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The Ulster Defence Association
(Part I)
Whilst it is possible to trace back the name Ulster Defence
to the Ulster Defence Union set up in 1893 in order to resist the Second Home
Rule Bill the genesis of the Ulster Defence Association, as it is known today,
is very much rooted in the period of the early 1970s. This was a period of great
violence and political uncertainty, and the zenith in terms of the level of
violence that would come from that phenomenon known euphemistically as “the
troubles”. In order to understand the dynamics that were at work in the
formation of the modern day Ulster Defence Association we have to place the
formation of this organisation within its proper historical context. This means
not only looking at wider historical events but also too at Irish Republicanism
and its development process.
The period 1969-1971 was one of increasing violence,
fuelled by a number of factors. One of which was the split that occurred within
the IRA in 1969/70. This split resulted in the creation of two factions: the
Official IRA and the Provisional IRA. The reasons for this split were numerous,
the main one was however a difference in ideology and attitude towards sectarian
violence. The Official IRA was socialist in their thinking whereas the
Provisional IRA represented a more “conservative” and “traditional” section of
Irish-Republicanism. Peter Taylor in his book, States of Terror, writes:
“…In 1962 the IRA
had rejected violence, forsworn the ‘armed struggle’ and embraced the idea of
unifying the Catholic and Protestant working class to force a socialist
revolution and establish a workers republic. Such Marxist dogma was anathema to
traditional IRA supporters who saw it as a betrayal of all the IRA stood
for…”
Many within the ranks of the IRA were also unhappy with the
leadership of the IRA and their refusal to supply weapons en masse to IRA
volunteers in Belfast. People such as Cathal Goulding, chief of staff of the IRA
and later the Official IRA, were not prepared to allow weapons to be supplied to
Belfast for fear of a sectarian blood bath. As a result of such factors the
Provisional IRA were formed, among its membership were men such as Gerry Adams
who is reputed to have remarked to another IRA prisoner that he would be
prepared "to wade up to my knees in Protestant blood" for a united Ireland.
The split in the IRA laid the way
open for those within the Irish Republican movement who favoured a return to
armed struggle and who were not squeamish about killing members of the
Protestant working-class as unlike their Official IRA counterparts the Provos
did not believe in the same Marxist ideology. The Provisional IRA would in time
come to be the dominant faction and this process was helped by the Irish state
who did not wish to see a left wing IRA come to prevalence within Ireland, with
the prospect of it campaigning against the Fianna Fail government over economic
and social issues. As a result the Irish state provided financial succour,
military training and provided armaments for the Provisional IRA who certain
sections of the Irish state regarded as the bastions of “traditional”
republicanism. Such financial succour was channeled through other bodies and
contacts but ultimately only the most naïve, or deliberately disingenuous,
believed that it would end up anywhere else than in the hands of the Provisional
IRA. Sean MacStionfain, the first Provisional IRA chief of staff confirmed this
in an interview with a journalist:
“Before the split the money was going to somebody who was
active in the Goulding wing (that would become the Official IRA) of the
movement. Then the money was stopped altogether for a few weeks. When it resumed
again it went to somebody who was working with us…The money in Belfast for the
Defence Committee was distributed by a person who was one of our leading
members.”
Two leading Irish government
Ministers, Neil Blaney and Charles Haughey would later be implicated in the gun
running scandal that involved Captain Kelly and the attempt to bring in guns
from Germany worth £80,000. Both Ministers were sacked and a third government
Minister later resigned. The subsequent trial of Haughey and Blaney later
collapsed as the actions were deemed “legal” by a jury due to the fact that the
Minister of Defence had authorised them.
