Tuesday, May 26, 2009
“I will not be attending and will not send a representative”
Gerry Adams’ refusal to attend the Derry debate follows below the fold
The invitation:
To Gerry Adams
I would like to take this opportunity to invite you to either participate or send a representative to sit on the panel for a debate which will be entitled “What is the truth behind the Hunger strike?”
This has been organised by the Republican Network for Unity and we hope to host panellists and guests from across the political spectrum.
The venue for the event will be at the gasyard in the Brandywell, Derry at 7.30 pm, Sat 23rd May 2009.
Panellists confirmed thus far include Richard O’Rawe, Willie Gallagher and Eamonn Mc Cann and we hope to have confirmation from various others.
It is imperative that we are inclusive and all encompassing so as to generate debate in this extremely emotive subject and maybe gain some form of clarity for the families of the men who died.
Though this will be an open debate we are actively encouraging former Blanket men to attend and contribute to the night’s proceedings.
I may be reached at the above telephone number and/or email address and would ask if you could please RSVP me at your earliest opportunity,
Regards,
John Cassidy
Gerry Adams’ response:
From: maire.grogan
To: johncassidy; Jcassidy2005
Date: Fri, 22 May 2009 11:06:36 +0100
Subject: Reponse letter from Gerry Adams
John a chara,
Thank you for your letter to me received on Wednesday 20th May about an event in Derry on Saturday 23rd Ma y 2009.
You assert that your aim is “clarity for the families of the men who died”. It is presumptuous of you to presume that you speak for the families on this, or indeed any other matter. These families are well able to speak for themselves.
My understanding from recent conversations with family members of hunger strikers who died during the 1981 Hunger Strikes is that they are quite clear about what happened. I have never had concerns to the contrary raised with me by any family members.
Any family member I have spoken to in recent times has been angered by the politically motivated stories printed by the Sunday Times which was hostile to the Hunger Strikers from the outset and also to Sinn Féin. Other political opponents of Sinn Féin have been quick to jump on this anti-Sinn Féin bandwagon to=2 0propagate bogus claims for political objectives of their own. This is a disgraceful affront to the memories of those who gave their lives. It totally disregards the feelings of family members.
Your event, in my opinion, is part of that agenda. I will not be attending and will not send a representative.
Is mise le meas,
Gerry Adams MP, MLA
Máire Grogan
Office of Gerry Adams MP MLA
Sinn Féin Party President
MP & MLA for West Belfast
0D
Tel: 028 90 347350
Fax: 028 90 347360
Email: .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)
Website: http://www.sinnfein.ie
Earlier on Slugger:
1981 Hunger Strike Truth Commission Includes text of British document of July offer and transcript of Willie Gallagher’s speech at the Derry meeting
The Truth is a Heartbreaking Thing Initial summary of Derry meeting
Upcoming Debate: “What is the Truth Behind the Hunger Strike?” Announcement of public meeting and note of Radio Foyle debate between Raymond McCartney and Richard O’Rawe (also discussed on The Pensive Quill: A Shifting Narrative)
When in a hole… Contrasts between Danny Morrison’s position and previously published accounts of the time
What were the hunger strikers told? Questions emerge that cast doubt on what the hunger strikers knew when about what negotiations were being conducted on their behalf by the Adams subcommittee.
“Let’s have the whole truth” - Danny Morrison and Richard O’Rawe statements
Did Thatcher Kill All 10 or Only 4? - contains statements and interview excerpts
Rusty Nail @ 09:47 AM
Other political opponents of Sinn Féin have been quick to jump on this anti-Sinn Féin bandwagon to propropagate bogus claims for political objectives of their own.
Your ears burning Rusty.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 11:07 AM“it is presumptuous of you to presume” - apart from that though, Beardy has a point.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 11:12 AMBy the way rusty - how long are you intending on milking this “debate”? (although I was always led to believe a debate required opposing arguments which were presented and discussed and there doesn’t seem to have been much in Derry that night)
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 11:15 AMAdams’ arrogance is typical Adams’ arrogance.
He thinks he speaks for everyone and no one better dare challenge his alleged authority.
There is a serious attempt to cover-up and Adams well knows that the lies this time will destroy Sinn Fein because the hunger strike is so very important historically.
Power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.
