Beginning of the End of Northern Ireland?
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Author Topic: Beginning of the End of Northern Ireland?  (Read 6606 times)
Statilius the Epicurean
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« Reply #75 on: February 24, 2021, 09:07:55 PM »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...
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Zinneke
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« Reply #76 on: February 25, 2021, 05:00:51 AM »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

It was unionists, not the IRA, that caused the failure of Sunningdale
But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...
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CumbrianLefty
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« Reply #77 on: February 25, 2021, 09:11:09 AM »

Its not for nothing that the late Seamus Mallon said the GFA was "Sunningdale for slow learners" Wink
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afleitch
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« Reply #78 on: February 25, 2021, 09:15:40 AM »
« Edited: February 25, 2021, 10:08:06 AM by afleitch »

Of course Loyalists absolutely didn't have a paramilitary wing and committed terrorist acts.
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« Reply #79 on: February 25, 2021, 10:08:11 AM »

Of course Unionists absolutely didn't have a paramilitary wing and committed terrorist acts.

Not to mention the RUC.
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Statilius the Epicurean
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« Reply #80 on: February 25, 2021, 10:29:12 AM »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

It was unionists, not the IRA, that caused the failure of Sunningdale
But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...

What relevance does that have to the fact that Provisional IRA acceptance of the GFA and its decommissioning was an admission of defeat?
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Coldstream
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« Reply #81 on: February 25, 2021, 07:45:29 PM »

Of course Loyalists absolutely didn't have a paramilitary wing and committed terrorist acts.

This.

People forget/don’t understand that the loyalist paramilitaries were just as, if not more, blood thirsty than the IRA. They will never back down. And I say this as someone who’d probably be called a soft unionist.
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Estrella
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« Reply #82 on: February 26, 2021, 01:47:20 AM »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

With politicians who have attitudes like this, it's honestly a miracle that Spain somehow managed to solve the ETA situation and that there isn't an Exèrcit Republicà Català (yet).
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Crane
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« Reply #83 on: February 26, 2021, 02:11:06 AM »
« Edited: February 26, 2021, 02:14:38 AM by Clarence Thomas is a Terrorist »

It seems that soon, the major chunks of the "United" Kingdom will only be England and Wales.

Cymru am byth. Long live Glyndŵr.
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Zinneke
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« Reply #84 on: February 26, 2021, 03:09:26 AM »
« Edited: February 26, 2021, 06:10:45 AM by Zinneke »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

It was unionists, not the IRA, that caused the failure of Sunningdale
But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...

What relevance does that have to the fact that Provisional IRA acceptance of the GFA and its decommissioning was an admission of defeat?

Because this pre-supposes that Sunningdale was in any way sustainable at that moment in History.

The 25 years do make a difference, and by then the IRA was perhaps tired but not defeated, not in the slightest. They wrote the textbook on urban insurgency (not condoning this nor their horrific terrorist acts in Britain) and forced a stalemate against a pretty strong state with experience in counter-insurgency from their colonial past (although that turned out to be a burden when dealing with the initial Irish Civil Rights movement).

Conditions, especially globally, were united for "Sunningdale" to become acceptable again, to both sides.

It was also mainly to point out to tack50 that Unionists are not innocent in this whole process, no matter how much he wants to project his Spanish centralism (another counter-productive ideology that is also radicalising the Catalan and Basque movements faster) on the conflict.
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Former President tack50
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« Reply #85 on: February 26, 2021, 05:41:17 AM »
« Edited: February 26, 2021, 06:16:15 AM by Senator tack50 (Lab-Lincoln) »

With politicians who have attitudes like this, it's honestly a miracle that Spain somehow managed to solve the ETA situation and that there isn't an Exèrcit Republicà Català (yet).

There actually used to be one!. They were finally crushed and the white flag waved in 1991. Their toll stands at 200 attacks, a couple dozen injured and 5 dead (4 of which were terrorists messing up explosives lol).

However their highest profile attack is the kidnapping of Federico Jiménez Losantos in 1981, a radio presenter who is nowadays known for his far right takes and hilarious nicknames of several politicians; though back then he was just centered on the defence of the Spanish language in Catalonia (he was even nominally left wing at the time and ran in the 1980 Catalan election as the candidate of the "Socialist Party of Andalucia"!)

However, as critical as I am of them, I will always praise Catalan secessionists for being 100% non violent and not resorting to terrorism (unlike the Basque country or NI). Indeed this is also a reason why they are so popular. Just look at the Basque Country actually. Excluding the 2009 election there, nationalist parties used to get somewhere around 55-65% of the vote on average. However the pro-terrorism HB only got about 17-18%*; meaning not just all Spanish unionists, but also a majority of Basque nationalists, rejected violence and terrorism.

