The IRA.....Once a terrorist organization or freedom fighters? You decide.

I have Always wondered this question. The IRA says they were fighting for independence from British rule,but was that really the case? Maybe they just wanted to have all the power and none of the responsibilities of being under the crown of England. Was it really so bad looking back in Hindsight as to Murder civilians and act like a jihadist does today? Over 1,800 total deaths were accrued by them,with 620 or so civilians.

And all they did was send out a apology for all the deaths over the years. Why not trials and convictions? A apology dont bring back the dead Or give the families satisfaction. The entire EX IRA needs to be locked up right along side of the people in guantonimo for their roles. Personally the IRA could have went the peaceful way I think,but it was just too easy to kill people instead i guess. Please do not take offense to this posting or topic. I was stating a opinion and Just want to hear all of your here on ATS.

The laugh is these idiots are now politicians.I just hope in twenty years the jihadists aren't given the same rewards.

They occupied us.

*Bloody Sunday*

The IRA provided British police with evactuation warnings for any bombs set. The police decided to ignore those warnings to twist things in the media.

It were the Brits who stormed everybodys houses and kidnapped and/or shot Irish men, even the God damn pets.

Whilst the deserters down south allowed it to happen.

Want to know how deep the resentment runs? My uncle said he'd shoot me in a heart beat if I joined the British forces. Took me a while to understand why. Now I do completely.

I guess its not nice loosing your closest brother, your mother, your pets, and friends to the british pigs.

Call them terrorists?

Meh. You have a few hundred men up against an army trying to protect their nation, women and children.

reply to post by glen200376

The laugh is these idiots are now politicians.I just hope in twenty years the jihadists aren't given the same rewards.

It is interesting "jihadists" was used on the people like Palestinians who were fighting for their lands.

It seems every body is using it for another concept.

Originally posted by yuppa
I have Always wondered this question. The IRA says they were fighting for independence from British rule,but was that really the case?

The political wing of the IRA, Sinn Fein barely managed to win more than 5% of the vote in parliamentary elections, suggesting that approximately 95% of people in Northern Ireland did not view them as freedom fighters.

Sinn Fein Electoral Performance

Only when the IRA stopped killing people did Sinn Fein's share of the vote rise.

I have spoken to a number of Northern Irish Catholics. They saw the IRA for what they were. Gangsters who prayed off of the Irish Catholic community.

The whole of Ireland used to be part of the United Kingdom from 1800-1920. In 1920, the British Government agreed to let Ireland leave, because of the protests and unrest in the country. However, there were more protests among the large Protestant population who wanted to remain part of the United Kingdom. As a compromise, Ireland was divided. The majority of Ireland became a new country, and Northern Ireland was kept as part of the United Kingdom, even though it had a sizeable Catholic population who opposed this.

Northern Ireland was given a large amount of autonomy and had its own Parliament and Prime Minister. However, since there were a slightly larger number of Protestants than Catholics, the unionists always held a majority in the Parliament, and the "majority rules" nature of it meant the republicans were frequently excluded. Nethertheless, Northern Ireland was relatively stable up until the 1960s.

The growth of unrest in Northern Ireland led to more British troops being sent in to help the police deal with The Troubles, as they became to be known. This didn't always work out, especially at Bloody Sunday in 1972. Soon afterwards, the British Government abolished the government of Northern Ireland and placed it under direct control (although Northern Ireland was still represented in the British Parliament). The Northern Ireland government was recently restored, with the unionists and republicans sharing power.

Originally posted by ollncasino

Originally posted by yuppa
I have Always wondered this question. The IRA says they were fighting for independence from British rule,but was that really the case?

The political wing of the IRA, Sinn Fein barely managed to win more than 5% of the vote in parliamentary elections, suggesting that approximately 95% of people in Northern Ireland did not view them as freedom fighters.

Electoral performances

Only when the IRA stopped killing people did Sinn Fein's share of the vote rise.

edit on 28-9-2012 by ollncasino because: (no reason given)

I guess then all that murder and chaos was for nothing then. Well except for political power. Was that all this was? a play to get power?

Originally posted by yuppa
I guess then all that murder and chaos was for nothing then. Well except for political power. Was that all this was? a play to get power?

Small violent minorities can be extremely successful at dominating much larger communities and driving the political agenda.

