Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland

James Dingley

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2008
• ISBN:
  9781134210459
• Edition: 1
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: Military & Maritime History
• Index: History

This edited book analyses the lessons which can be drawn from Northern Ireland's experiences of combating terrorism.

The essays in this volume unite analysis and practice in exploring both the conflict in Northern Ireland and the internationally applicable counter-terrorism lessons which can be drawn from the response to it. The contributors, all specialists in their fields, make a theoretical analysis of the underlying causes of terrorism, and explore how this interacts with the development of effective operations and policy responses. The book emphasises the socio-economic and socio-cultural dimensions underlying the problem of terrorism, arguing that short-term, violent/military responses can in fact exacerbate the problem. It highlights the complexity of terrorism as a social phenomenon, and outlines the multi-faceted approach needed to combat it.

1 Introduction

James Dingley

The aim of this book is to explore what lessons can be drawn from the Northern Ireland conflict in terms of combating terrorism. The implication is that internationally applicable counter-terrorism lessons can be drawn from Northern Ireland and terrorism successfully combated. This immediately raises the old problem of defining terrorism, which will be addressed later since it has important implications for successful counter-tactics. Further, it also raises questions as to what exactly underpins the conflict in Northern Ireland, hence a whole chapter is devoted to that alone. Questions of both terrorism and the nature and causes of the Northern Ireland conflict are legitimate, since they go to the heart of what kind of strategy and tactics are relevant in combating terrorism and thus how transferable lessons are. Indeed, one criticism of the state in Northern Ireland has been its lack of ability to clearly define the core problem it confronted, e.g. was it dealing with religious conflict or ethnic/national conflict? An internal UK conflict or an inter-Irish one? Answers to these questions have serious implications for tactics and strategy both in the political and security force spheres.

However, the security response in itself has been reasonably clearly focused. Both the Army and police clearly recognised they confronted a terrorist threat, primarily from the Provisional IRA. Security folk have simple minds, sharply focused by someone trying to kill them and consequently have a relatively unerring instinct as to what their immediate problem is. Indeed, part of their remit is simply to focus on things such as immediate threats to law and order, public safety and the protection of life and leave the politics to others. To stay alive and to fulfil their remit they need to quickly analyse their threat and respond to it effectively, i.e. things that work, which may not always please the liberal civilian conscience or the hardline armchair warrior. Hence, as will be clear from several contributors, the security response has often been better focused than the political.

This is a theme that re-emerges in several chapters in one way or another, whether it is emotional disengagement from the rest of Britain concerning Northern Ireland or the state’s semi-detached attitude to the Province; there has often been a lack of focus from the residing government to match the security forces. The ambiguous attitude of the UK to ‘its province’ and its deliberate desire to distance itself from its governance from 1921 onwards has been a constant factor in the ongoing troubles, not just now but in sporadic campaigns by the IRA ever since the 1920s. Lack of full engagement has meant lack of knowledge as well as a lack of commitment that may have encouraged terrorism and has led to an almost perpetual security threat that has necessitated the deployment of armed police and the Army on a regular basis. This in itself may be an important political lesson, the need for a very unambiguous state that directly involves itself in and exercises direct responsibility over all of its sovereign territory.

However, by and large the counter-terrorist campaign of the security forces in Northern Ireland has been successful, and for this reason alone Northern Ireland should be worth studying by all those interested in counter-terrorism. It has been successful in the light of the fact that the main protagonist—Provisional IRA (PIRA)—effectively accepted defeat when it entered into talks culminating in the Belfast Agreement, 1998. This is not to say that the ‘troubles’ are over or that Northern Ireland’s problems are solved (several contributors would have severe doubts about that) but to make the point that the security forces were successful in defeating terrorism and could successfully hand the terrorists over to the politicians. ‘Peace’ and the peace process are thus primarily due to the security forces and that is a point that should be strongly made both out of fairness to them and to draw adequate lessons.

One point of interest does emerge here, which at least one contributor brings out, in terms of the different concepts that government and security forces had of their roles, which was whether the point was to defeat terrorism or to bring terrorists into politics. Definitions of success or failure may also hinge on this and so must be taken into account, especially if the terrorists see themselves playing a very long game and simply envisage politics as the ‘pursuit of war by other means’ to invert Clausewitz’s famous dictum. This may also help explain the less than euphoric attitude of several contributors to the peace process as a whole and also certain reservations as to just how successful the political dimensions of combating terrorism have been. But since the main (but not sole) concern of this volume is with the security forces response to terrorism these are probably arguments better left to other places.

However, one aspect of the political dimension is very pertinent to the security situation, since it impacts directly on both the causes and responses to terrorism, and is directly referred to by several contributors, which is the attitude of the state itself to Northern Ireland. There is an ambiguity here on the part of the state as to Northern Ireland’s true position within the nation-state (UK) that not only impacts upon the attitude of the local population to the state but also upon the legitimacy of the state’s security forces. This was reflected in the state declaring that the UK had no strategic or selfish interests in Northern Ireland (Downing Street Declaration, 1993). This was very unsettling for Unionists (their state should have an interest in them) but comforting for Republicans (the UK state was not committed to its own citizens and territory). As such this attitude could help feed Republican (terrorist) motivation while also unsettling state supporters (making them less inclined to compromise and less trusting of government). In addition it could also pose questions for the legitimacy and morale of the security forces acting on behalf of the state in Northern Ireland. Consequently, it could be argued that it fed the insecurity of the local population and so helped fan the flames of the security problem.

