Brandon Sullivan ✒ with the first in a two part series looking at Provisional IRA targeting of civilian contractors servicing the British Repressive State Apparatuses. 

Dublin - 1985

On the 20th August 1985, the IRA shot dead a wealthy building contractor named Seamus McAvoy, in Dublin. McAvoy was alleged to have been involved in the supplying of building services to the RUC. The IRA statement read:

Mr McEvoy (sic) had been given many, many warnings - by telephone, by letter and by IRA attacks on his premises on Coalisland - about his collaboration with the occupation forces in the North. We repeat our recent warnings to those in the construction industry and those who are working in barracks they will suffer the consequences of such collaboration.
Mr. McEvoy, who supplied Rowan cabins and building materials to barracks and military border posts for renovations work, was not earning an honest day's pay but was receiving ill-gotten gains. From such military bases operations have been hatched which have resulted in the murders of nationalist civilians and IRA volunteers. Within such bases, nationalist people have been beaten and tortured.
Without such bases, British military power would be severely hampered. There will be no more warnings.

The journalist and writer Kevin Toolis noted, as others had, the precedent set in previous historical republican campaigns of destroying security force bases, and that the only surprise was that the Provos had not taken this step before.

McAvoy’s killing was unusual in the IRA’s campaign against contractors to the security forces in that it took place in the Republic. Overall, significantly more Protestant than Catholic contractors were killed, but in the opening stages of this campaign, this was not the case, with two out of the first three being Catholics.

The Campaign in the North in the 1980s


One year on from the McAvoy killing, an IRA spokesperson acknowledged that there was “some resistance” to including these contractors on a list of “legitimate targets” but that it has faded. In fact, the spokesman claimed:

The tactic was biting well. [John] Kyle had just been shot and while that was still fresh, it was decided to press on.” Footage of Mr Kyle’s funeral can be seen here, along with responses to the enhanced threat from the IRA.

The spokesman talked of a highly successful campaign, with “at least 50” organisations contacting the republican movement to confirm to them that they had stopped supping the security services with everything from building material to milk.

The spokesman continued:

Nobody has yet worked out the rationale for this, which is obvious. It's crippling the RUC. They will now have to leave their barracks for their milk, their coffee, their bread. Extra jeeps will be needed to protect the jeeps going out for supplies. There won't ever be enough, so the army will have to be called in and that will be a reversal of their Ulsterisation policy to normalise the situation.
The tactic will also throw routine patrolling and administration into chaos. The patrols in Nationalist areas will be thinned out and this will make it much easier for the IRA to carry out operations.

So, in republican terms, it was a success, according to the IRA spokesman. Kevin Toolis in Rebel Hearts also noted that the IRA’s campaign increased the cost of repairing and rebuilding bombed security force installations rocketed, and became extremely dangerous.

Loyalists, perhaps in response to this new threat from the IRA, threated nationalist taxi drivers and stockists of republican newspapers:

The UFF appeared . . .  threatening Catholic workers and those who distribute republican publications or drive in black taxis in nationalist areas of Belfast.

Tyrone – Henry Brothers, the UVF, the UDR, and the IRA

Kevin Toolis wrote a detailed analysis of the targeting by the IRA of Henry Bros building contractors in his book Rebel Hearts. During a meeting with the leadership of the East Tyrone Brigade, one IRA man said:

Henry Brothers are collaborating in the oppression of the nationalist people by taking part in that work, just as the British Crown is forcing those workers to prostitute themselves because of the huge money involved. They are corrupting the people. They have been warned countless times to stop.

Harry Henry was shot dead by the IRA on 21st April 1987. The IRA statement claiming responsibility said:

Since the last execution of one of their staff in Magherafelt the directors of the firm have re-stated to their work-force that they are more determined than ever to assist the British in the repair and building of their bases. Furthermore, they openly used the firm's vehicles to transport members of the British army and UDR about the country.

The Sunday Life reported that Harry Henry’s son, Robert Henry, was charged with conspiracy to murder Sinn Fein Councillor Joe Davey (who was actually murdered in February 1989. Robert Henry was convicted of possession of weapons and attempting to procure weapons, and was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 1991 (Rebel Hearts, p64). Robert Henry claimed that it was bitterness over his father’s murder that led him into loyalist terrorism, and that the RUC was guilty of “entrapment” over how he was led into the UVF.

There is evidence to confirm the IRA’s contention that employment in the security forces could overlap with employment at a contractors servicing security force bases. There is also evidence that there was a third strand of activity within these contractors: membership of loyalist paramilitary organisations.

