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Christopher Owens  ✍ “The grist that curtails will make us strong/And you'll be dead before I'm born/Puh!” - The Fall

31st August.

A memorable date for a variety of reasons: the terror of knowing that summer was over and that a new term of school was coming up still takes up space in my psyche around this time. It’s also a time whenever Seasonal Affective Disorder can kick in for many.

However, two anniversaries occur on this date that, for many, helped to shape the world we currently live in.

***


On this day 32 years ago, it was announced that the Provisionals had declared a ceasefire.

I vividly recall the euphoria and mistrust in the air. We were in uncharted terrain. Looking back at the process that began in October 1982 and would only be concluded in July 2005, this was a major milestone that had come about through sheer bluff and deception on the part of Gerry Adams whose personas of 'man of war' and 'peacemaker' became a high wire balancing act and, remarkably, he pulled it off while avoiding a major split within the IRA (although he was nearly deposed during an IRA convention in 1996).

Was it worth it?

For republicans, it meant they could call the Provos an undefeated army (although how they square that with British rule still in place is a different matter). For loyalists, it meant that they were still British (although the next 30 years would throw up many an ideological quandary that haunts them today). For the ordinary people, it was the first step on a road to normality that is not finished but does at least offer a way forward.

In some ways, globalisation has now given the situation in this country a wedge that has pushed both sides even further apart: nationalism/republicanism (generally) has gone Eurocentric while unionists/loyalists (generally) has gone in a Brexit style direction. Both of these, combined with a decaying infrastructure, loss of common bond within communities, disconnect between elected representatives and the voters and stagnant wages, has added an extra layer of gunpowder onto a tinderbox (as we saw in Belfast a few months ago).

But the road to peace must continue.


***

The second event is the death of Diana, occurring 29 years ago.

Undoubtedly a preventable death given an added layer of sordidness thanks to the knowledge that paparazzi snapped pics of the aftermath without offering assistance, it was undoubtedly a shock to wake up that morning and hear the news.

However, what was unprecedented was the public display of mourning which veered into mass hysteria. Even William and Harry have talked about feeling bewildered at what was unfolding.


Of course there were other factors at play, ones that you could trace from Gazza's tears at the 1990 World Cup. With the fall of the Soviet Union, the launch of the Premier League, Britpop, the rise of New Labour, the pre-millennium optimism and the 'end of history' euphoria that would be further emphasised by the IRA ceasefire arguably contributed as well. Britain was seemingly ready to throw off the shackles of its recent past and wanted to party like it was 1966 but at the same time demonstrate that the old stoicism was gone, to be replaced by emotional vulnerability.

Thus, the caring 90's was born.

And Diana fitted in perfectly: a wronged woman who was seemingly going against the aloof and staid royal family by not only divorcing but also with her choice of partners. Don't believe me? Bea Campbell wrote of Diana’s Panorama interview that, to the ‘chagrin of the establishment’, Diana had:

joined the constituency of the rejected – the survivors of harm and horror, from the Holocaust, from the world war and pogroms, from Vietnam and the civil wars of South America and South Africa, from torture and child abuse.

Mourning her death not only allowed you a chance to have a pop at the royals but also show just how much of a good person you are. And woe betide anyone who dared step out of line with the prevailing sentiment.


This included the likes of:

🔴Private Eye, with Ian Hislop later told The Independent that “The fact is that is that this supposed deep grief expressed itself in terms of self-righteousness.”

🔴Christopher Hitchens, who described the whole thing as being fuelled by “…a deferential mass media that became an echo chamber and feedback loop to the blubbering classes.”

🔴Fabio Piras, who was attacked by a former builder because he stole a teddy bear from outside the palace. The builder was later quoted as saying that he “…did it for Diana. She was the Queen of everyone's hearts. How dare he come over and do this.''

***

All these years later, seeing a defanged Sinn Fein get upset by Andy Burnham’s comments re. a border poll while celebrating Kieran Nugent and downplaying reports they had defaced a mural for Brendan Hughes, I can’t help but marvel at how the revolution has gone.

Likewise, seeing various politicians and political commentators use the suicide of Jason Arday as an opportunity to batter their enemies and regulate the press goes to show how dissenting voices are needed now more than ever.

August 31st. The end of summer but also the beginning of post-truth.

⏩ Christopher Owens was a reviewer for Metal Ireland and finds time to study the history and inherent contradictions of Ireland. He is currently the TPQ Friday columnist and is the author of A Vortex of Securocrats and “dethrone god”.

