Border Poll discussion

FrancieBrady

blanch152 wrote: »

Hmmmm. That was also being said about the remnants of the IRA as well.

We have learned differently in the last day or so.

I don't remember saying anything about the IRA on this thread at all.
My opinion would be that it is much easier (as it always was) for the IRA or any republican group to mount a campaign because of simple logistics. They can move freely along the border and disappear into the south. very difficult to police and stop that (again look to the factual evidence) Not so simple for groups that are hemmed in and have difficulty in moving any ordnance or even getting it. (again, plenty of material to study on that)

Imreoir2

blanch152 wrote: »

Hmmmm. That was also being said about the remnants of the IRA as well.

We have learned differently in the last day or so.

Have we? If in the case of a a United Ireland loyalists terror groups produce a handfull of bombs that, when they detonate, fail to do much damage even to the envelope containing them, I am not sure we have that much to worry about.

Imreoir2

blanch152 wrote: »

It doesn't take too many sick idiots to start a terrorist campaign. We have learned that in the past.

If anything, our past shows that it takes severe and sustained provacation from the state to create a terrorist campaign in response.

downcow

FrancieBrady wrote: »

Sure they did.




Note how the leader of the DUP begs the UK Government's support, asking they don't allow Brexit become "an impediment to the movement of people, goods or services" across the border.
Note how she outlines how the North relies on "their competitiveness" and that they need to "retain as far as possible the ease with which [they] currently trade with EU member states and, also retain access to labour".
Note how she outlines the importance of free and easy movement across the border, expressing a concern over the loss of EU funding, and concerns over exporting to countries after they exit the EU.

What is her position at the moment now she has the 'might' of the British government behind her?

I rest my case.

I don’t read anything in that that either contradicts there election pledge or their current position. Am I missing something. Can you highlight the bit you think is contradictory

downcow

Imreoir2 wrote: »

Have we? If in the case of a a United Ireland loyalists terror groups produce a handfull of bombs that, when they detonate, fail to do much damage even to the envelope containing them, I am not sure we have that much to worry about.

Sectarian killings through bombing was much more the PIRA tactic. Sectarian killing with guns was the norm of the loyalist terrorists. Loyalist bomb attempts more often than not killed the bombers.

FrancieBrady

downcow wrote: »

I don’t read anything in that that either contradicts there election pledge or their current position. Am I missing something. Can you highlight the bit you think is contradictory

When your negotiators negotiate a deal which ensures what you pleaded for 'free movement of people and goods across the border' and you vehemently oppose it and fail to come up with a satisfactory alternative....would you say that contradicts your position?
Ditto for the other 'requests' she made in the letter that I highlighted in my post.

Something changed in her mindset and imo it was the DUP's surprise elevation into a position of power and they took that opportunity to indulge in some oppression.
It is my opinion therefore, coupled with the historical factual history of northern Ireland that, given the opportunity and the backing of the British, unionism will oppress and subjugate to get their way.

downcow

FrancieBrady wrote: »

When your negotiators negotiate a deal which ensures what you pleaded for 'free movement of people and goods across the border' and you vehemently oppose it and fail to come up with a satisfactory alternative....would you say that contradicts your position?
Ditto for the other 'requests' she made in the letter that I highlighted in my post.

Something changed in her mindset and imo it was the DUP's surprise elevation into a position of power and they took that opportunity to indulge in some oppression.
It is my opinion therefore, coupled with the historical factual history of northern Ireland that, given the opportunity and the backing of the British, unionism will oppress and subjugate to get their way.

I am conscious you have diverted this to a brexit debate but I will address you point and leave it at that.

You said
“Note how the leader of the DUP begs the UK Government's support, asking they don't allow Brexit become "an impediment to the movement of people, goods or services" across the border.
Note how she outlines how the North relies on "their competitiveness" and that they need to "retain as far as possible the ease with which [they] currently trade with EU member states and, also retain access to labour".
Note how she outlines the importance of free and easy movement across the border, expressing a concern over the loss of EU funding, and concerns over exporting to count“

This is exactly what they are pushing for now but they are also trying to ensure that NI stays completely within UK - there other election pledge.
So I think they can do no other

FrancieBrady

downcow wrote: »

I am conscious you have diverted this to a brexit debate but I will address you point and leave it at that.