Even when ‘mainland’ politicians became directly involved in running the Province (direct rule, 1972) few could claim any first hand knowledge or interest in the Province, several contributors take up the point of lack of knowledge and interest in Northern Ireland by the rest of the UK, which can severely hamper effective political direction of security responses to terrorism. However, these are general points that underlie the immediate security problem and response but which form an important background to the specific responses of the security forces since they are bound to affect them. It is on the more specific responses that one must concentrate here and the key lessons learnt from 37 years of the ‘troubles’.

Key lessons

A major lesson to come out of this book is the continual emphasis on non-violent operations (‘soft power’)—shooting terrorists did not work, in fact it often had the opposite effect to deterrence. This is a vital tactical and strategic lesson for all security forces. What defeated the terrorist was prevention not just of terrorist incidents but any incidents, violence of any kind, bloodshed or bombs going off anywhere. It was better to get forewarning of a terrorist operation and swamp an area with security forces, so causing the terrorists to call off their operations than it was to shoot them or even arrest them (probably provoking shoot outs or confrontations). This demoralised the terrorist organisations and led to their internal decay and collapse of morale since they found themselves unable to do anything.

What caused this was not psychological but sociological and anthropological and relates to the complex social processes and messages that evolve around terrorism, ethno-nationalism, religion and the specific ideological baggage they utilise, which were all played out in Northern Ireland. Put briefly, terrorism succeeds when it can evoke a communal response from the terrorists own community and this works via playing on often unthought out but shared cultural messages that play on a cultural group’s myth-symbol complex. Most important here is the role of blood sacrifice and suffering (martyrs) in the cultural mythsymbol package (central to most nationalisms and religions). In many cultures the shedding of blood evokes a strong positive emotional response that consequently works important cultural mechanisms that send cultural messages that in turn affect the emotional state of those sharing a culture and so affects their attitudes and behaviour both socially and politically. If one can deny the blood-shedding image, which the security forces did, there is no cultural message to communicate.¹

Most importantly here, one is actually arguing that a primary target of the terrorist is not just the enemy but their own community. They are sending emotive, culturally specific messages of sacrifice and suffering that will recall members of their own community to collective ideals and goals (as well as repelling non-group members). Here one only has to think of the role of martyrs in any religion to see how the process works; and martyrs gain eternal life in paradise and are revered in their own communities of believers and act as an inspiration to them.² ‘Hard’, mass retaliatory actions and other conventional military responses actually play into the terrorist hands, because they increase the bloodshed and suffering and up the emotional ante and sense of martyrdom, which is why terrorists often goad the security forces into over-reaction against their own community. Low-level, non-violent responses (‘soft power’) and the long game were key factors in defeating terrorism in Northern Ireland simply by undermining the terrorists’ purpose from within. This became the key to counter-terrorism, strongly emphasised in the chapters on the Army, police and intelligence.

Another major feature is the emphasis on ‘low tech’ tactics and the almost routine policing nature of operations, indeed police primacy was a key feature since they had the requisite skills (terrorism is political crime and so needs to be responded to as essentially crime) and represented normality (armies quickly become identified as abnormal occupiers). Keeping a low profile helped reduce the sense of threat and incursion into daily life, it offered fewer targets for the terrorist, fewer causes for resentment from their supporters and helped maintain an air of normality that terrorism tries to undermine. Part of the definition of terrorism is its attempt to disrupt normality and to create a sense of an abnormal threat and so disruption and panic, even war has its normal rules and order. Consequently, by not responding in a disruptive way one helps undermine the terrorist and their impact. An important aspect of this was also the emphasis on the rule of law, normal due process and police primacy, the Army was merely there to support the civil authority not usurp it. Of course for the terrorist this was something they opposed and tried to undermine, which was where their political fronts came in so useful. Sinn Féin became most adept at ‘managing’ the news (spin) and the government never really got to grips with it.

In directly combating terrorism both the Army and police chapters emphasise strongly the junior ranks role at the forefront of the campaign and hence the importance of good training for them and the role of intelligence as the key to all counter-terrorist operations, especially if they were to be preventative and low key. The bulk of intelligence came from ordinary foot patrols, vehicle check points and routine observations. In effect good policing by local ‘coppers’ who knew their beat was the front line. The second front was being able to collate and analyse all the information gained and so process it into intelligence, from here they could utilise technology when they had clearly focused targets to track and survey. In addition, ordinary patrols led by Army corporals or police constables not only provided intelligence but also helped to deny territory to the terrorist. Constant patrolling upped the risk for terrorist movement, the increased chance of being spotted in the wrong place or in the process of an operation. It was not glamorous and would make a bad action film but was highly effective.

