Bloody Sunday & the Saville Inquiry.

[El Presidente]

Has anyone read Puckoon by Spike Milligan?

 

[Dandyman]

Someone else who is clueless!Newry had a big march the following weekend,the Paras were there too,and the only shot fired was a PIRA man shooting himself in the foot!Yes,I was there that weekend,in the Army,and didn't shoot anybody,even innocent Catholics!

What's clueless about it? Do you really think that troops who are trained as the first wave of attack are the best people to be put in a highly sensitive policing situation? That you and many other service people (including one of my uncles btw) behaved professionally does not mean that a minority did not.

 

[readingstockport]

Are you Alistair Campbell in drag?Don't really mean to be offensive but you seem to only see one side of an argument,& your side is always correct.If you were in NI in '72 where were you freezing your backside off?Don't think it could have been Derry,Newry,or Belfast,because you havn't got a clue

So, you're saying Saville is lying then are you when he reports that the facts are that the british troops opened fire first on unarmed civilians. and that those people did not begin firing until after the paras had already begun killing people?

 

[Dandyman]

i will try to elaborate on what i meant


The Gunpowder plot was a catholic plot aimed at removing the Protestant king, James the first and to install a catholic king in their sted. After it failed their was a back lash against Catholics.

Protestant - Originally kickstarted by Henry VIII who was originally catholic and wanted to divorce his wife (Catherine of Aragon) but the annullment was not allowed by the pope (who was being held prisoner by Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire at the time). After falling for Anne Boleyn king Henry excommunicated himself from the catholic church and a parliamnet act was passed known as the 'act of succession' which put Henry as the head of the church of england, which is to this day officially protestant (although this has alternated between catholisism and protestantism over the centuries and has sparked many feuds between the two religions. Perhaps most notably the gunpowder plot on the houses of parliament and of course the colonisation and 'thourough' by Sir Thomas Wentworth of Northern Ireland which still has massive political repocusions.)


An example of Irish Catholics being used recruited as soldiers to fight was when the wars of religion swept through Europe, setting Catholic against Protestant, often the Irish were to be found fighting for both sides

- this is highly likely to have caused bad blood between the religious divide in Ireland and the British involvement in Ireland could have been a partial excuse to escalate violence between two groups who have a historical hatred for each other.

Henry VIII remained a Catholic in doctrine and ordered the persecution and murder of Protestants - something carried out by his daughter "Bloody" Mary.

 

[readingstockport]

Hants, I normally respect your views even when I disagree with them but that post does you no favours.

Bloody Sunday Inquiry in Northern Ireland: World of Forensic Science



None of the dead tested positive for explosives, five definitely had not touched firearms. One body was claimed to have had nail bombs but still tested negative for explosive residue which suggests to many that the bombs were planted after his death.

Same as. But we all have our blind spots and I suspect for his own good reasons this may be Hants.



Mine is the franchise. And NO, I am not equating the two things before anyone shouts at me, they are totally different.

 

[Tyrone Biggums]

Even worse, Tyrone.

I live in a land where NI exists. Considering the remoteness of the Aboriginal settlesments to the cities in Australia and the size of your country, I don't think it's ridiculous to say that I probably live closer to NI than most Australians to Aboriginal townships. Therefore we, British, are as qualified by your standards (living in a country with oppressed people and seeing things, apparently) to say that I have life experience of what Republican people went through. It appears that we've already passed your criteria for "walking a mile in their shoes".

You'd be wrong again.

There's plenty of Aboriginals in the cities.

A lot are living a displaced kind of life. Go to Smith Street in Melbourne and you'll see them sitting around fighting and drunken at 10 in the morning.

And you've only walked a mile in their shoes if you understand why YOUR governments and militaries actions drove these people to these actions.

I can understand why soldier would shoot at them, can you understand why they'd fight back with force?

