Friday, February 29, 2008
The Secret War that Brought the Secret to Peace
George Brock reviews Ed Moloney’s new book Paisley, Steve Bruce’s new book Paisley along with the second edition of Ed Moloney’s Secret History of the IRA while also looking at Kenneth Bloomfield’s A Tragedy of Errors, and concludes the real thanks for peace go to the spooks and spies that made it possible. It’s a fascinating read.
By 1987, when Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness were already in secret, deniable communication with London, the securocrats were well enough informed to nudge matters along. Adams’s interest in turning the Provos into a political force was longstanding: he first mentioned it in 1979. But his withdrawal from the pretence that killing could push Britain out of Northern Ireland had to be very gradual. A grim kind of balance between armed force and elections had been achieved with the “ballot box and Armalite” strategy. As Provisional Sinn Féin started to experiment politically in the late 1980s, the IRA also started to rearm. But Adams knew that the Armalite half of the equation was not working: the hit rate might occasionally rise but the failure rate was rising faster. The British knew that Adams knew. For besides Scappaticci, for twenty years they were running one of Adams’s inner circle, Denis Donaldson. Those two were only the stars among a network of spies that must have gone wider.
Adams was meeting internal opposition on both political and paramilitary fronts. One of the most intriguing puzzles to be solved by his biographers is this: when and to what extent was Adams aware that the havoc being wreaked by spies in the IRA was helping his cause? At any rate the British government was in a position to post a devastating warning to his opponents. Nowhere was the opposition inside the IRA likely to be tougher than in Tyrone. In 1987, at Loughgall in East Tyrone, the SAS ambushed and killed an eight-man IRA unit attempting to demolish a police station, killing more “volunteers” in a single incident than at any time since 1921. Up to the year 2000, the IRA in Tyrone had lost fifty-three people; but twenty-eight of those died between 1987 and 1992.
In other words, after Loughgall, they were being killed five times faster. This acceleration could be a coincidence, but that hardly seems possible. Despite appalling headline atrocities, the numbers revealed that the Provisionals were nearly finished everywhere they operated. In the summer of 1988, they killed soldiers at twice their average rate. In 1989, they killed twenty-four; the total halved in each of the next two years.
This sequence of events is important for an understanding of the long last act of the drama. Many accounts of the “peace process” suggest that Adams turned the IRA towards elections; many leave his exact motives for this switch mysterious. Somehow the hard man softened.
Read more: Who really brought peace to Belfast?
Correction, the Paisley book being reviewed is Steve Bruce’s, not Ed Moloney’s - thanks, John (below, #6).
Rusty Nail @ 02:33 PM
Richard English wrote very much the best subjective history of the IRA.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 02:53 PMThe theory put forward here - it was the spies what won it by forcing the Provos along the political path - seems to me mistaken. For the simple reason it denies agency to those within the Provos who wanted the shift to greater power that came with electoral success. It was neither the spies, nor the loyalists, but the Provos themselves who were responsible for the decision to change tack.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:17 PMRusty Nail.
Erm...? “
“Many accounts of the “peace process” suggest that Adams turned the IRA towards elections; many leave his exact motives for this switch mysterious. Somehow the hard man softened”.
If this is some sort of thinly veiled way of implying that Adams himself may have been an informer, then it is surely Sunday World style juvenile journalism at it’s worst. Surely a lead contributor on this site should be above such such drivel…
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:18 PM“Nowhere was the opposition inside the IRA likely to be tougher than in Tyrone.”
..not south Armagh, then?
Or was that where the forcefulness was all bluff?
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:19 PMJo
“Nowhere was the opposition inside the IRA likely to be tougher than in Tyrone.”
It’s easy to say that as it fits nicely with what happened in Loughgall.
The IRA and Sinn Fein were coralled ?
Hmmmm makes you wonder why the Brits let Canary Wharf happen using that logic.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:25 PMRusty,
You’re a bit off there. It’s Steve Bruce’s biography of Paisley that Brock reviews, not Moloney’s. He does, as you mention, include Moloney’s Secret History of the IRA (2nd Edition) in the review.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:42 PMmacswiney:
“If this is some sort of thinly veiled way of implying that Adams himself may have been an informer,”I actually read “Adams turned the IRA towards elections; many leave his exact motives for this switch mysterious.”, in the context of the above post, as questioning whether Adams felt that the IRA were running out of options and/or puff rather than questioning his allegiance. Perhaps that was naivety on my part.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:45 PMMotive is notoriously an extremely difficult thing to prove in court…
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:51 PMDespite appalling headline atrocities, the numbers revealed that the Provisionals were nearly finished everywhere they operated. In the summer of 1988, they killed soldiers at twice their average rate. In 1989, they killed twenty-four; the total halved in each of the next two years.
