The Intelligence War against the IRA

by Thomas Leahy

  28. NUIG, Brendan Duddy papers, Pol 35/63, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1975, 18 September 1975.

  29. Taylor, Provos, pp. 177–91.

  30. NUIG, Brendan Duddy Papers, Pol 35/63, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1975 to 1976, 20 May 1975.

  31. NUIG, Ó Brádaigh Papers, Pol 28/67, Formal meeting between British and Irish republican representatives, 2 April 1975 (underlined in original. Italics mine).

  32. NUIG, Ó Brádaigh Papers, Pol 28/67, Formal meeting between British and Irish republican representatives, 7 May 1975.

  33. Oatley in Taylor, Brits, pp. 178–9.

  34. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, Meeting between SDLP representatives and a representative from the Irish Department for Foreign Affairs, 9–10 April 1975, pp. 1–2.

  35. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Meeting between SDLP representatives and members of the Irish government at Iveagh House in Dublin, 20 August 1974, pp. 1–5.

  36. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, Meeting between SDLP representatives and a representative of the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, 23–25 October 1974, pp. 1–3.

  37. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Report on the Northern Ireland situation by a representative from the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, 8 June 1975, p. 4.

  38. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/97, Letter from Eamon Kennedy of the Irish Permanent Mission to the United Nations to an Irish Department of Foreign Affairs representative, 24 August 1974, pp. 1–3.

  39. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Report on the Northern Ireland situation by a representative from the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, 8 June 1975, pp. 4–11; UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, meeting between the UDA and the Department of Foreign Affairs representative in Belfast, 30–31 July 1974, pp. 1–9; UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, Meeting between leading UDA members and the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs representative in Dunmurry in Northern Ireland, 20–21 May 1975, pp. 7–9.

  40. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 4–6.

  41. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Northern Ireland: an assessment of the current situation, 8 June 1975, pp. 4–10; UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Memorandum for the Government, 11 June 1975, pp. 1–8; for more comments on SDLP reservations about independence and British state intentions about withdrawal see UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Memorandum for the Government: Northern Ireland Situation, 18 November 1974, pp. 2–4; UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/68, Meeting between Government and SDLP at Iveagh House, 20 August 1974, pp. 1–28; UCD, FitzGerald papers, 215/94, Meeting between SDLP and Irish Department of Foreign Affairs representatives, 23–25 October 1974, pp. 1–3; for Craig, see UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, Meeting between Bill Craig and a representative of the Irish Department of Foreign Affairs, 21 October 1975, p. 8.

  42. TNA, PREM 16/515, The end of the IRA ceasefire, 17 January 1975, pp. 1–3.

  43. Cf. Neumann, Britain’s Long War, pp. 91–2.

  44. TNA, FCO 87/221, Meeting between Michael Oatley and Father Denis Faul and Father Patrick Conning at Laneside, 25 April 1973.

  45. TNA, CJ 4/860, Note of a meeting between the Secretary of State for Northern Ireland and the Bishop of Derry, 7 January 1975, pp. 1–2.

  46. Bradley with Feeney, Insider, pp. 123–4.

  47. O’Doherty, The Volunteer, pp. 136–37.

  48. Conway, Southside Provisional, p. 51.

  49. Moloney, Secret History, pp. 182–4.

  50. NUIG, Brendan Duddy Papers, Pol 35/63, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1975, Conversation with Ó Brádaigh, 7 May 1975.

  51. Conway, Southside Provisional, pp. 193–4; for the Irish government’s fears in 1975, see Kerr, Destructors, pp. 256, 302–3.

  52. NUIG, Brendan Duddy Papers, Pol 35/63, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1975 to 1976, 25 June 1975.

  53. UCD, FitzGerald papers, P215/94, Meeting between SDLP representatives and a representative from the Irish Department for Foreign Affairs, 9–10 April 1975, pp. 1–2.

  54. For more detail on SDLP and Sinn Féin relations and strategies in this period, see Murray and Tonge, Sinn Féin and the SDLP, pp. 43–82.

  55. NUIG, Brendan Duddy Papers, Pol 35/63, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1975 to 1976, 15 September 1975.