Midnight In The Century

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of Two Thousand And Eighty Two

 

Religious Derangement Syndrome @ 14

 

A Morning Thought @ 3254

Micheál Choilm Mac Giolla Easbuig ★ What was Andy Burnham actually saying about the British controlled; and sometime, maybe, poll, on their version of a united Ireland?

  
It could be viewed as a 'Freudian slip' by him. But it is more likely that his 'handlers', the 'Deep state actors' like, MI5, Ml6 and others, had a hand in his choice of words. Maybe they wanted to say to Sinn Fein ' stay in your box, we hold all the cards here'.

The other question is: Were the Shinners really shocked? If yes, that would show a serious level of political naiveity and misjudgment.
 
But, l suspect that the Shinners know the craic. They cannot but know that the English ruling class and the deep state actors, will decide, when or even if, a poll on Their (an English) united Ireland will be called at all. In fact, that's written in 'black and white' in the, so called, Good Friday Agreement (GFA).

Not alone that, the British will decide the wording of such a poll. The poll will Not be an all-Ireland poll. But two separate polls, one North and one South. That is their stated plan. And ultimately, even if the poll result is in favour of their united Ireland, it will need a certain percentage majority, which will, again, be decided as appropriate or not, by the said, English ruling class.

And when all those 'hurdles are jumped through', the English rulers will then decide If or How the result in favour of their united Ireland, will be implemented. Baile Átha Cliath, America and the EU will hold a 'watching brief', favourable, to the English of course, throughout all of these political shenanigans.
 
All that said, I have no doubt that when the British 'deep state', imperialism and capitalism, decides that an all-Ireland arrangement (their united Ireland) suits their needs better, they will do just that; no matter what is said, not said or written . . .  ever. Unionist protests or not. We know that from the 1922 Free State arrangement, to this very day; but now with BaileÁthaCliath, Yankee and EU backing.
 
That's what article 3.2 of the IRA Constitution was designed to ensure; a 32 County Socialist Republic; clearly stated. But that has been abandoned, long ago by the careerist Sinn Fein leadership, in favour of going along with the Imperialist and capitalist, status quo.

The 'United Ireland' that the ruling class i Baile ÁthaCliath, the Brits, the Yanks and EU are talking about . . . a shared/agreed island et al, will be a retention of the capitalist and imperialist system we presently exist under. And Dublin, via it's NATO and EU Army preparations, is lining itself up for just such a settlement.

It will be an Ireland controlled by the minority 'powerful and wealthy ' for the benefit of that powerful and wealthy elite; and at the expense of the majority, the poor and working poor. Unaffordable homes, a two tier health service, an underfunded and expensive education system; combined with poor wages and conditions for the majority, the working class. The poor and working poor will continue to struggle to exist and not live a decent life or benefit fully from the wealth they always create. No change there.

This is where the SF project has went and it will fail. They had many opportunities in the last 60 years, to build a people powered, decentralised democratic system; and utilise Revolutionary politics, as opposed to the politics of the powerful and wealthy, at council level, Stormont, Teach Laighean and Europe.
 
I really put no value on polls, laws, promises or otherwise, that emanates from those in power or their servants. Eight hundred years + of English/British occupation, their laws and false promises, tells us all we need to know. As does the three hundred years of the life of capitalism.

Micheál Choilm Mac Giolla Easbuig 
is an independent councillor on Donegal County Council.

Burnham Burns Border Poll

Owen Jones 📹 with a video posted by Israeli Nazi Itamar Ben Givr.

Ben Gvir is Israel's National Security Minister. 

Yes It's Real

Anthony McIntyre ☠ Defence spending has come to the fore in Irish political discourse from the moment Russia's right wing authoritarian leader ordered his country's military to invade Ukraine.

Ireland's Defence Minister Helen McEntee's bobbing and weaving in recent days suggests she might be more suited to a boxing ring than a government portfolio. Direct answers are not her thing, ducking and diving considered just fine in the bamboozling exercise that serves as government communication policy.

The UK too has faced the same disquiet. Prime Minister Andy Burnham - having evicted from No 10 anti-human rights lawyer Keir Starmer - has failed to assuage his critics, some within his own ranks, of his commitment to increase defence spending to a level of 3% of the GDP by 2030.

