On Wednesday October 27th, British troops, who had ‘wisely’ maintained a low profile in the area for a few days, entered the Catholic Turf Lodge in West Belfast where they provoked a confrontation with local residents during a funeral service. There was a minor riot, during which a woman and three teenage girls were arrested. They were taken to the army’s Fort Monagh close by. After being photographed with cards showing name and religion they were taken to Andersonstown RUC station in a Saracen armoured car. The Turf Lodge people had already hijacked vehicles to barricade off their area, now a crowd of mainly women and youths gathered outside the RUC station and stoned it. Finally the prisoners were released ‘pending further enquiries’. No charges were laid.
This story could have come out of Catholic West Belfast at almost any time in the last seven years. However the incident does merit further examination. Three of the arrested women have close relations that between them sum up much of the recent history and present situation in Northern Ireland.
One was Mary Green, half-sister of the passenger in the car that crashed after the driver had been shot dead without warning by the army, and killed the three Maguire children in the incident that gave rise to the peace movement. Another was the mother of Sandy Lynch, a victim of increasing army brutality (he was in a car that was shot up by the army after passing through a checkpoint and is still seriously ill). The third was Kathleen Stewart, sister of 13-year-old Brian whose death has helped to discredit the peace movement and stiffen resistance behind the Provisionals. At the time of writing it is not known whether the 14-year-old girl arrested with them was known to the army.
The Northern Ireland ‘peace movement’ began after Danny Lennon, a known IRA volunteer was shot dead while driving a car which went out of control and crashed, killing three young children. Their aunt M. Corrigan, an organiser for the ‘Legion of Mary’, was interviewed on television. Betty Williams, a suburban Andersonstown Catholic, contacted her, and with the instant support of the media, initiated a series of meetings and marches whose clear intentions were to further isolate and weaken the Provos in the anti-unionist ghettos. Encouraged by what appeared to be growing support from sections of women in the nationalist population, the ‘Peace Movement’ immediately launched a mass campaign of demonstrations, meetings etc. throughout the province and the rest of Ireland. Recruiting to their ranks a professional journalist and noted anti-IRA ‘specialist’, K. McKeown, the Peace Movement began to develop a sense of permanence which threatened to further divide the anti-unionist population in a way not seen since the war began.
Despite the obvious fear that the peace campaign, especially the leadership, were decisively anti-IRA and pro ‘security’ forces, it is also a fact that it has received sympathy and support from sections of the nationalist population. Why is this so?
First it is significant that the bulk of those in sympathy with the demands for ‘peace and reconciliation’ have been women. By the very nature of republicanism women have been actively excluded from the military (all male) struggle, despite their involvement within the movement as a whole. Essentially they have been seen as an auxiliary back-up resource, the roots of which lay within the need for continuity of the ‘family’ and the ‘mother’ as protector. Combined with the ideology of catholicism denying contraception, divorce and abortion, women have been offered no choice and no say in decision making about the direction of the struggle. The Provos have never resisted this. The full effects of six years struggle in which they have been compelled to bear an increasing burden passively, has led to increasing sense of futility among considerable sectors of nationalist women.
Secondly, the nature of the Provos campaign with its exclusive reliance upon the bombing campaigns has meant a progressive downswing in the confidence and unity of the anti-unionist mass population. As the bombing campaign grew in intensity, the number of marches and demonstrations faded — participation of those who once were deeply involved politically declined. Even the struggle against internment saw few demonstrations. Though few nationalist workers are prepared to throw in the towel their support has been both negative and resigned in the face of a war whose logic and duration is as fought by the IRA becomes more and more divorced from the mass political basis from which it originally emerged.