With the financial succour and
military training provided by the Irish state the Provisional IRA were now in a
position to crank up the “war” as they saw it. This meant not just attacks
against the British security forces and the Royal Ulster Constabulary but also
the Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community. Part of the reason why the Provos
became the dominant Irish-Nationalist organisation was that they won more
support from the Nationalist-Roman-Catholic population because of their
willingness to engage in sectarian murder. Despite the rhetoric of fighting a
legitimate war against “occupying forces” the campaign of the Provisional IRA
soon degenerated into sectarian murder and the Provos became little more than a
sectarian murder gang. On the 27th June 1970 the Provisional IRA
embarked on a sectarian killing spree murdering William Kincaid, Daniel
Loughlins and Alexander Gould. These three men were shot dead as they stood on a
street corner, shortly after Irish-Republicans had rioted on the Crumlin Road in
Belfast. Later that evening the Provisional IRA murdered yet more members of the
Protestant community in what would become one of the most infamous sectarian
incidents of the troubles at St. Mathews Catholic Chapel in East Belfast. The
IRA had laid a trap to lure Protestants into the area and once they had them
within range opened fire from their vantage point in the Church and its
surroundings. Two men, Robert Neill and Robert James McCurrie were killed and
many others wounded.
The year 1971 would see yet a
further increase in violent attacks by the Provisional IRA. In 1971 some 43
British Soldiers would die at the hands of the IRA. The most brutal and chilling
of these murders was the murder of three young Scottish Soldiers who were
ambushed in a “honey trap”. This was a method of killing that involved a female
Irish-Republican terrorist or those who were sympathetic to the IRA luring off
duty soldiers to a given location usually in the mistaken belief that they were
going to a party. The victims, Dougald McCaughey and Joseph and John McCaig
(both brothers) were encouraged by a well-known Irish-Republican to travel to a
public house in the rural area of Ligoniel. As they stood by the side of the
road relieving themselves IRA gunmen shot them from behind. This incident is
remembered as one of the incidents that that proved to be the key in the descent
of society into full-scale violence.
Alongside attacks against the
British army the sectarian murder campaign against the
Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community continued. On the 9th February 1971 five
men, John Aiken, Harry Edgar, George Beck, William Thomas and Malcolm David
Henson, were killed when an IRA bomb blew up a BBC land rover on its way to
inspect a transmitter. The Provisional IRA claimed that the BBC van had been
mistaken for a British Army land rover but such attempts to justify the murder
of Protestant civilians were greeted with skepticism as most people viewed the
attack as nothing more than sectarian murder aimed at intimidating the
Protestant-Unionist community in Co. Tyrone.
Emergence of the Loyalist Resistance
Quis separabit?
(Who will set us apart?)
Such attacks against the
Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community resulted in the growing demand that
something be done to protect the community from Irish-Nationalist sectarian
murder gangs. During the early 1970s in direct response to the threat posed to
embattled loyalist communities various loyalist vigilante groups were set up in
Belfast (such as the Shankill Defence Association) and other areas of Northern
Ireland. The vigilante groups took it upon themselves to do what the security
forces were not, provide adequate protection to their communities. The groups
were not under one umbrella organisation but had their own area or territory and
their own autonomy. There was no overarching command and control structure. At
this stage such groupings had little or no access to guns and weapons consisted
mainly of cudgels and pickaxe handles. In the community in which the given
vigilante group operated every able bodied man was expected to play a full part,
either patrolling the area in order to stop attacks by Irish-Republican murder
gangs or to contribute in some manner to the functioning of the vigilante group.
During this period it was truly a case of David versus Goliath as ordinary
working class Loyalists were pitched against the full might of Irish-Imperialism
financed and trained by the Irish state.
It would not be until 1971 that
the Ulster Defence Association would emerge, unifying many of these various
vigilante groups under the one command and control structure under the one
banner. Men such as Andy Tyrie, Tommy
Herron and others realised the need to have all such organisations under the one
overarching organisational structure in order to coordinate them. As a result
the Ulster Defence Association was created, its organisational structure in the
early days was in keeping with the structure of the regular army. There was also
the Inner Council of Commanders or Brigadiers representing territorial based
divisions of the state of Northern Ireland. Each Brigadier commanded an area;
for example in Belfast there would a North, South, East and West division in
terms of command and control. And within that area there would be Companies of
varying numerical strength depending upon the area in question. At this stage it
is estimated that the membership of the U.D.A. was 30,000 (perhaps more
according to some estimates) taking into account total membership across
Northern Ireland. The U.D.A. was also emerging as a powerful force in other
areas such as Londonderry and in Mid-Ulster in areas such as Portadown there was
a growing U.D.A. organisation.