Enter Kemi Badenoch, leader of the Tories with a proposal that is neither original nor surprising. Her plan for raising the £10bn required is to hit the poor, and certainly not tax the rich.

According to the Daily Sceptic, Bad Enoch wants to slash.

The Conservatives say their savings will include £4 billion through housing benefit reforms, and £3.1 billion from reimposing the two-child benefit cap. They will end the £1 billion annual funding increase for the British Business Bank and save £1 billion by ending VAT exemptions for motability vehicles.

The Labour Party cast scorn on her proposals, ridiculing the previous Tory government's commitment to Defence.

These unserious plans are hardly surprising from the same Tory Party that hollowed out our Armed Forces, shrinking the British Army to its smallest size since the Napoleonic era.

Badenoch is making a pitch to the wealthy.

The first duty of every government is defence, and the Conservatives will always put our defence first.

She seems determined to defend British citizens against Russian aggression but not defend them against the aggression of the greedy rich, better known as poverty.

⏩Follow on Bluesky.


Bad Enoch

Caoimhin O’Muraile  ☭ Frank Ryan was an Irish republican and socialist who fought on the anti-Treaty side of the Irish Civil War. 

He was born into a family of nine in the townland of Bottomstown near Elton, County Limerick to parents, Verne Foster Ryan and Annie Slattery, both national School teachers in 1902. He died in Dresden Germany in 1944, and it is the Dresden connection which has prompted some revisionist and reactionary ( and some not so reactionary) historians to paint an erroneous picture of Ryan, suggesting his views may have changed. Some claim, citing his stay in Nazi Germany, that Ryan switched sides from radical socialist, Marxist, towards an ideological Nazi-style side, claims which are unfounded. 

Frank Ryan was an Irish Republican Army (IRA) Volunteer who fought in the Irish Civil War against the Irish Free State forces and later, in 1934, along with George Gilmore, Michael Price, Nora Connolly O’Brien (daughter of James Connolly) Peadar O’Donnell, and many others formed the left-wing Republican Congress. He left the mainstream IRA due to ideological differences which, in Ryan's case, meant socialism. Frank Ryan fought in the Spanish Civil War against the reactionary fascist forces of General, later Generalissimo, Francisco Franco and was heavily involved in the fighting at the Battle of Jarama in February 1937 where his friend and comrade, Kit Conway, met his death. Ryan succeeded Conway taking command of the Connolly Column, part of the XV International Brigade. 

On 31st March 1938 Frank Ryan was captured by Franco's allied Italian forces and imprisoned initially in Mora del Ebro and San Pedro de Cardena before being moved to Burgos Prison and sentenced to death. In October 1938 Ryan was visited in Burgos Prison by the Irish minister to Spain, Leopold Kerney, who secured a lawyer for him paid for by the Irish government. Despite the lawyer's - Jaimie Michel de Champourcin - best efforts the Spanish regime would not grant Ryan's release. His death sentence was commuted, after the intervention of Eamon de Valera, to 30 years imprisonment and he did secure his release by a least expected organisation and certainly unlikely wing of the German establishment.

Frank Ryan was released into the custody of the German Intelligence Service, the Abwehr under the command of Wilhelm Canaris, on 15th June 1940. At the time the Nazi/Soviet non-aggression pact was still in play so, albeit cautiously, acceptance of Abwehr hospitality was acceptable to Ryan as a socialist especially when his life depended on it. The situation was not ideal but, by comparison with the alternatives, Gestapo custody and certain torture, Canaris and the Abwehr was the best attainable. Wilhelm Canaris, unknown to Hitler and the Nazi Party, was not a follower of the dictator and was anti-Nazi, something he managed to keep secret for many years, But was eventually discovered and executed by the SS. Canaris was an old-style right-wing Conservative but no Nazi. 

Unlike the Gestapo the Abwehr was aligned with the German armed forces, the Wehrmacht, therefore the methods of the Gestapo were usually not adopted by the intelligence service. The Gestapo kept hounding the Abwehr for Ryan to be handed over but Canaris stood his ground. The Gestapo were interested in Frank Ryan's anti-fascist work and his involvement in the International Brigades in Spain and, had they been successful in securing him into their custody, Ryan would almost certainly have been tortured to death. Plus the former IRA Chief of Staff, Sean Russell, had been in meetings with the Nazis, working on the old maxim; ‘my enemy’s enemy is my friend’ which though applicable in the First World War most certainly was not in World War II. Russell died on board a U Boat of a perforated ulcer returning to Ireland. 

