Sinn Fein Ignores the Dissidents at their Peril.

Guest writer radical unionist commentator Dr John Coulter, former a columnist with The Blanket, with an exclusive offering for The Pensive Quill. Here he ponders if Sinn Fein can politically allow the dissidents of the New IRA to develop like the former Provos.

The fall-out from the murder of leading north Dublin Real IRA boss Alan Ryan could be to re-launch the dissident republican movement in the South. To prevent this becoming a political reality, Sinn Fein will need to join the legions of commentators trying to present Ryan’s killing as part of the gangland war between criminal elements.

But chatting to an Oglaigh na hEireann source in the immediate aftermath of the Ryan killing, I got the distinct impression that those who did not share the Sinn Fein peace process agenda could use his death to their own political advantage.  The ONH source said Ryan had left behind “a tight knit group in north Dublin”. He had known Ryan since he was 17 when Ryan joined the Fianna of Republican Sinn Fein. He later progressed to the Real IRA.

Always well dressed because of his upbringing and a committed non drinker and non smoker, according to the ONH source, Ryan was “pretty high up in the Real IRA ranks, he was a big mover, was well thought off, honest and charismatic”.

It was this impression, said the source, which made Ryan “very prominent and well respected” among the other dissident republican factions.

The key question is; will Ryan’s murder act as a fresh springboard to kick-start the sporadic terror campaign by republican dissidents in the North, and develop a way of recruitment among impressionable young republicans in the South?

The main ingredient in this republican mix will be the impact of the formation of the so-called New IRA - effectively an amalgamation of the Real IRA, Republican Action Against Drugs (RAAD), and a number of independent former Provo cells.

The problem, too, for Sinn Fein, is how the Northern and Southern security forces will operationally react to the New IRA. Publicly, their response has been mooted. There have been no Dad’s Army-style ‘Don’t Panic, Don’t Panic’-style speeches from leading PSNI officers. Such senior commanders are still emphasising a significant threat still exists from dissidents.

In the early years of the dissident republican terror campaign - in spite of the disaster of the Omagh massacre - the main aim was to publicly embarrass Sinn Fein into condemning actions by violent republicans.

When Sinn Fein took its seats on the Policing Board in the North, the dissidents’ plan was to target Catholic members of the security forces. Senior Sinn Fein officials - particularly Stormont deputy First Minister Martin McGuiness (a former Derry PIRA commander) - were forced into situations to describe so-called fellow republicans using language not heard since the Irish Civil War between pro and anti-Treaty factions.

From a nationalist perspective, the growth of the Provos at the start of the conflict in the 1960s was that the British Government tried to impose a colonial-style military solution in Northern Ireland as if it was fighting the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya.

Foolishly, the British Government listened to key Unionist Brian Faulkner and introduced internment. Internment and Bloody Sunday in Londonderry gave the Provos their best recruiting tools.
Unionists responded by trying to brand the Civil Rights Movement as a movement against the state, even though many working class Protestant families found themselves living in the same social poverty as their Catholic counterparts. Thousands of working class loyalists would have equally benefited from Terence O’Neill’s reforms.

But the Right-wing of Unionism was not taking the reforms seriously enough, and a strong movement was emerging lead by a certain Ian Paisley senior. Provisional republicans were able to use the Civil Rights Movement to goad both the Stormont and Westminster administrations into making unwise military decisions. While the B Specials had been crucial to crushing the 1956-62 IRA border campaign, the late Roman Catholic Cardinal Conway was instrumental in getting the B Men disbanded.

Bearing these historical developments in mind, the key question is how the dissident republican movement creates a situation whereby the British and Irish governments adopt the view they can jointly crush the dissidents through a military strategy.

With the DUP snugly entrenched in the power-sharing Stormont Executive with Sinn Fein, and little likelihood of major revivals of fortunes for either the election -battered Ulster Unionists or feud-ridden SDLP, the chances of a tough-talking and effective SDLP/UUP Opposition emerging at the Assembly are next to nil.

The British are notorious for their back-channel talks with republicans. They are the masters of the secret talks. What happens if dissident republicans can wring more meaningful concessions from the British and Irish governments than Sinn Fein in the Dail and Stormont?

How could the British and Irish administrations sell the concept of a ’shoot to kill’ policy against dissident? What happens if loyalist hardliners in the UDA and UVF rise to the dissident bait and begin a limited form of retaliation?

Is there a scenario whereby IRA members loyal to the Sinn Fein peace strategy would return to some kind of Night of the Long Knives reprisals to eliminate the dissident republican threat in the same way as the Provos launched a similar offensive against the republican breakaway faction, the Irish People’s Liberation Organisation?

Now that London and Dublin has Sinn Fein totally immersed in the peace process, the governments can turn their attention to persuading the dissidents to join the democratic process. The British are notorious for their ’acceptable level of violence’ approach while negotiations are in progress.

The New IRA might embark on a terror campaign which would provoke either the British to indulge in a return to their Kenyan Mau Mau tactics, or else provoke grumbling loyalists into resuming their sectarian campaign against Catholic targets.

In either scenario, Sinn Fein could not allow the New IRA to emerge into the old Provisionals. To prevent this, it must either become like Fianna Fail after the end of the Irish War and push the dissidents finally into influential oblivion, or it could open negotiations with the dissidents to bring them into the peace process under Sinn Fein’s wing.

What Sinn Fein cannot do, is sit around and pretend the dissidents do not exist. Sinn Fein ignores the dissidents at their peril. 

Posted in: Guest Writer,Physical Force Republicanism,Sinn Fein