One of the first major tests of the resolve
of the U.D.A. came on the 30th June 1972 when the U.D.A. decided to
erect barricades and create 'no go' areas in many loyalist areas throughout
Northern Ireland. This was in part a response to the actions of the IRA who had
erected similar ‘no go’ areas in Londonderry and elsewhere but was also a
defensive measure in order to protect the loyalist community from further IRA
attacks. Many Loyalists also wanted to place pressure on the British security
forces to do their duty and protect the Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community
by taking down barricades in Irish-Republican strongholds as such ‘no go’ areas
allowed Irish-Republican murder gangs to act with impunity as the security
forces could not operate within such areas. The stand off between the British
security forces and the Ulster Defence Association came about at Ainsworth
Avenue in Belfast and was sparked by a dispute over where the barricades being
erected by the members of the Ulster Defence Association should be placed. The
British army wanted the barricade 100 yards further up Ainsworth Avenue. The
Ulster Defence Association did not accept this proposal as it would have left
many Protestant homes in the area open to attack from sectarian murder gangs
from the Irish-Nationalist community in the nearby Springfield Road.
The Ulster Defence
Association was is no mood to compromise with the safety of members of their
community and the call went out for members of the Ulster Defence Association to
assemble in order to confront the British Army. It is estimated that several
thousand members of the Ulster Defence Association heeded the call and assembled
in the Ainsworth Avenue area, the issue had become a point of principle, the
principle being the safety and security of Protestant families. The British army
Commander of Land Forces General Ford spoke to senior representatives of the
Ulster Defence Association who were led in their delegation by Andy Tyrie. The
result was that a tense situation was defused with the Army promising to ensure
the safety of vulnerable Protestant families against attack from
Irish-Republican sectarian murder gangs. The next great test of the Ulster
Defence Association, and for many the zenith of its political influence, was to
come in 1974 with the Ulster Workers Strike.
The Emergence of the Ulster Freedom Fighters
Feriens Tego – (Striking, I defend)
Throughout 1972 the Provisional IRA continued to intensify
its campaign, and as a result the incidents of bombings and shootings increased.
The death toll for 1972 was higher than for any other year of the troubles with
279 deaths resulting from Irish-Republican terrorism, most of which was the work
of the P.I.R.A. This maelstrom of violence was accompanied by political turmoil
and the two fed off each other in a destructive cycle. For the Unionist-Loyalist
community this uncertainty was felt all the more acutely when the Heath
government shut down Stormont, the Northern Ireland government, and imposed
direct rule on Northern Ireland. On the streets of Belfast and of towns across
Northern Ireland there were shootings and bombings. It seemed to many that this
was the “last push” by the IRA and indeed there was talk within
Irish-Republicanism of victory in 72. There were also rumours, that proved later
to have foundation in fact, that the British government was engaged in secret
talks with the P.I.R.A. Such was the level of violence against not just the
security forces but also the Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community that it
appeared that the constitutional status of Northern Ireland was under threat as
was the very existence of the Loyalist people. The relatively blunt instrument
of the Ulster Defence Association needed to be refined.
Whilst the Ulster Defence Association was a more broad
based community organisation, involved in various community initiatives as well
as in the defensive capacity of seeking to ensure the safety of vulnerable
Loyalist communities against sectarian attack, the Ulster Freedom Fighters were
to be the military wing. The operational stance of the U.F.F. is reflected in
its motto of, “Striking I defend”, with the rationale behind the organisation
being to directly engage the sectarian murder gang known as the P.I.R.A. and
Irish Republicanism. Unfortunately there were numerous innocent members of the
Roman-Catholic community killed as the U.F.F. sought to engage the enemy, an
enemy it should be remembered that hid within the midst of the Roman-Catholic
community and whom a section of the Irish-Nationalist/Roman Catholic community
either actively or passively helped to maintain. It would of course be
untruthful to try to justify the proposition that sectarian murder was not
carried out under the organisational structure of the U.F.F. but such murders
were often reactive in nature. That is, they were a response to the P.I.R.A.
killing innocent members of the Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist community. There
was, however, the growing rationale that if the Irish-Nationalist community were
prepared to shelter and hide those who were terrorising the Protestant community
then for every attack there would be a counter attack. To put it simply, the
serve was to be returned and the pain that the Protestant-Unionist-Loyalist
community felt when a member of their community was indiscriminately murdered by
the P.I.R.A. was to be “paid back”.