From the Loyalist blog It's Still Only Thursday, a piece which featured October last asking questions of republicans about collusion.

The Irish republican narrative has apparently shifted yet again. No longer content with allegations of so-called “collusion” in certain incidents, mostly in the assassination of prominent republicans, the narrative shifted to “collusion in most cases“. Unhappy that this did not sufficiently smear Loyalism, or the Security Forces, they now seem to be heart set on a complete and total rewriting of history, now presenting armed Loyalist groups as being nothing more than mere “proxies of the British state”, armed, organised, funded and directed by the Army, MI5, UDR, RUC and even the RUC Reserve.

This ludicrous, almost laughable, narrative is so fantastical, so evidently false that I contemplated scrapping this blog post. What could be funnier and more entertaining than watching Irish supremacists, especially the online troll variety, tie themselves up in knots trying to defend such a ludicrous fairy-tale?

As comical as it is however, I feel that it is important to forensically tear apart such tall-tales. Irish republican extremists have so successfully rewritten Ulster’s recent past over the last 20 years or so that (personally) I feel that to leave any of their myths unchallenged is something of a dereliction of duty.

Continue reading @ It's Still Only Thursday.

➽ Follow It's Still Only Thursday on Twitter @0nIyThursday

30 Questions Republicans Can’t (Or Won’t) Answer About Alleged “Collusion”

From the Loyalist blog It's Still Only Thursday, a piece which featured October last asking questions of republicans about collusion.

The Irish republican narrative has apparently shifted yet again. No longer content with allegations of so-called “collusion” in certain incidents, mostly in the assassination of prominent republicans, the narrative shifted to “collusion in most cases“. Unhappy that this did not sufficiently smear Loyalism, or the Security Forces, they now seem to be heart set on a complete and total rewriting of history, now presenting armed Loyalist groups as being nothing more than mere “proxies of the British state”, armed, organised, funded and directed by the Army, MI5, UDR, RUC and even the RUC Reserve.

This ludicrous, almost laughable, narrative is so fantastical, so evidently false that I contemplated scrapping this blog post. What could be funnier and more entertaining than watching Irish supremacists, especially the online troll variety, tie themselves up in knots trying to defend such a ludicrous fairy-tale?

As comical as it is however, I feel that it is important to forensically tear apart such tall-tales. Irish republican extremists have so successfully rewritten Ulster’s recent past over the last 20 years or so that (personally) I feel that to leave any of their myths unchallenged is something of a dereliction of duty.

Continue reading @ It's Still Only Thursday.

➽ Follow It's Still Only Thursday on Twitter @0nIyThursday

18 comments:

  1. On reading the first few of the questions one quickly realises the author has no clue to his lyoalists history. For example, after bomb attacks like the McGurk's Bar Masacre the Brits relised that Loyalists were too irratic and uncontrollable. -hence in the early 70's a decison was made to keep loyalists away from explosives. Journalists Barry McCafferty wrote a couple of investigative articles on RUC and UDR weaponary going missing. Documents that he uncovered for his articles detailed that a decison had been made to allow a certain % of weaponary to go astray -aware that the lost guns were finding their way into the hands of Loyalists.

    To be honest I couldn't be bothered answwering the questions. Not that I would not like to engage meaningfully on collusion but the author is asking questions that if he bothered his arse he'd trip over if he looked.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. It didn't work. Loyalists still retained Powergel sent to them from sympathisers in scotland and Northern England up until the ceasefires. The problem they had was obtaining detonators, and having the skill set to actually detonate them (the ones who did have the skills died by the 80's apart from Curry, who was taken out for killing Nelson -final straw)

      Delete
  2. Hilarious.....has the author never contemplated the 'acceptable level of violence' narrative? The Brits are masters at pretending they are only in a country to 'keep the peace' allthewhile their shadowy hidden hand is fomenting the conflict to achieve a desired outcome for eg Iraq,Libya and the present day Syria, where they claim they are only there to 'stop the rise of ISIS'.............no laughing at the back! P.s I am always minded of the incident when unionist terrorist Brian Robinson was shot by undercover Brit terrorists on his way back from shooting a catholic shopkeeper. This incident came shortly after republicans,nationalist and US politicians were claiming the Brit State wasn't as trigger happy towards unionist terrorists as it was to Republicans I.e whilst appearances had to be kept up by being seen to arrest armed unionists, there was never the fatal outcome for them as there was for republicans. Of course the Brit state denied there was any notion that armed unionists were being treated differently to republicans and cue the Robinson incident shortly after.......a case of 'I told you so'. As for the unionist prisoners example? Well just like republicans, the foot soldier isn't in on the game and doesn't realise he's been played too! But unionist prisoners 'kept up appearances' as well.

    ReplyDelete
  3. 31# And why did the Security Forces swap the bullets for those with less gunpowder when Gregg shot Adams?

