone innocent always seems to get hurt.

Nobody comes out of war being a Saint...just don't happen. Thus, the tragedy of War: where passions are created and unleashed that should never be.
 
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I tell ya' something really sad. Birmingham was done with evil intentions: the gratuitous and useless indulgence in cruelty. However, in the big scheme of a war - from inception to 1998, the PIRA fought a very clean fight compared to most states.

They did ?

What's the par score for the number of civilians and members of the emergency services killed by a terrorist group ?

What is the "peer group" of wars you're comparing it to ? To me there's a big difference between a terrorist group trying to get their way in a working democracy (like this example) and somewhere without a working government in the middle of a civil war.
 
I keep forgetting that the Northern Bank robbery and the murder of Robert McCartney never happened.

No you just keep forgetting that those weren't IRA ops. We can't expect every IRA volunteer to turn into a choir boy over night.
 
They did ?

What's the par score for the number of civilians and members of the emergency services killed by a terrorist group ?

What is the "peer group" of wars you're comparing it to ? To me there's a big difference between a terrorist group trying to get their way in a working democracy (like this example) and somewhere without a working government in the middle of a civil war.

Pah. Somewhere without a working government in the middle of a civil war - which your government presided over for decades and no British person ever stood up and protested about the filthy apartheid regime being propped up by Westminster.
 
Pah. Somewhere without a working government in the middle of a civil war - which your government presided over for decades and no British person ever stood up and protested about the filthy apartheid regime being propped up by Westminster.

Can you provide evidence that NO British person stood up and protested?

This statement seems a little racist in group blaming everyone by their 'ethnicity'.
 
Can you provide evidence that NO British person stood up and protested?

This statement seems a little racist in group blaming everyone by their 'ethnicity'.

I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?
 
I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?


Mmmmm....the they made me do it gambit
 
I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?

Jeremy Corbyn?
 
I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?

You said;
"... no British person ever stood up and protested about the filthy apartheid regime being propped up by Westminster."

I do not know where you come from, but in Britain most governments do not even claim a 100% approval of the electorate. Your statement is equivalent to saying that all Irish supported terrorism because the UFF were Irish. Or all jews are responsible for the actions of the Israeli government.

Quoting from the troops out movement;
"There is a long and honourable tradition in Britain of opposition to the occupation of Ireland. It goes as far back as 1647 when one of the first political parties in England and early socialists, the Levellers, published The English Soldiers' Standard in which they set out their belief that Ireland should be free.

Two years later, in 1649, a group of English soldiers, inspired by the Levellers, mutinied rather than go with Oliver Cromwell and his army and take part in the slaughter of Irish people. In their own pamphlet, The Soldiers' Demand, the group asked "What have we to do in Ireland, to fight and murder a people and a nation... which have done us no harm? We have waded too far in that crimson stream already of innocent and Christian blood."

Their defiance was costly. Pursued by Cromwell, the insurgents took shelter in Burford Church in Oxfordshire before being surrounded by his men. Their leaders were hauled out of the church and executed on the spot. Corporal Perkins, Private Church and Cornet Thompson are still commemorated each year at the very place where they were murdered by the Crown.

Opposition within Britain continued to ebb and flow through the succeeding centuries with, for example, strong support for the Fenian Movement in the north of England in the 1860s, through to the Home Rule Confederation of Great Britain in the 1870s and the Irish Volunteer Movement in 1913 (of which Michael Collins was a member during his time in London).

After the 1916 Rising came the Irish Self-Determination League which numbered something like 40,000 members. And when Terence Macswiney died in Brixton Prison on 25 October 1920, tens of thousands lined the streets as his coffin passed by.

When the conflict in the north erupted in the late 1960s, the Irish Civil Rights Solidarity Campaign was formed, quickly followed by the Anti-Internment League.

This organised opposition to Britain's presence in Ireland continues to this day through, for example, the Trade Union Movement, a small but dedicated number of MPs, and groups such as the Wolfe Tone Society and the Connolly Association. The backbone of the various resistance groupings has generally consisted of first and second generation Irish people, but there has always been a small stream of English radicals, and people of other ethnic backgrounds, ready to take up the cause of Ireland.