But taking your experience. You live in a land where there has been near extermination of an indienous race, children removed from their families, they now have their own quasi-autonomous governments and all this without one shot being fired. This is your experience, remember. How can you, from watching the peaceful protests of the Aborigines then understand armed conflict and outright terrorism by Republican British? It never happened where you live. Something altogether different happened. Something altogether more peaceful. Logically, it's impossible to make judgements about an armed conflict based on living in a country that never had one. It's all about life experiences according to you. Remember?

Yes you are right, it was different here.

The Aboriginals didn't have the technology to fight back and make much of a dent against the British when they arrived.

But they did fight back, not with guns to start with but with spears and whatever else they had at hand.

Some did fight back with guns over time but as always they were killed swiftly.

So if you think what's happened with the aboriginals has been peaceful you're truly deluded.

Because of the British colonization their communities today are now incredibly violent and resentful.

So it appears that I'm far more qualified to give judgements on Republican terror than you are - and I don't understand jack shit of how killing 4 year old kids can be justified for any reason.

If you can't understand why someone would use force to try and remove you from their lands then you're incapable of understanding the situation at all.

Interesting how you use the term "Republican Terror". Can we use the term the "British" Terror" to describe the military force imposed upon that island and its people by your governments?

Oh, but I can read. I think you mean my inability to understand what's written. It's you that has the misunderstanding. I said quite clearly that you were unable to give an unequivocal condemnation of their actions. Every time you have said the actions were vile, you have qualified it with comments such as "both sides did it".

And what's the problem with saying both sides are as vile as each other?

It's the truth is it not?

So you refuse to see the other side of the argument because that's their job. Not the fact that they are also human and under enormous stress.

They are humans who signed up to undertake a job which may involve killing other humans(if they signed up to be mere foot soldiers).

If you choose that to be your job then that does separate you somewhat from other sections of the community.

I'm not sure why i'm supposed to feel empathy with people who are oppressing others.

Hmm...Can you see why I keep pointing out that your arguments are blinded by your own prejudice? You've been offered several times to take a step back and consider both sides and this is an outright refusal. You won't and can't.

There is no prejudice.

Just a great sense of injustice against people living under what is tant amount to military rule.

unless they are of Indian descent in Fiji, if I recall. You hate the "body odour types".

What the fhell are you on about?

The Fijians are lovely people. Ironically enough they dislike very much the Indian community there because they treat the poor Fijians like second class citizens and look down their noses at them.

 

[Tom Hark Preston Park]

One or other side - soldiers or victims families - was always going to feel hard done by, no matter how painstaking the inquiry and how much it cost. That's how life is.

 

[El Presidente]

Same as. But we all have our blind spots and I suspect for his own good reasons this may be Hants.



Mine is the franchise. And NO, I am not equating the two things before anyone shouts at me, they are totally different.

The IRA have a franchise? I guess that explains the Provisional IRA, the Real IRA, the Official IRA, the Continuity IRA and the Surreal IRA Fish

 

[readingstockport]

The IRA have a franchise? I guess that explains the Provisional IRA, the Real IRA, the Official IRA, the Continuity IRA and the Surreal IRA Fish

I would say lol but this subject is a bit more serious than that.

 

[Tyrone Biggums]

The IRA have a franchise? I guess that explains the Provisional IRA, the Real IRA, the Official IRA, the Continuity IRA and the Surreal IRA Fish

If they don't have their own twitter, they are SO not a franchise.

 

[Joey Deacon's Disco Suit]

0/10 You really don't understand logical consequences, do you?

Your experience as an Aussie somehow gives you an insight as to how oppressed people live BUT your life experience of oppressed people and their reaction is totally diffrent from what happened in Ulster. And according to you, you can only make judgements when you've had the life experience. Which you clearly haven't. Not Irish oppression by a Protestant majority. Not the type of oppression nor the reaction to it.

You are talking out your arse to claim otherwise. The "peacefulness" I was talking about with regard to your country was the way in which the Aborigines gained their rights.



And there's a difference between using force to remove people from your land and travelling to that land, going to a shopping centre and planting bombs to kill 4 year old boys. I can see that. What I can't see is how killing 4 year old boys is justified in ANY circumstances. You clearly can.

Although can you? One minute it's vile and the next it's understandable.