The IRA in Tyrone seemed confident that Henry Brothers workforce contained members of the security forces, as well as members of the UVF. As Kevin Toolis wrote “the IRA’s determination to hit Henry Brothers and the alleged UVF cell among its workforce intensified” (Rebel Hearts, p65).

In 1990, the IRA shot and killed Henry Brothers’ employee Derek Ferguson, in front of his two sons, who were left alone with their father’s body. Ferguson was related to Willie McCrea, and the IRA alleged that he was in the UVF. The UVF denied that he was. Ferguson was a “close friend” (Rebel Hearts, p73) of Leslie Dallas who was shot dead by the IRA. Dallas was a former UDR man who owned a garage. Ed Moloney wrote that Dallas, like Ferguson, was related to Willie McCrea, and was “a UVF member and a leading member of one of the four UVF families in the East Tyrone–South Derry area” (Secret History of the IRA). 

In 1977, Leslie Dallas and his brother were charged with arms offences in Coagh. The IRA claimed to have spotted Ferguson in a car that was later used in an attack on a republican target. Willie McCrea, with typical sectarian bombast, proclaimed at Ferguson’s funeral that “these Roman Catholic terrorists in the IRA are liars.” Like the IRA, loyalists have often hidden membership of a murder victim for political, or other practical, reasons. The IRA men killed at Cappagh are one example, another is Alan “Smudger” Smith, described as an innocent victim at the time, and now acknowledged as a senior militant loyalist by the Police Ombudsman, and the Irish News.

The Jameson Brothers, Portadown

On the 2nd of November, 1979, 19 year old David Jameson was remanded in custody on charges relating to stealing a Walther .22 pistol, and eight rounds of ammunition. He was not charged with UVF membership, but his co-accused were. The BBC referred to his having been convicted of this offence in a documentary detailing the UVF/LVF feud that started in 2000.

The Belfast Telegraph reported that David Jameson was also charged with loaning his UDR issued personal protection weapon to a UVF unit. Among those charged with him was future LVF murderer, Clifford McKeown. McKeown was convicted of the murder of Michael McGoldrick, a Catholic taxi driver. Another man charged with him was Robert Nigel Willis, then aged 24, and of Markethill. In 2000, the BBC reported reported that a 27 year old man named Nigel Willis was charged with possessing the weapon used to kill Richard Jameson, and of membership of the LVF. I do not know if the two Willis men are related, or if they are the same man with an incorrectly given age in one of the two reports.

In April 1991, an IRA car bomb exploded in his car, and he suffered severe injuries including the loss of one leg, and two fingers. The IRA said in a statement that he was targeted as a UVF member, in response to recent murders of nationalists by the UVF. The Jameson family said in a statement that he was not in the UVF. David Jameson, in the Spotlight documentary, said that he was targeted because his firm worked on security force bases.

David Jameson is one of nine siblings with four sisters, and four brothers. According to BBC Spotlight, all five Jameson brothers served in the security forces, as did their mother. David was a member of the UDR, who served a jail sentence for hijacking a vehicle.

According to Spotlight, the Jameson clan became wealthy through construction and were “one of the most powerful families in Portadown … two of the brothers ran building companies which handle lucrative contracts for the security services.” Bobby Jameson, who ran one of the companies, still had police protection in the year 2000. Interestingly, he was then vice-chairman of Portadown FC (now chairman).

The Jameson family became known more widely when Richard Jameson, described at the time as the UVF “Brigadier” in Portadown was shot dead by the LVF. It is alleged that Richard Jameson had an altercation with an acolyte of Billy Wright, Muriel Landry (AKA Muriel Gibson). Jameson is alleged to have struck her (Sunday Mirror, 16th Jan 2000). LVF prisoners on Christmas parole at a social club linked to Portadown FC verbally abused Jameson about this. Later that evening, a group of men severely beat the LVF prisoners. Richard Jameson was shot dead not long afterwards.

Then First Minister of Northern Ireland, David Trimble, visited Jameson’s widow, Moira, and had this to say about the family:

the family are well known in this town … local businessmen … [who] have contributed a lot … let’s leave it there.

The Spotlight documentary shows the surviving Jameson brothers painting over LVF graffiti and murals and handing out leaflets condemning the LVF. Such activities are the work of brave men, but one might be excused for thinking that the Jameson brothers had a degree of protection and/or back-up.