Admas thinks he has absolute power over all republicans (or he should have) and damn the truth.Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 11:52 AMIt seems to me, from the sidelines, that this debate can go nowhere. People are just not going to change the stories they have given for almost 30 years, whether they are true or are lies.
The hunger strikers obviously believed that their cause was just and so gave their lives. We should leave it at that whether or not we agree with them.Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 11:57 AMSome things we might like to know:
The full list of the panel that participated in this ‘debate’.
The list of ‘witnesses’ giving evidence that supported the ‘commission’s’ conclusions and was therefore accepted.
The list of ‘witnesses’ whose testimony was rejected as being not so supportive.
A list of those surviving who were engaged in the hunger strike or present in the H-Blocks at that time who gave evidence.
A list of the family members of hunger strikers who gave evidence.
The names of those, outside of the H-Blocks, negotiating on behalf of the prisoners who gave evidence.
A list of those prison officials who gave evidence and likewise a list of any Home Office, NI Office or other British agents who gave evidence.
A full transcript of the proceedings and copies of all documentary evidence presented or referred to during the course of the ‘tribunal’.
The names of the ‘commissioners for truth’ who adjudicated, evaluated the evidence and pronounced sentence.
That should be doing nicely to be going on with in order that we might have an opportunity to evaluate the worth or otherwise of this commission and its findings.
I am sure that Rusty Nail who has been ever so helpful in providing us with voluminous reading matter with every posting on this matter will be only to keen to continue in this helpful way and provide us with all that is asked for above.
After all there can’t be that much material emanating from a one day trial now can there?
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 12:04 PMAdams has never had the reputation for sticking his head into the jaws of a lion.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 12:53 PM-
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 01:04 PM
Rory, all of this has been covered quite comprehensively in previous posts on Slugger, the majority of which also have extensive backlinks to all this information.
The full list of the panel that participated in this ‘debate’.
Willie Gallagher, Gerard Hodgins, Richard O’Rawe, Liam Clarke, and Brendan Duddy were on the panel at the meeting in Derry. Tommy Gorman chaired the discussion. Invitations had also been issued to Bik McFarlane, Gerry Adams and Danny Morrison, who did not attend. This has already been noted in previous posts.
The list of ‘witnesses’ giving evidence that supported the ‘commission’s’ conclusions and was therefore accepted. & The list of ‘witnesses’ whose testimony was rejected as being not so supportive.
No testimony has been rejected from anyone. Any information from all quarters is welcome. On the night of the meeting itself, Gerard Clarke came forward during the meeting and confirmed hearing the conversation between Bik and Richard where they discussed and accepted the offer that came in as relayed by Danny Morrison. Tommy McCourt also spoke from the floor noting that the IRSP had not been informed about the Mountain Climber negotations, nor told anything about the offer or the prison leadership acceptance of the same. This, too has been noted in previous posts, and links to the video of their contributions have been provided.
A list of those surviving who were engaged in the hunger strike or present in the H-Blocks at that time who gave evidence.
Richard O’Rawe, Gerard Hodgins, Gerard Clarke; other former Blanketmen spoke at the meeting and have also written in other fora about the subject; in addition representatives of the IRSP of the time and people who were on the H Block committees spoke at the meeting. As well, representatives from that time of various groups from the IRSP to Father Faul and those pursuing the ICJP initiative have also spoken publicly about this time. Lawerence McKeown has written about this, as has Brendan Hughes. As previously noted on Slugger, Raymond McCartney and Richard O’Rawe discussed the issue on Radio Foyle last week.
A list of the family members of hunger strikers who gave evidence.
Many family members have spoken in various fora before, this is all documented in a number of books and newspaper articles over the years.
The names of those, outside of the H-Blocks, negotiating on behalf of the prisoners who gave evidence.
Danny Morrison, Jim Gibney and Gerry Adams have all written about this period.
A list of those prison officials who gave evidence and likewise a list of any Home Office, NI Office or other British agents who gave evidence.
Brendan Duddy, the Mountain Climber link, spoke at the meeting; documents from the NIO obtained under Freedom of Information requests were presented on the night. Previously other documents obtained from the NIO have been published. The Bobby Sands Trust website carries an interview with Mi5 agent John Blelloch, and there are a number of books about both the hunger strike itself, the Provisional IRA, the INLA, the prison service, and Thatcher/the British government of the time that address this area.
