02 May 1984
In a glittering ceremony in the royal 'palace' earlier that day Spring had watched the President and King sign the most radical change in UK-Ireland relations since the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921.
The Treaty of Portsmoth made something possible from raw pragmatism in a post-war world the PIRA had failed to get in decades of fighting: a United Ireland.
They had used several pens, which would be distributed as gifts, the ceremony was carried live on RTE TV and radio. The BBC would report it with the regular news and while most British people would be surprised, very few gave a damm, their own dire circumstances took precedence over ''flag saluting nonsense''.
Aboard the plane was President Robinson, Spring and a British military contingent who would be meeting their Irish counterparts when they landed to begin planning to take over Operation Banner, and make whatever adjustments the Irish forces saw fit.
With Belfast and Derry utterly annihilated there was a smaller population to contain, which needed less troops.
The three months since the war had scarce good news. A green zone re-opened in Dublin here, a ship limping into port with news of a far away country there, but beyond that just slow, steady, baby steps of ''reconstruction''. The government was going to make the most of this morale booster.
In a glittering ceremony in the royal 'palace' earlier that day Spring had watched the President and King sign the most radical change in UK-Ireland relations since the Anglo-Irish Treaty of 1921.
The Treaty of Portsmoth made something possible from raw pragmatism in a post-war world the PIRA had failed to get in decades of fighting: a United Ireland.
They had used several pens, which would be distributed as gifts, the ceremony was carried live on RTE TV and radio. The BBC would report it with the regular news and while most British people would be surprised, very few gave a damm, their own dire circumstances took precedence over ''flag saluting nonsense''.
Aboard the plane was President Robinson, Spring and a British military contingent who would be meeting their Irish counterparts when they landed to begin planning to take over Operation Banner, and make whatever adjustments the Irish forces saw fit.
With Belfast and Derry utterly annihilated there was a smaller population to contain, which needed less troops.
The three months since the war had scarce good news. A green zone re-opened in Dublin here, a ship limping into port with news of a far away country there, but beyond that just slow, steady, baby steps of ''reconstruction''. The government was going to make the most of this morale booster.
The island would be united in three phases:
Stage One. On 4th July, NI would become part of the the Irish Republic on a similar basis with which it was part of the UK: controlling local matters with only foreign affairs and security issues being held in Dublin.
The international border would become an internal border and would hold firm during this phase.
Irish forces would replace UK forces over a phased period (to be determined as matters progressed, in consultation between the governments), with the UK surrendering proportionate defense assets. The RUC would transition to become part of the Garda force over the same period.
Joint funding of the provence would commence with stage one, with the UK subvention dropping in slow progressive stages until the new government takes effect in January 1986.
Stage Two (before the end of 1985). There would be an island-wide referendum on a constitution for a United Irish Republic which would have provision for a 32-county Dail Eireann and a Senate with digressivly proportionate unionist representation.
NI would have an assembly of it's own to control local matters, and would elect a power sharing executive headed by a First Minister, the assembly would have a voting system based on cross-community consent.
During the concluding month of this phase, elections for the new UIR would be held.
Stage Three (would conclude in time for a new government to take effect north and south on January 1st 1986). The new United Irish Republic would be established under the four provinces flag. It would become a member of the British Commonwealth. Some compared the arrangement as one more of 'special autonomy' rather than federalism, these semantics were hotly debated in the press.
A secret clause permitted the internment of every suspected loyalist, after which they would be shipped over to prison camps on the UK mainland.
Stage One. On 4th July, NI would become part of the the Irish Republic on a similar basis with which it was part of the UK: controlling local matters with only foreign affairs and security issues being held in Dublin.
The international border would become an internal border and would hold firm during this phase.
Irish forces would replace UK forces over a phased period (to be determined as matters progressed, in consultation between the governments), with the UK surrendering proportionate defense assets. The RUC would transition to become part of the Garda force over the same period.