Terrorism was also a very convenient excuse for unionists to reject any talks; a common line in those days was "With violence we cannot talk about anything. Once we have peace we can start talking" (which we now know was a convenient excuse but people didn't know that at the time Tongue )

I have absolutely 0 doubts that a Catalan version of ETA would be extremely divisive among separatists themselves, and only get perhaps 5-10% support at best; compared to the 45-52% that secessionists enjoy now with their peaceful methods.

*: It gets slightly more complicated as their support stayed constant throughout the 80s and 90s, then fell in half after an attempt at a Basque version of the GFA failed because of the terrorists. I am not going to claim that the Spanish government never negotiated; but one of the lines of the GFA (giving NI the right to a referendum to join the ROI) would have never been accepted by any Spanish government.



It was also mainly to point out to tack50 that Unionists are not innocent in this whole process, no matter how much he wants to project his Spanish centralism (another counter-productive ideoogy that is also radicalising the Catalan and Basque movements faster) on the conflict.

Pretty sure I mentioned in a previous post I also think several unionist parties in NI should have been banned just like I think Sinn Fein should have been banned (most notably the DUP, though the clearer cases involve the paramilitary based Vanguard or PUP). Northern Ireland's politics are that terrible; to the point where you have to ban the parties of >50% of the electorate (as of now, I imagine in the 70s, 80s and 90s thankfully cooler heads were prevailing in the electorate)

Of course I do not really trust the UK to do that since the loyalist terrorists would have been helping them; but in an "ideal" world, the loyalist terrorists would have been crushed and repressed just as hard as the IRA.

PS: I am definitely on the pro-Catalonia / pro-regionalism side of the Spanish debate compared to the national median Tongue Definitely not a centralist.

"Crushing ETA and not surrendering" was a thing shared by all parties here back in the day; though all Spanish governments did attempt peace talks that failed at several points because as I mention the main aim of Basque secessionists (a referendum) is something that the UK had to concede, but that no Spanish government ever would.



Ironically after a quick read of the very few differences between Sunningdale and the GFA; it is worth noting that a progressive Spanish government could have passed something like Sunningdale; but not the GFA. Self-determination being the key red line.
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Velasco
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« Reply #86 on: February 26, 2021, 06:56:03 AM »

Northern Ireland Catholic nationalists seek the reunification of Ireland, hence they are not "separatists" in a strict sense

Please stop comparisons with Catalonia and Basque Country. They are not Castilian colonies and I wish they remain in friendly terms with the rest of Spain, but in no way opposing separatism means that I am "unionist" like the Ulster folks.

Stop, for God's sake!
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Zinneke
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« Reply #87 on: February 26, 2021, 07:24:11 AM »

Northern Ireland Catholic nationalists seek the reunification of Ireland, hence they are not "separatists" in a strict sense

Please stop comparisons with Catalonia and Basque Country. They are not Castilian colonies and I wish they remain in friendly terms with the rest of Spain, but in no way opposing separatism means that I am "unionist" like the Ulster folks.

Stop, for God's sake!

Calm down. People are entitled to look at Catalonia, the Basque Country, and the Irish Reunification movement alongside each other and do a comparative study.

But you are quite right to point out that doesn't mean you can project your political opinions from one struggle to the other and pretend they are in any way similar.

With politicians who have attitudes like this, it's honestly a miracle that Spain somehow managed to solve the ETA situation and that there isn't an Exèrcit Republicà Català (yet).

There actually used to be one!. They were finally crushed and the white flag waved in 1991. Their toll stands at 200 attacks, a couple dozen injured and 5 dead (4 of which were terrorists messing up explosives lol).

However their highest profile attack is the kidnapping of Federico Jiménez Losantos in 1981, a radio presenter who is nowadays known for his far right takes and hilarious nicknames of several politicians; though back then he was just centered on the defence of the Spanish language in Catalonia (he was even nominally left wing at the time and ran in the 1980 Catalan election as the candidate of the "Socialist Party of Andalucia"!)

However, as critical as I am of them, I will always praise Catalan secessionists for being 100% non violent and not resorting to terrorism (unlike the Basque country or NI). Indeed this is also a reason why they are so popular. Just look at the Basque Country actually. Excluding the 2009 election there, nationalist parties used to get somewhere around 55-65% of the vote on average. However the pro-terrorism HB only got about 17-18%*; meaning not just all Spanish unionists, but also a majority of Basque nationalists, rejected violence and terrorism.

Terrorism was also a very convenient excuse for unionists to reject any talks; a common line in those days was "With violence we cannot talk about anything. Once we have peace we can start talking" (which we now know was a convenient excuse but people didn't know that at the time Tongue )

I have absolutely 0 doubts that a Catalan version of ETA would be extremely divisive among separatists themselves, and only get perhaps 5-10% support at best; compared to the 45-52% that secessionists enjoy now with their peaceful methods.