Richard Jameson did not feature in a recent history of the UVF, and where he is mentioned, it is generally only in terms of his assassination. Portadown was home to a virulently sectarian UVF unit, but Jameson often holidayed in the Republic, where his brother had a house in Galway. One source on Spotlight said that he was “a leading light in the community … brought in to reign in the dissidents.”

Richard Jameson was buried with no paramilitary trappings. His funeral was very well attended, with mourners from across NI and Scotland, some of them wearing UVF ties. Loyalist prisoners and politicians gave death notices. PUP leader Billy Hutchinson said that “all he wanted to talk about was keeping peace in Portadown.”

I found the case of the Jameson brothers interesting on a number of levels. Entrepreneurial Protestants with links to the security forces and loyalist paramilitaries, they nonetheless were not targeted with anything like the same ferocity as Henry Brothers. In histories of the Troubles, the Portadown UVF has a number of names which appear frequently. None of the Jameson brothers appeared until the year 2000.

It could be that the IRA in that area were not capable enough to launch a sustained campaign, or that they didn’t consider the Jameson brothers as “legitimate” targets. Or there could be other reasons. I simply don’t know.

For my next piece, I’m going to look at an IRA attack on a contractor outside Tyrone and South Derry, and how the murder of Trevor Kell could be linked.

⏩ Brandon Sullivan is a middle aged, middle management, centre-left Belfast man. Would prefer people focused on the actual bad guys. 

The IRA’s War Against Security Force Contractors – Part Ⅰ

Brandon Sullivan ✒ with the first in a two part series looking at Provisional IRA targeting of civilian contractors servicing the British Repressive State Apparatuses. 

Dublin - 1985

On the 20th August 1985, the IRA shot dead a wealthy building contractor named Seamus McAvoy, in Dublin. McAvoy was alleged to have been involved in the supplying of building services to the RUC. The IRA statement read:

Mr McEvoy (sic) had been given many, many warnings - by telephone, by letter and by IRA attacks on his premises on Coalisland - about his collaboration with the occupation forces in the North. We repeat our recent warnings to those in the construction industry and those who are working in barracks they will suffer the consequences of such collaboration.
Mr. McEvoy, who supplied Rowan cabins and building materials to barracks and military border posts for renovations work, was not earning an honest day's pay but was receiving ill-gotten gains. From such military bases operations have been hatched which have resulted in the murders of nationalist civilians and IRA volunteers. Within such bases, nationalist people have been beaten and tortured.
Without such bases, British military power would be severely hampered. There will be no more warnings.

The journalist and writer Kevin Toolis noted, as others had, the precedent set in previous historical republican campaigns of destroying security force bases, and that the only surprise was that the Provos had not taken this step before.

McAvoy’s killing was unusual in the IRA’s campaign against contractors to the security forces in that it took place in the Republic. Overall, significantly more Protestant than Catholic contractors were killed, but in the opening stages of this campaign, this was not the case, with two out of the first three being Catholics.

The Campaign in the North in the 1980s


One year on from the McAvoy killing, an IRA spokesperson acknowledged that there was “some resistance” to including these contractors on a list of “legitimate targets” but that it has faded. In fact, the spokesman claimed:

The tactic was biting well. [John] Kyle had just been shot and while that was still fresh, it was decided to press on.” Footage of Mr Kyle’s funeral can be seen here, along with responses to the enhanced threat from the IRA.

The spokesman talked of a highly successful campaign, with “at least 50” organisations contacting the republican movement to confirm to them that they had stopped supping the security services with everything from building material to milk.

The spokesman continued:

Nobody has yet worked out the rationale for this, which is obvious. It's crippling the RUC. They will now have to leave their barracks for their milk, their coffee, their bread. Extra jeeps will be needed to protect the jeeps going out for supplies. There won't ever be enough, so the army will have to be called in and that will be a reversal of their Ulsterisation policy to normalise the situation.
The tactic will also throw routine patrolling and administration into chaos. The patrols in Nationalist areas will be thinned out and this will make it much easier for the IRA to carry out operations.

So, in republican terms, it was a success, according to the IRA spokesman. Kevin Toolis in Rebel Hearts also noted that the IRA’s campaign increased the cost of repairing and rebuilding bombed security force installations rocketed, and became extremely dangerous.

Loyalists, perhaps in response to this new threat from the IRA, threated nationalist taxi drivers and stockists of republican newspapers:

The UFF appeared . . .  threatening Catholic workers and those who distribute republican publications or drive in black taxis in nationalist areas of Belfast.