Nothing to do with the British army deploying better body armour and the IRA’s aging arsenal of automatic weapons becoming increasingly outdated or indeed a change of tactics (see below).
At any rate the British government was in a position to post a devastating warning to his opponents.
Similarly, the IRA was able to post it’s own devastating warnings (Bishopsgate, Baltic exchange, Canary Wharf and Manchester bombings which caused over £2.3 Billion worth of damage) to its opponents.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:54 PM..there was also the series of one-shot Barrett attacks carried out by Mr Caraher.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:56 PMwho is going to bring peace to SA? because according to the locals it aint happening (Quinns)
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 03:59 PMBeano,
I think it was naivety to be honest. Adams has been quoted in several interviews since the original ceasefire as saying that the IRA (i.e. in 1996) felt that they could have perpetuated their campaign indefinitely. Rusty Nail’s comments were actually a (nauseous) attempt to imply that Adams himself had draqmatically changed his political path for somewaht ‘mysterious’ reasons.
It’s exactly the same sort of bull that the Sunday World put out 2 years ago when they ran a lead article implying that Martin McGuiness was MI5’S number one spy in the North. Typical politically-motivated fantasy from Messrs McDowell and Campbell whose main circulation seems to derive from the more socially-deprived aress of loyalist Greater Belfast.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:01 PMMacswiney:
You will have to take the phrasing up with George Brock of the Times Literary Supplement, as he wrote the phrase you differ with, not I.
In addition, I read it as suggesting not that Adams was or is an informer but that the level of informers and agents in the IRA so compromised its military capabilities that it forced Adams’ hand as it were, and was perhaps an over-riding aspect of what prodded him into the direction of politics and therefore is what accounts for the change in direction or as he puts it, what softened the hard men.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:10 PMRusty Nail,
It was actually you who decided that George Brock’s quote was worth inclusion in your thread, therefore for you to now distance yourself from his comments, seems to me to be somewhat disengenuous.
Furthermore, you admit that the general ‘steer’ of your lead thread was related to the alleged fear of informers which you say that both governed and informed Adams subsequent decision-making.
Your overall analysis also seems particularly naive, bearing in mind that Adams had been often quoted (in the decade before) about his aim to ultimately pursue a political path towards Irish Unity. Your definition of Adams (at that time) as being one of the ‘hard men’ of Republicanism also seems particularly out-of-touch as he is widely credited with being the main influence in turning the actual ‘hard-men’ towards the political path which ultimately changed the entire situation on the island.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:25 PMThe IRA has proved time and again a devastating ability to change weapons and tactics when the ones they have no longer work. To say that they were corralled is silly, they just hadnt found a new tactic and perhaps hadnt even looked for one before accepting the surrender of unionists via the british government
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:32 PMmac,
It’s the TLS for goodness sake! If I’d seen it, I would probably have blogged it too.
In truth no one knows any of this stuff for sure. The IRA can’t go for full disclosure to put speculation out of play. In lieu of that, people can only speculate logically about what might or might not have been the case.
In which case, I’d be looking for inconsistency or illogic if I were running a critical rule over the piece. So please, get stuck in (to the article, rather than the blogger);-))!!
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:32 PMMac,
You don’t think Adams was one of the hard men? How do you think he got where he was then? His charm and wit?
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:38 PMI have to admit that when I read Maloney’s book and the particular emphasis he puts on the capture of the Eksund and the wiping out of East Tyrone PIRA I thought his implication was that Adams was the whistle blower, maybe I read it wrong but it certainly came across very strongly indeed.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:45 PMI am not distancing myself from his comments; I was clarifying that I did not write them as it appeared from your posts you were under the impression that I did.
Adams has also claimed that he was never in the IRA, so that begs the question, in relation to your citing Adams’ claim [in “interviews since the original ceasefire"] “that the IRA (i.e. in 1996) felt that they could have perpetuated their campaign indefinitely”, how would he know? (which is of course disingenuous on my part as of course he was in the IRA, but goes to show that what Adams says is not exactly what Adams does).
My “steer” (if any) was not about an alledged “fear” of informers. I am suggesting that if Adams’ key people (such as the IRA’s security department and members of his “think tank") were British agents and informers, as it turns out they were, that accounts for his change in direction on two fronts: both the running down of the IRA’s military campaign, which would have been evident as its capabilities were reduced no matter what brave face Adams put on for the party faithful (the facts belie the spin); and the kitchen cabinet strategising being conducted amongst people who were working to a British agenda. If Adams was outnumbered in those strategy and policy meetings by British agents 4 to 2 that could not but have an effect on the direction the movement moved in and the influence on Adams’ political thinking, as would the IRA’s increasing inability to persecute an effective and sustained campaign.