Completely wrong; I merely said they were 'using their power now to take the people of northern Ireland to somewhere they don't want to go' as part of a wider point.(I didn't even use the word Brexit) It was YOU who used the Brexit word and picked that point out of my post to respond to.

You said
“Note how the leader of the DUP begs the UK Government's support, asking they don't allow Brexit become "an impediment to the movement of people, goods or services" across the border.
Note how she outlines how the North relies on "their competitiveness" and that they need to "retain as far as possible the ease with which [they] currently trade with EU member states and, also retain access to labour".
Note how she outlines the importance of free and easy movement across the border, expressing a concern over the loss of EU funding, and concerns over exporting to count“

This is exactly what they are pushing for now but they are also trying to ensure that NI stays completely within UK - there other election pledge.
So I think they can do no other

And they cannot achieve it, because they have no alternatives to offer. There is NO constitutional implications for northern Ireland in Theresa May's deal according to the UK's own AG. Yet the DUP's position will take the UK out of the EU without a deal, thus contradicting everything Foster was pleading for.

The DUP are oppressing the majority opinion of northern Ireland to avoid their own abstract nightmare. (and as the Attorney General pointed out, their nightmare isn't real...like all nightmares)

Junkyard Tom

downcow wrote: »

the loyalists went on a fairly indiscriminate sectarian rampage which shifted things and had the nationalist community wanting an end to the trouble and thereby the cessation of violence from the IRA.

So unionist killers murdering random Catholics in bars and bookies made the Provos give up?

That's some twisted version of history you've got there.

The principle factor that brought the troubles to its conclusion was the PIRA bombing campaign in Britain.

Peregrinus

Baron de Charlus wrote: »

It's almost certainly the case that part of the British government's response to Northern Ireland's volatility has been throwing money at the problem.

The question is, would the attitude of the North's political parties change following unification, or would they just expect Dublin to replicate or even improve on London's largesse?

Well, they might hope for it, but they'd be very foolish to expect it.

But, take a step back. If we have a vision of this process in which, say, there's a 52:48 vote in favour of reunification, followed a couple of years later by an actual reunification in which nothign changes except that, basically, Leinster House steps into the shoes of Westminster with respect to NI, that's (a) delusional, and (b) dangerous. People who thought Brexit would work like that are responsible for the shambles that the UK has been reduced to, and transposing their attitudes to the Irish problem will be much, much more disastrous.

The emergence of a nationalist majority in NI, with consequential victory in a border poll, will be the start of a process of convesation, dialogue and reimagination, with a view to instituting a project that can turn this aspiration into a reality. This will involve significant change in attitudes and institutions in the RoI as well as in NI, and a major part of the project will be addressing the need to secure losers' consent. We really will be imagining, and then bringing into being, a new Ireland. It will take years - but we will jhave years, since the emergence of a nationalist majority is itself the product of decades-long trends which are not going to suddenly stop or reverse just because a border poll has produced the predictable result.

It's within the context of that new Ireland, and its relationship to GB and to the EU, that tax and financial questions will need to be addressed. The starting point will not be the current subvention from Westminister to Stormont; it will be the needs and resources of Ireland and of the various parts of Ireland, the residual obligations of Great Britain, and the soidarity of Europe.

I'm not saying there will be an easy or simply solution to the financial and economic challenges of reunification. But I am saying that to frame those challenges in terms of the current subvention from Westminister to Stormont is absurdly reductive, and treats the current subvention as an immutable law of nature rather than as the chance outcome of a number of contingent and transient circumstances. You need to look beyond the current subvention at the real issues, and at how they will be changed by the very fact of reunification,.

downcow

Junkyard Tom wrote: »

The principle factor that brought the troubles to its conclusion was the PIRA bombing campaign in Britain.