A full transcript of the proceedings and copies of all documentary evidence presented or referred to during the course of the ‘tribunal’.
At the moment the meeting is available for everyone to view on YouTube, broken into a number of segements; the IRSP and the RNU also videoed the meeting and will be making the video available publicly; a transcript of Willie Gallagher’s comments has been posted on Slugger previously, as has the NIO document of the British offer, and Adams’ refusal to attend the debate. At some point the full debate will likely be transcribed as well.
The names of the ‘commissioners for truth’ who adjudicated, evaluated the evidence and pronounced sentence.
That would be everyone following the debate.
Hopefully this clarifies things for you, Rory; all of this information and more has already been posted on Slugger and you can find more background information using the backlinks that have always been provided.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 01:06 PMhttp://www.derryjournal.com/county/39There-was-no-offer-to.3956317.jp
Was this guy invited? It’s just that this story doesn’t appear among your list of links.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 01:10 PM@Intrigued: You will find that article, as well as Scullion’s letter to the Irish News and Richard O’Rawe’s response to it, linked and discussed previously on Slugger here: Hunger Strike Controversy Has Not Gone Away, You Know (please also note this post is linked in the backlinks/background information appended to nearly every post on the subject; you will find it in the subsection, “Previously on Slugger”, it is the second link).
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 01:28 PMRusty
Why did Richard O’Rawe write the following in a comm on July 23rd 1981 (two weeks after the death of Joe McDonnell):
”…only direct talks between the British and ourselves…can guarantee clarity and sincerity and thus save lives…At present the British are looking for what amounts to an absolute surrender. They are offering us nothing that amounts to an honourable solution…”
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 01:44 PMRusty Nail,
Your response to my points in post 7, as any reading of it will confirm, is completely inadequate and serves only to illustrate further what an absolute farce this whole show trial really was.
Why is it that Richard O’Rawe’s recall and more importantly, interpretation of, crucial events are accepted when those he claims as witnesses to support his recall and his interpretation, Bik McFarlane and Colm Scullion both ardently deny both his recall and interpretation of events?
Why are McFarlane and Scullion treated as though they were either in their dotage or being manipulitvely deceitful in denying O’Rawe’s version of the account while O’Rawe (whose book sales were aided by this new spin that his tale was able to bring to the table) is treated as not only the only reliable witness but also the only one extant from that time with a clear sighted interpretation of the intricacies of the unfolding events?
As I have eluded to before this sorry event resembles nothing more than a BNP meeting gathered to adjudicate the merits of David Irving’s Did Six Million Really Die and should be treated with all the contempt of similar distaste.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 02:02 PMThat still doesn’t answer the question: this guy is obviously a crucial witness to events - so why wasn’t he invited?
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 02:11 PM@Dec: From the same comm (which you have quoted out of context):
“The death of our comrade Joe McDonnell on July 8th, plus the Humphrey Atkins statement of the same day, and the evolution of bitter claim and counter-claim between the British and the ICJP left one thing clear – that intermediaries (and this is no slight on the ICJP), are dangerous and that only direct talks between the British and ourselves based on our 4th July statement can guarantee clarity and sincerity and thus save lives.”
Indeed.
On page 200 of Blanketmen, O’Rawe details a comm that came in from Adams on 22 July:
“Another comm came in from Adams on 22 July, stating that talks with the Mountain Climber had broken down once more and that nothing new was on offer. Adams outlined the Army Council’s view that we were facing two options: to end the hunger strike immediately without accepting the Mountain Climber’s proposals, or to stay on hunger strike, basically hope for the best and pray that at some time in the future the British government would concede to our five demands. He then repeated the Army Council’s opinion that the Mountain Climber’s proposals did not provide the basis for an honourable settlement. The reason given was that the Council thought that there was too much distance between the Mountain Climber’s offer and what was needed to validate the deaths of the six hunger strikers. By presenting us with only two choices, the Army Council was stating clearly that only implementation of the full five demands, in their entirety, was now sufficient to bring an end to the hunger strike.”
The PRO statement you quote continues:
“At present, the British are looking for what amounts to an absolute surrender. They are offering us nothing that amounts to an honourable solution and they have created red herrings, that is, their refusal to allow Brendan McFarlane to represent the Hunger Strikers, to cover their inflexibility…
“Lastly, we hope that it is clear that we cannot end the Hunger Strike unless justice is done and that ultimately lies in the hands of the Brits.”
