Irish republican socialists call on Real IRA to end 'armed struggle'
Internal paper from political wing of Irish group that assassinated Airey Neave is made public, calling armed republican actions ‘self-defeating’
An internal document from the political wing of the Irish terror group that assassinated one of Margaret Thatcher’s closest allies calling on the Real IRA, also known as New IRA, and other dissident republicans to end their “armed struggle” has been made public.
The Irish Republican Socialist party discussion paper describes the hardline republicans’ ongoing armed campaigns as a “self-defeating dynamic”.
The IRSP are the political allies of the Irish National Liberation Army, which in 1979 exploded a booby trap bomb under the car belonging to the Conservative party’s Northern Ireland spokesman and second world war hero Airey Neave in Westminster. The Colditz escapee’s murder in the House of Commons car park catapulted the INLA, then a small splinter organisation, into international infamy. Neave, a strong supporter of unionism, was a close adviser and personal friend to Thatcher, who was elected prime minister a few months after his death.
The intervention in the debate over the future of republican armed struggle is significant because dissidents opposed to the peace process remain on friendly terms with and respect many IRSP and INLA veterans.
In its discussion paper, the IRSP refers to the continued New IRA, Continuity IRA and Óghlaigh na hÉireann: “Sporadic armed actions are not working; they are placing zero pressure upon either the British/Stormont or Free State regimes nor upon the capitalist economic systems which underwrite all of those states.”
Former INLA hunger striker Willie Gallagher said he hoped that the publication of the document on the republican website The Pensive Quill would add to the debate about the efficacy of ”armed struggle”.
Gallagher said: “We are hoping that at the very least the paper will produce some discussion among all the anti-Good Friday Agreement republican family. It’s the first time it’s been made public and no longer behind closed doors ... the debate can be conducted in a comradely fashion.”
In their document, the IRSP claim the continued campaigns of violence are now counterproductive.
The republican socialist movement said the infrequent attacks on police, army and some symbolic targets are simply “...bolstering the budgets of British military intelligence and handing a monthly propaganda victory to those who wish to make partition, capitalism, austerity and overt security measures appear to the general public as the rational state of affairs in Ireland; rational in comparison to actions which only achieve a temporary sense of personal achievement for the individuals involved and their supporters on the ground.”
The wreckage of a car hit by an INLA bomb killing the Tory spokesman on Northern Ireland, Airey Neave, in 1979. Facebook Twitter Pinterest The wreckage of a car hit by an INLA bomb killing the Tory spokesman on Northern Ireland, Airey Neave, in 1979. Photograph: Central Press/Getty Images The continuation of the armed campaigns were also hampering the growth of a broad-based leftwing republican alternative to Sinn Féin, the IRSP said.
“Just as advocates of current armed actions assert that they have a right to bear arms in the name of Irish freedom; in the spirit of comradeship we must urge them to consider what duties come with that right. Not least the duty to consider the logistical limitations which come with practicing armed struggle perpetually in a woefully unsuitable environment. And the very real costs of that decision, both to you personally and to the cause of building a capable revolutionary momentum, which the Irish people so dearly need and deserve,” the IRSP document continues.
It noted the increasing number of New IRA, CIRA and ONH members that were arrested and imprisoned in thwarted terror attacks.
“The imprisonment of so many political activists has been a godsend to the state and to opponents of popular political struggle in Ireland and not only in terms of bodies lost on the ground. “In addition to locking up scores of republicans; Britain has seized the opportunity to tie down remaining activists in an endless cycle of prison-based campaigns; ensuring that the time, resources and energies of militantly minded republicans are eternally deflected from the vital task of building a viable street-based alternative to the corrupt political and economic setup which now exists in Ireland.”
This is the latest critique of armed struggle within the broad-based and often factional wing of republicanism that opposes the Good Friday Agreement and Sinn Féin’s participation in the devolved power-sharing executive in Belfast funded by the UK treasury.
In 2014 Gerard Hodgins, a former Provisional IRA hunger striker and now one of Sinn Féin’s harshest critics in West Belfast, called on the dissident groups to declare ceasefires. Hodgins said that the British state had the surveillance technology to watch the armed organisations “24/7” and that the conditions were not right for continuing armed campaigns.
Earlier this year Hodgins’ warning was echoed by the hardline Irish-American critic of the peace process Martin Galvin, whom the Thatcher government once banned from Northern Ireland in the 1980s.
The Pensive Quill is run by former IRA prisoner Anthony McIntyre. It gives a voice to republicans and republican socialists opposed to Sinn Féin’s peace strategy and opposes any return to violence.