I know many would like to believe this but the facts show something very different.
The one group who did not shift their position around that time was the British government. They simply facilitated an opportunity for the ira to save face through the gfa. The ira were the ones who called a cessation to their violence and accepted everything they said they were fighting against ie British stayed in NI and they joined a devolved British Parliament in Stormont etc etc. As joe brolly said yesterday there is absolutely no logic to them sitting in Stormont and abstaining from WM.
Indeed some admission of these facts by republican may be important in oiling the wheels of unionists accepting a UI should there be a majority. This would clearly be defeat for unionists so a open admission of defeat of ira in 90s would ease that pain.

Peregrinus

I don't think you can say, with a straight face, that HMG did not shift its position, but simply "facilitated an opportunity for the IRA to save face through the GFA". The GFA was itself a huge shift in position by HMG. As was the Downing Street Declaration before it.

Having said that, the GFA of course followed the IRA ceasefire, so it can hardly be said to have caused or facilitated it. (Other way round, if anything. Or, most accurately, the Downing Street Declaration opened up the possiblity of the ceasefire, which opened up the possiblity of the GFA.) In general I think it's unhelpful (and probably deliberately so) to insist on an "admission of defeat" as a condition of further progress; demanding the humiliation of your interlocutor is rarely a productive way to make shared progress. But in this case it would also be untrue.

The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat, because of course the obective of securing Irish unity has not been defeated. It still exists and is still pursued, and indeed the GFA acknowledges that fact, legitimises it and provides a (peaceful, constitutional, agreed) framework for pursuing it.

So, there was no surrender, to coin a phrase.

downcow

Peregrinus wrote: »

I don't think you can say, with a straight face, that HMG did not shift its position, but simply "facilitated an opportunity for the IRA to save face through the GFA". The GFA was itself a huge shift in position by HMG. As was the Downing Street Declaration before it.

Having said that, the GFA of course followed the IRA ceasefire, so it can hardly be said to have caused or facilitated it. (Other way round, if anything. Or, most accurately, the Downing Street Declaration opened up the possiblity of the ceasefire, which opened up the possiblity of the GFA.) In general I think it's unhelpful (and probably deliberately so) to insist on an "admission of defeat" as a condition of further progress; demanding the humiliation of your interlocutor is rarely a productive way to make shared progress. But in this case it would also be untrue.

The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat, because of course the obective of securing Irish unity has not been defeated. It still exists and is still pursued, and indeed the GFA acknowledges that fact, legitimises it and provides a (peaceful, constitutional, agreed) framework for pursuing it.

So, there was no surrender, to coin a phrase.

You say
“The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat”

I actually don’t see the difference. But a admission like that from sf would be very helpful (I believe)

We can agree ira failed and unionists compromised, but tell me any way in which HMG agreed to something it would not have agreed to 20 years earlier under the same circumstances

Peregrinus

downcow wrote: »

You say
“The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat”

I actually don’t see the difference . . .

Really? There's a huge difference between "our campaign has failed to secure its objectives" and "our cause is defeated". In a time where the "Dunkirk spirit" is being constantly evoked across the water (in the most inappropriate, inept and frequently offensive contexts), the difference should be immediately obvious.

downcow wrote: »

But a admission like that from sf would be very helpful (I believe)

We can agree ira failed and unionists compromised, but tell me any way in which HMG agreed to something it would not have agreed to 20 years earlier under the same circumstances

Seriously? The UK announcing that it has no strategic commitment to a part of its own territory, and that the future of NI would be decided exclusively by the people of NI and the people of RoI? You think the UK would have signed up to that in 1978? Or even 1988?

Political progress was paralysed for years during the 1980s at least in part because Margaret Thatcher, for ideological reasons, flatly refused to accept the easily-observed reality that NI nationalists felt alienated from the British state and from a British identity. She simply would not accept that British citizens could feel this way, or that such feelings could be legitimate, or could be something the British state had to acknowledge and accommodate. This was simply too threatening to her idea of Britishness. You think a government led by someone operating out of that frame of reference would have signed up to the Downing Street Declaration or the Good Friday Agreement?

