Or The Life of Brian"(Faulkner)
meeting of UDI leadership
IRA HQ
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"If They Want It They Can Have It": Ulster's Tragedy.
- Thread starter nezza
- Start date
meeting of UDI leadership
IRA HQ
David Flin
Gone Fishin'
Quite possibly. How much closer, I wouldn't like to guess.
It will be bad works for both.
In reality a declaration of UDI would have been doomed from the start. Ulster/Northern Ireland was not Rhodesia. Smith had access to plenty of supplies plus support from Mozambique as well as being a few thousand miles away from London. Faulkner would have been biting the had that fed him.
@FriendlyGhost I did mean Harry Tuzo's family re the apology
Thanks for the feedback. I've learnt so much about Irish military history.
@FriendlyGhost I did mean Harry Tuzo's family re the apology
Thanks for the feedback. I've learnt so much about Irish military history.
The TA is the Territorial Army, can't recollect if it had been merged with the Reservist as the TAVR (Territorial Army Volunteers and Reserve?) at that point. A less well equipped version of the US National Guard.
Northern Ireland was a very odd part of the UK from 1921 to 1972*. A largely self governing entity with the central government at Westminster only responsible for defence, foreign policy and macro economic issues. And a subsidy to the Northern Ireland administration. There's no US equivalent but you could think of a combination of Puerto Rico and maybe Alaska. Although it elected MPs to Westminster, NONE of the British parties organised there or ran candidates.** Usually the few MPs it elected were irrelevant to which of Labour or the Conservatives governed Great Britain (and the UK for the purposes mentioned above).
And while the Unionists considered themselves British, the Nationalists certainly didn't agree. And the Unionists were "loyal to the Crown", not the central government at Westminster
In the author's scenario the Unionists feel betrayed by Westminster being soft on Irish terrorists. Ignoring the half century of discrimination and suppression of civil rights they'd inflicted on Nationalists so as to maintain their dominance. And by the imposition of Direct Rule by Westminster. Treating them just like Scotland, Wales and England rather than the semi-detached statelet run for their convenience.
Apologies for the length. The key bit is that the situation is more like an attempted secession of Puerto Rico than the American Civil War. Or an attempt by the OAS and Pied Noirs to hang to part of Algeria when it was given independence by France.
The British reaction probably won't be as quick and violent as you think it requires. IMHO, David Flin could convince me otherwise.
* also beforehand and afterwards of course.
** because it wasn't really British in their eyes
Theres plenty of WTF elements in it, I mean I think at this stage you still have the Comet stuck in the Glen of Imaal (since DOD) didn’t pay for recovery vehicles so instead they left the tank where it broke down and unshipped the gun when they weren’t training until they finally decided to bury the tank after a kid broke his leg on it. The same DOD bought a squadron of comets (but not spares or rounds) and 1, just one transporter, imagine getting from the Curragh to the Glen for training... The panhards are only coming into service by 75 so the main armoured vehicles are still the WW2 ACs.
The Navy at this point has maybe one operational Flower class, just check the weather before it sails.
The AC has 3 Alouette’s in service at this time...
Though this might mean the 70s development plan might actually happen.
Currently reading BEIRUT RULES. Not gonna do the Atrocity Olympics thing, but boy, was Lebanon in 1985 helluva fucking BAD.
David Flin
Gone Fishin'
Some were really nice. Being taught to ski at Government expense in Arctic Norway (where I got to invade the Soviet Union all by myself); a couple of years in Nepal recruiting Gurkhas for the British Army (I never understood that one), training US Marines in Parris Island.
On the other hand, two tours of Northern Ireland, three months in Beirut (Hotel Commodore) guarding a government person who said his name was Michael but probably wasn't, six months in Dhaka guarding the British Embassy during the period East Pakistan was changing its name to Bangladesh. They weren't so much fun.
Interesting times.
TDM
Kicked
Kind of, I mean yes they espoused that a bit but it was all pretty much in the "what happens after we win" authors notes, plus in the 60's and 70's it gives you a bit of street cred when it come to hob-knobbing with other terrorist groups / support networks of the day and trying to cache in with antiestablishmentarianism of the era in general, As you say it was never came up in US support drives.
Look at SF as an party in politics, they've never exactly been pushing the envelope of modern day Marxism.
Basically as a core driving motivation its about as much window dressing for certain audiences as the efforts designed to appeal to the American Irish-Catholics, and Noraid
now, now, the food's not as good either!
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I was also thinking the same. Going through all that (Northern Ireland, Falklands, Lebanon...) and to live to tell the tell.
Trully impressive.
That's not a bad analogy though the British army did have more control than the Lebanese authorities ever could have managed. Just not enough to eliminate paramilitary or mafia type gangs, to the extent there was a distinction between them by the 1980s.
Thinking about it further, the situation resembles what could have happened if the French had tried to grant independence to only a part of Algeria. Hanging on to the most developed area where French settlers had a slender majority. Then letting said Settlers run the territory rather than having it a normal DOM with full civil rights for all residents.
With the results being an eventual insurrection and descent into near anarchy.
I went to a fancy French-style restaurant in Carrickfergus for a conference at the University of Ulster. I heard some of the people from Northern Ireland say after the meal that they were heading for McDonald's for a good feed after a meal as they were still hungry after the style french nouvelle cuisine. The quality of food was measured by the quantity.
Scotland reputation for food is not much better.
If it is not fried or comes from a tin it is not food. Scotland and Northern Ireland had the world highest rate of coronary heart disease when I lived there.
Scotland land of the deep-fried pizza and mars bar.
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TDM
Kicked
Heh,
(and yeah and yeah I know I'm being a bit mean, I know there's definately recent moves to try and make the best regional produce shine going on at the moment)
Was that "government person" supposedly from the Foreign Office but likely to be from the S.I.S?
At one point in the late 1990s the new Security Risk Consultant at the bank I then worked for introduced himself as Michael "Smith"* and added that he had "recently retired from Her Majesty's Secret Intelligence Service after running agents in East Germany". We had an interesting discussion on the overlap between his area and what the country risk sources I used could add to his briefings to the Board. Sadly I was too shy to ask about his experiences but I doubt he'd have been very forthcoming.
* I can't recollect his actual name but it was an anodyne typically English surname - might even have been his real name.
This was back in 1994.
I also help out at a barbeque at my boss's house in Whiteabbey and I started giving out goats cheese wrapped in vines leaves and other such fancy French food.
after 10 minutes people started to bang the knives and forks on the table saying where are the burgers and sausages.
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Cissies - my local Ayrshire chippy has as its speciality 'Blaggis and chips'. Blaggis being a mix of black pudding and haggis and then deep fried in batter.