It would appear, and if you read that section of Blanketmen (starting on 199 and going on from there), it seems that the PRO statement from O’Rawe on 23 July was clearly influenced by and reflecting what was sent in by Adams the day prior.
For a definitive answer, you would have to ask Richard O’Rawe.
@Rory: You asked:
Why is it that Richard O’Rawe’s recall and more importantly, interpretation of, crucial events are accepted when those he claims as witnesses to support his recall and his interpretation, Bik McFarlane and Colm Scullion both ardently deny both his recall and interpretation of events?
Simply put. Because the weight of evidence that has since emerged supports O’Rawe’s claims and does not support the denials from others. McFarlane claims the conversation did not take place, and that there was no offer: “There was no concrete proposals whatsoever in relation to a deal.” This has been contradicted by Danny Morrison and indeed, in the letters cited by Intrigued earlier, Colm Scullion, where he says: “I agree with Richard that there was certainly an offer which Richard was made aware of by Brendan McFarlane, who was a few cells away.”
More than that though, corroborating evidence from independent primary sources - such as Duddy, and the NIO documents - has emerged that support what O’Rawe claims and contradicts the denials against his claims. Nothing has emerged that supports the denials of O’Rawe’s claims; in addition the denials have shifted over time from flat out denial to mitigation. O’Rawe’s claim has not shifted.
This is why more weight is given to the O’Rawe version of what happened; it bears out. The ‘packaged narrative’ no longer holds up to scrutiny.
Why are McFarlane and Scullion treated as though they were either in their dotage or being manipulitvely deceitful in denying O’Rawe’s version of the account while O’Rawe (whose book sales were aided by this new spin that his tale was able to bring to the table) is treated as not only the only reliable witness but also the only one extant from that time with a clear sighted interpretation of the intricacies of the unfolding events?
I do not recall anyone claiming McFarlane or Scullion were dotty. People have asked and are asking why the truth is not being told. This is again because of the contradictions of the denials. They do not add up, whereas the accumulating supportive evidence that verifies O’Rawe’s claims does.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 02:29 PMI have sent these two pieces in previous posts but as of yet no-one has responded - can someone please point me in the right direction in relation to my questions about this period?
Liam Clarkes contribution to this discussion:“if the PIRA accepted the draft statement and ordered the hunger strikers to end their protest the statement would be issued immediately. If they did not the statement would not be put out.”
My good God after what happened at the end of the December 1980 Hunger Strike i.e when Republicans ( the Hunger Strikers) moved first and were then ‘dirty joed’ by the Brits is it any wonder that the utmost caution was being displayed by republicans at this time?
Reluctant to take part in this discussion because for myself nothing should ever take away from the heroic sacrifice of the men and women onthe 80/81 hunger strikes; we should all be concious of the impact til this day of the families and friends of the hunger strikers; and nothing but absolutely nothing should ever try and take away the onus on the British Government for what happened here in Ireland.
Someone keep me right here and try and satisfy my curiosty in a constructive fashion please.
Deadmanonleave ( point 2) ‘This deal was, it is alleged, rejected by the leadership of the Provisional movement outside the prison in order to further a political agenda outside’.Was it not obvious from the EU elections in June 1979 and the amazing performance by Bernadette Mc Aliskey ( despite the outright opposition / hostility of SF) that if any organisation wanted to use the prison protest ‘in order to further a political agenda outside’ then the local government elections in April 1981 would have been the perfect platform in which to further this political agenda? Despite the fact that it had been known for years that these elctions would take place during April 1981, SF at their previous Ard Fheis decided not to contest them with the result that any other individual or organisation that did stand on an anti H Block Armagh manifesto during these elections did remarkbly well with many getting elected. These local govt elections could have been predicted many months in advance - the death of Frank Maguire ( RIP ) could not have been predicted at all.
After Bobbys election and death the Britiish Government brought in a law that prevented ‘convicted felons’ standing in elections - if i was able to attend the meeting in derry I would like to know was this also part of the SF agenda?