While Ryan was in Germany he had no passport, no legal status, and was entirely dependant on the Abwehr for accommodation. Being in the custody of the Abwehr must have seemed fortunate given the alternatives were the SS or the Gestapo, possibly both! As a guest of the intelligence service it was not perfect, far, far from it, but certainly preferable. At this point and perhaps at no other did Ryan know many of his hosts were also anti-Nazi. The head of the Abwehr, Wilhelm Canaris, even managed to smuggle a small number of Jews out of the clutches of the Third Reich but unlikely any of this would have been known to Frank Ryan, Canaris was playing a very dangerous game, one which would eventually cost him his life.

Another ruse the Abwehr played to keep Ryan out of Gestapo custody was denying any such person was in their custody. They had a ‘Frank Richards’ under arrest and this was nothing to do with the Gestapo or the SS Canaris informed his inquisitors. Had Ryan been handed over to the Gestapo they would have, after extensive torture, in all probability executed him as a communist. While in German custody at no point did Frank Ryan change or even modify his political and ideological views in any way. It was simply a battle of survival. And with the Abwehr things were a lot more favourable than the alternatives. 

The protective shield the Abwehr provided for Ryan was invaluable. Remember, the Nazis were not a normal government even by the standards of the day. The concept of the IRA coming firmly down on the Nazi side during the war may have been perceived as beneficial to Sean Russel but highly unlikely that Frank Ryan would have approved. Ryan was aboard the U Boat on which Russell died but was nothing more than a passenger. 

Those who would have us believe Frank Ryan changed his political position while in German custody are wrong. If anything his anti-fascist stance, though kept under wraps, may well have been strengthened. The narrative about Ryan dropping socialism may suit what some reactionaries wish to believe but that does not make such nonsense a fact, it was, and remains at best a myth. It is true he did ‘collaborate’ in the true sense of the word but this was a on a minimal basis as part of staying alive. ‘Collaborate’ had many different guises during the Second World War ranging from sympathetic collaboration of people like Quisling in Norway, Petain in France, to the mildest form adopted by ordinary people under occupation who just wished to stay alive. Those who adopted the latter would not cause any trouble for the Germans and hoped that would be enough to see them through. If Frank Ryan did ‘collaborate’ it was in the mildest sense and there is no evidence to suggest anything different.

Irish republican and International Brigade leader Frank Ryan died on 10th June 1944 at a hospital in Dresden, Germany, at the age of 41. The cause of death was pleurisy and pneumonia and he had been in poor health for many years. He had been living in Germany since 1940 where his remains stayed until repatriation in 1979 when the Irish government successfully repatriated his body. He was reinterred with a large republican funeral at Glasnevin Cemetery in Dublin.

Caoimhin O’Muraile is Independent Socialist Republican and Marxist.

Frank Ryan 🪶 Myth V Truth

Lynx By Ten To The Power Of Two Thousand And Eighty One

 

A Morning Thought @ 3253

Jim Duffy ✍ The West's response is invariably timid and that timidity plays into Putin's hands. 


Autocrats see the world in zero sum ways: win vs lose, where they show determination and are winners and the West shows timidity and are losers. That is how they invariably see things. It is rigidly black and white. Issuing tough statements and shutting down a consulate is in Russia's eyes classic Western timidity. 

The West reminds me of a notorious Irish judge who is endlessly weak on criminals and literally thinks that saying "you are being bold! Now stop it!" is being tough. A robber robbed a house I lived in. The Gardaí caught him. The case went to court, but when they heard what judge they had I remember a guard sighing and saying they had wasted their time. Sure enough the judge told the criminal to "stop being so bold" and gave him a short suspended sentence. The robber already had three suspended sentences having over him, but the Gardaí said to me that they didn't know what crime that robber had to commit to actually get sent to prison. I remember the robber walking out of the court and in the hall outside laughing at the Gardaí and giving them the finger. He knew that judge would effectively let him off. He always did.
 
The West's endless handwringing "tough talk but no serious action" approach is just like the judge.

It is worth reminding people that Putin says he is at war with Europe. Every single country. Not just NATO countries. All the neutrals too - Switzerland, Austria, Cyprus, Malta and Ireland. They are all targets according his ambassadors. The Russian ambassador made it clear that Ireland is a target and "will be dealt with."
 
