The conflict in Northern Ireland was referred to as ‘the Dirty War’ by many of us who served there, both because of the way it was fought and the appalling impact it had upon the victims.
The Good Friday Agreement was presented to the public as the panacea that would bring the violence to an end once and for all. It was an extremely bitter pill to swallow for the relatives of those who had died at the hands of the paramilitaries over the years and had then had to watch these murderers return to their communities feted as heroes.
It was also a bitter pill for the Security Forces and the Intelligence Services to digest, reflecting on the risks and toil over the years it had taken to put these killers where they belonged in the first place.
Too much was asked of our soldiers when operating in Northern Ireland:
- They were expected to prevent physical violence between communities of opposite sides of the sectarian divide, hell bent on killing each other.
- They were expected to fill the void left vacant by a Police Force that could not carry out the most basic of functions due to the physical threat to their lives.
- They were expected to endure verbal and physical abuse as they went about their tasks without responding or reacting in order not to risk escalating the situation.
- They were expected to return to the streets and countryside days after witnessing their friends and colleagues killed or injured, again, without reacting or responding in any manner that could be deemed aggressive by the local populace.
- They were expected to completely switch from core infantry fighters to peacekeepers after conducting 8 weeks or so ‘theatre specific training’.
The republican PR machine, with its backers and sympathisers from the UK and the USA, was very effective in portraying British soldiers as murderers carrying out a state-sponsored ‘shoot to kill’ policy. The real truth is that soldiers in Northern Ireland actually dreaded the day when they would have to use their firearm because they knew too well the legal consequences of the action and the pressure that the republican movement would heap upon the Government for punitive measures to be taken against the individual.
An example which I believe typifies this is the horrific killing of Army Corporals Derek Wood and David Howes. These two soldiers were murdered in the most brutal manner by a mob of republicans, all recorded by a helicopter’s camera from above. The point here is that both men were armed but the only shot that was fired was fired into the air to attempt to get the mob to retreat. The majority of soldiers who watched the incident unfold or saw it on later coverage were puzzled as to why the men never fired at their attackers. It is my firm belief that, like most soldiers of that era, they had been so used to following the wisdom of never firing your weapon that when the time came when it was absolutely necessary, the mindset just wasn’t there.
We have entered an era where we seem very keen to illuminate the actions of our past with the enlightenment of today’s knowledge, statutes and protocols which have no comparison to the muddled mission statements and directives that soldiers followed through the years of the the Troubles.
Under the GFA, the paramilitary murderers and criminals returned to their families and friends. Those who were On The Run from the law were issued official letters confirming that they could also return with no threat of incarceration hanging over them. Yet we now find we have a government in power who want to pursue former soldiers, some of them well into their 60’s and beyond, for mistakes made while carrying out the country’s domestic security policy? I thought I’d seen it all with the Phil Shiner affair but clearly not.
Don’t hound these veterans for the actions carried out decades before under the most difficult of circumstances. Don’t judge their historic actions using today’s comparisons. Don’t pretend there is anything to be gained other than to pander to the republican victimhood agenda.
But if the government is determined to follow this course of action, then every minister, policy writer and senior MoD official linked to the formulation of policy for military operations during this period should also be held under the same scrutiny. Deployed Service personnel are merely a physical representation of a government’s domestic or foreign policies; nothing more.
Here’s an idea: Level the playing field. Give our NI veterans a ‘Good Saturday Agreement’. Acknowledge that mistakes were made while operating under stressful conditions with muddled directives and policies. Acknowledge that no party with any involvement in the Northern Ireland conflict will ever be satisfied and therefore also acknowledge the futility in highlighting one party, the veterans, for investigation.
Give the veterans their own official letters, letting them know they have nothing to fear from legal reprisals. Allow them to remain at ease in their homes with their families. In short, allow them nothing more than that which was afforded to the terrorists and criminals who dragged Northern Ireland through a senseless conflict for over three decades.