Tyrone – Henry Brothers, the UVF, the UDR, and the IRA

Kevin Toolis wrote a detailed analysis of the targeting by the IRA of Henry Bros building contractors in his book Rebel Hearts. During a meeting with the leadership of the East Tyrone Brigade, one IRA man said:

Henry Brothers are collaborating in the oppression of the nationalist people by taking part in that work, just as the British Crown is forcing those workers to prostitute themselves because of the huge money involved. They are corrupting the people. They have been warned countless times to stop.

Harry Henry was shot dead by the IRA on 21st April 1987. The IRA statement claiming responsibility said:

Since the last execution of one of their staff in Magherafelt the directors of the firm have re-stated to their work-force that they are more determined than ever to assist the British in the repair and building of their bases. Furthermore, they openly used the firm's vehicles to transport members of the British army and UDR about the country.

The Sunday Life reported that Harry Henry’s son, Robert Henry, was charged with conspiracy to murder Sinn Fein Councillor Joe Davey (who was actually murdered in February 1989. Robert Henry was convicted of possession of weapons and attempting to procure weapons, and was sentenced to 12 years in prison in 1991 (Rebel Hearts, p64). Robert Henry claimed that it was bitterness over his father’s murder that led him into loyalist terrorism, and that the RUC was guilty of “entrapment” over how he was led into the UVF.

There is evidence to confirm the IRA’s contention that employment in the security forces could overlap with employment at a contractors servicing security force bases. There is also evidence that there was a third strand of activity within these contractors: membership of loyalist paramilitary organisations.

The IRA in Tyrone seemed confident that Henry Brothers workforce contained members of the security forces, as well as members of the UVF. As Kevin Toolis wrote “the IRA’s determination to hit Henry Brothers and the alleged UVF cell among its workforce intensified” (Rebel Hearts, p65).

In 1990, the IRA shot and killed Henry Brothers’ employee Derek Ferguson, in front of his two sons, who were left alone with their father’s body. Ferguson was related to Willie McCrea, and the IRA alleged that he was in the UVF. The UVF denied that he was. Ferguson was a “close friend” (Rebel Hearts, p73) of Leslie Dallas who was shot dead by the IRA. Dallas was a former UDR man who owned a garage. Ed Moloney wrote that Dallas, like Ferguson, was related to Willie McCrea, and was “a UVF member and a leading member of one of the four UVF families in the East Tyrone–South Derry area” (Secret History of the IRA). 

In 1977, Leslie Dallas and his brother were charged with arms offences in Coagh. The IRA claimed to have spotted Ferguson in a car that was later used in an attack on a republican target. Willie McCrea, with typical sectarian bombast, proclaimed at Ferguson’s funeral that “these Roman Catholic terrorists in the IRA are liars.” Like the IRA, loyalists have often hidden membership of a murder victim for political, or other practical, reasons. The IRA men killed at Cappagh are one example, another is Alan “Smudger” Smith, described as an innocent victim at the time, and now acknowledged as a senior militant loyalist by the Police Ombudsman, and the Irish News.

The Jameson Brothers, Portadown

On the 2nd of November, 1979, 19 year old David Jameson was remanded in custody on charges relating to stealing a Walther .22 pistol, and eight rounds of ammunition. He was not charged with UVF membership, but his co-accused were. The BBC referred to his having been convicted of this offence in a documentary detailing the UVF/LVF feud that started in 2000.

The Belfast Telegraph reported that David Jameson was also charged with loaning his UDR issued personal protection weapon to a UVF unit. Among those charged with him was future LVF murderer, Clifford McKeown. McKeown was convicted of the murder of Michael McGoldrick, a Catholic taxi driver. Another man charged with him was Robert Nigel Willis, then aged 24, and of Markethill. In 2000, the BBC reported reported that a 27 year old man named Nigel Willis was charged with possessing the weapon used to kill Richard Jameson, and of membership of the LVF. I do not know if the two Willis men are related, or if they are the same man with an incorrectly given age in one of the two reports.

In April 1991, an IRA car bomb exploded in his car, and he suffered severe injuries including the loss of one leg, and two fingers. The IRA said in a statement that he was targeted as a UVF member, in response to recent murders of nationalists by the UVF. The Jameson family said in a statement that he was not in the UVF. David Jameson, in the Spotlight documentary, said that he was targeted because his firm worked on security force bases.

David Jameson is one of nine siblings with four sisters, and four brothers. According to BBC Spotlight, all five Jameson brothers served in the security forces, as did their mother. David was a member of the UDR, who served a jail sentence for hijacking a vehicle.