FrancieBrady

downcow wrote: »

You say
“The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat”

I actually don’t see the difference. But a admission like that from sf would be very helpful (I believe)

We can agree ira failed and unionists compromised, but tell me any way in which HMG agreed to something it would not have agreed to 20 years earlier under the same circumstances

You require SF to 'admit' to something because you 'can't see the difference'? Brilliant.

You had the likes of Thatcher claiming she would 'never negotiate with terrorists' while what the HMG actually did was entirely different though. They negotiated a settlement with an armed group, agreed it no longer had a strategic interest in northern Ireland and agreed to withdraw it troops to barracks, disband the police force and to withdraw entirely when the people required them to.

FrancieBrady

Peregrinus wrote: »

Really? There's a huge difference between "our campaign has failed to secure its objectives" and "our cause is defeated". In a time where the "Dunkirk spirit" is being constantly evoked across the water (in the most inappropriate, inept and frequently offensive contexts), the difference should be immediately obvious.


Seriously? The UK announcing that it has no strategic commitment to a part of its own territory, and that the future of NI would be decided exclusively by the people of NI and the people of RoI? You think the UK would have signed up to that in 1978? Or even 1988?

Political progress was paralysed for years during the 1980s at least in part because Margaret Thatcher, for ideological reasons, flatly refused to accept the easily-observed reality that NI nationalists felt alienated from the British state and from a British identity. She simply would not accept that British citizens could feel this way, or that such feelings could be legitimate, or could be something the British state had to acknowledge and accommodate. This was simply too threatening to her idea of Britishness. You think a government led by someone operating out of that frame of reference would have signed up to the Downing Street Declaration or the Good Friday Agreement?

I think there is a word missing there, 'she could not publicly accept'.

of course, as we know, privately she was happy to negotiate behind the backs of unionists with those she publicly and vehemently claimed she wouldn't.

Unionists have fallen for this duplicity again and again. Theresa May, for instance, publicly and vehemently claiming to be a 'unionist' yet standing on stage in Europe willing to throw northern Ireland Unionism under the bus ..again by shaking hands on a deal, that selfishly gave the rest of the UK what IT wanted.
This same branch of Unionism has been complaining that they had been thrown under the bus by the GFA for 20 years btw.

Thankfully the Irish government has learned the lesson and will not accept verbal reassurances/promises from Westminster as has the rest of the EU. They must sign the dotted line.

janfebmar

downcow wrote: »

Sectarian killings through bombing was much more the PIRA tactic.

The set off bombs in the likes of Enniskillen, Le mons hotel, Claudy etc knowing they were going to kill Protestants. The border campaign in the likes of Fermanagh killed many border Protestants. Republicans burst in to a church in Darkely and shot up and killed totally innocent elderly parishoners. It was not just one side in the North that contained sectarian elements.

downcow wrote: »

Loyalist bomb attempts more often than not killed the bombers.

That is because Republicans were more skilled and experienced at bomb making than loyalists were. Republicans made probably 100 to a 1000 more bombs than loyalists did. The fact one side was much better at using explosives that the other side shows who may have had collusion in learning how to use explosives?

downcow

janfebmar wrote: »

The set off bombs in the likes of Enniskillen, Le mons hotel, Claudy etc knowing they were going to kill Protestants. The border campaign in the likes of Fermanagh killed many border Protestants. Republicans burst in to a church in Darkely and shot up and killed totally innocent elderly parishoners. It was not just one side in the North that contained sectarian elements.



That is because Republicans were more skilled and experienced at bomb making than loyalists were. Republicans made probably 100 to a 1000 more bombs than loyalists did. The fact one side was much better at using explosives that the other side shows who may have had collusion in learning how to use explosives?

