Given the allegations made against him, the presiding judge might have felt he was listening to Harold Shipman deny that he was ever a doctor. Like Shipman, the allegations about a body count have been persistent, the Belfast Telegraph
proclaiming in the immediate wake of his Dublin libel case, Gerry Adams is a man of towering ambition who’d no moral qualms about securing his goal through murder. If the accusations against Adams were upheld as being true - that he was a member of the IRA army council - then critics would feel free to contend that he has been responsible for even more autopsies than Shipman.
In the end the London case against Adams collapsed, giving him not quite his preferred outcome which was a dismissal of the claim on the basis of the evidence before the court. Still, he got a much better result than the claimants who had issued the proceedings against him. And it must be conceded that in his post-court media interview in Belfast he spoke truthfully about one matter - the claimants had been badly advised from the outset - leaving the observer to wonder if they were prompted to take the case by the same element that badly advised them.
While some of the Trump-style lying in London opened him to ridicule - as in his nonsensical contention that he was not the author of the Brownie columns - apologists for Adams have long insisted that he must deny IRA membership otherwise he would be prosecuted and imprisoned. Yet, as Brendan Hughes observed in the H Blocks some months before his release in 1986, he would not expect Adams to admit membership for that very reason, but went on to point out the obvious: a mere 'no comment' would suffice to prevent prosecution. There was no need to lie about membership.
The real reason for the unrelenting organised lying is arguably the need to give cover to those movers, shakers and gatekeepers in the world of politics who could open doors to an extended and enhanced political career for Adams whereby he could prance around as Percy Pompous on the national and international stage, a human rights champion, a statesman, so long as he kept his end of the bargain and strangled the IRA, forcing it to accept British terms for disengagement - unity only by consent. In rendering himself a major asset (as distinct from an agent) to the rich and powerful of this world, his disavowal of IRA membership made it easier for them to open doors for the man they could do business with, while simultaneously serving as the lubricant with which he could oil the wheels of his political career.
Perhaps the institutional instinct of the judge kicked in. As a barrister Jonathan Swift's “favourite clients were the security and intelligence agencies”, so he was well positioned to readily understand how any ruling was likely to play out. He, rather than the Adams legal team, raised the issue of a possible abuse of process which in the end relieved him of any responsibility to make a determination on the merits of the case. While much less robust on the bombings of English cities the evidence of membership seemed pretty compelling in circumstances where only a balance of probability slope had to be scaled in order to reach the summit of culpability. So, while Adams rails against the British establishment's supposed involvement in the case, that same establishment secured the outcome most suitable to it. The London court case was no battle between Gerry Adams and the British state, but a common purpose enterprise that both satisfied and sanctified the preservation of a legal fiction, beneficial to both.
Gerry Adams is fortunate. He lied for Ireland into his seventies while others died for it in their teens and twenties. He was regarded by key colleagues as an effective, ruthless and courageous, but ultimately unsuccessful IRA leader. The guerrilla organisation of which he is reputed to have been chief of staff in 1978-79 spent almost thirty years replacing the unity only by consent principle with . . . the unity only by consent principle: a truth as irrefutable as it is uncomfortable for those who prefer to mystify it by seeking validation not in breaking from London but through lying in London.
In the end the London case against Adams collapsed, giving him not quite his preferred outcome which was a dismissal of the claim on the basis of the evidence before the court. Still, he got a much better result than the claimants who had issued the proceedings against him. And it must be conceded that in his post-court media interview in Belfast he spoke truthfully about one matter - the claimants had been badly advised from the outset - leaving the observer to wonder if they were prompted to take the case by the same element that badly advised them.
While some of the Trump-style lying in London opened him to ridicule - as in his nonsensical contention that he was not the author of the Brownie columns - apologists for Adams have long insisted that he must deny IRA membership otherwise he would be prosecuted and imprisoned. Yet, as Brendan Hughes observed in the H Blocks some months before his release in 1986, he would not expect Adams to admit membership for that very reason, but went on to point out the obvious: a mere 'no comment' would suffice to prevent prosecution. There was no need to lie about membership.
The real reason for the unrelenting organised lying is arguably the need to give cover to those movers, shakers and gatekeepers in the world of politics who could open doors to an extended and enhanced political career for Adams whereby he could prance around as Percy Pompous on the national and international stage, a human rights champion, a statesman, so long as he kept his end of the bargain and strangled the IRA, forcing it to accept British terms for disengagement - unity only by consent. In rendering himself a major asset (as distinct from an agent) to the rich and powerful of this world, his disavowal of IRA membership made it easier for them to open doors for the man they could do business with, while simultaneously serving as the lubricant with which he could oil the wheels of his political career.
Does the London ruling change anything? Not in the slightest. Nobody who last Sunday believed Adams to have been in the IRA believe this Sunday that he was not in it. Even had he lost it would have changed the minds of no one. A judgement that he had been a member of the IRA would have been less uncomfortable for him than it would have been for the British state. A court finding against Adams would have left the state exposed for having - despite all its protestations to the contrary that it had never talked with 'terrorists' - previously negotiated with a person legally acknowledged as an IRA figure, even allowing him to cross the threshold of 10 Downing Street. For the British, better that such is left judicially unsaid.
Gerry Adams is fortunate. He lied for Ireland into his seventies while others died for it in their teens and twenties. He was regarded by key colleagues as an effective, ruthless and courageous, but ultimately unsuccessful IRA leader. The guerrilla organisation of which he is reputed to have been chief of staff in 1978-79 spent almost thirty years replacing the unity only by consent principle with . . . the unity only by consent principle: a truth as irrefutable as it is uncomfortable for those who prefer to mystify it by seeking validation not in breaking from London but through lying in London.
You'd think as he's approaching 80 the realisation that 'wining and dining' on a elevated political stage is coming to an end. Maybe on the day he's lowered into the Milltown turf there'll be a beret and gloves on his box as a final acknowledgement. Nobody believes the denials but it's interesting and unsurprising to see the Shinners who really should know better fall in behind. When the shoe drops they'll still be here and questions asked of them.
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ReplyDeleteThere was a very interesting article by Suzanne Breen on Brendan Hughes and Gerry Adams in the Belfast Telegraph (I read it online). I won’t go into detail, suffice to say, i would encourage everyone to read it. Ot perfectly encapsulates the different roads that both men ended up treading and tbh, I find someone like Hughes, who admitted his past and did not seek to apologise or excuse it, more honorable (whatever you may think of what occurred in the conflict) than the other.
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