The RA

OnTheCounter

Im curious to know what is the modern day makeup of the IRA/CIRA/RIRA.

What are the majority of members doing these days?

Any truth that they (mainly in the north) kneecap young hooligans as a punishment for breaking the law and a warning to other young ones?

Do they actually deal drugs themselves or just extort dealers?

Whats the story with them seemingly taking over the bouncer industry?

Whats the current relationship with Sinn Fein?

If you are known to be a member of the IRA is it still a convictable offence?

Any guesses on total membership numbers?

Wild speculation is not only allowed but encouraged.

Stained Class

Basically, all of them are a cancer on Irish society.

End of.

Richard Hillman

The IT wing of the organisation just discovered email

TeddyTedson

They've all combined except for the CIRA as far as I'm aware. Oh, and some left to join Sinn Féin too.

One or two were given the noble peace prize.

Tom_Cruise

They have all left for Australia.

DEFTLEFTHAND

An organised crime group of different factions. Patriotism hasn't been relevant in years.

Pace2008

3:23 on this video gives a good account of some of the main players in the RA:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iBT4ZWy6Lm4

zef

Buy the 'Sunday World'. It knows the answers to your questions.

fasttalkerchat

The dissidents and an anti-drugs group joined to make one large organisation with about 1000 members across Ireland (They claim more, but IMO max 800-1000 are active).

My name is URL

HAIRY JAPANESE BASTARDS!

Darkglasses

I don't know the answer OP, but i'm curious too. I think the 32 County Sovereignty Movement might be the most important armed terrorist republican organization of the bunch though.

dlofnep

The current splinter groups are not the RA. The RA was the Provisional IRA, which is now disbanded. The current factions RIRA/ONH/CIRA have nothing to do with Sinn Féin, and probably dislike SF as much as they dislike the British Government. They are supported vocally by the 32 county Sovereignty Movement and Republican Sinn Féin (Not to be confused with Sinn Féin).

The majority of their supporters are barstool dickheads, who are rarely seen when it comes to legitimate protests, canvassing, charity events, etc..

starbelgrade

The CIA and the IRA recently joined forces to form the CIARA and they came second in this year's Rose of Tralee.

Stained Class

Tom_Cruise wrote: »

They have all left for Australia.

TBH, most of these wankstains wouldn't get a passport, so we're stuck with them unfortunately.:mad:

dlofnep

Darkglasses wrote: »

I don't know the answer OP, but i'm curious too. I think the 32 County Sovereignty Movement might be the most important armed terrorist republican organization of the bunch though.

32 County Sovereignty Movement isn't a paramilitary organisation. It's a mouth-piece/vocal outlet. There may be some overlap in membership with the RIRA, but probably only a small portion. I highly doubt that the RIRA.. and CIRA/ONH actually have more than a couple of dozen active members.

fasttalkerchat

Darkglasses wrote: »

I don't know the answer OP, but i'm curious too. I think the 32 County Sovereignty Movement might be the most important armed terrorist republican organization of the bunch though.

Except they're not armed. They're a political organisation liked to what was the RIRA.

OnTheCounter

Darkglasses wrote: »

I don't know the answer OP, but i'm curious too. I think the 32 County Sovereignty Movement might be the most important armed terrorist republican organization of the bunch though.

actually only heard that crowd mentioned this week. Whats their story?

Fromthetrees

dlofnep wrote: »

32 County Sovereignty Movement isn't a paramilitary organisation. It's a mouth-piece/vocal outlet. There may be some overlap in membership with the RIRA, but probably only a small portion. I highly doubt that the RIRA.. and CIRA/ONH actually have more than a couple of dozen active members.

They have a handful of councillors in both the north and south too.

starbelgrade

The 32 County Sovereignty Movement sound like something out of 'The Life of Brian'...

Excuse me. Are you the Sovereign 32 County Movement?

**** off! We're the 32 County Sovereignty Movement.

round tower huntsman

your in the right place, ah is the best place get info on dissos:rolleyes:

fasttalkerchat

starbelgrade wrote: »

The 32 County Sovereignty Movement sound like something out of 'The Life of Brian'...

Excuse me. Are you the Sovereign 32 County Movement?

**** off! We're the 32 County Sovereignty Movement.

Óglaigh na hÉireann are worse, theres also OnaH and the aforementioned are sometimes referred to as ONH.

Pottler

"We havn't gone away you know". I asked my next door neighbour and that's what he said. So there you go, they still live next door, apparently. They play their stereo too loudly, imo.

Stained Class

Richard Hillman wrote: »

The IT wing of the organisation just discovered email

And how to get ink cartridges to print their bile.

At the taxpayers expense too.

Remember Angus O Ugly's recent escapade?