I think you are misunderstanding what I am saying. I agree entirely with what you are saying. You just put it much more articulately than me.
I think there is a view in some quarters that the ira were not motivated by sectarianism

downcow

FrancieBrady wrote: »

You require SF to 'admit' to something because you 'can't see the difference'? Brilliant.

You had the likes of Thatcher claiming she would 'never negotiate with terrorists' while what the HMG actually did was entirely different though. They negotiated a settlement with an armed group, agreed it no longer had a strategic interest in northern Ireland and agreed to withdraw it troops to barracks, disband the police force and to withdraw entirely when the people required them to.

I never asked them to admit to anything. I just agreed wholeheartedly with your fellow posters statement “The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity” and said it would be great to hear that admission from a SF leader

janfebmar

downcow wrote: »

I think you are misunderstanding what I am saying. I agree entirely with what you are saying. You just put it much more articulately than me.
I think there is a view in some quarters that the ira were not motivated by sectarianism

Ihe IRA was always motivated by sectarianism, even 100 years ago when there were many innocent Protestants killed in Cork, for example, and many more burnt out. It was a cold house for Protestants, and extremely few got jobs in public office. Not surprising their number fell in the Republic but times have changed, it is not the same now thankfully.

FrancieBrady

downcow wrote: »

I never asked them to admit to anything. I just agreed wholeheartedly with your fellow posters statement “The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity” and said it would be great to hear that admission from a SF leader

For goodness sake can you stop this. You qualified what he said with your own take and then asked that SF admit that.

RobMc59

Junkyard Tom wrote: »

So unionist killers murdering random Catholics in bars and bookies made the Provos give up?

That's some twisted version of history you've got there.

The principle factor that brought the troubles to its conclusion was the PIRA bombing campaign in Britain.

The bombing campaign in Britain towards the end was a serious miscalculation by the ira,the Americans with their noraid had finally woken up to exactly what was really going on.
Unless you see paramilitary terrorists from all sides as repugnant there is no point discussing it as you can't reason with closed minds.

downcow

Peregrinus wrote: »

I don't think you can say, with a straight face, that HMG did not shift its position, but simply "facilitated an opportunity for the IRA to save face through the GFA". The GFA was itself a huge shift in position by HMG. As was the Downing Street Declaration before it.

Having said that, the GFA of course followed the IRA ceasefire, so it can hardly be said to have caused or facilitated it. (Other way round, if anything. Or, most accurately, the Downing Street Declaration opened up the possiblity of the ceasefire, which opened up the possiblity of the GFA.) In general I think it's unhelpful (and probably deliberately so) to insist on an "admission of defeat" as a condition of further progress; demanding the humiliation of your interlocutor is rarely a productive way to make shared progress. But in this case it would also be untrue.

The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat, because of course the obective of securing Irish unity has not been defeated. It still exists and is still pursued, and indeed the GFA acknowledges that fact, legitimises it and provides a (peaceful, constitutional, agreed) framework for pursuing it.

So, there was no surrender, to coin a phrase.

I think you are way off if you think HMG wants to keep NI. HMG would have loved to offload NI at any point since the early 70s and probably before. They could though not be seen to disown our people or give in to the IRA.
You can wrap it up any way you like - The IRA fought to get Britian out of Ireland and failed.
Now if there is amajority who want out it will happen - did you ever think it wouldn't happen even without the GFA.. The GFA simply stated what would be inevitable if there is a majority in NI wanting out of UK. Its that simple

BonnieSituation

I do like how "primary" objective is being conflated with "sole" objective from our friend from the Mournes.

jm08

janfebmar wrote: »

Ihe IRA was always motivated by sectarianism, even 100 years ago when there were many innocent Protestants killed in Cork, for example, and many more burnt out. It was a cold house for Protestants, and extremely few got jobs in public office. Not surprising their number fell in the Republic but times have changed, it is not the same now thankfully.

When you mention sectarianism 100 years ago, are you claiming that 1916, and the voters of the General Election of 1918 and war of independence was motivated by sectarianism?

