Most of the civil rights goals had been achieved even before PIRA was formed

In light of the recent claims from nationalists that there was ‘no alternative’ to Provisional IRA terrorism, it may be useful, especially for those too young to remember, to revisit the events of 1969–70 that preceded and surrounded the formation of the Provisional IRA in December 1969 and the beginning of its campaign from around June 1970.

Much of the ‘no alternative’ commentary relates to the apparent ‘suppression’ of the civil rights movement.

While a number of civil rights marches were indeed attacked, far from being suppressed, the movement – led by people like John Hume – was actually incredibly successful. In a short period of time, and before the Provisionals had even been formed, it had wrung a list of concessions from the government: one-man-one-vote in council elections; Londonderry Corporation was abolished and a review of local government boundaries initiated to deal with gerrymandering; powers over housing allocation were to be transferred from local government to a new Housing Executive; the B-Specials were to be abolished; an ombudsman was set up to deal with discrimination in the public sector.

Also cited is the failure of the state to prevent nationalist houses in Bombay Street and elsewhere from being attacked and burned by loyalists, reportedly supported by some police, in August 1969. This was the horrible culmination of days of rioting that had in fact been initiated by nationalists in Derry, who had attacked first a loyalist parade and then the police (the ‘Battle of the Bogside’), and was then deliberately extended to Belfast as a tactic to stretch police resources. Nationalists on the Falls Road attacked police stations and businesses with petrol bombs. Loyalists came out to confront the rioters and inter-communal violence ensued.

Police killed a number of nationalists and nationalists shot loyalists. These horrendous events were brought to an end by the deployment of the army. Calm was thankfully restored and attacks such as that on Bombay Street were ended.

The troops were initially welcomed by nationalists during a ‘honeymoon period’ that lasted many months until the spring of 1970. During this period, incidents of civil unrest did still continue, but were inter-communal in nature more so than the army attacking nationalists.

Indeed, it was loyalists who came into confrontation with the army, two of whom were killed while rioting in protest at the Hunt Report. Between the deployment of the army and the beginnings of the PIRA campaign in June 1970, not a single Catholic was killed, compared to four Protestants: two by the army, one by republicans, and one by a UVF ‘own goal’.

Relationships between nationalists and the army did eventually deteriorate. One of the key moments being a riot at Ballymurphy at Easter 1970, widely believed to have been engineered by the Provisionals, who were uneasy about a benevolent relationship between nationalists and the army and were keen to exploit resentment at the enforcement of security measures such as curfews that was seen as heavy-handed.

Escalation in June was connected to tensions around the marching season and involved in the Provisionals killing five Protestants and one Catholic in Belfast, and four of their own and one innocent Catholic in a Derry ‘own goal’. It wasn’t until the following month that the first nationalist was killed by the army during the Falls Road curfew.

The PIRA campaign, therefore, was clearly not a defence against a loyalist and police attacks. Such attacks had ended months before. It was deliberately engineered and was an offensive, not a defensive campaign.

JM,

Belfast (Name and address with the editor)