What also helped enormously was that the terrorists support was often limited to specific areas and a minority of the population as a whole. Unionists and Protestants (the majority) were almost 100 per cent hostile to the PIRA and Loyalist terrorists rarely scored more than 2–4 per cent of the popular vote. Mean-while, Catholics and Nationalists had a more ambiguous attitude to terrorism. Sinn Féin now get around 26 per cent of the vote, in the 1980s this was around 10 per cent, but many Catholics loathed the IRA without being enamoured of the Unionist state and a significant proportion, around 20 per cent would actually support the UK state. But outside of hard line Republican areas overt support for terrorism was low and this significantly helped the security forces gain information, intelligence and a regular supply of local recruits.

Local recruits were vital for both the police (RUC) and Army (UDR/RIR) since they represented a normality, had the commitment that goes with defending their own homes and the intimate local knowledge on which good intelligence is built (for this reason alone they were always prime targets for PIRA attacks and propaganda). Thus they also assisted soft power techniques by utilising that knowledge to prevent incidents in the first instance and by being a local presence for other locals to deal with. And when targeted by the terrorists it helped produce an image of the terrorist as the prime threat to local civil liberties and the source of violence and oppression, thus supplies of information and support for the security forces was maintained, even if it was just lack of cooperation with terrorists.

In military terms the security forces were very good at denying the terrorists the territory to operate on or a popular sympathy to feed off and so destroying their internal morale and will to continue. This was much aided by the security forces skill in being able to ‘turn’ or ‘plant’ informers in the terrorist organisations (a key factor in defeating terrorism), which had a tremendously destabilising effect upon them and greatly reduced their morale and operational capability. However, one could almost say that in political terms the opposite was the case. Sinn Féin were often able to operate and dominate the political landscape and even operate some of their own informers in a way that was sometimes demoralising for constitutional politicians of all persuasions, hence an entire chapter on political fronts and another on the role of government.

Defining terrorism and the PIRA’s terrorism

Defining terrorism is a linguistic minefield. However, just because something is difficult it does not mean it is impossible, similarly definitions may raise points of ambiguity but that does not mean that there is not a core phenomenon at work. So it is with terrorism. In international law terrorism is recognised as a distinct category precisely because it defies the normal rules of war and engagement, such as wearing recognisable uniforms or insignia or bearing arms openly. Certainly all war involves a degree of ‘terror’ and a violence way beyond that exercised by any terrorist group, however, precisely because of the terrible affects of war and modern violence, civilisations have attempted to restrict and control it via rules and laws, hence the recognition of civilian and non-combatant rights and status; formal chains of command and authority to hold combatants formally and openly accountable for their actions: combatants cannot just make up their own rules as they go along. This is precisely what is missing in terrorism and helps give it its peculiar feature,³ and was the situation in Northern Ireland—it was not war but terrorism.

Terrorism is unaccountable and unpredictable violence, following unknown rules and defying all conventions on the use of violence. As such it is also a defiance of all that has been built up under the concept of civilisation and civilised society. And it is interesting to note that most terrorist movements represent ideologies that would specifically reject the basic legal rational canons of modern civilisation, of rule of law, with formal processes and procedures to govern the complex sets of relations that make it possible for modern men to survive in their crowded and sophisticated urban settings. Civilisation is built on rules and laws, specifically of a legal rational nature, governing social relations that try to bind all people in to a single set of binding relations that enable them to interact effectively and non-violently on a daily basis. Legal rational is important in that it takes as its model the scientific paradigm on which industrial society is also built (industry—the appliance of science). Science is law bound, verifiable, open to testing and objective verification and the great child of the Enlightenment.

However, most terrorist movements reject the Enlightenment and utilise the ideology of the Romantic reaction against it and Irish Republicanism is no different. Romantics specifically rejected science as dead and soulless, its legal rational norms as inhibiting the spirit and free expression and also opposed industrial society as unnatural. Romantics wanted a return to Arcadian idylls, peasant life, spontaneity, emotional being and expression unconstrained by artificial (Enlightenment) civilisation—the cultural enemy. The most important thing for Romantics was freedom of the spirit and emotional expression and the greatest emotional expression of all was violence, the ultimate unconstrained freedom of being. Violence, suffering, struggle (Sturm und Drang) and sacrifice were key values⁴ and terrorism became its means of expression, almost as an end in itself since expression was being. Terrorist groups from ETA, the IRA, Animal Rig...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Notes on contributors
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Northern Ireland and the ‘troubles’
• 3 The rise of the paramilitaries
• 4 Terrorist strategy and tactics
• 5 Terrorist groups and their political fronts
• 6 Terrorist weapons and technology
• 7 Organised crime and racketeering in Northern Ireland
• 8 The government’s response
• 9 Northern Ireland terrorism: the legal response
• 10 The Royal Ulster Constabulary and the terrorist threat
• 11 The military response
• 12 From war of manoeuvre to war of position: a brief history of the Provisional IRA and the Irish Republic
• 13 How significant was international influence in the Northern Ireland peace process?
• 14 The war continues? Combating the paramilitaries and the role of the British Army after the Belfast Agreement
• 15 Conclusion