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Title: After Warrington Author: Des McCarron Date: 1993 Language: en Topics: Ireland, peacebuilding, Irish Republican Army, sectarianism, Workers Solidarity Source: Retrieved on 12th October 2021 from http://struggle.ws/ws93/peace39.html Notes: Published in Workers Solidarity No. 39 â Summer 1993.
Dublin Sunday March 28^(th). On a rainy afternoon about 20,000 people
(Irish Times estimate) crowd OâConnell Street to protest at the deaths
of two children, Jonathan Ball and Tim Parry. At the fringes of the
rally a small group carry pictures of some other victims of violence.
Fergal Carahersâs widow holds a placard saying âalso, remember, British
soldiers killed my husbandâ. Others hold pictures of Majela OâHare,
Aiden McAnespie, Seamus Duffy, Karen Reilly and other victims of
security force violence in the North.
A small section of the crowd reacts angrily and begins to heckle them
shouting âout, out, out!â. Gardai move in quickly to grab the offending
placards. In death as in life it seems that some are more equal then
others.
The Peace 1993 movement was set-up after the Warrington bombings as
people reacted angrily to the killing of innocent children. Their
efforts to distance themselves from politics have not been entirely
successful. Attempting to mould the peace movement in their own image
were New Consensus and the Peace Train Organisation.
These organisations are little more then fronts for the Democratic Left,
Workers Party and others who see the IRA as the incarnation of all evil.
They are partly financed by the British government, through the Northern
Ireland Office (see âPeace train runs out of steamâ Workers Solidarity
33). The people involved in Peace 1993 events have the best of motives
and are sickened by the violence on all sides. Unfortunately they are
been used.
Peace 1993 has started with the analysis we are offered again and again
by our rulers and the media. Paramilitaries, especially republican ones,
are portrayed as gangsters and psychopaths used and manipulated by
cynical âgodfatherâs of crimeâ. It is because of the IRA (we are told)
that ânormal democratic politicsâ cannot proceed. If they were to lay
down their arms everything would be Hunky-Dory. Unfortunately this is
not the case. Indeed the ceasefire of 1975 between the British
government and the IRA was broken unilaterally by the British. They used
the opportunity to conduct raids and searches for arms, and provoked the
republicans in every way possible. The ceasefire was not signed by the
loyalist gunmen who stepped up their sectarian campaign.
Sinn FĂ©inâs electoral support is 10% in total and 30% among Northern
Ireland Catholics, concentrated in the working class areas of West
Belfast and Derry and among small farmers in the border counties. The
IRA have no difficulty in recruiting young Catholic workers and
unemployed and will continue to do so. They are not the problem, they
are a product of the real problem.
This is the Northern Ireland State. There can be no ânormal politicsâ in
Northern Ireland. This is a State founded on blatant sectarianism and
the repression of the minority. Catholics are still twice as likely to
be unemployed as their Protestant neighbours (according to the
governmentâs own Fair Employment Agency). This is combined with
day-to-day harassment by the security forces and the recent acceleration
of sectarian attacks. These are the conditions that make it very
unlikely that the IRA will just disappear.
The IRA are a response to a State that was a model in sectarianism. The
British State succeeded in buying off Protestant workers with marginal
privileges. They created the reactionary ideology of unionism. Normal
politics in Northern Ireland is illustrated graphically by the
activities of the Belfast city council which recently took another giant
step into the dark ages when it renewed itâs ban on over 18s films on
Sundays. The normal politics of this council chamber was described as
âmore like pond-life then politicsâ by one recently resigned SDLP
councillor.
As long as the British occupation continues and as long as unionism is
propped up by them, so-called normal politics in Northern Ireland
remains in the realm of sick humour. The IRA are not to blame for the
situation in the North. But they will never be able to change it.
The armed struggle over the last 20 or so years has done little more
then irritate the British and Irish governments. A small guerrilla army
will never defeat the combined resources of the British and Southern
Irish States. Like all small guerilla armies they are elitist and
unanswerable to those they claim to represent. The only role they offer
Catholic workers is to cheer on from the sidelines.
No group of this nature no matter, how brave or well armed, will ever
set us free. Ultimately the armed struggle is no substitute for mass
action. The only way to fundamentally change things is by uniting
workers North and South of all religions and none to defeat the bosses,
orange and green, and build a secular workerâs republic.
The so-called economic bombing campaign in Britain is another reflection
of the IRAâs political bankruptcy. Any serious socialist
anti-imperialist group would attempt to enlist the support of British
workers against their own ruling class. The IRAâs simplistic strategy is
that they can bomb them into submission by causing massive economic
damage. In fact it alienates British workers and makes the introduction
of anti-Irish laws like The Prevention of Terrorism Act that bit easier.
And it has to be said that the IRA know well that the authorities will
occasionally ignore or delay a bomb warning in order to whip up anger at
the Provos. With this knowledge it has to be said that the IRA take a
very cavalier attitude towards the lives of ordinary people every time
they plant a bomb in a shopping mall or railway station. It would not be
unreasonable to ask if their bombing of Warrington amounts to
manslaughter.
The economic bombing campaign of the last 20 years from the Birmingham
pub bombs, through the attacks on Downing Street, the stock exchange and
the recent massive attack on the Nat West tower have not shaken the
British governmentâs resolve. Despite the cost (the Damage from the Nat
West bomb is estimated at ÂŁ3â500 million or about 1/10 of the annual
bill for running the North for a year) they still hang on.
Anyone waiting eagerly to hear radical ideas from the IRAâs political
wing, Sinn FĂ©in after the slight relaxation of Section 31 (of the
Broadcasting Act) forced on RTE can stop holding their breath. Take
womensâ rights for example. At this yearâs Ard Fheis a motion was put
forward committing them to support a womanâs right to choose abortion.
One delegate (Daisy Mules from Derry) in support of the motion said that
âthe struggle for human rights and democracy must include womensâ rights
which includes the right to chooseâ.
The partyâs ruling Ard Chomhairle had different ideas. Tom Hartley
claimed that existing policy was âthe most progressive held by any
political party in the countryâ (Not true, of course, both Democratic
Left and the Workers Party have gone further in their limited support
for abortion rights). Gerry Adams claimed that to change policy âwould
be the biggest mistake we could make this weekendâ. The motion was
defeated (An Phoblacht/Republican News 25^(th) February).
Sinn FĂ©inâs politics continue to be based around a desperate attempt to
make friends with right wing nationalist elements like Fianna FĂĄil TD
Michael Noonan and the SDLP âgrassrootsâ. This strategy has failed
totally and their vote in the South remains minute.
The truth is that neither Peace 1993 nor the republicans can change
things. Their simplistic solutions of âLets all put down our guns and be
palsâ (unless we happen to have uniforms) or that of a united capitalist
Ireland underline the lack of ideas of both organisations. Not only have
they no solutions they havenât even begun to ask the right questions.
Our solution is not quite so simple. It is a longer and more difficult
route, but it is the only one which will work. It involves uniting
workers in Ireland to fight for a united anarchist republic.
In the short-term this means supporting and building, where possible,
united action against the bosses. Also where united struggles do take
place trying to make connections showing how the only way to real unity
against the bosses is to oppose partition which is used to keep
Protestant and Catholic workers apart. In the long-term it means
fighting both British imperialist occupation of Northern Ireland and our
own native bosses and Southern clericalist laws. The only way to do this
is through massive united class struggle. There are no short-cuts on the
road to freedom.