A different IRA SAM question

Please, no Irish or UK politics here.

After posting my thread, I had another idea, one which could have far wider implications.
If the US supplies SAMs to Afghanistan which helps turn the tide of the Afghan War, and the US/Libya/Arms Dealers supply SAMs to Northern Ireland, which helps turn the tide against the Brits, would MANPADS* SAMs become more popular around the world? Would the USSR distribute them in their own proxy wars? Would SAMs be used in other armed conflicts? Would drug cartels be purchasing them for possible use? Would gangs? Militias? Terrorists? Lone nuts? Would people/groups build their own SAMs? Could we see SAMs used to shoot down airliners? Could we see SAMs used (by whomever) in the USA?

*Man-Portable Air Defense Systems. I know, it's not a proper acronym...
 
It's a lot harder to smuggle SAMs into Northern Ireland (which is surrounded by sea controlled by the Royal Navy, and a short guarded border with a friendly country) than it is into Afghanistan (which has a long porous border with Pakistan). Even if the IRA had SAMs, I don't think it would make much difference to the war on the ground. The British Army would just drive around more in armored vehicles. (Actually IIRC, there was a concern in the 80s that the IRA had weaponry to potentially shoot down a helicopter).

Nobody's going to make SAMs in their garage. A fertilizer bomb is one thing, but building a SAM requires a wide mix of fairly advanced military-industrial technologies, and lots of testing, and is beyond many countries let alone many individuals.

A jet airliner (too high) is safe from Stingers and Blowpipes except during take-off, landing, ascent, descent.

SAMs are already very popular around the world. But they're mostly used by armies, since it's beyond most guerilla forces to obtain them (there have been a few exceptions such as UNITA and the Afghan Mujahideen) or operate them.
 
The IRA did have some SAMs during the 80s, courtesy of Mr. Quadaffi. IIRC, I once saw a documentry about it, they attempted to shoot down a RAF chopper in South Armagh, but somethign went wrong with the launcher (dont recall if it was human or mechanical fault), and that put them off using them again.

The thing is, they had very few of them, so any use of them was really going to be more of a symbolic gesture than anything that would have made any military difference. The Brits wouldn't have know that at first, but would have worked it out in fairly short order.
 
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