According to Spotlight, the Jameson clan became wealthy through construction and were “one of the most powerful families in Portadown … two of the brothers ran building companies which handle lucrative contracts for the security services.” Bobby Jameson, who ran one of the companies, still had police protection in the year 2000. Interestingly, he was then vice-chairman of Portadown FC (now chairman).

The Jameson family became known more widely when Richard Jameson, described at the time as the UVF “Brigadier” in Portadown was shot dead by the LVF. It is alleged that Richard Jameson had an altercation with an acolyte of Billy Wright, Muriel Landry (AKA Muriel Gibson). Jameson is alleged to have struck her (Sunday Mirror, 16th Jan 2000). LVF prisoners on Christmas parole at a social club linked to Portadown FC verbally abused Jameson about this. Later that evening, a group of men severely beat the LVF prisoners. Richard Jameson was shot dead not long afterwards.

Then First Minister of Northern Ireland, David Trimble, visited Jameson’s widow, Moira, and had this to say about the family:

the family are well known in this town … local businessmen … [who] have contributed a lot … let’s leave it there.

The Spotlight documentary shows the surviving Jameson brothers painting over LVF graffiti and murals and handing out leaflets condemning the LVF. Such activities are the work of brave men, but one might be excused for thinking that the Jameson brothers had a degree of protection and/or back-up.

Richard Jameson did not feature in a recent history of the UVF, and where he is mentioned, it is generally only in terms of his assassination. Portadown was home to a virulently sectarian UVF unit, but Jameson often holidayed in the Republic, where his brother had a house in Galway. One source on Spotlight said that he was “a leading light in the community … brought in to reign in the dissidents.”

Richard Jameson was buried with no paramilitary trappings. His funeral was very well attended, with mourners from across NI and Scotland, some of them wearing UVF ties. Loyalist prisoners and politicians gave death notices. PUP leader Billy Hutchinson said that “all he wanted to talk about was keeping peace in Portadown.”

I found the case of the Jameson brothers interesting on a number of levels. Entrepreneurial Protestants with links to the security forces and loyalist paramilitaries, they nonetheless were not targeted with anything like the same ferocity as Henry Brothers. In histories of the Troubles, the Portadown UVF has a number of names which appear frequently. None of the Jameson brothers appeared until the year 2000.

It could be that the IRA in that area were not capable enough to launch a sustained campaign, or that they didn’t consider the Jameson brothers as “legitimate” targets. Or there could be other reasons. I simply don’t know.

For my next piece, I’m going to look at an IRA attack on a contractor outside Tyrone and South Derry, and how the murder of Trevor Kell could be linked.

⏩ Brandon Sullivan is a middle aged, middle management, centre-left Belfast man. Would prefer people focused on the actual bad guys. 

21 comments:

  1. Brandon, This is a very good and granular piece of research.

    ReplyDelete
  2. In all wars and conflicts civillians are targeted. During WW11 Arthur "Bomber" Harris head of Bomber Command made no "distinction" between military and civillian targets. His rationale was that civillians work in Nazi factories thus aiding the German "war machine". Without these civillians working away the German millitary's ability to wage war would be severely depleted. For this reason he made no apologies for bombing Dresden and Hamburg, carpet bombing not precision attacks.

    The same argument, it appears, was used by the IRA in the six counties. If its good for "Bomber Harris" and the USAAF in Japan then the IRA case is a strong one.

    Caoimhin O'Muraile.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Just that Bomber Harris is widely regarded as a war criminal

      Delete
    2. The Provos branded those of provided portakabins and civilian building contractors as 'collaborators' yet are very keen to hold on the memory of Sean Russell, a one time Chief of Staff and Nazi collaborator. A few years back Mary Lou McDonald made a complete fool of herself claiming Russel .was a "militarist" but not a "Nazi collaborator". He offered logistical and tactical support to Hitler's regime which makes him a collaborator in anyone books.

      There is more irony in Sinn Fein's support and defense of the only statue to a Nazi collaborator in Europe. Hats off to those attacked the statue shortly after is was erected.

      Delete
    3. AM says,
      "Just that Bomber Harris is widely regarded as a war criminal"
      And many conversely regard him as hero.

      Harris followed direct orders from the British Cabinet to implement the 'Area Bombing Directive', a plan put forward by Professor Frederick Lindemann, the Chief Scientific Advisor who also sat at cabinet.