There clearly is prejudice. You seem to have no bother understanding why 4 year old boys must die to help free an oppressed people yet can't see why 18 yr olds with guns against a hostile crowd might feel slightly anxious.

The Indian -Fijian reference was to one of your posts when you describe them as the body odour types. I was merely commenting that your own championing of the underdog doesn't seem to extend to them.

Your arguments are, quite frankly, a mess.

 

[Dandyman]

Not being funny, but I really don't understand your point? I was pointing out that the Civil Rights Association was not an entirely innocent civilian organisation - If you want to argue the rights and wrongs of the ANC's campaign of violence, that's a whole different issue. The SA govt were correct to fight the ANC as they saw them as terrorists, the politics behind that fight were clearly flawed and horrible, likewise the British Govt were correct to deploy the military to try and keep order against violent organisations.

The ANC were a non-violent organisation from 1912 until the early 1960s when the violence of the Apartheid regime (originally lead by people jailed as Nazi terrorists during WW2) lead to the sabotage campaign.

With the exception of Bernadette McAlisiky (sp?) I'm not aware of anyone dubious in the Civil Rights Association, which was lead by the Protestant Ivan Cooper.

The main aims of the Association were:

one man, one vote which meant extension of the local government franchise from ratepayers to all those over 21
an end to gerrymandering which meant Unionists were elected even in districts with Catholic majorities
an end to discrimination in housing
an end to discrimination in jobs
the disbandment of the B-Specials, the Ulster Special Constabulary, which many viewed as sectarian.

Has those demands been met in the 1960s, I doubt PIRA would ever have attracted any significant support for their murder campaign.

 

[Uncle Buck]

The evidence shows the Paras fired directly at innocent unarmed people and had bee geed up by their commanding officers before hand. For what its worth I don't think assault troops like the Paras were the right sort of soldiers to be involved in peace keeping in the first place but that does not change what happened.

Was that Dracula himself?

 

[Race]

i think what has pissed a few people off is that they feel the inquiry was already decided in favour of the victims. it seems that there are many conflicting stories and it has believed one argument over the other. there seems to be a lot of contradiction in the testimonies of major players in it. how can martin mcguinness appear in the report saying that he had a sub-machine gun on him then deny it on channel 4 news. its either true or not and if they are not sure then it cant be used. like-wise if some-one said that the paras fired first and the paras say it was the other way round then you cannot really trust it. it seems that the soldiers have not been believed which some might say is a whitewash

 

[Two Professors]

So, you're saying Saville is lying then are you when he reports that the facts are that the british troops opened fire first on unarmed civilians. and that those people did not begin firing until after the paras had already begun killing people?

Possibly a politically correct terminological inexactitude,with apologies to WCS.As for your previous post on the militant Republicans lack of action prior to Bloody Sunday you should try Covent Garden bombing 1940 e.g.,or look at Sean Russell,Frank Ryan,Stephen Hayes etc who accidently killed people during the Second World War,sponsored by the Nazis.

 

[Tyrone Biggums]

0/10 You really don't understand logical consequences, do you?

Your experience as an Aussie somehow gives you an insight as to how oppressed people live BUT your life experience of oppressed people and their reaction is totally diffrent from what happened in Ulster. And according to you, you can only make judgements when you've had the life experience. Which you clearly haven't. Not Irish oppression by a Protestant majority. Not the type of oppression nor the reaction to it.

You are talking out your arse to claim otherwise. The "peacefulness" I was talking about with regard to your country was the way in which the Aborigines gained their rights.

Just to fill you in on Australia as you seem to be missing chunks about its history.

Australia was rife with oppression against its Irish immigrants and their families, especially the catholic.

The author Thomas Keneally has written many a piece on this issue.

One of our greatest heros/villains Ned Kelly is a prime example of how even today people are polarized by this guys history because of his treatment by British authorities of the time.

In some ways a lot of what happened in our history mirrored that in NI of the time.

So we are fully aware of what oppression against the Irish was like.