Ultimately however, a large level of support does exist for Sinn Fein in Northern Ireland with the party gaining almost 28% of the votes cast in 2010.

Sinn Fein Electoral Performance

The IRA? It was never terribly popular amongst the Northern Irish Catholics.

Ex-Northern Irish Catholics who lived oversees often had a more romantic view however.

Originally posted by Sinny
They occupied us.

*Bloody Sunday*

The IRA provided British police with evactuation warnings for any bombs set. The police decided to ignore those warnings to twist things in the media.

It were the Brits who stormed everybodys houses and kidnapped and/or shot Irish men, even the God damn pets.

Whilst the deserters down south allowed it to happen.

Want to know how deep the resentment runs? My uncle said he'd shoot me in a heart beat if I joined the British forces. Took me a while to understand why. Now I do completely.

I guess its not nice loosing your closest brother, your mother, your pets, and friends to the british pigs.

Call them terrorists?

Meh. You have a few hundred men up against an army trying to protect their nation, women and children.

edit on 28-9-2012 by Sinny because: (no reason given)

And you retaliate by blowing children to pieces. Innocent people who have nothing to do with the conflict.

Bravo.

Originally posted by mr-lizard
And you retaliate by blowing children to pieces. Innocent people who have nothing to do with the conflict.

Bravo.

My ex-brother in laws grandfather was in the original IRA and fought for Irish independence. He thought the provisional IRA were a bunch of murdering terrorists and he most certainly did not support them.

reply to post by ollncasino


And this is exactly my point. The actions of a few affect many, both in Ireland and the UK.

It's very sad.

Originally posted by ollncasino

Originally posted by mr-lizard
And you retaliate by blowing children to pieces. Innocent people who have nothing to do with the conflict.

Bravo.

My ex-brother in laws grandfather was in the original IRA and fought for Irish independence. He thought the provisional IRA were a bunch of murdering terrorists and he most certainly did not support them.

Well the Original One must have been worlds better than the ones who took on the name afterwards. And SInny you have my condolences about having a uncle who is so bitter. My shows how much he cares about family if he would shoot his own relatives. People need to let go of past hatreds to move forward. Hatred is still letting them win. Better to not play the game. I dislike the IRA's actions(new IRA not the old one) Not the people themselves.

reply to post by yuppa


The IRA history just shows how ludicrous current campaigns against terror are. Nearly 2000 dead after years and years of bombing and terror campaigns by the IRA and then one incident and all of a sudden it becomes a global problem with a different enemy.

Britain spent 2 billion on olympics security, Canada spent 2 billion on g20 security, how much is being spent on airport security now?

That's a lot of money changing hands. But suddenly all that money is justified once the IRA issues stopped and a new enemy popped up.

(Not condoning the IRA in any way, simply pointing out a group of people equally as bad received not nearly the same kind of response)

reply to post by ollncasino


I think that when dialog breaks the only path is radicalization, that starts in the weakest side as self preservation but it is soon replicated by the other side as to maintain the previous power relation.

When things go to crap, the only path available is compromise or escalation. Escalation is easier but the worst path to fallow, the result is the continued exchange fo blows until both sides become to bloody or tired to continue, history teaches that in an asymmetric confrontation against a guerrilla, there is no final victory possible that doesn't end in a compromise or a successful revolution after a civil war.

Regarding the IRA the religious aspect of the struggle is part of the radicalization, used to define the "us versus them", its uncompromisable to me how they managed to radicalize what seems to me devout Christians to kill each-others using that ideology.

reply to post by Sinny

So if you hate us 'Brits' so much, why are you living here then?
And us Scots never had a bad word to say about anyone in Ireland, Catholic or Protestant ..

reply to post by yuppa


First of all the IRA were only one side of the coin, Its strange you should single them out for criticism and completly ignore the fact that the British army and unionist paramilitary groups comitted just as many atrocitys and killed just as many people.

You dont seem to know much about the subject, i dont mean to be putting you down by saying so but the troubled history of Ireland is a long and complicated story, with the troubles of the 60s,70s and 80s being only the final chapter.You have to know the history of Ireland to understand the hatred for the Crown and and how it came about.