When Joe died on the 8th July there was absolutely no indication whatsoever that the British Govt were going to call a by election at all for Bobbys seat. Much speculation in the papers at that time was that the Brit Govt were prepared to leave the position unfilled til the end of that Parliament. The writ for the by election for Bobbys seat was not moved ( by a Tory MP?) until 31st July - was this also part of the SF agenda?Unfortunately I can not be at the meeting in derry but I hope that nothing is ever taken away from the role of the Britsh Government in the deaths of Mickey and the other 9 men.
Posted by joe soap on May 26, 2009 @ 12:40 PMPosted by on May 26, 2009 @ 02:31 PM“Rusty Nail”? Rusty hinge more like, that keeps squeaking and squawking, and needs a good shot of the oil of modern thinking to silence it.
Nobody believes for a second that you are motivated by anything other than a desire to undermine Sinn Fein. Would you and your sectarian cavemen friends be any less liars and scoundrels than SF if you get what you want? No? You’d probably be worse.
Why not lay out your vision for a future Ireland and give us all a good laugh.Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 02:44 PMBut it all boils down to this:
Was there an offer or a deal from the Brits?
There clearly was no deal so we must now only consider if indeed there was a serious offer that could be trusted (my emphasis).
The answer to that in the light of all past experience must be that “No, there was not!”.
What the Army Council were in fact faced with was a demand that they first order the hunger strike to cease and the strikers to capitulate in return for which they were teased with an “assurance” that the Brits would then issue a statement of what might then be on offer.
Given the complete betrayal of earlier British “assurances” which were the very catalyst for the second hunger strike how could the Army Council have risked betraying the strikers and denying all that those already dead and those willing to die were fighting for?
It cannot be more emphasised that the Army Council has no power to order volunteers to begin a hunger strike. It only has authority to order volunteers to cease. But that authority has to be exercised with great care and responsibility for the understanding of the will and determination of those so committed and the reasons why their prison conditions have become so intolerable to them as to embark on such a perilous means of protest.
The desperate situation of 1981 demanded that the strikers themselves must be left to make their own decision and that those outside give them the best guidance they were able as to the reliabilty and trustworthiness of any proposals made to them by the enemy.
In the light of all that went before no reasonable man with the goodwill for the hunger strikers’ full intent to heart could fault the reading of such as Danny Morrison and Gerry Adams as to the ploy played by the Brits where a demand to capitulate first and then await a publicly declared offer was the only game in town. They had played that game before and knew the dice were loaded.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 03:41 PMAdams has taken all the gains from the heroism of the hunger strikers and the truth is that most of these young men were not doing it for republicanism but for the good of their people in the Nationalist and Catholic community.
It’s time that the narrow agenda of Adams is set aside and the broader picture looked at. Then we can begin to understand the nature of the betrayal of these young men from when it began as they undertook the strike to the intervention in the form of a deal in early July.
I can clearly recall the mood of the time of the hunger strike when it was being said that the longer it went on the more it would suit Sinn Fein. So there needn’t have been an election at all. The cold betrayal of these men by their brothers was carried out in order to further the political ambitions of Sinn Fein in general and Gerry Adams in particular.
That argument has been won so far as I see and I think it is merely a question of getting the message across in the media.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 03:54 PM@Intrigued: I have no idea if he was invited or not; it was a public meeting well publicised. Why he chose not to attend I cannot say.
@joe soap: You wrote:
My good God after what happened at the end of the December 1980 Hunger Strike i.e when Republicans ( the Hunger Strikers) moved first and were then ‘dirty joed’ by the Brits is it any wonder that the utmost caution was being displayed by republicans at this time?
This is not how the first hunger strike ended. If you take a look at page 299 of Denis O’Hearn’s biography of Bobby Sands, Nothing But an Unfinished Song:
“The movement had sent comms to let him (Sands) know that the British government was sending a courier with a document that might be a solution. But Bobby never got the comms until the next day because “the lad had to swallow them”. It would not have made any difference because the authorities refused to let Sands go to the hospital, where the drama of the negotiations and pressures on Brendan Hughes was unfolding…”
“The next thing he knew, he was taken to the prison hospital at 6:45 in the evening. What he found there shocked him.