*: It gets slightly more complicated as their support stayed constant throughout the 80s and 90s, then fell in half after an attempt at a Basque version of the GFA failed because of the terrorists. I am not going to claim that the Spanish government never negotiated; but one of the lines of the GFA (giving NI the right to a referendum to join the ROI) would have never been accepted by any Spanish government.



It was also mainly to point out to tack50 that Unionists are not innocent in this whole process, no matter how much he wants to project his Spanish centralism (another counter-productive ideoogy that is also radicalising the Catalan and Basque movements faster) on the conflict.

Pretty sure I mentioned in a previous post I also think several unionist parties in NI should have been banned just like I think Sinn Fein should have been banned (most notably the DUP, though the clearer cases involve the paramilitary based Vanguard or PUP). Northern Ireland's politics are that terrible; to the point where you have to ban the parties of >50% of the electorate (as of now, I imagine in the 70s, 80s and 90s thankfully cooler heads were prevailing in the electorate)

Of course I do not really trust the UK to do that since the loyalist terrorists would have been helping them; but in an "ideal" world, the loyalist terrorists would have been crushed and repressed just as hard as the IRA.

PS: I am definitely on the pro-Catalonia / pro-regionalism side of the Spanish debate compared to the national median Tongue Definitely not a centralist.

"Crushing ETA and not surrendering" was a thing shared by all parties here back in the day; though all Spanish governments did attempt peace talks that failed at several points because as I mention the main aim of Basque secessionists (a referendum) is something that the UK had to concede, but that no Spanish government ever would.



Ironically after a quick read of the very few differences between Sunningdale and the GFA; it is worth noting that a progressive Spanish government could have passed something like Sunningdale; but not the GFA. Self-determination being the key red line.

Well the issue is that the banning of the parties would deligitamize the "doves" within the parties and paramilitaries supporting them. I also agree that a favoured end goal is an eridaction of the secterian cleavage in party politics* but it has to be done through grassroots movements and campaigning. And making it clear that SF and DUP are too cheeks off the same backside in terms of benefiting from the chaos and the paranoia.

*that includes a United Ireland on the table as an option
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CumbrianLefty
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« Reply #88 on: February 26, 2021, 10:59:47 AM »

It seems that soon, the major chunks of the "United" Kingdom will only be England and Wales.

Cymru am byth. Long live Glyndŵr.

If both Scotland and NI leave the UK, it won't be long until Wales does too.

(and even now, support for independence there is non-negligible)
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EastAnglianLefty
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« Reply #89 on: February 26, 2021, 11:20:37 AM »

This is going to be a hugely hot and controversial take, but in a way I think that the Good Friday Agreement was a mistake. You do not negotiate with terrorists. It would have been vastly preferrable for the IRA to have been utterly crushed than for the GFA to happen.

Except the GFA was the defeat of the IRA. It was more or less what the UK government had agreed to at Sunningdale in 1973, 25 years previously. The IRA armed campaign during the intervening 25 years was to force a united Ireland by collapsing the British state in Northern Ireland militarily; the reason Adams, McGuinness and co. abandoned the armed campaign was because they saw that was impossible to achieve. So the Provisional IRA decommissioned and went into electoral politics.

Ok, I guess I'll slightly change that to "unconditional surrender from the IRA" Tongue (as opposed to the "negotiated treaty" that was the GFA)

It was unionists, not the IRA, that caused the failure of Sunningdale
But my point is that they surrendered in exchange for an agreement that the British government had already made with nationalists and moderate unionists decades ago...

What relevance does that have to the fact that Provisional IRA acceptance of the GFA and its decommissioning was an admission of defeat?

Because this pre-supposes that Sunningdale was in any way sustainable at that moment in History.

The 25 years do make a difference, and by then the IRA was perhaps tired but not defeated, not in the slightest. They wrote the textbook on urban insurgency (not condoning this nor their horrific terrorist acts in Britain) and forced a stalemate against a pretty strong state with experience in counter-insurgency from their colonial past (although that turned out to be a burden when dealing with the initial Irish Civil Rights movement).

Conditions, especially globally, were united for "Sunningdale" to become acceptable again, to both sides.

It was also mainly to point out to tack50 that Unionists are not innocent in this whole process, no matter how much he wants to project his Spanish centralism (another counter-productive ideology that is also radicalising the Catalan and Basque movements faster) on the conflict.

By the mid-1990s, the upper ranks of the IRA were infested with informers. The writing was on the wall.
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #90 on: February 26, 2021, 11:27:58 AM »

By the mid-1990s, the upper ranks of the IRA were infested with informers. The writing was on the wall.