Richard Hillman

These groups are about 50% republican loons, 50% British and Irish agents. The agents have no problems letting the odd pipe bomb go but when it comes to the big ones they are shut down fairly quickly.

emo72

If you are a criminal, you can give a percentage of your criminal earnings to some other criminal who goes under the name of republicanism, and hey presto, they are now legit freedom fighters. Most of your income is extortion money. Basically scumbags.

DEFTLEFTHAND

emo72 wrote: »

If you are a criminal, you can give a percentage of your criminal earnings to some other criminal who goes under the name of republicanism, and hey presto, they are now legit freedom fighters. Most of your income is extortion money. Basically scumbags.

Exactly right, it works like the Soldato, Capo relationship in a Mafia family. The street thugs do the dirty work and pay tribute to their superiors, hence strengthening the organisation and protecting the top brass from legal prosecution.

Red About Town

dlofnep wrote: »

The current splinter groups are not the RA. The RA was the Provisional IRA, which is now disbanded.

The Officials probably said the same of the Provos.

How history repeats itself.

Stained Class

Red About Town wrote: »

The Officials probably said the same of the Provos.

How history repeats itself.

Agreed, it's just scum by a slightly diffrent name.

Amazing how the Irish people tolerate this kind of filth really..

racso1975

Some got into property development.....
Their morals always played havoc with them

Yamanoto

OnTheCounter wrote: »

What are the majority of members doing these days?

Squeezing into their leather jackets, adjusting their comb-overs and wondering where the fcuk their lives went.

OnTheCounter

What are all the current republican groups?

This is getting worse than the yanks... Fbi, cia, dia, abc...

what are the different views held by these groups?

what was the political objective of omagh? That was the RIRA, right?

Red About Town

OnTheCounter wrote: »

what was the political objective of omagh? That was the RIRA, right?

An economic target and to destabilise the peace process.

Red About Town

OnTheCounter wrote: »

What are all the current republican groups?

This is getting worse than the yanks... Fbi, cia, dia, abc...

what are the different views held by these groups?

what was the political objective of omagh? That was the RIRA, right?

Armed groups you have the IRA (made up of Reals, RAAD and OnH), another ONH, CIRA and a breakaway CIRA group sometimes known as Real CIRA.

Political groups are Sinn Fein, Republican Sinn Fein, 32CSM, Real Sinn Fein, IRSP and Eirigi.

I may have left some out as well.

Colmustard

I hate them. They disgust me and I wish they would just go away.

DEFTLEFTHAND

The name is only a guise to fall under in a desperate attempt to provide justification for their acts. These guys are losers, degenerates who never sought a better life, their extortion attempts in the South reveal how vacant they are.

Even in other criminal enterprises they flounder, these boys aren't capable of running an international drug ring which stays undetected. For the most part we're talking about street monkeys.

Pride Fighter

Red About Town wrote: »

Armed groups you have the IRA (made up of Reals, RAAD and OnH), another ONH, CIRA and a breakaway CIRA group sometimes known as Real CIRA.

Political groups are Sinn Fein, Republican Sinn Fein, 32CSM, Real Sinn Fein, IRSP and Eirigi.

I may have left some out as well.

Think you got all of them bar the INLA.

Red About Town

Pride Fighter wrote: »

Think you got all of them bar the INLA.

As they have decommissioned I considered them to have 'left the stage' and didn't bother including them.

Hannibal

Red About Town wrote: »

Armed groups you have the IRA (made up of Reals, RAAD and OnH), another ONH, CIRA and a breakaway CIRA group sometimes known as Real CIRA.

Political groups are Sinn Fein, Republican Sinn Fein, 32CSM, Real Sinn Fein, IRSP and Eirigi.

I may have left some out as well.

Every other group you mentioned despise Sinn Féin

policarp

Fiana Fail politicians fighting to get back onto the gravy train with Gerry and Martin. . .The Rragh. . .

KKkitty

I hate them with a passion. Doesn't matter what they were fighting for because what they did ripped families apart. Tough men hiding behind guns and bombs to prove a point They were rebels without a cause from the word go. They shouldn't have done what they did but of course they thought whatever they did no matter how bad it was was the right thing to do. Without their meaningless intervention The North could well have been handed back to Irish rule but thanks to the RA we'll never know.

Seaneh

KKkitty wrote: »

I hate them with a passion. Doesn't matter what they were fighting for because what they did ripped families apart. Tough men hiding behind guns and bombs to prove a point They were rebels without a cause from the word go. They shouldn't have done what they did but of course they thought whatever they did no matter how bad it was was the right thing to do. Without their meaningless intervention The North could well have been handed back to Irish rule but thanks to the RA we'll never know.

Right, so what should the Irish citizens of the 6 counties done during the 50/60/70 and 80's? When government policies made them second class citizens, when apartheid was being practised in all but name? when civil rights marches were being met with shootings and beatings?
Sit there and take it?
You can huff and puff and spout all the anty ra ****e you want but the reality is that without an armed resistance/retaliation to the policies and "law enforcement" of the day, Irish men and women in the 6 counties would have been treated as second class citizens for a lot longer.
The only time the British establishment took notice of the civil rights movement in the north was when it gained an army.