Joint funding of the provence would commence with stage one, with the UK subvention dropping in slow progressive stages until the new government takes effect in January 1986.
Stage Two (before the end of 1985). There would be an island-wide referendum on a constitution for a United Irish Republic which would have provision for a 32-county Dail Eireann and a Senate with digressivly proportionate unionist representation.
NI would have an assembly of it's own to control local matters, and would elect a power sharing executive headed by a First Minister, the assembly would have a voting system based on cross-community consent.
During the concluding month of this phase, elections for the new UIR would be held.
Stage Three (would conclude in time for a new government to take effect north and south on January 1st 1986). The new United Irish Republic would be established under the four provinces flag. It would become a member of the British Commonwealth. Some compared the arrangement as one more of 'special autonomy' rather than federalism, these semantics were hotly debated in the press.
A secret clause permitted the internment of every suspected loyalist, after which they would be shipped over to prison camps on the UK mainland.
02 May 1984
(Dublin Orange Zone: Malahide)
Lt Micheal Boland was dying of boredom. Since the new ring of steel similar to the one on the border with NI had been thrown up around Dublin there had been far less looting.
There were watch towers within line of sight of each other ringed around Dublin. Anyone attempting to cross in without a permit saying they were residents returning to a specified green zone would be turned back. If they persisted they would be arrested. If they resisted they would be shot.
He expected there to be no looters here, and so far he was right.
Malahide escaped most of the blast effects from the nuclear attack, and there had been very limited fallout from the Airport and Dublin Port nukes, though part of the firestorm from Swords had reached here. However almost all of that fallout had blown north-east right over Malahide.
They searched neighborhoods and then returned to the patrol route, searched again, and returned to the patrol route.
It was months ago, but they still wore the protection.
He and his men were wearing CBRN gear and driving in a 4 vehicle convoy in a mix of a clearing and combat patrol. There was one APC and GARDA jeep flanked front and back by an armored fighting vehicle in which he stood beside the gunner. He and one of the privates were just talking about how creepy an entire empty suburb was when they heard an engine. He immediately raised his fist and the convoy stopped.
A white truck pulled out from a housing estate just up the road and took off. This being an Orange zone it was meant to be uninhabited, so either the people in the van were residents who had returned without permission, in which case they were going to be arrested, or they were looters and they were possibly in for a worse fate.
The fact that it was a van made him think looter, but he had learned from a series of tragic mistakes by his counterparts in other zones not to presume.
The convoy picked up speed suddenly, the sirens from the Garda jeep and the 'bobble' lights on the top of each army vehicle roaring loudly. Boland got on the loud-haler as the van picked up speed attempting to get away ''White truck this is the army you are inside an orange zone, come to a stop immediately or we will open fire''.
His voice echoed loudly around the empty streets.
Nothing, the truck continued to evade them as he watched from the hatch of the AFV. They were an about even match in speed and could not overtake them. Boland spoke to the AFV operator in the lead vechile ''Private Henderson, fire a warning shot over the top of the truck''. A 20MM chain gun letting loose in your direction would make anyone stop, surely...
Nothing. ''Aim just to their right so your fire will clip off their rear view mirror that ought to spook him''. The machine gun let rip again at the truck, the rear view mirror being blown off and shattering into 4-5 bits, the driver slammed on the brakes and the convoys vehicles surrounded it.
''Come out of the vehicle singly, and unarmed, with your hands behind your heads!''. Two rather skinny youths about 19 wearing tracksuits emerge.
They were the type that he had seen in the city centre when he had got his part time college job, a load of teenagers in a council estate next door would regularly come in and slag them for working when they could get welfare and drug money, they had literally said this, he was amazed at how overt they were about it, punching a clock was ''for mugs'' they had said. These were nearly the spitting image of those kids.
His mother originally came from a council estate and had worked all her life. The type revolted him. Vermin, even after a world war they are still finding ways to leech off others.