John Hume's strategy of forcing them to the negotiating table by putting pressure on their ability to easily raise funds in the USA also bore fruit: their finances were well known to be a right mess by the middle 1990s. Actually this probably encouraged some senior members to turn informer: not (of course) part of Hume's plan in any sense, but it all added up and pushed in the same direction.
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Battista Minola 1616
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« Reply #91 on: February 26, 2021, 02:20:17 PM »

It seems that soon, the major chunks of the "United" Kingdom will only be England and Wales.

Cymru am byth. Long live Glyndŵr.

Oh, I see you are a man of culture as well. Incidentally, in three days it's the feast of Saint David.
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Statilius the Epicurean
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« Reply #92 on: February 26, 2021, 08:06:23 PM »
« Edited: February 26, 2021, 08:16:06 PM by Statilius the Epicurean »

Because this pre-supposes that Sunningdale was in any way sustainable at that moment in History.

No? The point about Sunningdale is that the Provisional IRA retreated from an armed campaign to unite Ireland by force to surrendering its arms and accepting a power sharing agreement under the British state that had been brokered with moderate nationalists and unionists decades ago. It is a curious "stalemate" where one side surrenders all of its objectives and weapons to the other side that keeps all of theirs.

(And yeah, the same applies to the loyalist groups post-GFA. They're mostly fat old men who call themselves 'community activists' and complain on TV/to Arlene Foster and can't do much else.)
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Crane
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« Reply #93 on: February 26, 2021, 11:31:22 PM »

It seems that soon, the major chunks of the "United" Kingdom will only be England and Wales.

Cymru am byth. Long live Glyndŵr.

Oh, I see you are a man of culture as well. Incidentally, in three days it's the feast of Saint David.

March is a blessed month for Celtic nationalist movements.
St. David, then St. Piran, then St. Patrick.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #94 on: February 27, 2021, 09:42:58 AM »

Because this pre-supposes that Sunningdale was in any way sustainable at that moment in History.

No? The point about Sunningdale is that the Provisional IRA retreated from an armed campaign to unite Ireland by force to surrendering its arms and accepting a power sharing agreement under the British state that had been brokered with moderate nationalists and unionists decades ago. It is a curious "stalemate" where one side surrenders all of its objectives and weapons to the other side that keeps all of theirs.

(And yeah, the same applies to the loyalist groups post-GFA. They're mostly fat old men who call themselves 'community activists' and complain on TV/to Arlene Foster and can't do much else.)

This is not entirely true - a lot of those fat old men also deal drugs.
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« Reply #95 on: February 27, 2021, 03:20:57 PM »

Because this pre-supposes that Sunningdale was in any way sustainable at that moment in History.

No? The point about Sunningdale is that the Provisional IRA retreated from an armed campaign to unite Ireland by force to surrendering its arms and accepting a power sharing agreement under the British state that had been brokered with moderate nationalists and unionists decades ago. It is a curious "stalemate" where one side surrenders all of its objectives and weapons to the other side that keeps all of theirs.

(And yeah, the same applies to the loyalist groups post-GFA. They're mostly fat old men who call themselves 'community activists' and complain on TV/to Arlene Foster and can't do much else.)

This is not entirely true - a lot of those fat old men also deal drugs.

And polish their own guns in case they need them again down the line.
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afleitch
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« Reply #96 on: February 27, 2021, 05:21:12 PM »

Speaking of Loyalist Paramilitaries

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DC Al Fine
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« Reply #97 on: March 01, 2021, 02:30:34 PM »

By the mid-1990s, the upper ranks of the IRA were infested with informers. The writing was on the wall.

John Hume's strategy of forcing them to the negotiating table by putting pressure on their ability to easily raise funds in the USA also bore fruit: their finances were well known to be a right mess by the middle 1990s. Actually this probably encouraged some senior members to turn informer: not (of course) part of Hume's plan in any sense, but it all added up and pushed in the same direction.

How exactly did Hume go about doing that?
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Filuwaúrdjan
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« Reply #98 on: March 01, 2021, 07:19:43 PM »

How exactly did Hume go about doing that?

He cultivated ties with various senior Irish American politicians who were concerned at the situation and wished to lobby heavily in the Irish American community for the necessity of Peace and Negotiation, but felt unable to do anything unless and until they had a very credible figure from Northern Ireland to back them up. It is known that the IRA considered assassinating Hume after they worked out what he was up to, though cooler heads prevailed.
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Tetro Kornbluth
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« Reply #99 on: March 07, 2021, 12:00:20 AM »

Anyway, my position on this is, as I have said before, that merger (a better term I think than 'unification') only happens if middle class Protestant voters decide that the current Northern Ireland is a non-viable entity. Right now, that's clearly not the case. In practice, the only entity that could bring about such an outcome is the British government who, despite having no real interest in trying to achieve this, seems to working fairly hard at the moment in trying to bring about such an outcome.
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