I saw Index (Father Toner) and Silvertop (Father Murphy) in the corridor as I walked down the wing. There were three cartons of eggs sitting in a doorway. My heart jumped. Dorcha (Brendan Hughes) came out of Tommy McKearney’s room and went into Tom (McFeeley)‘s room in front of me. Tom was in bed. Raymond and Nixie were sitting beside the bed. They were all shattered. Dorcha said, “Did you hear the sceal (news)?” I said, “No.” He said it again. I thought Sean was dead. Then he said, “We’ve got nothing, I called it off.” The MO was banging an injection into Tommy. Sean was en route to the hospital. Tom had been against it, wanting to wait to see what Atkins was going to say in the Commons. Dorcha was under the impression that Sean had only twelve hours to live.”
And also look Adams’ description of the end of the first hunger strike as he writes of it in A Farther Shore, pages 12-13:
But with the commencement of the hunger strike, the British government opened up contact with republicans. Through this contact in the British Foreign Office - code-named “Mountain Climber” - a channel of communication which had been used during the 1974 IRA-British government truce was reactivated. Father Reid’s role had been filled by another Redemptorist priest, Father Brendan Meagher. The British said they wanted a settlement of the issues underpinning the protest and committed to setting out the details in a document to be presented to all of the prisoners formally and publicly after they came off their hunger strike.
Mountain Climber brought the document to Father Meagher, who delivered it to Clonard Monastery where I and a few people who were assisting the prisoners were waiting for him. As he was briefing us, Tom Hartley, the head of our POW department, burst into the room where we were meeting to tell us the hunger strike was over in the blocks.”
Continues…
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 03:55 PMSee also pages 108-109 of Richard O’Rawe’s Blanketmen:
By 18 December the hunger strikers had not eaten for over seven weeks. Bobby was summoned to the camp hospital about ten o’clock that night. (We later found out that while there, he had met Father Meagher, who presented him with a document from the British government on prison procedures.) You could feel the tension on the wing as Bobby got ready to leave for the hospital. Everyone knew this was an important meeting, because reports had been circulating that Sean McKenna was in a critical condition. After an hour and a half, Bobby returned with the news that the hunger strike was over. My immediate reaction was one of huge relief, but this was tempered when Bobby said, “Ní fhuaireamar faic.” (‘We didn’t get anything.’)
Brendan Hughes had made a commitment to Sean McKenna that he would not let him die, and when he was close to death, he kept his word and called the strike off, before any British documents came in or any deal could be done.
As he wrote in a letter to the Irish News, 13 July 2006, “Risking the lives of volunteers is not the IRA way”:
In a recent BBC documentary Bernadette McAliskey said she would have let Sean McKenna die during the 1980 hunger strike in order to outmanoeuvre British brinkmanship.
Implicit in her comments was a criticism of those senior republicans who decided against pursuing the option favoured by Bernadette.
As the IRA leader in charge of that Hunger Strike I had given Sean McKenna a guarantee that were he to lapse into a coma I would not permit him to die.
When the awful moment arrived I kept my word to him.
Having made that promise, to renege on it once Sean had reached a point where he was no longer capable of making a decision for himself, I would have been guilty of his murder.
Whatever the strategic merits of Bernadette’s favoured option, they are vastly outweighed by ethical considerations.
Terrible things happen in the course of any war and those of us who feel obliged to fight wars must take responsibility for the terrible consequences of actions we initiate.
I can live with that - in war we kill enemies and expect to be killed by them.
I can stand over the military decisions I made during our war against the British.
But there are no circumstances in which I was prepared to make a cynical decision that would have manipulated events to the point where a republican comrade would forfeit his life.
Twenty-five years on, I have no reason to change my mind that the decision I made to save the life of Sean McKenna was the proper one.
Faced with similar circumstances I would do the same again.
History may judge my actions differently but preventing Sean McKenna from becoming history rather than my own place in history was my prevailing concern.
Brendan Hughes, Belfast.At the meeting in Derry, this was discussed and former blanketmen Gerard Hodgins, Tommy Gorman, Dixie Elliott and Gerard Clarke, and Richard O’Rawe, were all very clear that there was no deal for the British to renege on, and that those inside the prison at the time knew this. They had decided to save face, however, and claim that was what ended the hunger strike in order to keep the pressure on the British. This discussion should be available in the You Tube videos and when I have time I will find it for you later, if you have not already viewed them.
So the idea that the rejection of the British offer in July during the second hunger strike was based on the prisoners’ fear of the British ‘dirty joeing’ them again is a nonsense. The Brits could not renege on a deal that had not been struck. It is propaganda, nothing more.