Yeah a lot of horrible things happened and they should be condemned, but the sad fact is that it took violence before the British government of the day actually treated Irishmen and women of the north like human beings.

Seaneh

KKkitty wrote: »

Without their meaningless intervention The North could well have been handed back to Irish rule but thanks to the RA we'll never know.

What a pile of absolute drivel.

Einhard

Seaneh wrote: »

Right, so what should the Irish citizens of the 6 counties done during the 50/60/70 and 80's? When government policies made them second class citizens, when apartheid was being practised in all but name? when civil rights marches were being met with shootings and beatings?
Sit there and take it?
You can huff and puff and spout all the anty ra ****e you want but the reality is that without an armed resistance/retaliation to the policies and "law enforcement" of the day, Irish men and women in the 6 counties would have been treated as second class citizens for a lot longer.

The thing is, they could have resisted the British government without blowing men, women, and children to bloody pieces.

Seaneh

Einhard wrote: »

The thing is, they could have resisted the British government without blowing men, women, and children to bloody pieces.

That would fall under the "Yeah a lot of horrible things happened and they should be condemned" section, obviously.

Einhard

Seaneh wrote: »

That would fall under the "Yeah a lot of horrible things happened and they should be condemned" section, obviously.

That's fair enough. Both the Brits and the IRA have innocent blood on their hands.

Seaneh

Einhard wrote: »

That's fair enough. Both the Brits and the IRA have innocent blood on their hands.

Definitely.

I'm not a ra head, I don't particularly like Sein Feinn (or any other Irish party tbh) but the sad truth is that it took violence for progress to be made.

Einhard

Seaneh wrote: »

Definitely.

I'm not a ra head, I don't particularly like Sein Feinn (or any other Irish party tbh) but the sad truth is that it took violence for progress to be made.

I really dislike the IRA and SF (though SF now for what I think is their extreme populism...they're basically the new FF, but anyhoo). However, I can understand why violence was deemed necessary in the North in the late 60s and 70s. I could understand an armed campaign that targeted security forces. I can't though, understand or condone a campaign in which innocent civilians were deliberately targeted.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Einhard wrote: »

I really dislike the IRA and SF (though SF now for what I think is their extreme populism...they're basically the new FF, but anyhoo). However, I can understand why violence was deemed necessary in the North in the late 60s and 70s. I could understand an armed campaign that targeted security forces. I can't though, understand or condone a campaign in which innocent civilians were deliberately targeted.

I've often pondered that myself. Like you I agree that they had a right to take arms when civil rights were breached in NI. The bombing campaign on Britain's mainland puzzled me, one can only presume that they wanted to assert and highlight their cause by physically attacking the enemy. It was a war in their eyes, misinterpreted collateral damage probably entered the mind frame.

Einhard

DEFTLEFTHAND wrote: »

It was a war in their eyes, misinterpreted collateral damage probably entered the mind frame.

I could even understand collateral damage where the damage was well and truly collateral. Say, for example, if a security checkpoint was attacked and a passerby killed. I might not agree with it necessarily, but I could understand that, and accept an argument on that score.

However, collateral damage does not include children blown up by bombs left on busy shopping streets; it doesn't involve men shot dead as they travelled home from work for the crime simply of being Protsetant; it doesn't massacring civilians in pubs simply because soldiers also happened to drink there. That's not collateral damage in my estimation.

Chuck Stone

KKkitty wrote: »

The North could well have been handed back to Irish rule but thanks to the RA we'll never know.

Lol.

Seaneh wrote: »

I'm not a ra head, I don't particularly like Sein Feinn (or any other Irish party tbh) but the sad truth is that it took violence for progress to be made.

Indeed. If the civil rights movement had been respected and people's struggle for equal civil and political rights (not a UI) had been given the due regard that any normal democracy would have then we might never have had the troubles.

The IRA were a fringe element before the British, on behalf of Unionists/Loyalists, started shooting 'the natives' to teach them a lesson. The natives, of course, fought back.

DEFTLEFTHAND

Einhard wrote: »

I could even understand collateral damage where the damage was well and truly collateral. Say, for example, if a security checkpoint was attacked and a passerby killed. I might not agree with it necessarily, but I could understand that, and accept an argument on that score.

However, collateral damage does not include children blown up by bombs left on busy shopping streets; it doesn't involve men shot dead as they travelled home from work for the crime simply of being Protsetant; it doesn't massacring civilians in pubs simply because soldiers also happened to drink there. That's not collateral damage in my estimation.

That's where they changed the rule, misinterpreted Collateral. Britain didn't see themselves at war, The IRA did and bombed legitimate targets implementing in their own eyes a legal use of force and knowing full well of the potential civilian casualties. Similar to the tactics the USA have exercised in their recent terrorist campaigns.