  56. TNA, CJ 4/1427, The Republican movement, 5 May 1976.

  57. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 7–8; TNA, CJ 4/1427, The Republican movement, 5 May 1976.

  7 British Political, Military and Intelligence Strategy towards the IRA: 1976–1998

  1. Operation Banner, point 809.

  2. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 6–7.

  3. The next four chapters build on earlier arguments presented in Thomas Leahy, ‘The Influence of Informers and Agents on Provisional Irish Republican Army Military Strategy and British Counter-Insurgency Strategy, 1976–1994’, Twentieth Century British History, 26.1 (2015), 122–46.

  4. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 4–8.

  5. TNA, PREM 16/958, Merlyn Rees telegram to Harold Wilson, 29 November 1975, pp. 1–5.

  6. NUIG, Brendan Duddy Papers, Pol 35/132, Brendan Duddy Diary: 1976, 8 May 1976.

  7. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 8.

  8. TNA, PREM 16/958, Merlyn Rees telegram to Harold Wilson, 29 November 1975, pp. 1–5.

  9. TNA, FCO 87/484, Note of a conversation at Headquarters Northern Ireland in Lisburn, 9 April 1975.

  10. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 6; Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 62–4, 72.

  11. Hamill, Pig in the Middle, pp. 184–5.

  12. TNA, CJ 4/1656, Annex B: ‘The Way Ahead for Security Policy’, 9 September 1977 (italics mine).

  13. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 72, 107, 246–7; Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 6.

  14. Operation Banner, point 809.

  15. Frampton, ‘Agents and Ambushes’, pp. 84–5.

  16. Taylor, Provos, pp. 202–3.

  17. TNA, PREM 16/1343, Letter from Roy Mason to James Callaghan, 9 February 1977.

  18. Moloney, Secret History, pp. 149–51.

  19. Neumann, Britain’s Long War, pp. 99–123.

  20. Operation Banner, point 233.

  21. Bradley with Feeney, Insider, pp. 151.

  22. Stephen Greer, ‘The Supergrass System’, in Anthony Jennings (ed.), Justice under Fire: The Abuse of Civil Liberties in Northern Ireland (London: Pluto Press, 1990), pp. 73–9.

  23. Barker, Shadows, pp. 214–15.

  24. Greer, ‘Supergrass’, pp. 77–8.

  25. Stephen Greer, Supergrasses: A Study in Anti-Terrorist Law Enforcement in Northern Ireland (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 192, 205.

  26. Kiran Sarma, ‘Informers and the Battle against Republican Terrorism’, Police Practice and Research: An International Journal, 6.2 (2005), 170.

  27. Mark Urban, Big Boys’ Rules: The SAS and the Secret War against the IRA (London: Faber and Faber, 1993), pp. 136–7.

  28. Frampton, ‘Agents and Ambushes’, pp. 85–6.

  29. Harnden, ‘Bandit Country’, pp. 197–237.

  30. See table 2, ‘Responsibility for Deaths’ in McKittrick et al., Lost Lives, p. 1553.

  31. Aldrich and Cormac, The Black Door, pp. 330–1.

  32. The cell structure was not implemented in rural areas because of the smaller numbers involved in those areas.

  33. Interview with Séanna Walsh, Belfast, 21 May 2012 in Leahy, Informers, p. 118.

  34. Bradley with Feeney, Insider, pp. 128–9, 152–4; Taylor, Provos, pp. 210–12.

  35. Interview with Féilim Ó hAdhmaill, Cork, 9 September 2013; see a similar view in Urban, Big Boys’ Rules, p. 31.

  36. Operation Banner, point 232.

  37. Taylor, Provos, pp. 214–16.

  38. TNA, FCO 87/976, Future Terrorists Trends, 15 December 1978.

  39. Cf. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 74–5; cf. Moloney, Secret History, pp. 169–71.

  40. Cf. McKearney, Provisional IRA, pp. 141.

  41. Ó Do
chartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 3–7.