They were handcuffed and laid face down on the pavement while he turned to search the truck. The black market in stolen canned goods and various other products from the Orange Zones was heating up, so that's what he expected to find in the truck. When he opened the trucks back doors he found something else entirely...BRICKS of heroin and cocaine stacked high.
Of course...they must have had the stash here when the sh1t hit the fan and came back for it after figuring they would have quite a market in such misery where people would do anything to escape it.
Boland was of the opinion drugs should be legalized (in a limited controlled fashion) but for pragmatic reasons. He looked with contempt at the two youths on the ground, they were going to give someone a heroin addiction to add to their existing problems, in an era where a steady supply would be hard to come by, a situation that could only lead to more misery.
When they removed the drugs they found a myriad of other items. Curiously though there was a large collection of womens jewlery there, it stood out from among the rest. He went over to the youths ''where did you get the jewelry lads...tell me now...'' They refused to talk.
Much as he wanted to beat a confession out of them that was not the kind of solider he was. No well do things right, they stole some stuff after all it's bad but it's not the end of the world.
A beating might further alienate them from society, they might still pull out of the nose dives their lives were in and turn into decent people one day and he didn't want to do anything to make that less likely.
He suddenly thought back to the street they had turned out from, he had got a fleeting glance of it as they drove past it was a very well to do area houses were hidden by trees behind gates...these two definitely didn't live there they must have gotten the drugs from elsewhere and done some raiding along the way. He turned to the Garda officers who were with the convoy ''take your jeep and go back to that cul de sac, search the houses see which one these were taken from, we'll get the persons address and find them in the camps from the database and make sure it gets back to them...Henderson, Chambers go with them''.
While they were gone he searched the truck and found a pistol and two shotguns, the pistol had recently been fired, a sense of dread grew in him for what they would find at that house.
A few minutes later a double beep on his radio broke his glare at the two youths laying on the ground. ''Sir...you should probably come look at this...''
He drove the APC at breakneck speed towards the cul-de-sac and burst through the door of the house sprinting up the stairs, when he stepped into the master bedroom he immediately turned cold and recoiled in a kind of horror he had never before experienced.
On the floor of the room was a woman perhaps mid-50s who you could tell had been fastidious about her appearance and was doing her best despite the circumstances to keep it up, she was wearing decent clothes, a pearl necklace, a perm , broach and had a motherly countenance about her. She was hogtied and dumped on the floor with a bullet wound in her forehead. A girl he presumed was her daughter was beside her. There were white lines on her wrist and neck, she had clearly recently had jewelry taken from her. They searched the rest of the house and found signs of a struggle in the kitchen with a man they presumed to be her husband beaten to death with severe head injuries on the floor.
A kind of rage he had never thought possible rose up in him and without a word he exited the kitchen out to the backyard. His men did not understand what he was doing, they looked at each other as he used his side arm to blow open the shed door....
----
Sergeant Keith Wood got out of the white truck, having parked it in formation with the convoy ready to leave again.
He saw the Garda jeep screaming down the road at top speed, it sped to a screeching stop at an angle not half a meter from him. His usually quiet reserved CO Lt Boland jumped out carrying two shovels, picked the prisoners up and dragged them away, without a word, down the small hill under the nearby bridge.
----
Wood followed him as he vanished behind the mound out of sight. Just as he came around the corner he saw Boland drop the two shovels at the youths feet ''I want you to dig one hole each, as deep as you can. Start''. The two looked back at him in horror and mock confusion. ''Don't even bother, I saw what you did to that family (his voice now took on an icy edge) you're both dead men, I'm gonna give you a simple choice, you can dig the holes and take a nice clean quick painless shot to the head or you can refuse to dig, take one each in the stomach and we leave you here you'll take hours to die''.
They began to whimper and blubber at first spinning a story that they must have been at a different house to the one they saw they didn't hurt anyone, then when his face held firm they turned on each other, ok it was that house but HE did it not me I tried to stop him..Boland stopped the blubbering with a double pistol shot to the air. ''SHUT UP! If you're not digging by the time I count to five you get the stomach option...1.....2...(they both picked up the shovels and begun digging).
