No army is immune from leaving skeletons inside cupboards

Thirteen innocent civilians shot and killed by British troops:

Saville Report on Bloody Sunday in Northern Ireland:

On January 30th 1972, British paratroopers opened fire - or were forced to do so, according to their account, after being fired at, at first - on a civil right march in Londonderry in Northern Ireland, the part of Irish territory that is under British rule. A total of 13 people were killed in the incident and it triggered off a chain of disasters in the long run.

The 10000-odd protestors were up in arms against a law that had been brought in to imprison suspects who were involved in subversive activities against the state without trial. So, the government had banned the march which went ahead defying the authority.

The paratroopers, on being pelted with stones, initially fired rubber bullets, water cannons and tear gas to disperse the crowd. Paratroopers were deployed with clear orders to arrest as many as possible; however, at dusk, the atmosphere turned ugly. Paratroopers opened fire killing 13 and injuring a similar number. Then started the blame game: marchers accused the army of firing indiscriminately; the soldiers, in turn, accused the marchers of attacking them first.

The incident was the watershed of Northern Ireland troubles; it had the potential to turn even those who didn’t want to form a united Ireland by violent means, to embrace armed struggle as the only solution. IRA, the main armed movement in the Northern Ireland, saw its fortunes growing exponentially in terms of human resources, finances, especially from the influential Irish community in America and patriotism among the Irish.

Since then, there had been calls for public inquiries into the incident. The British government, in the end, bowed to international pressure and a few inquiries were launched in the past. However, none of them could satisfy the grieving relatives of those who were killed; they just saw them as a series of whitewash.

In this context, both the victims and the British government attached huge significance to the latest report that was published on June 14th by Lord Saville. It was a very damning report as far as the parachute regiment was concerned, which was involved in the shooting. Some of the major findings of the Saville report are as follows: Who got injured and killed?

“None of the casualties shot by soldiers of Support Company was armed with a firearm or (with the probable exception of Gerald Donaghey) a bomb of any description. None was posing any threat of causing death or serious injury. In no case was any warning given before soldiers opened fire.

“None of the casualties was posing a threat of causing death or serious injury, or indeed was doing anything else that could on any view justify their shooting.”

Were the soldiers provoked by the IRA to commit the atrocities?

“We have concluded that the explanation for such firing by Support Company soldiers after they had gone into the Bogside was in most cases probably the mistaken belief among them that republican paramilitaries were responding in force to their arrival in the Bogside. This belief was initiated by the first shots fired by Lieutenant N and reinforced by the further shots that followed soon after.”

Who fired the first shot?

“Soldiers reacted by losing their self-control and firing themselves, forgetting or ignoring their instructions and training and failing to satisfy themselves that they had identified targets posing a threat of causing death or serious injury.”

Was this an act in self-defence or did paratroopers fire indiscriminately?

“The soldiers fired because they lost control. He said with the exception of two soldiers; none of the firing was aimed at people posing a threat of causing death or serious injury”.

Were the soldiers properly prepared for the scenario?

“Soldiers of Support Company had been told by officers and believed that this was a particularly dangerous area for the security forces, with any incursion running the risk of meeting attacks by paramilitaries using bombs and firearms; if these soldiers were not frightened, they must at least have been highly apprehensive.”

Was there any evidence about disobeying superiors by the paratroopers?

“The soldiers of Support Company who went into the Bogside did so as the result of an order by Colonel Wilford, which should not have been given and which was contrary to the orders that he had received from Brigadier MacLellan.”

Did the army cover up the events of the fateful day?

“Apart from Private T many of these soldiers have knowingly put forward false accounts in order to seek to justify their firing.” .

Did an, Irish republican hot-head fire the first shots?

“There was some firing by republican paramilitaries” but that on balance the Army fired first. A member of the official IRA told the inquiry that they had shot at soldiers very early on in retaliation to the shooting of two of the protesters. These two official IRA members had gone to a pre-arranged sniping position in order to fire at the soldiers; and probably did so when an opportunity presented itself rather than because two civilians had been injured.”

What was the role of Martin McGuinness, the leader of Sinn Fein in all that?

“In the course of investigating the activities of the Provisional and Official IRA on the day, we considered at some length allegations that Martin McGuinness, at that time the Adjutant of the Derry Brigade or Command of the Provisional IRA, had engaged in paramilitary activity during the day. In the end we were left in some doubt as to his movements on the day. Before the soldiers of Support Company went into the Bogside he was probably armed with a Thompson sub-machine gun, and though it is possible that he fired this weapon, there is insufficient evidence to make any finding on this, save that we are sure that he did not engage in any activity that provided any of the soldiers with any justification for opening fire.”

Was the British government responsible for the deaths?

“The immediate responsibility for the deaths and injuries on Bloody Sunday lies with those members of Support Company whose unjustifiable firing was the cause of those deaths and injuries.”

Did the British government encourage the soldiers to send a clear message to trouble-makers?

“In the months before Bloody Sunday, genuine and serious attempts were being made at the highest level [of the British government] to work towards a peaceful political settlement in Northern Ireland. Any action involving the use or likely use of unwarranted lethal force against nationalists on the occasion of the march (or otherwise) would have been entirely counterproductive to the plans for a peaceful settlement; and was neither contemplated nor foreseen by the United Kingdom government.”

Did the Northern Ireland government covertly contribute to the violence?

“So far as the Northern Ireland government was concerned, although it had been pressing the United Kingdom government and the Army to step up their efforts to counter republican paramilitaries and to deal with banned marches, we found no evidence that suggested to us that it advocated the use of unwarranted lethal force or was indifferent to its use on the occasion of the march.”

Were the paratroopers just trigger-happy or there any shoot-to-kill policy?

“It was also submitted that in dealing with the security situation in Northern Ireland generally, the authorities (the United Kingdom and Northern Ireland governments and the Army) tolerated if not encouraged the use of unjustified lethal force; and that this was the cause or a contributory cause of what happened on Bloody Sunday. We found no evidence of such toleration or encouragement.”

The damning report, comprising 5000 pages, took almost 12 years to produce. It certainly put both the government and the army in a precarious position. David Cameron, the British prime minister said “it was shocking and he is deeply sorry,” while delivered the findings.

It is highly likely that the soldiers who were on duty on Bloody Sunday may be prosecuted in the light of the Saville report. If the situation develops that far, it is like taking the lid off a can of worms; plenty of ugly things that lie under the fragile peace agreement between the British government and the IRA may come up - only to burden the peace agreement which is already at the breaking-point with the last straw.

Courtesy: Asian Tribune