While 2023 will, hopefully, see me clock up 45 years reporting on political developments in Northern Ireland, at times of crisis for Unionism, it seems loyalists prefer to beat the Ulster Independence drum from time to time.
The inability of Unionism to rid itself of the Northern Ireland Protocol, which is posing a clear threat to the future of the Stormont institutions, especially as the cost of living crisis begins to bite hard over the winter months, loyalists are again turning to the concept of an independent Ulster - especially as Unionism is now a minority ideology at Stormont, and the recent census shows that the gap between Protestants and Catholics in Northern Ireland has all but evaporated.
It should be noted that when Unionism feels the Union is safe, an independent Ulster is always off the table as a ‘nonstarter’. But if the body politic in Unionism feels Northern Ireland has been placed on a slippery slope to a united Ireland, the independent Ulster drum is well and truly battered!
It’s been almost four years since the last time such a drum was beaten - and that was in the aftermath of Brexit. I last penned an article on an independent Ulster in July 2019.
In all reality, an independent Ulster has been viewed as more of ‘doomsday solution’ than a serious workable alternative to the ending of the Union. It was always seen as a purely loyalist and Protestant solution and never took account of the number of pro-Union folk from the Catholic community.
Its first real serious entry into the Unionist political arena came in the aftermath of the collapse of the Sunningdale power-sharing Executive following the Ulster Workers’ Council strike of 1974. Essentially, Unionism had no workable alternative to Sunningdale, so independence for Ulster was on the agenda for loyalism by default!
At that time, it was being pushed by the Vanguard Unionist movement, then one of the most influential pressure groups within the pro-Union community. But Vanguard made the error of becoming a separate political party and by the end of the Seventies was almost defunct as a movement.
The Ulster Defence Association dabbled with the concept of Ulster independence to give the terror group a distinct political agenda compared to the overt socialism of the rival Ulster Volunteer Force’s political wing, the Progressive Unionist Party.
It would not be until 1985 and the signing of the Anglo-Irish Agreement, which gave Dublin its first real say in the running of Northern Ireland since partition in the 1920s, that Ulster Independence would emerge seriously again.
The Dublin accord mobilised a section of the loyalist community which had been politically silent for a number of years. A series of militant organisations were launched, all with an agenda linked to an independent Ulster.
As part of the broad Ulster Says No campaign, the UDA openly erected recruitment posters. A grassroots movement known as the Ulster Clubs was launched, mirroring the Unionist Clubs which were formed in the early 1900s to combat the influence of the Home Rule for Ireland movement.
The red-berated Ulster Resistance paramilitary group emerged in 1986, again with a pro-independence agenda to combat the threat to the Union. The UDA, Ulster Resistance and the Ulster Clubs were all advocating an independent Ulster in some shape.
More overt pro-independence groups emerged, such as the Ulster Movement for Self-Determination (MSD), and the Ulster Independence Committee (UIC).
MSD wanted a nine-county independent Ulster with Southern border counties being used as security ‘buffer zones’ between the new loyalist state and the Republic of Ireland. The UIC version of independence was based on the current six-county Northern Ireland.
Now, with the prospect of a total collapse of Stormont if a future Assembly election does not result in the restoration of the devolved institutions and a potential Sinn Fein government in the Dail, loyalists are again revisiting their independence option.
But the brutal reality which the pro-independence lobby within loyalism continually cannot answer is - who will bankroll an independent Ulster?
It certainly won’t be Westminster as the concept of an independent Ulster is based on the view that the London establishment wants to cut Northern Ireland adrift from the Union.
Indeed, would the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association, which represents some 50 national and regional parliaments across the globe be prepared to fund the new statelet? This could be a non-starter given the influence of the British Government in the CPA.
It won’t be the Americans given the massive influence which the Irish American lobby wields, particularly within the Democratic Party in the United States.
That only leave three significant power blocks for an independent Ulster to look towards - rejoining the European Union, China and Russia.
Given the war in Ukraine and the growing tensions in China, neither of these superpowers are in a current position to take on the bill for an independent Ulster.
In short, Ulster independence remains a theoretical debating topic. Until loyalists can find a significant financial sponsor who will fund independence, the concept will remain nothing more than a sabre-rattling agenda.
Its danger is that it could propel the hardmen of Ulster loyalism to the fore as a significant force against the Protocol.
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The next call for “Ulster Independence” will be as successful as the previous time this hair-brain idea was floated. And now that the perpetual Unionist majority is no longer in place it will have even less appeal, not unless counties Antrm and Down wish to form a new nation.
ReplyDeleteIf Unionist had any sort of political foresight (no laughing at the back of the classroom) they would be back in Stormont as fast as possible. It’s the last place they have any sort of collective voice. Donaldson is looking more and more ridiculous and isolated as the days go by at Westminster.
It's a non-starter because it's a daft idea. Besides, if a referendum in the 6 counties of Northern Ireland vote for a UI then the PUL community MUST abide by it because if they do not, it shows the world they are not Democrats and only interested in self-preservation.
ReplyDeleteSad when you think about it. The South is far removed from that theocratic state that played the Unionist bogey man so well yet the PUL community can't see it.