SOCIALIST UNITY

6 Responses to BRITISH STATE TERRORISM

1. Nice to re read this, one of the best things in Socialist Review for a while was that piece. Heres to the innocents slain and to the great campaign that finally got some truth about that terrible day.

   Posted by cliff foot 30 January, 2012 at 12:10 pm

2. As always, a very clear analysis by one of the sharpest minds of the Irish Left.

   McCann exposes here the real nature of the British presence in Ireland.

   Posted by Charlie Maguire 30 January, 2012 at 12:34 pm

3. The Guardian today runs a piece saying that the marchers have been exonerated and David Cameron has apologised. So what did the Guardian say at the time? They blamed the demonstrators for the killings:

   ‘The organisers of the demonstration, miss Bernadette Devlin among them, deliberately challenged the ban on marches. They knew that stone throwing and sniping could not be prevented, and that the IRA might use the crowd as a shield.’ (Guardian, 1 February 1972)

   When Lord Wigery’s report into the killings was widely denounced as a whitewash, the Guardian disagreed. ‘Lord Widgery’s report is not one-sided’, it led. Indeed they questioned Widgery’s view that trouble could have been avoided if the army had kept a low-key attitude: ‘To ask anyone to keep a low-key attitude if persistently stoned is to ask superhuman behaviour.’ (Guardian, 20 April 1972)

   Posted by James Heartfield 30 January, 2012 at 12:38 pm

4. James Heartfield,

   Scratch the surface of a liberal and you will find a reactionary.

   Posted by red snapper 30 January, 2012 at 2:33 pm

5. One of the girls killed in the post 1992 election bombing in London wasn’t born when this happened, one of the last soldiers killed in Northern Ireland in 1998 wasn’t born when this happened.

   Posted by John P reid 31 January, 2012 at 10:23 am

6. #5 Interesting facts, but what’s the significance?

   Personally I was around at the time, and although I was only 8 I distinctly remember hearing the Monday morning news as the priest describing giving the last rites to a young man who had just been shot in cold blood.

   I also remember the feeling, as someone with a precocious interest in military and historical matters that ‘our’ army was also capable of murdering unarmed civilians.

   I was English, living in England from a family with no more Irish connection than most, and less than many, so I can only imagine the feeling amongst many 8 year olds from the same community as the victims.

   I think the Cameron apology had little in reality to do with the enquiry as I suspect the establishment has always known what happened that day. The point is that the war is over and the exorqWneration of the victims is a symbolic part of the peace process.

   I would be more impressed if with it came some sort of guarantee that it won’t happen again in another conflict, and there is little sign of that guarantee to put it mildly!

   Posted by Vanya 31 January, 2012 at 11:57 am