    ReplyDelete
  4. Steve they wanted Adam's wounded rather than dead... was an affective tactic to consolidate peoples outrage into trust and loyalty to their leader.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Simply Google these 4 words: "British Collusion Northern Ireland".

    And you'll have more than 30 questions for Loyalists to answer:

    From Stalker to Stevens, Finucane to Nelson, Glenanne to Stakeknife...

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. There's reallty no question that collusion happened though. The question is who was colluding with who. From what I've read and seen over the years there's been collusion between absolutely EVERYONE and some level at one point or another. From the Provo's talking to Brits, to BA handing Int notices to Loyalists, to Loyalists and Republicans carving up areas for fundraising and everything in between.

      Point a finger and 3 point back at you, as the old japanese saying goes.

      Delete
  6. Steve R.,

    Sorry, but you’re Japanese metaphor smacks of the piggy-in-the-middle mind-set.

    Sure, British government collusion was widespread.

    Because it was British government collusion.

    Who else could afford that?

    So they were the primary sponsors of NI terrorism.

    As this author points out:

    A Very British Jihad: Collusion, Conspiracy and Cover-up in Northern Ireland

    by Paul Larkin

    "The compelling evidence in this book, however, is that one of the most powerful states in the world, the United Kingdom, was the primary sponsor of a covert regime of murder and terror which lasted for three decades and was demonstrably directed against one section of the community only - Irish Catholics and nationalists and their `fellow travellers'."

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/1900960257/ref=acr_dpproductdetail_text?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

    ReplyDelete
  7. LOL Paul Larkin? Really? Bit like having Himmler right a book on the Holocaust!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Steve R,

    Once again your analogies limp.

    But wasn't Himmler the author of the Holocaust?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Yes, my point being that Himmler would look very favourably at the Holocaust while ignoring any evidence to the contrary. Much like Larkin sees things through his own biases and that come across in his tome.

      Delete
  9. Larkin's book is nowhere near as good as Larkin thinks it is but nowhere near as bad as many of the critics have slammed it for. Packed with very useful information, he doesn't succeed in pulling it together as well as he should have. Nor did he get the endorsement he probably expected from the usual suspects. The PFC didn't rate it. Many people did not want it mentioned in the same breath as Lethal Allies. And two faced friends who praised it to his face rarely cited it in public but went around rubbishing it behind his back. People familiar with his fantasy stuff of later years will read back the back and not necessarily come to the right conclusion, feeling that fantasy is encoded in the Jihad Book. I think one of the biggest problems Larkin caused for himself might have been the use of the term Jihad. I often wondered had he simply used Dirty War, might the book not have been more widely received. If people are going to approach Larkin fairly, they should take a step back in light of all we have learned on collusion since he first published. Must review it some time here. Or maybe you could give it a go Eoghan - you as well Steve.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Been awhile since i read it but struggled to finish it, if I recall correctly I found passages that were contradictory, but as I say, some time has passed and I may be wrong.

      Delete
  10. Steve R.,

    Whew, thanks for clarifying that! But everyone sees things through their own biases so you just have to weigh their work accordingly against the evidence that is available to you and judge from there. And fact that Himmler would have written favorably about the Holocaust doesn’t mean it didn’t happen. Irony of ironies, he would not then have been a Holocaust denier if he wrote favorably about it, just a diabolical promoter as he always was.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Anthony,

    Thanks for the invite to review this book!

    But I currently have other writing project deadlines.

    That said though here is the link where others have reviewed it...

    For better or worse:

    https://www.amazon.co.uk/product-reviews/1900960257/ref=acr_dpproductdetail_text?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Eoghan - it was just a suggestion and not pressure! And I know had you time you would have crafted a fine review. I lifted the book with a preformed view that it was a load of wank, given what so many including his own supposed friends (they were lethal allies) had been saying about it. There is a lot of good stuff in it. Had he not succumbed to a conspiratorial mind he could have finetuned it and made it much more effective. His chapter on Alice McLaughlin was brilliant and I thought he did some great stuff on Billy Wright. Despite the serious structural weaknesses he was ahead of the curve on the extent of collusion. So rather than the approach of "don't read that crap, read my friend Anne's", Jihad should be at least read rather than dismissed. I would have reviewed it earlier but when the laptop was reset my notes were amongst the things I lost.

      Delete
  12. Anthony,

    Thank you again and sorry to hear you lost your notes.

    I’m sure you would’ve done and could do a better job.

    But here is a positive review in of all places the Irish Times:

    Refusing to say nothing

    https://www.irishtimes.com/news/refusing-to-say-nothing-1.1307695

    Speaking of conspiracy theory...

    Last I looked it was a mystery who owned the Irish Times.

    Some speculated it was MI5/MI6 given their usual editorials.

    So maybe their positive review of Paul Larkin's book here...

    Is just meant to throw us off their scent.

    Yeah, that's the ticket.


    ReplyDelete