Wood pulled Boland aside and said ''Sir we can't execute civilians'', Bolands eyes were cold ''they're not civilians, they entered a restricted area carrying firearms and murdered a family back there for their jewels and the nicknacks they had around their house, if they went to court it would be the same result''. Wood was pleading ''sir that's the courts job not ours-'' ''If we'd caught them in the act they'd have been shot, the courts will probably sentence them to death so the results the same, only before a judge they can start claiming their age or some other factor as reason why they should get life instead, and the tax paid by the relatives of that family goes towards keeping their murderers comfortable in prison''
Wood ran both his hands over his face and back over his high and tight haircut interlacing his fingers behind his back then putting them in front of him in a pleading praying pose ''Sir...we've been friends a long time you told me you were against the death penalty you said it was a GOOD thing that pre-war we hadn't executed anyone in 20 years..that sentences were always commuted to life''
Boland responded but his eyes were on the youths digging and whimpering between bouts of admonishing each other for this and that, leaving evidence, ''should have just tied them up'' etc ''Yeh I'm opposed to it, because innocent people tend to get caught in the system and executed, that's not a problem this time''
Wood was desperate ''Sir it makes us no better than them-'' Bolands head snapped around ''don't give me that horse s1t Keith for f**s sake! They tied up a nice household mother and her daughter and executed them point blank rage as they pleaded for their life, then beat the husband to death they murdered the people we took an oath to protect and now were gonna make sure these two don't do it again''
''How do you know they were pleading for their lives?'' Wood asked, not sure if he wanted to know
''The womans mascara was ran down her face with the tears'' Boland responded ''they must have snuck back home thinking it was safe not realizing the danger...''
Keith was about to protest again ''look Sergent Wood (he intentional switched mode by using ranks) if you want to report me to the MP's do it, have me court martial'd, if you wanna save these people by arresting me do it, if not this debates over I will hear not one more word''
---------------------------------------------------
03 May 1984
The Irish Times
(Front Page)
FAMILY BRUTALLY MURDERED IN DUBLIN ORANGE ZONE
Security Minister Haughey urges everyone to heed the warnings and stay out of the Red and Orange Zones.
A family of three was brutally attacked in Malahide yesterday. Malahide took a light amount of fallout from both nuclear attacks and some damage from the Swords firestorm. It has been declared a red zone. For those who have been living under a rock and not watching the media, the Red Zones are zones that had direct effects from the attacks, Orange Zones are areas that escaped direct attacks but because of decaying infrastructure and services and security problems are not yet ready for re habitation. Green zones are zones where the civil engineers, military and police have gone in , repaired them, and they are ready for re habitation.
When the nuclear attacks were coming, the government did not know if the USSR was going to hit Dublin at all, hit it with one giant nuke, or several smaller ones. So the govt evacuated most of the greater Dublin area. It turned out that instead of one 25MT nuke as many in the govt had feared, two smaller 100kt nukes went off, one at the airport the other at the port.
Many people grew sick of living in hotels or displacement camps and saw no reason why they could not go home. To quote one man ''The water might not be pumping and the gas might not be on but at least it's my own home instead of a plastic tent or a pre-fab''. However before the recent 'ring of steel' with ling of sight sentry towers was thrown around Dublin (being modeled on the success of the border closure) many looters had snuck in.
The government has ensured water, sewage, electricity etc are all terminated to Orange and Red zones to make going back to them less attractive. This has only had a limited effect in deterring people however.
With the ration book and points system there is an exploding black market for canned goods, and various other goods 'liberated' from the Orange Zones by looters. Working radio or mobile TVs are very sought after.
The fear of their home being looted (since most took only essential items in the evacuation, as ordered) added to the perception that they could ''just go home'' led, it's estimated, to up to 10,000 people sneaking back into Dublin in various ways. A recent Emergency Powers Order by the government, which amended the criminal justice code established when the emergency was declared, prescribed a penalty of 60 days solitary confinement and 50% cut in ration points for anyone caught sneaking back in.