  42. Interview with Séanna Walsh, Belfast, 21 May 2012 (italics mine) in Leahy, Informers, p. 120.

  43. Interview with Danny Morrison, Belfast, 20 January 2014 (italics mine).

  44. O’Brien, Long War, p. 118.

  45. Interviewed by Brook Lapping Productions for the four-hour TV documentary Endgame in Ireland, first shown on BBC Two in June–July 2001. Interview transcripts available in the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives (LHCMA), Endgame in Ireland Television Documentary Archives, Endgame in Ireland 3/19, Typescript transcript of rolls 284–8 with Father Alec Rid; for more background on Reid see Moloney, Secret History, pp. 219–45.

  46. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, 5.

  47. LHCMA, Endgame in Ireland 2/6, transcript of rolls 193–5 with Pat Doherty.

  48. English, Does Terrorism Work?, pp. 108–17.

  49. TNA, CJ 4/4797, The Belfast Newsletter, ‘SF Hits Back at Prior’, 10 December 1983.

  50. TNA, PREM 16/1342, Letter from Roy Mason to Prime Minister on Provisional IRA intentions, 3 February 1977, pp. 1–5 (italics mine).

  51. TNA, CJ 4/4815, Irish Times, 7 December 1982.

  52. TNA, CJ 4/4797, G. L. Angel, ‘Sinn Fein and Violence’, 16 November 1983.

  53. Linen Hall Library Political Collection (LHL NIPC) Belfast, PH905, Sinn Féin President Gerry Adams speech to 86th Ard Fheis, 1991, pp. 1–4.

  54. Moloney, Secret History, p. 156.

  55. The Rt Hon Sir Desmond de Silva QC, The Report of the Patrick Finucane Review (House of Commons, 2 December 2012), p. 90: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/246867/0802.pdf.

  56. Operation Banner, points 501–6, 809, 818, 835, 855–6.

  57. Operation Banner, point 242.

  58. LHCMA, Endgame in Ireland 1/14, transcript of rolls 94–6 with Charles Powell.

  59. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 82–116; Neumann, Britain’s Long War, pp. 120–47.

  60. Taylor, Brits, pp. 238–9, 265–7.

  61. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, p. 88.

  62. Setting the Record Straight: A Record of Communications between Sinn Féin and the British Government October 1990 – November 1993 (Belfast: Sinn Féin, 1993), pp. 2–3, 11–12.

  63. Margaret Thatcher, The Downing Street Years (London: HarperCollins, 1995), pp. 385–6.

  64. Taylor, Brits, pp. 226–59.

  65. Thatcher, Downing Street Years, pp. 385–6.

  66. McKearney, Provisional IRA, p. 135.

  67. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 83–5.

  68. TNA, CJ 4/5513, Edward Bickham, ‘Political Development’, 12 May 1985, p. 2.

  69. ‘Margaret Thatcher interview, The Belfast Telegraph, 13 December 1985: www.margaretthatcher.org/document/106202 (italics mine).

  70. Moloney, Secret History, p. 241; Neumann, Britain’s Long War, pp. 126–7.

  71. Thatcher, Downing Street Years, pp. 406–7.

  72. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 101–3.

  73. Cf. Matchett, Secret Victory, pp. 159, 162–3, 169–71.

  74. TNA, FCO 87/1379, undated paper, ‘Approaches to Government by Sinn Fein assemblymen’, pp. 3–5.

  75. TNA, CJ 4/5501, BBC Radio 4 Today interview with Douglas Hurd, 21 May 1985, p. 12 (italics mine).

  76. TNA, CJ 4/4544, ‘Prior Says He Will Not Meet Adams’, Irish Times, 13 June 1983.

  77. TNA, CJ 4/4933, D. A. Hill, ‘Ministerial Dealings with Sinn Fein Members’, 17 January 1984, pp. 1–2; for examples of the ‘curt’ replies to even Labour Party politicians who advocated talks with republicans, see TNA, CJ 4/4933, ‘Secretary of State draft reply letter to Clare Short MP’, undated document.

  78. TNA, CJ 4/5387, ‘Rebuke for Hume’, February 1985.

  79. Moloney, Secret History, pp. 246–60.

  80. Interview with Tommy McKearney, Monaghan, 18 April 2011.

  81. Moloney, Secret History, pp. 256–7.

  82. TNA, FCO 87/1582, P. H. C. Eyers, ‘Possible proscription of Sinn Fein’, pp. 1–3; TNA, CJ 4/4542, ‘Proscription of Sinn Fein’, 19 August 1983; TNA, CJ 4/4542, W. E. Bell, ‘Sinn Fein proscription’, 19 December 1983, pp. 1–2; TNA, CJ 4/4542, J. M. Lyon, ‘Sinn Fein’, 19 December 1983, pp. 1–3.