Your second question I am not entirely clear on what you are asking? Someone else may take a stab at it.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 03:56 PMRory
If what you say is the case, (please read rusty’s post above), what prevented Adams from going in there and stating it? A journalist? This (Adams) was the man who brought peace to Ireland, he negotiated with the Brits since Clonard monastary right up to St Andrews, he talked to unionists, and went off to the middle east to show them how to do it. But suddenly he is put off by one journalist??
Thats strange.
Or maybe it wasn’t the journalist, maybe it was the weight of evidence against his position that he truly feared. Either way, sooner or later, he has questions to answer. Sooner or later people will start to demand answers.
Lets hope when he answers he isn’t shown to been in any way at fault, for if he is history won’t be kind to him.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 04:21 PMNevin,
#8
The detail in that link has been removed. What was it about please?Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 04:52 PM@Rory (05:41 PM): All of that is well and good but made totally irrelevant by the fact that the prisoners themselves had accepted the offer.
On whose authority then, did the Adams committee take it upon themselves to over-rule the prisoners’ acceptance and reject the offer?
As Brendan Duddy confirmed when asked about this on Saturday, the Adams committee rejected the offer, telling the British “a good deal more was needed.”
The prisoners themselves thought enough was there.
You write:
Given the complete betrayal of earlier British “assurances” which were the very catalyst for the second hunger strike how could the Army Council have risked betraying the strikers and denying all that those already dead and those willing to die were fighting for?
First, there was no ‘betrayal of earlier British assurances’ as discussed above. Using the ending of the first hunger strike to justify the rejection of the July offer does not wash.
More importantly, those on the Adams committee did betray the hunger strikers when they over-ruled the prison leadership acceptance of the British offer; when they kept their negotiations secret from the hunger strikers and from the IRSP/INLA, when they kept the July offer and acceptance secret from other volunteers on hunger strike. Mickey Devine died not knowing about the July offer, nor knowing that the prison leadership had accepted it. If the withholding of such important, life-saving information is not a betrayal of the worst magnitude - for whatever reason, I don’t know what is.
It cannot be more emphasised that the Army Council has no power to order volunteers to begin a hunger strike. It only has authority to order volunteers to cease. But that authority has to be exercised with great care and responsibility for the understanding of the will and determination of those so committed and the reasons why their prison conditions have become so intolerable to them as to embark on such a perilous means of protest.
So please explain why then the Adams committee gave themselves the power to keep volunteers on hunger strike after they had accepted an offer that would end it?
Is it because, as was said in Brian Rowan’s article last week, that the prisoners were naive, inexperienced and incapable of “making a judgment” - did the Adams committee think they knew better than the prisoners themselves what was good for them, at the cost of the hunger strikers lives?
The desperate situation of 1981 demanded that the strikers themselves must be left to make their own decision and that those outside give them the best guidance they were able as to the reliabilty and trustworthiness of any proposals made to them by the enemy.
So which is it, do the hunger strikers have the ability to make their own decisions or don’t they? Brendan Hughes explained why he made the decision that he did in ending the 1980 strike: “Risking volunteer’s lives is not the IRA way”. Yet in the 1981 strike, when the prison leadership decided to accept the July offer from the British, they were not left to ‘make their own decisions’ - the ‘best guidance’ that the outside leadership gave was to play with the lives of six men and over-rule what the prisoners themselves wanted: an honourable end to the hunger strike at the cost of as few lives as possible.
In the light of all that went before no reasonable man with the goodwill for the hunger strikers’ full intent to heart could fault the reading of such as Danny Morrison and Gerry Adams as to the ploy played by the Brits where a demand to capitulate first and then await a publicly declared offer was the only game in town. They had played that game before and knew the dice were loaded.
But they ‘played that game’ using the lives of the volunteers they were supposed to represent as collateral, without respecting the prison leadership’s wishes nor fully informing all of the hunger strikers of the offers on the table - and six of them died because of it.
Goodwill doesn’t come into a gamble like that.
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 05:01 PMIntersting reading Rusty.
I am intrigued as to what your background is. Are you a member of another political party? Ar you a journalist? Or merely an interested observer?
Posted by on May 26, 2009 @ 05:18 PM
