Algerian-like putsch of the Generals in Northern Ireland

Hi all,

I know it's a sensitive subject and quite a bleak outlook (as indicates the thread closed today) but something popped up in my mind.

During the worse of the troubles, would it be possible for some British generals to protest against any potential peace effort by essentially declaring themselves no longer bound to a central government, as did the French General during the Putsch of Algers?

Understanding this would not lead to a long term situation, with the Metropole with bigger armies being right there and the issue being different, as, as far as I understand full independance wasn't really on the table in NI, especially since the Republic didn't really want to reintegrate them, but is it something that would happen? What would be the consequences in the British Army? Could this lead to a civil war on the mainland?
 
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Short answer no.

The British Military was primarily there as a peace keeping force to prevent violence between Republcan and Loyalist militias. Despite being biased towards the latter in some cases, the goal was always to return the province to peaceful government, not the destruction/expulsion of the Catholic minority.

So a peace deal between the various sides is exactly the end state the Army set out to achieve, and would not protest it.


Maybe a scenario could arise where loyalist sympathising members of the Ulster regiment and NI security forces are so disgusted with the peace terms that they reject them, size control, and perform a Rhodesia style UDI. Not sure what would be required to make them do that though. Would have to be pretty drastically in favour of the republicans.

Thus would be treason however, and certainly condemned by the UK. I'm not sure what action the UK would take in response, maybe try to subdue the traitors themselves, or call in NATO allies.


Anyway, the UK army as a whole taking the Algeria route, and civil war in Great Britain itself are not going to happen.
 
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Hi all,

I know it's a sensitive subject and quite a bleak outlook (as indicates the thread closed today) but something popped up in my mind.

During the worse of the troubles, would it be possible for some British generals to protest against any potential peace effort by essentially declaring themselves no longer bound to a central government, as did the French General during the Putsch of Algers?

What year are we talking about?

The "Curragh Mutiny" was in 1914, when Parliament was going to enact Home Rule, Ulster Protestants were threatening violent resistance, and some Army officers talked of defying orders to enforce Home Rule.

Or is it the Irish Rebellion of 1919-1922 - when the British army was fighting the IRA?

Or the period from 1969 onward. when IRA violence in Northern Ireland became a major problem? No British government ever seriously considered giving up sovereignty over the Six Counties, unlike 1914 and 1922. So I can't see any British troops mutinying.
 
The most likely time this could have happened was the abolition of Stormont in 1972, apparently Bill Craig and a few other hardliners in the NI Government suggested it but there was no support for it.

Had they tried it things would have got ugly fast, there would have been very little support among Unionists and you would probably have seen the IRA attempt to take over Nationalist areas and demand intervention from the Republic and the UN, there would almost certainly have been Bosnian style ethnic cleansing on a huge scale. Rhodesia was thousands of miles from Britain and had large deposits of gold, coal and chromium to fund itself, NI has nothing, the economy would have imploded within a few days without British money.
 
Anarch King said:
Or the period from 1969 onward. when IRA violence in Northern Ireland became a major problem? No British government ever seriously considered giving up sovereignty over the Six Counties, unlike 1914 and 1922. So I can't see any British troops mutinying.

Was more thinking of the "troubles", so 69 onward. During the first independance, I think it could have happened and would probably have unfolded similarly to Algeria. Although there's also the aspect that before 22, UK is still a power at its height and doesn't have anything to prove, contrary to the French army in 54.

Ato said:
The British Military was primarily there as a peace keeping force to prevent violence between Republcan and Loyalist militias. Despite being biased towards the latter in some cases, the goal was always to return the province to peaceful government, not the destruction/expulsion of the Catholic minority.

Thanks for your answer :) . Were there big resistances against any compromises or a will from segments to go to an apartheid-like state (as in the XIXth century)?
 
Or the period from 1969 onward. when IRA violence in Northern Ireland became a major problem? No British government ever seriously considered giving up sovereignty over the Six Counties, unlike 1914 and 1922. So I can't see any British troops mutinying.

Not only that but the nature of the relationship between the Army and the establishment in Britain is very different to that between the French Army and the French Third and Fourth Republics, further the internal culture of the British Army is very different and the command set up is less conducive to organising a coup or revolt.
 
they've swallowed the NORAID / Plastic Paddies view that NI is under occupation by an external power ...

Well, beside the occasional Orange March and Gerry Adams shenanigans, of course now it's perfectly stable.

Seeing this from South of the border (not being Irish though), it does seem like it was very near an actual civil war with regular bombings and a lot of hatred on both sides following what could come across having a real religion-based division.

One might easily make the case that because of the different religion, the different culture and the different economic treatment going on relatively late, NI WAS indeed occupied by a proxy-foreign power.
 
Well, beside the occasional Orange March and Gerry Adams shenanigans, of course now it's perfectly stable.

Seeing this from South of the border (not being Irish though), it does seem like it was very near an actual civil war with regular bombings and a lot of hatred on both sides following what could come across having a real religion-based division.

One might easily make the case that because of the different religion, the different culture and the different economic treatment going on relatively late, NI WAS indeed occupied by a proxy-foreign power.

Certainly parts of it would have voted to leave if they'd been given the option.
 
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