The pictures we carry today, while mostly blurred or blacked out in key parts, give you a general idea of the horrific scene in that Malahide house. They were taken by the Garda officers who, along with the army, was on patrol in the area when they came upon the house. It is understood the youths who perpetrated this outrage were caught in the act, and shot dead by the army when they refused to drop their weapons...
(Dublin Orange Zone: Malahide)
Lt Micheal Boland was dying of boredom. Since the new ring of steel similar to the one on the border with NI had been thrown up around Dublin there had been far less looting.
There were watch towers within line of sight of each other ringed around Dublin. Anyone attempting to cross in without a permit saying they were residents returning to a specified green zone would be turned back. If they persisted they would be arrested. If they resisted they would be shot.
He expected there to be no looters here, and so far he was right.
Malahide escaped most of the blast effects from the nuclear attack, and there had been very limited fallout from the Airport and Dublin Port nukes, though part of the firestorm from Swords had reached here. However almost all of that fallout had blown north-east right over Malahide.
They searched neighborhoods and then returned to the patrol route, searched again, and returned to the patrol route.
It was months ago, but they still wore the protection.
He and his men were wearing CBRN gear and driving in a 4 vehicle convoy in a mix of a clearing and combat patrol. There was one APC and GARDA jeep flanked front and back by an armored fighting vehicle in which he stood beside the gunner. He and one of the privates were just talking about how creepy an entire empty suburb was when they heard an engine. He immediately raised his fist and the convoy stopped.
A white truck pulled out from a housing estate just up the road and took off. This being an Orange zone it was meant to be uninhabited, so either the people in the van were residents who had returned without permission, in which case they were going to be arrested, or they were looters and they were possibly in for a worse fate.
The fact that it was a van made him think looter, but he had learned from a series of tragic mistakes by his counterparts in other zones not to presume.
The convoy picked up speed suddenly, the sirens from the Garda jeep and the 'bobble' lights on the top of each army vehicle roaring loudly. Boland got on the loud-haler as the van picked up speed attempting to get away ''White truck this is the army you are inside an orange zone, come to a stop immediately or we will open fire''.
His voice echoed loudly around the empty streets.
Nothing, the truck continued to evade them as he watched from the hatch of the AFV. They were an about even match in speed and could not overtake them. Boland spoke to the AFV operator in the lead vechile ''Private Henderson, fire a warning shot over the top of the truck''. A 20MM chain gun letting loose in your direction would make anyone stop, surely...
Nothing. ''Aim just to their right so your fire will clip off their rear view mirror that ought to spook him''. The machine gun let rip again at the truck, the rear view mirror being blown off and shattering into 4-5 bits, the driver slammed on the brakes and the convoys vehicles surrounded it.
''Come out of the vehicle singly, and unarmed, with your hands behind your heads!''. Two rather skinny youths about 19 wearing tracksuits emerge.
They were the type that he had seen in the city centre when he had got his part time college job, a load of teenagers in a council estate next door would regularly come in and slag them for working when they could get welfare and drug money, they had literally said this, he was amazed at how overt they were about it, punching a clock was ''for mugs'' they had said. These were nearly the spitting image of those kids.
His mother originally came from a council estate and had worked all her life. The type revolted him. Vermin, even after a world war they are still finding ways to leech off others.
They were handcuffed and laid face down on the pavement while he turned to search the truck. The black market in stolen canned goods and various other products from the Orange Zones was heating up, so that's what he expected to find in the truck. When he opened the trucks back doors he found something else entirely...BRICKS of heroin and cocaine stacked high.
Of course...they must have had the stash here when the sh1t hit the fan and came back for it after figuring they would have quite a market in such misery where people would do anything to escape it.