And since you mention Cork, what was the motivation of the burning of cork by the Black and Tans and Auxiliaries in 1920?

jm08

RobMc59 wrote: »

The bombing campaign in Britain towards the end was a serious miscalculation by the ira,the Americans with their noraid had finally woken up to exactly what was really going on.
Unless you see paramilitary terrorists from all sides as repugnant there is no point discussing it as you can't reason with closed minds.

The bombing of the Stock Exchange is what really worked. Dunkirk Spirit fight talk doesn't work on the markets!

blanch152

Peregrinus wrote: »

I don't think you can say, with a straight face, that HMG did not shift its position, but simply "facilitated an opportunity for the IRA to save face through the GFA". The GFA was itself a huge shift in position by HMG. As was the Downing Street Declaration before it.

Having said that, the GFA of course followed the IRA ceasefire, so it can hardly be said to have caused or facilitated it. (Other way round, if anything. Or, most accurately, the Downing Street Declaration opened up the possiblity of the ceasefire, which opened up the possiblity of the GFA.) In general I think it's unhelpful (and probably deliberately so) to insist on an "admission of defeat" as a condition of further progress; demanding the humiliation of your interlocutor is rarely a productive way to make shared progress. But in this case it would also be untrue.

The ceasefire represented an acknowledgement that the armed campaign had failed in its primary objective, the securing of Irish unity. But this is quite different from admitting defeat, because of course the obective of securing Irish unity has not been defeated. It still exists and is still pursued, and indeed the GFA acknowledges that fact, legitimises it and provides a (peaceful, constitutional, agreed) framework for pursuing it.

So, there was no surrender, to coin a phrase.

The GFA wasn't such a huge shift from Sunningdale. Arguably, the biggest shift since Sunningdale was the renouncement by the South of the territorial claim.

RobMc59

jm08 wrote: »

The bombing of the Stock Exchange is what really worked. Dunkirk Spirit fight talk doesn't work on the markets!

Living your life in the past won't bring a UI-neither will snide comments.
There's nothing wrong with being patriotic but extreme views unsettle ordinary people and cause entrenchment.

Avatar MIA

So, can we all agree history proves terrorism isn't effective (and possibly galvanises opposition) and any threat or act of loyalism in the run up to a UI would likewise be ineffective. Terrorism post a UI would be beyond pointless.

Peregrinus

Avatar MIA wrote: »

So, can we all agree history proves terrorism isn't effective (and possibly galvanises opposition) and any threat or act of loyalism in the run up to a UI would likewise be ineffective. Terrorism post a UI would be beyond pointless.

I think that's too simplistic. Terrorism campaigns are rarely successful in directly achieving their primary objective, but they are quite effective in disrupting the conditions that give rise to them, and in provoking radical change.

There are few, if any, examples of terrorist campaigns being defeated by purely military/security measures (and certainly none by military/security measures conducted by a state that observes democratic norms and the rule of law). Military/security measures can contain or limit terrorist campaigns, but ultimately the only way to stop them is political action to address the factors that give rise to them. "I will never yield to terrorism" is a fine principle for making yourself feel good/for asserting important moral truths [pick whichever you want] but if a government sticks to it it is making a choice for more of its citizens to suffer and die as the victims of terrorism. Ultimately you have to address the problem and that involves talking, if not to the terrorists directly, then at the very least to the, um, political wing of the same movement.

I'm old enough to remember the 70s and 80s very well and, believe me, I despise Sinn Fein and their support for the "armed struggle", and for what they did to my country. I'm appalled at the prospect of such a party sharing power, North or South. And yet I completely get that we have to be open to this; this has to happen. If there isn't a path for gunmen to become statesmen, they stay gunmen. And why would we want that?

So, yeah, this is an area where the head has to rule the heart, or we're lost. We did that in the South in the 1920s, and if we hadn't done it successfully we probably wouldn't be a democracy today. And it has to be done in the North too, as painful as it must be.