      Delete
    4. It is rare to find a war criminal not regarded as a hero in the circles which approved of their actions. Perhaps the most prominent war criminal alive is Kissinger. He is currently discoursing on Ukraine. In the case of Harris he found himself progressively marginalised by the British establishment - with no small dose of hypocrisy and double standards. Had Harris been a Nazi they would most likely have hung him at Nuremburg.
      I think Brandon is right - the analogy doesn't work very well.

      Delete
  3. I don't think the 'Bomber' Harris comparison works in this instance. The IRA could have reduced large swathes of London to rubble, killing hundreds if not thousands in deliberate attacks, but didn't. Loyalists could have done the same with Dublin.

    Birmingham, Dublin & Monaghan happened but were unusual tactically.

    I struggle to accurately categorise the killing of contractors. Morally, if one considers Henry Brothers "collaborators" then Fred Anthony was, too. But Fred worked a humble job for presumably meagre pay, and he worked alone, not in a yard with British soldiers protecting him and UDR workmates with UVF connections.

    There is a difference there but I can't quite find the words.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Dublin and Monaghan succeeded in its intention - not sure Birmingham did. I would not regard Birmingham despite all its horrific properties as a war crime on a par with Kingsmill.

      Delete
    2. One man's terrorist is another's freedom fighter.
      There's always going to be a subjective divergence on these matters.
      The IRA for the largest part needed to avoid unnecessary civilian casualties in their operations ... particularly so after Birmingham. They needed to manage the PR battle as well as the actual one fought on the ground; to avoid as much negative publicity as possible in the media and keep as many as possible, of their largely conservative and moralistic supporters, on board.
      That's the tightrope they had to walk, and as they moved towards electoralism that became even more essential. The intensity of the random sectarian, and security forces enabled, assassinations of CRN's coupled with the drive for electoral success did as much as, and even probably more, than any moral outrage or repugnance did to move the military campaign towards an end.

      There are many seeking retribution for events of the past yet there aren’t many who hold such information which could lead to prosecutions coming forward with names and details. I wonder if those now plodding through the moral quagmire of the past would feel obligated to offer up such information if they had access to it?

      Delete
    3. Truth can often be about recrimination rather than reconciliation. The awkward joints between Truth and Reconciliation have been all too visible yet there is an expectation that we should gloss over them.

      Delete
  4. In the documentary The Fog of War, Robert Macnamara acknowledged that he and Curtis LeMay would have been tried as war criminals if they'd lost WW2.

    I don't know much about Birmingham - but I think the 'Balcombe Street' ASU definitely attacked civilian targets with intent, iirc.

    @ AM - how was the campaign against contractors perceived in jail?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. as would those who bombed Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

      By the time Teebane happened I had felt it was strategic low hanging fruit. I made the point that if the majority of the targets were ancillary rather than central, at the bottom of the target hierarchy rather than at the tope, it had to be statement of where the IRA armed struggle was at.
      But it was not a view widely shared.

      Delete
    2. "By the time Teebane happened I had felt it was strategic low hanging fruit."

      And a way of stiffing Prods.

      Surely they would have known that this would have, and did, provoke a murderous reaction from the Loyalists?

      Delete
    3. Steve - I don't think it was seen as a chance to kill Protestants in the way that Grahams Bookies was a chance to kill Catholics. They were not targeted because of their religion. However, had they been a van load of Catholics, I very much doubt they would have been hit. And that is in spite of what happened to Patsy Gallagher and the human bomb. I think that is where the sectarian dimension lies.

      Delete
    4. But did the response not factor into their thinking?

      Delete
    5. I think it would have had to given the very active nature of loyalism at the time.

      Delete
    6. Further proof of the utter madness of it all.

      Delete
  5. Looking forward to Part II.
    The planning, bravery, and even luck, required of the IRA to launch attacks on crown forces installations was astounding.
    That contractors would come in afterwards to work on these facilities is equally astounding.
    Both groups took risks, but volunteers did so for love of country, the others...how much did they get paid? What were the equations or odds that they used in their heads to justify the risk?

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. "Both groups took risks, but volunteers did so for love of country, the others...how much did they get paid? What were the equations or odds that they used in their heads to justify the risk?"

      Because PUL are all about the pay and not the country? Dream on.

      And the IRA loved the place so much they blew the shite out of it and murdered anyone who dared rebuild it?

      Again, dream on.

      Delete
    2. John, what was so brave about shooting John Kyle, a highly popular businessman in the Omagh area, as he was having a quiet pint in a country pub in Greencastle?

      Delete
  6. John, 'the others' did it to earn a living. It's called being working class.

    ReplyDelete