Boland was of the opinion drugs should be legalized (in a limited controlled fashion) but for pragmatic reasons. He looked with contempt at the two youths on the ground, they were going to give someone a heroin addiction to add to their existing problems, in an era where a steady supply would be hard to come by, a situation that could only lead to more misery.
When they removed the drugs they found a myriad of other items. Curiously though there was a large collection of womens jewlery there, it stood out from among the rest. He went over to the youths ''where did you get the jewelry lads...tell me now...'' They refused to talk.
Much as he wanted to beat a confession out of them that was not the kind of solider he was. No well do things right, they stole some stuff after all it's bad but it's not the end of the world.
A beating might further alienate them from society, they might still pull out of the nose dives their lives were in and turn into decent people one day and he didn't want to do anything to make that less likely.
He suddenly thought back to the street they had turned out from, he had got a fleeting glance of it as they drove past it was a very well to do area houses were hidden by trees behind gates...these two definitely didn't live there they must have gotten the drugs from elsewhere and done some raiding along the way. He turned to the Garda officers who were with the convoy ''take your jeep and go back to that cul de sac, search the houses see which one these were taken from, we'll get the persons address and find them in the camps from the database and make sure it gets back to them...Henderson, Chambers go with them''.
While they were gone he searched the truck and found a pistol and two shotguns, the pistol had recently been fired, a sense of dread grew in him for what they would find at that house.
A few minutes later a double beep on his radio broke his glare at the two youths laying on the ground. ''Sir...you should probably come look at this...''
He drove the APC at breakneck speed towards the cul-de-sac and burst through the door of the house sprinting up the stairs, when he stepped into the master bedroom he immediately turned cold and recoiled in a kind of horror he had never before experienced.
On the floor of the room was a woman perhaps mid-50s who you could tell had been fastidious about her appearance and was doing her best despite the circumstances to keep it up, she was wearing decent clothes, a pearl necklace, a perm , broach and had a motherly countenance about her. She was hogtied and dumped on the floor with a bullet wound in her forehead. A girl he presumed was her daughter was beside her. There were white lines on her wrist and neck, she had clearly recently had jewelry taken from her. They searched the rest of the house and found signs of a struggle in the kitchen with a man they presumed to be her husband beaten to death with severe head injuries on the floor.
A kind of rage he had never thought possible rose up in him and without a word he exited the kitchen out to the backyard. His men did not understand what he was doing, they looked at each other as he used his side arm to blow open the shed door....
----
Sergeant Keith Wood got out of the white truck, having parked it in formation with the convoy ready to leave again.
He saw the Garda jeep screaming down the road at top speed, it sped to a screeching stop at an angle not half a meter from him. His usually quiet reserved CO Lt Boland jumped out carrying two shovels, picked the prisoners up and dragged them away, without a word, down the small hill under the nearby bridge.
----
Wood followed him as he vanished behind the mound out of sight. Just as he came around the corner he saw Boland drop the two shovels at the youths feet ''I want you to dig one hole each, as deep as you can. Start''. The two looked back at him in horror and mock confusion. ''Don't even bother, I saw what you did to that family (his voice now took on an icy edge) you're both dead men, I'm gonna give you a simple choice, you can dig the holes and take a nice clean quick painless shot to the head or you can refuse to dig, take one each in the stomach and we leave you here you'll take hours to die''.
They began to whimper and blubber at first spinning a story that they must have been at a different house to the one they saw they didn't hurt anyone, then when his face held firm they turned on each other, ok it was that house but HE did it not me I tried to stop him..Boland stopped the blubbering with a double pistol shot to the air. ''SHUT UP! If you're not digging by the time I count to five you get the stomach option...1.....2...(they both picked up the shovels and begun digging).