And there's a difference between using force to remove people from your land and travelling to that land, going to a shopping centre and planting bombs to kill 4 year old boys. I can see that. What I can't see is how killing 4 year old boys is justified in ANY circumstances. You clearly can.

NO killing is justified unless you have a figure like Hitler standing before you.

I don't justify the IRA killing anyone.

There's a big difference between understanding why they do it and justifying it.

I don't see you on this thread questioning those who seem to be justifying the actions of the soliders who shot dead 13 people.

That would be your prejudice coming through.

There clearly is prejudice. You seem to have no bother understanding why 4 year old boys must die to help free an oppressed people yet can't see why 18 yr olds with guns against a hostile crowd might feel slightly anxious.

You don't get it do you?

The 4 y/o kiddie is dead because you kept sending 18 y/o soldiers to foreign lands and telling the people there what to do.

It's your governemts/militarys actions which caused all this shit to go down.

They are the ones who sent those poor 18 y/o sods there. The soliders might have pulled the trigger, but their leaders put them there.

Sadly a lot of innocent people then lost their lives because of these actions.

If i have prejudice its against regimes that go into other nations and impose their politics and military force on others.

The Indian -Fijian reference was to one of your posts when you describe them as the body odour types. I was merely commenting that your own championing of the underdog doesn't seem to extend to them.

Because the Indians aren't the underdogs.

They are the bullys.

I'd never describe Fijians as "body odour types", they don't stink .

Your arguments are, quite frankly, a mess.

Only because they dont agree with your views.

 

[Dandyman]

Possibly a politically correct terminological inexactitude,with apologies to WCS.As for your previous post on the militant Republicans lack of action prior to Bloody Sunday you should try Covent Garden bombing 1940 e.g.,or look at Sean Russell,Frank Ryan,Stephen Hayes etc who accidently killed people during the Second World War,sponsored by the Nazis.

The Official IRA and PIRA were separate organisations. The running gag in the late 1960's was that IRA stood for "I Ran Away". The first killings in the Troubles were carried out by the UVF who killed a Protestant Widow, Matilda Gould, in an attack on a Catholic bar in 1966 and later the same year shot and killed a Catholic man, Patrick Scullion, in the Falls and also killed Peter Ward (sic) in Malvern Street. On 11 October 1969, Constable Victor Arbuckle was shot dead by loyalists on Belfast's Shankill Road, becoming the first RUC death.

 

[Psychobilly freakout]

When did I say I wanted that? But hey, why let facts get in your way? Keep going, you're destroying what little sympathy I have for the soldiers and making me more of the view that those involved should face a court

Tosser

 

[Dandyman]

Was that Dracula himself?

Derek Wilford.

 

[ROSM]

it seems that there are many conflicting stories and it has believed one argument over the other. there seems to be a lot of contradiction in the testimonies of major players in it. how can martin mcguinness appear in the report saying that he had a sub-machine gun on him then deny it on channel 4 news. its either true or not and if they are not sure then it cant be used. like-wise if some-one said that the paras fired first and the paras say it was the other way round then you cannot really trust it. it seems that the soldiers have not been believed which some might say is a whitewash

I have sympathy with that view however we need to understand the approach and wording used in the report.

I think the issue here is that much of the resulting report is based on balance of probability (for example the Martin McGuinness piece). Where most people say something did happen but others say it didn't hence why the report says 'probably carrying a sub machine gun' in this case because given his background and the weight of statements it would seem more than likely he was.

But on the key issues of were the soldiers responding to nail bombs, petrol bombs or stones being thrown by the group in the area they were in at the point at which they opened fire, it would seem that it is more than the balance of probability and hence why the comment is firmly that they were not.

In terms of did warnings get issued to that group in that vicinity before opening fire again it would seem that the consensus was that they weren't.

In answer to the question did soldiers lie about their actions in the immediate aftermath again it is more than the balance of probability that they did according to the report.

But all groups of people in arms or in a shared battle will collude to protect each other. I'm sure we've done it on football pitches, at work. The army aren't alone and the context needs to be understood, I'm sure the police do it too (in fact given things I've seen at football matches I know they do).