The Murder of Robert McCartney: The War on Terror in Northern Ireland
newsisyphus.blogspot.com
By NewSisyphus
As regular readers know, we don’t hold much stock in the “Americans are ignorant about world affairs” stereotype. On the contrary, we’ve found the average American more informed and thoughtful about foreign lands than, say, your average Frenchman. However, if there is one foreign policy issue where we would agree with the stereotype, it’s with regard to Northern Ireland.
Indeed, if you ask most Americans about NI, you’re likely to find that the responses fall into three broad categories. First, there are those who don’t know the difference between NI and the Irish Republic and just generally have no clue. Second, there are those who will tell you that “the Protestants and the Catholics” have been fighting there. Third, you’ll find the American Irish pub types who will say, with anger, that “the British need to get the hell out of there.” All wrong and wrongheaded in their own way.
There are a number of reasons Americans are woefully under- and misinformed about NI, not the least of which is demography. Irish nationalists formed a great part of the late Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century influx of immigrants into the U.S. and their political culture quickly became part of American political folklore, repeated in Democratic Party ward meetings and St. Patrick’s Day festivities ever since.
In fact, talk to anyone about NI for any length of time and it’s only a matter of minutes before you’re swimming in a hazy, green sea of mythology. From the Great Potato Famine to Bobby Sands, nationalist political thinking has fully permeated American political culture.
We’ve always wondered why the IRA and its splinter groups have avoided mention in our War Against Terror. If there ever was an international terrorist group, one with the will and desire to kill and maim innocents in their quest to turn Ireland into a Celtic version of East Germany, the IRA is one. From bombing Second World War vets on parade to teaching the FARC how to more effectively kill Americans in Colombia, the IRA has done it all.
Yet for the most part the Bush Administration has had little to say about NI beyond the standard boilerplate. This is a mistake, because the people of NI are also yearning for the end of the age of terrorist, as recent events have shown.
The story begins, as most stories involving the IRA do, with a murder. A young Catholic man from Belfast named Robert McCartney was killed by IRA men in a Belfast pub on January 30. As is usual, the IRA sent out the word that no one was to speak to the police about the murder and witnesses should shut up if they know what’s good for them. The pub where McCartney was killed was locked tight and cleaned of evidence while the 70-odd patrons were given that time-honored IRA warning: do what we say or we’ll kill you and your family.
The IRA commander on the scene told the people “You saw nothing. This is IRA business.”
Except this time, no one listened. The McCartney family, of impeccable Republican credentials, courageously and valiantly stood up to the extreme social and political pressure and demanded in public that all people with knowledge of the crime step forward. What happened next was nothing less than the NI equivalent of what you’re now seeing in Martyr’s Square in Beirut; a long-suppressed people stepped forward to demand justice, sick and tired of living under a tyrannical and cruel yoke.
Under pressure from those it condescendingly calls “its people,” the IRA announced that it had kicked out three of its “volunteers” and urged them to seek legal representation. History in NI being what it is, no doubt the leaders of IRA/Sinn Fein thought that was enough and the story would end there.
But it didn’t. The McCartney family released a statement that cheered the hearts of the average people of NI that read:
"We welcome the fact that the IRA has accepted unequivocally that their members were involved in Robert's cold-blooded murder and the subsequent cover and clean-up operation.
"We acknowledge that they have taken action against particular members in the form of expulsions and are in the process of conducting their own procedures against others involved. The statement confirms what our family has maintained all along that Robert was a completely innocent man."
It’s hard to over-estimate the vicious control of some areas of Belfast the IRA has. When their leaders pass by, you stop and doff your cap. When their men speak, you jump. And when they tell you to do something, you do it. Ignore these rules and you’ll be shot in the kneecaps, or has become more popular of late, between the palms while your hands are tied in a praying position, thereby giving you the “IRA stigmata.” So, you can see that what the McCartneys were doing was virtually unprecedented.
Like their friends in the FARC, the old ideological crusade is merely so much cover for what has become a thriving organized crime racket. From drugs to protection extortion to bank robbery, the IRA is one of the world’s most successful crime syndicates. And like all such thugs, taking the lives of the little people who populate their planet is not only a trifling thing, it’s practically their right.
After a vicious bank robbery, more “punishment” beatings and killings and then the murder of McCartney, the sheen has quickly fallen off of Sinn Fein. It’s taken a number of years, but finally more than just Unionists are seeing Sinn Fein for what it is: the smiling face of fascism. Despite all the good will and bending over backwards possible expended by both the British and Irish Governments, not to mention that of the average people of the North and the Republic, the IRA still stubbornly refuses to live up to any of its commitments under the Good Friday Agreement. And any attempt to ask it to do so is met with P. O’Neill communiqués threatening to re-start what this little band of little men call a “war.”
By Feb 28, the popular revolt against the IRA’s self-anointed role of police, judge, jury and executioner was picking up steam. Signs appeared on Belfast and Derry/Londonderry streets of McCartney’s children with the slogan “Why My Daddy?.” Shockingly, graffiti began to appear in nationalist/republican neighborhoods reading “PIRA Scum Out!.” The family, led by the McCartney sisters, began appearing at public rallies—unthinkable just a few years ago—demanding justice and accountability.
Then the McCartneys took the campaign to the place where it could really hurt the PIRA and its murderers: the United States. Sadly, and as many a British diplomat will complain to you, the U.S. is where SF/IRA does most of its fundraising, from those above-identified Americans buying in to the lyrical mythology set to Enya music that a smiling Gerry Adams is more than happy to sell 5th generation Irish Catholics in Boston or San Francisco.
As the story began to circulate in the U.S., Sinn Fein experienced a modest version of the same popular backlash the murder caused in NI itself. Accustomed to raising funds here and meeting the President, SF moved into full damage-control mode. Old reliable Adams was trotted out, complete with full beard, charming brogue and turtleneck sweater, to assure Americans that SF was for “justice.”
The fact that our Administration allows SF fund raising to occur sickens and upsets us. In fact, it is one of the things that we are most ashamed of and, truth be told, when we hear a British cousin railing on the hypocrisy of our stance on this issue, all we can do is sadly agree. Our political culture is so infused with Republican myths that we Americans simply have gone blind in the face of terror in this instance.
The fact that the main enemy of the IRA is a long-time friend of the United States makes it that much more painful. From WWI to WWII, the Unionist men of Northern Ireland fought shoulder-to-shoulder with the G.I., while the sad nationalist government was signing condolences books at the German Embassy expressing its sorrow and regret when Hitler killed himself. Unionists have been in Ireland for centuries, much longer than we have been in North America, which makes cries of “go home!” a bit hard to swallow. It’s true that much of the Unionist bad press is self-inflicted: the civic oppression of Catholics through the 1970’s, the rise of fanatics like Ian Paisley, the stubborn refusal to change with the times. But you’ll not find a better man in British politics than David Trimble, and when Trimble tells you he’s done all he can to bring the IRA on board a democratic solution, you can take that to the bank.
Thousands attended McCartney’s funeral, in direct defiance to SF/IRA. Word has reached us that Sein Fein was dis-invited from this year’s St. Patrick’s Day celebrations at the White House.
Well, we suppose that’s a start. Terrorism is terrorism is terrorism. There is no dealing with it, no negotiating with it. A weakness on one front is a weakness on all. Our demand for justice, liberty, the rule of law and democracy should not stop at the Middle East.
The United States, for reasons political, financial and historical, has enormous influence in Northern Ireland. We should use that influence to open up a northern front. |