Wood pulled Boland aside and said ''Sir we can't execute civilians'', Bolands eyes were cold ''they're not civilians, they entered a restricted area carrying firearms and murdered a family back there for their jewels and the nicknacks they had around their house, if they went to court it would be the same result''. Wood was pleading ''sir that's the courts job not ours-'' ''If we'd caught them in the act they'd have been shot, the courts will probably sentence them to death so the results the same, only before a judge they can start claiming their age or some other factor as reason why they should get life instead, and the tax paid by the relatives of that family goes towards keeping their murderers comfortable in prison''
Wood ran both his hands over his face and back over his high and tight haircut interlacing his fingers behind his back then putting them in front of him in a pleading praying pose ''Sir...we've been friends a long time you told me you were against the death penalty you said it was a GOOD thing that pre-war we hadn't executed anyone in 20 years..that sentences were always commuted to life''
Boland responded but his eyes were on the youths digging and whimpering between bouts of admonishing each other for this and that, leaving evidence, ''should have just tied them up'' etc ''Yeh I'm opposed to it, because innocent people tend to get caught in the system and executed, that's not a problem this time''
Wood was desperate ''Sir it makes us no better than them-'' Bolands head snapped around ''don't give me that horse s1t Keith for f**s sake! They tied up a nice household mother and her daughter and executed them point blank rage as they pleaded for their life, then beat the husband to death they murdered the people we took an oath to protect and now were gonna make sure these two don't do it again''
''How do you know they were pleading for their lives?'' Wood asked, not sure if he wanted to know
''The womans mascara was ran down her face with the tears'' Boland responded ''they must have snuck back home thinking it was safe not realizing the danger...''
Keith was about to protest again ''look Sergent Wood (he intentional switched mode by using ranks) if you want to report me to the MP's do it, have me court martial'd, if you wanna save these people by arresting me do it, if not this debates over I will hear not one more word''
---------------------------------------------------
03 May 1984
The Irish Times
(Front Page)
FAMILY BRUTALLY MURDERED IN DUBLIN ORANGE ZONE
Security Minister Haughey urges everyone to heed the warnings and stay out of the Red and Orange Zones.
A family of three was brutally attacked in Malahide yesterday. Malahide took a light amount of fallout from both nuclear attacks and some damage from the Swords firestorm. It has been declared a red zone. For those who have been living under a rock and not watching the media, the Red Zones are zones that had direct effects from the attacks, Orange Zones are areas that escaped direct attacks but because of decaying infrastructure and services and security problems are not yet ready for re habitation. Green zones are zones where the civil engineers, military and police have gone in , repaired them, and they are ready for re habitation.
When the nuclear attacks were coming, the government did not know if the USSR was going to hit Dublin at all, hit it with one giant nuke, or several smaller ones. So the govt evacuated most of the greater Dublin area. It turned out that instead of one 25MT nuke as many in the govt had feared, two smaller 100kt nukes went off, one at the airport the other at the port.
Many people grew sick of living in hotels or displacement camps and saw no reason why they could not go home. To quote one man ''The water might not be pumping and the gas might not be on but at least it's my own home instead of a plastic tent or a pre-fab''. However before the recent 'ring of steel' with ling of sight sentry towers was thrown around Dublin (being modeled on the success of the border closure) many looters had snuck in.
The government has ensured water, sewage, electricity etc are all terminated to Orange and Red zones to make going back to them less attractive. This has only had a limited effect in deterring people however.
With the ration book and points system there is an exploding black market for canned goods, and various other goods 'liberated' from the Orange Zones by looters. Working radio or mobile TVs are very sought after.
The fear of their home being looted (since most took only essential items in the evacuation, as ordered) added to the perception that they could ''just go home'' led, it's estimated, to up to 10,000 people sneaking back into Dublin in various ways. A recent Emergency Powers Order by the government, which amended the criminal justice code established when the emergency was declared, prescribed a penalty of 60 days solitary confinement and 50% cut in ration points for anyone caught sneaking back in.
The pictures we carry today, while mostly blurred or blacked out in key parts, give you a general idea of the horrific scene in that Malahide house. They were taken by the Garda officers who, along with the army, was on patrol in the area when they came upon the house. It is understood the youths who perpetrated this outrage were caught in the act, and shot dead by the army when they refused to drop their weapons...
