The Dirty War by Martin Dillon

Author:Martin Dillon [Dillon, Martin]
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Tags: Political Science, General
ISBN: 9781407074801
Google: er3HfXL7CKQC
Amazon: B009XBQF2Y
Publisher: Random House
Published: 2012-10-25T23:00:00+00:00

10

Secret Liaisons: the Security Forces and the UDA

AT THE BEGINNING of 1972 the Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, declared that if there was a concerted effort by both communities a lasting solution could be found to the problems of Northern Ireland. His view was not shared by the SDLP’s Austin Currie, who told an anti-internment rally in Belfast that within six months the Unionist Prime Minister, Brian Faulkner, and his ‘rotten Unionist system’ would be smashed: ‘To Maudling, I say: why should we talk to you? We are winning and you are not.’ For his part, Brian Faulkner saw the continued use of internment as the way of solving the problem. To him the defeat of the IRA was the sole issue in Ulster and he stood implacably opposed to any dialogue with Catholics which would question or interfere with Unionist political domination. Maudling’s hopes after three years of street demonstrations, rioting and the shooting of soldiers by the Provisionals sounded hollow.

There were those in the Protestant community who were beginning to assert that violence achieved change for nationalists and it could also halt the erosion of the Protestant way of life in Ulster. Advocates of such a policy of violence from the Protestant and Loyalist community were to be found not only in the UDA and UVF but also within political circles on the fringes of the Unionist Party. In the Catholic community there was constant reiteration of an ominous warning that at any time there might be a ‘Protestant backlash’. The use of this term was not restricted to Catholics but was often used by Loyalists as a reminder to everyone that, if events began to slide from Unionist control, Protestants would rise up and the subsequent ‘backlash’ would engulf Northern Ireland in a civil war; Catholics would be killed in their thousands and would be unable to defend themselves against the formidable weaponry available to Protestants through gun clubs, the police and the UDR. The communities were more polarised than in 1969. In the minds of Loyalists all Catholics supported the IRA. This assumption was readily made because of the overwhelming nationalist opposition to internment and the feelings expressed by Currie that Unionism was going to be smashed. Catholics were fifth-columnists and in the eyes of the majority of Unionists were undermining the Protestant heritage and way of life in order to achieve the IRA aim of creating a united Ireland.

A Loyalist newssheet in August 1971 contained a letter which illustrated the bitterness, resentment and naked hatred which was welling up in Loyalist circles:

I want to remind Protestants that these animals are crawling into Ulster, hitting vital points like the RUC stations etc. The ugly thing is that the bastards are getting away with it. Then the question arises, what the hell is the UVF doing about it? You’ve got to fight fire with fire, and personally I don’t think they’ve enough fire to make the animals sweat.

In the same period, after internment, the UDA was born and

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