The voting was nearly finished at the polling station in Andersonstown. At first Gerry Adams' supporters thought that the Army and the RUC had come to take away the ballot boxes. Things had gone well for Gerry Adams so the supporters were ready to follow the ballot boxes down to the City Hall just to make sure that none of them were thrown away. Almost directly over the polling station a helicopter hovered motionless.
When Garret FitzGerald made his famous remark a bout Charles Haughey's "flawed pedigree", hinting at Haughey's involvement in the 1970 Arms Trial, he was being conveniently forgetful. 1970 wasn't the first time authorities in Dublin had tried to import arms for the IRA in the North. It had happened in 1922 as well. And then one of the principal figures involved had been Garret's uncle, Frank FitzGerald.
Since 1968 a series of reforms have been introduced in Northem Ireland which had as their objective the ensuring of equal treatment as between Protestants and Catholics. However, in spite of successive measures and indeed some goodwill on the part of both the former Stormont and later Westminster authorities these reforms have failed. This has been especially so in the critical area of employment, where the position is now, if anything, worse than it was 14 years ago.
Sean MacStiophain was opposed to the campaign in England from the beginning. There were repeated arguments at army council level in the early years over this issue, especially in August 1971 after internment, in Feb 1972 after Bloody Sunday and, more particularly, in August 1972 after Operation Motorman. Several members of the IRA army council believed at the latter time that the most effecitve response to the massive British operation in Northern Ireland then would be a bombing campaign in England.
The Provisional IRA has now acquired the capacity for a limited and sporadic bombing campaign in England, as a oprelude to a sustained onslaught there, which forms an integral part of its strategy for a 20 year war.
The IRA bombing in 'London on July 20 is not justified for the following reasons:
1. The Cult of Death
We unreservedly condemn the killing of Jim Flynn. There is absolutely no justification for such killings and the INLA attempted "explanation" is entirely hyoppcritical.
Northern Ireland's only holy roller evangelist has failed. His grand plans for a massive 'Faith Cathedral' with its own recording studio, audiitorium, motel and sports centre have produced only one small building and some £180,000 worth of debts to banks, building societies and finance houses. Leslie Hale has moved to a small town in Florida where he has bought a house and a church.
From January 1 to December 13 of 1981 one hundred and twelve people lost their lives in Northern Ireland because of the political conflict. Paddy Agnew and Vincent Browne
For a minute it looked like there might be a run on the Trustee Savings Bank. Dozens of anxious looking people crowding around the branch of the bank that sits across the road from the Harland and Wolff building down at the shipyards on Queen's Island. Well over a hundred people, stamping their feet against the cold. The press was back in Belfast for the Loyalist Day of Action, many of them for the first time since Bobby Sands died. The Europa Hotel was booked out.