This ‘unseen hand’ as it were must be examined as a contributing factor towards the turning of a Titantic in the bathtub that Adams achieved in his leadership of the Provisional Republican Movement.
Perhaps that may be a naive analysis, I am inclined to view it as cynical, and see a neat dovetail of interests between Adams’ desire for politics and the British government’s need to neutralise the IRA.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:48 PMOk then,
If you want me to get stuck into the article, rather than the blogger, I will start (and finish) with:
“the numbers revealed that the Provisonals were finished nearly everywhere they operated”.
If this is deemed to be an informed crtical analysis, then revisionism is truly in full flow…
As for the general insinuation that ‘spying’ was a one-way process, then surely such an assumption is spectacularly naive. It is generally acknowledged that the Republican movement also recruited many informers who passed information to them (both within the police and local government circles).
This (I am quite sure) had no influence whatsoever on British Government Policy towards the North. So, why then should the reverse be deemed to be true??
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 04:52 PMHere is the problem with the Provos recruiting informers. The people those informers were reporting to ended up being informers themselves, and if not them, a number of the people who the information was brought to and implemented into policy and strategy were working for the British. So in effect that rendered those informers useless and likely accounts for why, as you say, that had no influence on the British government’s policy towards the north. In fact, it could be argued that the British used that as a backdoor way to influence Provo policy and politics.
As to why the reverse should be true, one need only look at the [alleged] informers surrounding Adams to understand.
Adams’ bodyguards;
Adams’ driver;
Members of his think tank;
Relatives of Adams;
Key IRA personnel (for example the security department);You could imagine his day and realise a strong percentage of the people he had political and policy interaction with were [secretly] working to a British agenda.
Given that we have been told that the numbers of informers and agents in the Provisional movement is enough to fill 10 filing cabinets with, and that is just what Eames & Bradley have been made privvy to (c.f. Brian Rowan), certainly not the full extent of the penetration, it should be easy to see how the British government could have a huge influence on Adams’ steerage of the Provisionals.
A bit of a tangent:
One can also certainly understand why the IRA baulked at meeting with Eames & Bradley. A more uncomfortable meeting could not be imagined: Agents and informers named in security force paperwork E & B and their team have examined which detailed some of what they got up to sitting across the E & B team in their role as an IRA representative - how on earth would they conduct themselves? And how would they proceed to ask E & B about what they know?
“So....tell me about British collusion and what you have found out....am I in there anywhere?...”
yikes! No wonder they said no! (Or perhaps, were ordered to; imagine the poor chump sent to the meeting who then unwittingly finds out how many of his comrades and leaders are informers - that’s far too big a risk of exposure to take! Talk about CYA! Pull out the oul Republican rhetoric instead and hope no one notices...)
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 05:16 PMOne thing on this . Loughall is not in East Tyrone but in Armagh. Find it hard to take things seriously when basic facts of geography are incorrect
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 05:19 PMRusty Nail
As for your tangent, why should the IRA be forthcoming with these 2 lackeys of the english government when the english government itself is not being honest or forthcoming with them
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 05:26 PMboth the running down of the IRA’s military campaign, which would have been evident as its capabilities were reduced no matter what brave face Adams put on for the party faithful (the facts belie the spin);
If you check the cross tabulation on deaths at CAIN, there is a drop in the number of people killed by republicans after 1991, and the numbers of British security killed drops after 1989. It isn’t dramatic though and I think to suggest that the Provisonals were finished nearly everywhere they operated is either naivete or wishful thinking. It also doesn’t take into account potential advantages of technology or tactics either, and personally I’m glad we didn’t get to see what the IRA would come up with in an era of mobile phones and cheap technology.
No doubt Adams used the difficulties and problems with informers to his advantage in getting the organisation to go where he wanted; but all leaderships try to take advantage of situations.
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 05:39 PMPeter Taylor’s “The Provos” was an early part of my politicicisation, particularly as one of the main protagonists was a college mate of mine at the time.. although I never forgave him for publicly humiliating me at a book signing in Hodges Figgis afterwards when as a poor student, I could just about afford the fiver door charge, and he refused to sign my scrappy folscap insisting I buy his new book “The Loyalists” instead..
Tim Pat was much more avuncular buying me pints in Doyles as he signed my first and second edition “IRA” books..
Anyway congrats to my fellow polblog nominee, best of luck and make sure to say hello on the night -
What say we polbloggers get together beforehand, lobby drinks around 7??Drop me a line or comment back to confirm..?
Posted by on Feb 29, 2008 @ 05:40 PM