By September 1973 some British left-wing radicals, trade unionists, Irish people living in Britain and many other ordinary people had managed to see something of the truth of what was happening in the North of Ireland through the fog of British Government propaganda.

They were appalled at what they were seeing and they came together in London to form the Troops Out Movement.

They were tapping into an almost unbroken tradition of resistance within Britain to the state's involvement in Ireland. In 1974 there was sufficient support for the group to be launched nationally, with branches throughout Britain."

I think you need to face the fact that your views about British people may be a little prejudiced. There is huge diversity in Britain, in ethnicity, politics, religion. It is wrong to say that Brits believe this or do that.
 
I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?

Sure, but come on, SOME Brits protested. If nothing else the SWP was always pro-Irish independence.
 
I can certainly provide evidence that for over 30 years the pleas of constitutional nationalists fell on deaf ears.

And of course the only ears they could plea to were British ones, so how is it racist to point out that the British government let us down so badly we took up guns?

You can read here about anti-discrimination legislation in NI. I am not sure when your 30 years starts, but religious discrimination was outlawed in 1976.
https://www.into.ie/NI/Schools/Equality/EqualityOpportunityGuides/pdf-1
This would have been the last Wilson Labour government.
 
Sure, but come on, SOME Brits protested. If nothing else the SWP was always pro-Irish independence.


The SNP, when I was around, was pretty exercised to keep its face well out of a contentious issue that wasn't really its business.
 
You can read here about anti-discrimination legislation in NI. I am not sure when your 30 years starts, but religious discrimination was outlawed in 1976.
https://www.into.ie/NI/Schools/Equality/EqualityOpportunityGuides/pdf-1
This would have been the last Wilson Labour government.

We got anti-discrimination legislation in the USA preceeding that which reference, and yet...black people in the USA are thrown in prison at an extraordinary rate. So all that legislation sounds fine in theory...but how does it work in practice?

The USA calls itself "...the Land of the Free"...and yet has more imprisoned than Russia and China combined. And if you consider that the combined population of China and Russia 4x+ greater than the USA, then it is staggering the rate with which the USA imprisons people. Hey...people say one thing, and do another. That's life.
 
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I think you need to face the fact that your views about British people may be a little prejudiced. There is huge diversity in Britain, in ethnicity, politics, religion. It is wrong to say that Brits believe this or do that.
Please stop confusing a bigot with information. It ruins the groove. It might dilute the hate.
 
For an outsider, the "Irish - North Irish - British" issues/fighting is almost beyond understanding. But that's not unique: Vietnam was such a war.

Most Americans have no idea - NONE - of who Vietnamese were, their grievances, or their objectives. Instead, the issue (i.e., the war) was laid before Americans as a "Communist vs Free World" struggle, and this forever polluted the way Americans viewed the war, and their ability to understand the war and what was going on.

Likewise, the Irish Struggles were laid before the world as a Catholic vs Protestant fight (and this was so dishonest), and most people haven't been able to determine what transpired to this day. And I think this no accident.

In both Ireland and Vietnam, I believe there was a lot of effort to confuse the public as to what was happening because the Governments didn't really want the people to know the truth. Such a shame.
 
For an outsider, the "Irish - North Irish - British" issues/fighting is almost beyond understanding. But that's not unique: Vietnam was such a war.

Most Americans have no idea - NONE - of who Vietnamese were, their grievances, or their objectives. Instead, the issue (i.e., the war) was laid before Americans as a "Communist vs Free World" struggle, and this forever polluted the way Americans viewed the war, and their ability to understand the war and what was going on.

Likewise, the Irish Struggles were laid before the world as a Catholic vs Protestant fight (and this was so dishonest), and most people haven't been able to determine what transpired to this day. And I think this no accident.

In both Ireland and Vietnam, I believe there was a lot of effort to confuse the public as to what was happening because the Governments didn't really want the people to know the truth. Such a shame.

Sadly I suspect that not even many in government knew the truth and I am pretty sure they were mostly confused too.

Drawing a parallel with Danish history.

“The Schleswig-Holstein question is so complicated, only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten all about it.” Palmerston.
 

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