How hundreds of thousands of people were thrown off their land in Northern Ireland in the centurys proceding and how their land was given away free to scotish protestants.How 1.5 million people died of hunger during the potato famine while the Crown stood by and done nothing,How the Penal laws were introduced forbidding all catholics (90% of the population) from owning land, practicing their religion or even speaking their native language or attending schools.Even young children were executed for doing so at the that time.Adults were hung drawn and quartered.My own home town was laid siege to by Cromwell, he offered the inhabitants and amnesty to surrender, after they accepted he gave the order for them to be slaughtered, 17,000 men, women and children.These are the things that hatred is born of, and much of that hatred was justified.The troubles in NI were Britains chickens coming home to roost.

Eh hold on. The Brits weren't little Sir Innocents in all this.

British intelligence, Special Branch & the RUC regularly leaked confidential information to Loyalist gunmen, who then went out and killed Catholics. Up until comparatively recently, too. To be blunt, it wouldn't surprise me that they still do.

A dossier here, a nod and a wink there. The British establishment was up to it's knees in blood, despite all the contrived innocence of Westminster politicians, wheeled out to express their phoney outrage every time people like Johnny Adair and his thugs went out on a murder spree.

What did you expect the Irish Catholic community to have done ? They were discriminated against in employment, housing, education & they had the whole weight of the British state against them. May I remind some of you that it was the UVF which kicked the Troubles off by murdering innocent Catholics ? It was the RUC which brutally put down civil rights demonstrations way back in the 1960's.

The only time the British cared was when the Troubles came to the British mainland, so true was the saying that one bomb in London was worth a thousand in Belfast. Most people on the mainland couldn't care less about Ireland until the pub bombings or even Mountbatten's death, they don't care even today. They'd prefer rid of the whole problem, it's an embarrassment and the sooner the Loyalist population gets that into their heads the better ; the British don't want them and never have.

Anyway. The IRA. They weren't terrorists. Strangely, I don't think they were freedom fighters either. They simply drew the world's attention to the dreadful wrongs being done to their community through the medium of killing other Irishmen, idiots.

Originally posted by auraelium
reply to post by yuppa

 

First of all the IRA were only one side of the coin, Its strange you should single them out for criticism and completly ignore the fact that the British army and unionist paramilitary groups comitted just as many atrocitys and killed just as many people.

You dont seem to know much about the subject, i dont mean to be putting you down by saying so but the troubled history of Ireland is a long and complicated story, with the troubles of the 60s,70s and 80s being only the final chapter.You have to know the history of Ireland to understand the hatred for the Crown and and how it came about.

How hundreds of thousands of people were thrown off their land in Northern Ireland in the centurys proceding and how their land was given away free to scotish protestants.How 1.5 million people died of hunger during the potato famine while the Crown stood by and done nothing,How the Penal laws were introduced forbidding all catholics (90% of the population) from owning land, practicing their religion or even speaking their native language or attending schools.Even young children were executed for doing so at the that time.Adults were hung drawn and quartered.My own home town was laid siege to by Cromwell, he offered the inhabitants and amnesty to surrender, after they accepted he gave the order for them to be slaughtered, 17,000 men, women and children.These are the things that hatred is born of, and much of that hatred was justified.The troubles in NI were Britains chickens coming home to roost.

You forgot to explain why Cromwell invaded Ireland. It was in retaliation for the Irish Catholic Army that fought on the side of Charles I and his Royalists. Cromwell and his New Model Army where fighting for Parliamentary Democracy. The Irish fought against that.

reply to post by yuppa


Irish history is not as black and white as you seem to see it.

The IRA were originally an actual legitimate military organisation called the Irish Volunteers who fought the British Empire in 1916 for Irish independence.

A few years later they fought a guerrilla campaign against British forces eventually leading to the Anglo Irish treaty of 1921. Then there was a split within the IRA and after that it gets complicated.

In this context, yes the IRA were freedom fighters, they fought for and gained Irish independence from the English crown. And yes that was a good thing.

The modern terrorist version of the IRA came later their main objective was unifying Ireland. Now if you want to get into the whole situation that was 'the troubles' and the conflict between the Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland you're gonna open a can of worms IMO. It's a deeply complicated and touchy subject that still goes on to this day.

My forebears fought the English, my great great uncle, a man not involved with the IRA, was summarily executed by English soldiers in front of his family, including his small children, for not disclosing the whereabouts of his younger brother(who was IRA). There are more stories like this in my family and people I know. There is also a bitterness still there in the older generations of Irish.

I'm not a fan of the modern IRA, and I like English people, but the 'Old IRA' were a different thing.