Irish Republican Army

From RationalWiki
Jump to: navigation, search
What is it good for? Absolutely nothing!

War

Icon war2.svg
Don't believe us?

The Irish Republican Army, or IRA, is an Irish nationalist terrorist organization whose goal is a united Irish republic independent of British rule. Formed in 1919 to be the armed forces of the Sinn Fein government democratically elected the previous December, they fought to free Ireland using guerrilla warfare and terrorist tactics, until a cease-fire was declared, followed with a treaty resulting in partition. The southern five-sixths of Ireland was made into a self-governing Dominion like Canada or Australia, called the Irish Free State (later declared the Republic of Ireland in 1949), while the northeastern sixth, comprising most of the historic Ulster province, became Northern Ireland. Unsatisfied, many in the IRA rejected the treaty setting this up, and fought a brutal civil war before their defeat by the Free State government.

[edit] History

IRA actions continued until the early 1960s, opposed by both the Irish and British governments. In this period, the organization's leadership became dominated by Communist sympathizers who took it in a left-wing direction, eschewing further violent actions for marching alongside trade unions and talked of gaining support from the KGB. More conservative and very Catholic members balked at this. With a civil rights campaign in Northern Ireland by Catholics that was often attacked viciously by police and Protestant thugs, renewed conflict drew the divide to a breaking point. 1969 saw the organization split with the advent of The Troubles, the Provisional IRA embarking on a new campaign of violence in Northern Ireland, with the Official IRA, seeing itself become irrelevant, morphed into the Marxist-oriented Irish National Liberation Army (INLA) as the IRA's leftist counterpart, though never of its stature or success.

Bloody Sunday, an incident in January 1972 when British paratroopers opened fire on civil rights marchers in Londonderry, killing 13, provoked a massive Catholic backlash that ended peaceful attempts at change and saw IRA support rise, gaining thousands of new recruits. Violence increased throughout the 1970s, with the IRA conducting bombings on the British mainland that shocked and infuriated the public, the first of their kind since World War II. Even apart from their violence against British government forces and Protestants, IRA members used vicious tactics in areas they dominated to punish criminals. Despite taking an anti-crime stance so brutal it involved shooting people in the knees for theft (so-called "kneecapping") the IRA got involved with international crime itself (such as drug-running) as a source of funds. Many Irish Americans supported the IRA, not only in spirit but with donations. Warsaw Pact states, Libya and China all supplied weapons at various points. A particularly despicable tactic created by the IRA in the '70s was proxy bombings, wherein people would be forced into driving explosives-laden vehicles (usually by threats to their families) and in some cases ended up as unwilling IRA suicide bombers.

Terrorist prisoners were given "Special Category" status in British prisons originally, meaning they could wear civilian clothes while not being required to do work in prison, receiving one parcel and one letter per week from relatives. However it was decided to end this policy in the late '70s, since the British government felt it damaged their position for them to be given privileges not afforded ordinary prisoners. In protest, IRA prisoners refused to wear prison uniforms, wrapping themselves in blankets, smeared their excrement on the walls of the cells as the guards prevented them from "slopping out," (i.e. emptying their chamber pots) and, when this did not work, began hunger strikes. A hunger strike in 1980 ended when the government promised to consider their demands for political status, but immediately reneged. Therefore, a further hunger strike occurred in 1981, led by IRA commander Bobby Sands. Sands, who was elected to the British Parliament during the strike, eventually starved to death after 66 days (setting a record) along with nine other men before it was called off, with the British government reinstating Special Category status in all but name. Sands has been honored with monuments and streets named after him around the world, while victims of his organization receive no such international honors. The British Parliament subsequently passed a law preventing any other prisoner from being elected to office.

The conflict dragged on with no end in sight during the 1980s, with the IRA even attempting to assassinate Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and nearly succeeding. In 1994, a cease fire was declared, the first since the 1970s, but it lasted less than two years. When the Labour Party swept into power in 1997 after 18 years of being the opposition, the Irish peace process at last began to find ground. The Good Friday or Belfast Agreement in 1998 finally ended the long conflict after nearly 30 years of bloodshed, with a cease-fire by the IRA and other terrorist organizations, plus decommissioning of their weapons by the early 2000s. However, a number of members refused to accept this, forming the Real IRA, which committed further terrorist actions such as the bombing of Omagh. An earlier split in 1986 over the leadership's decision to end their abstention from taking seats in any parliament spawned the Continuity IRA from members that opposed this. Both are still listed as terrorist groups by the United States Bureau of Counterterrorism as of 2012.[1] Otherwise, the peace has held aside from acts by marginal extremists, and the future of Northern Ireland at last seems to be looking up.

[edit] External links

[edit] Footnotes

Personal tools
Namespaces

Variants
Actions
Navigation
Community
Tools
support