  83. TNA, CJ 4/3784, G. L. Angel, ‘Implications of Sinn Fein Elections Success’, 25 October 1982, pp. 1–2.

  84. TNA, CJ 4/3784, G.L. Angel, ‘Implications of Sinn Fein Elections Success’, 25 October 1982, p. 1; TNA, CJ 4/4544, ‘Prior Says He Will Not Meet Adams’, Irish Times, 13 June 1983.

  85. TNA, CJ 4/4868, D. Holt note, 28 August 1984.

  86. For example, see TNA, FCO 87/1582, ‘Foreign and Commonwealth telegram to certain missions and dependent territories’, November 1983.

  87. TNA, CJ 4/4797, ‘Ireland “Could Become a Cuba”’, Irish Times, 11 November 1983.

  88. See for example TNA, CJ 4/5144, Government’s attitude to Sinn Fein and notes for supplementaries, undated document.

  89. Ó Dochartaigh, ‘The Longest Negotiation’, pp. 7–13.

  90. David Bloomfield, Political Dialogue in Northern Ireland: The Brooke Initiative 1989–92 (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 1998), pp. 15–18.

  91. Setting the Record Straight, p. 12.

  92. Taylor, Provos, pp. 320–2.

  93. Taylor, Provos, pp. 315–21.

  94. John Major, The Autobiography (London: HarperCollins, 1999), pp. 432–3.

  95. Interview with former British civil servant, 25 March 2014.

  96. Taylor, Provos, pp. 328–9.

  97. McKearney, Provisional IRA, pp. 138–9.

  8 The Intelligence War against the IRA in Belfast and Derry City, January 1976 to August 1994

  1. Cf. Bew et al., Talking to Terrorists, pp. 107–28, 244–7, 255–6; Matchett, Secret Victory, pp. 8, 112–13, 232–4.

  2. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/246867/0802.pdf.

  3. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93; The Rosemary Nelson Inquiry Report (House of Commons, May 2011), pp. 137–9: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/247461/0947.pdf.

  4. The name of the HMSUs emerged in the early 1980s following controversy surrounding the killings of a few allegedly unarmed republicans by their predecessors the E4 Special Support Unit. Matchett, Secret Victory, pp. 180, 209–20; Nelson Inquiry Report, appendixes A–D; Holland and Phoenix, Phoenix, 113–15.

  5. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93.

  6. Cursey, MRF, pp. 77–80, 203 and 232; James Rennie, The Operators: On the Streets with Britain’s Most Secret Service (London: Arrow, 1996); Urban, Big Boys’ Rules, pp. 1–9, 35, 38–42, 238.

  7. Andrew, Defence of the Realm, pp. 771–5.

  8. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93; Nelson Inquiry Report, pp. 138, 161–9.

  9. Aldrich, GCHQ, pp. 498–500.

  10. Aldrich, GCHQ, pp. 500–2.

  11. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93; Nelson Inquiry Report, pp. 161–3.

  12. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93.

  13. Matchett, Secret Victory, pp. 108–12. Patrick Finucane Review, pp. 71–80.

  14. Holland and Phoenix, Phoenix, pp. 132–5; Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93.

  15. Matchett, Secret Victory, p. 187.

  16. Holland and Phoenix, Phoenix, pp. 205–21.

  17. Nelson Inquiry Report, pp. 184–5.

  18. Rob Lewis, Fishers of Men (London: Coronet Books, 2000), pp. 120, 227.

  19. Holland and Phoenix, Phoenix, pp. 189–90, 321–2.

  20. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp. 59–93.

  21. Matchett, Secret Victory, pp. 172–6, 188–90.

  22. Patrick Finucane Review, 2 December 2012, pp
. 59–93.

  23. Operation Banner, point 812.

  24. Pat Finucane Review, pp. 65–6.