The West thinks in terms of a gradient up to war, with cyber-attacks, drone attacks, etc as below war level. That is not how Russia thinks. It sees cyber-attacks and drone attacks as an actual war tactic. They saw the cyber-attacks on Ireland as war attacks. Of course the Irish government while knowing definitively Russia was behind them didn't even announce the fact publicly, instead saying they didn't know and investigations "are still ongoing." They actually finished investigations years ago and know precisely where they came from (right down to the building) and who ordered them. At least this time the Germans named who was responsible. Britain did not name who had planted parcel bombs in DHL,  parcels that caught fire in a warehouse in Birmingham thankfully before they had been put on a plane.

⏩ Jim Duffy is a writer-historian.

The Timid West

Anthony McIntyre ☠ The UUP leader Jon Burrows was described last month by Tom Kelly in the following unflattering terms:

Self assurance - is meaningless without self awareness. Jon Burrows is a loquacious confident speaker but the output is a word salad of political nothingness, contradictions . . .

The inference is that as a former RUC officer Burrows has brought the force's lack of self awareness into the heart of the political arena with all the self assurance of one of Bertrand Russell's fools and fanatics who are invariably so 'certain of themselves,' while wiser counsel is often 'so full of doubts.'

However we choose to assess him he is neither foolish nor fanatical when denouncing attacks on the Ballymena war memorial in August. Twice over a three day period the memorial was vandalised. Flags were stolen and flag poles broken. 

Mr Burrows castigating the attacks as “despicable and deeply disrespectful” added that he was:
 
absolutely disgusted to learn that this memorial has been attacked and damaged for a second night over the course of this weekend. This is not simply an act of mindless vandalism. It is an attack on a place of remembrance dedicated to those who made the ultimate sacrifice during the Great War.
This memorial provides a quiet place where people can sit, rest and reflect. More importantly, it serves as a lasting reminder of the men and women who gave their all in service and sacrifice . . . To attack this memorial once was disgraceful. To return and target it for a second night shows a level of contempt for our community, for the volunteers who care for this area and, above all, for the memory of those commemorated here . . .
Whatever motivates someone to deliberately target such a place, there can be absolutely no excuse for it.

Whether Great War or Great Waste, hate crime as alleged by the PSNI or clown crime, desecration of space reserved for quiet reflection in memory of lives lost should have as much place in discursive practices as the N word. 

Critics are entitled to view the slaughter of World War 1 with the same contempt that Connolly and others did: an imperialist grab where lions were sent to their deaths by donkeys. That entitlement does not extend to desecration of memorial tributes to the dead of that war. Memorial marauding is as wrong in Ballymena as it is in Twinbrook where the Brendan Hughes mural was defiled by goondas associated with Sinn Fein. It is no different from what the IDF did in Gaza to a war cemetery, where satellite imagery showed:

extensive earthworks in the southernmost corner of the graveyard. Bomb craters can be seen around the cemetery, but in this area the destruction appears to have been more systematic.
Rows of gravestones have been removed, the topsoil has been churned up and a substantial earth berm can be seen running across the middle of the affected area. It is of a size that suggests the use of heavy equipment.

Despise the fallen and what they died for if we wish, but allow the dead to rest in peace and the living to remember them in peace. 

⏩Follow on Bluesky.

Desecration

Irish Times 📰 Written by Sinéad O'Sullivan. 

Europe has stumbled into a new growth paradigm with a reliance on the permanent threat of war

At the launch of the White Paper for European Defence – Readiness 2030, Ursula von der Leyen declared the era of Europe’s peace dividend “long gone”. Peace, apparently, was a phase that we have now outgrown.

The EU’s centre of gravity has rapidly moved from a focus on trading to armament, as outlined by von der Leyen in early 2025, and this transfer of meaning is not happening through defence memorandums but through nation state treasuries. Consider the following: the European Commission is in the midst of mobilising €800 billion defence spending by 2030; more than 15 member states have activated “escape clauses” to enable an economic breach of fiscal rules to procure weapons; €150 billion of so-called “bomb bonds” has been raised for collective borrowing; a new multilateral bank – the Defence, Security and Resilience Bank – is targeting hundreds of billions of euro, with Belgium, Greece, Romania, Latvia and Ukraine among its founders; Canada has been admitted as a non-EU member state, in a leadership role, on many of these initiatives.

Continue @ Irish Times.

The Irish Government Is Helping To Usher In A New Wartime Economy In Europe

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