It is within the political vacuum created by the Provos’ all-dominant military strategy that the peace movement, like the less successful but equally symptomatic ‘Better Life Campaign’, has sprung. It is the ideological confusion within sections of the nationalist population that has given the Peace Movement a small foothold in some of the nationalist ghettos. Though it is undoubtedly a precarious foothold, given the extremely limited room for manoeuvre within the conflict, the Peace Movement has been allowed to sow even deeper confusion at a time when it looked possible to build around the question of political status — a mass campaign. In August 12,000 attended a mass rally in West Belfast. Sadly, the Provos permitted this magnificent initiative to be relegated to a minor role in their overall campaign. Refusing to see the apathy and demoralisation as the signs for a change of direction tactically, they still prefer to utilise mass involvement as a secondary and optional extra. It is no accident that they initially underestimated the potential power of the peace movement — as it grew, they have been forced to contend with it, dubbing it simply as an instrument of British imperialism and hoping that abuse and counter-marches would of themselves destroy it. In doing so the Provos are again dealing with the symptoms and not the causes — in this way the clear and stark need for a mass campaign on the major issues facing the anti-unionist population has become further blurred.
The reaction to Brian Stewart’s murder
One clear example will illustrate all of this. The first real test for the peace movement occurred in Turf Lodge over the murder by the British army of Brian Stewart. The Turf Lodge population immediately united to keep the army ‘out’. An ad hoc women’s group issued a statement calling a public meeting in order to set up a broad committee, and to discuss the way forward for the people as a whole. A local representative of the Turf Lodge ‘peace committee’ was invited — also, with the clear intention of deepening their foothold, went Williams and Corrigan. Without realising it they also were offering the anti-unionist population a real chance to put to the test what they really meant about ‘peace’. If a committee had been elected, if it had quickly outlined a limited number of activities, the first of which would have been a march against the British army, the Peace Movement could have been concretely challenged by this situation. Its local support both in Turf Lodge and elsewhere would have been given a clear example that the leadership of the peace movement, however they may quibble and equivocate, will never march with republicans, socialist and anti-unionist population against the British army. Furthermore such a strategy would have shown the real basis for unity; the clarification of demands, aims etc. and spelling out how to realise them before as large an audience of the anti-unionist population as possible. The building of broad local committees can only successfully occur within such a perspective.
Unfortunately none of this occurred. Despite the fact that the meeting was called to set up a committee none was elected. Instead the meeting spent nearly two hours attempting to remove Corrigan and Williams. A meeting for the next evening also failed to elect a committee. Finally voluntary women’s street groups, with the signal role of mobilising the population in Turf Lodge of the approach of the army, emerged. Despite their success in repelling the first attempt by the army to get into Turf Lodge, the impetus for action and unity has been lost — already the familiar hijacking and burning of cars has occurred as a response to the arrest of four women in Turf Lodge.
The peace movement’s leaders emerged from the Turf Lodge incident politically unseated — indeed they were able to condemn the ‘specific’ army atrocity in Turf Lodge. Even though, later, forced to reaffirm their general support for the ‘security forces’ the issues illustrate that the peace movement can and will remain an obstacle in the way of the anti-imperialist movement. The question of how to destroy the peace movement cannot be divorced from the task of uniting the population to face the immediate problems of the army, repression and political status.
Since the demise of the Northern Ireland assembly earlier this year the British government has had no real policy for the North except to hope that the sheer weight of the British army can wear down the resistance of the nationalist population to the point where a superficially reformed version of the pre-1968 government can be imposed on them. The army had reacted to this, even before their taste for blood had been implicitly endorsed by the appointment of ‘their man’ Mason to replace Rees, by demanding tougher laws and greater freedom. This would have been the logical outcome of British policy, if you’re relying on the weight of the army the more weight it has the better, if world opinion was not at stake. The army though, has no such worries and soldiers have been manifesting their frustration of fighting a purposeless and unwinnable war in a horrifyingly carefree escalation of violence towards the Catholic population. Their off-handed shooting of civilians, beatings of youths in front of reliable (i.e. middle-class) witnesses and a rising incidence of drunkenness, all show that while the army is capable of inflicting endless misery on the Catholics their morale is deteriorating.
The Provisionals still remain the fighting vanguard of the Irish people against British imperialism. This is well testified to by the massive turn out for Maire Drumm’s funeral and the obscene chorus of abuse from the Fleet Street hirelings of capital. Marxists have the sharpest criticisms of the Provisional Republicans, for their programme and their tactics. It is a misplaced internationalism which suppresses these criticisms since the fate of the struggle in Ireland depends on transcending the crippling limits of republican strategy and tactics.
