More on, "The Troubles"
Jun. 18th, 2010 10:46 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
pecuniumThere is a very good piece up in the Guardian right now, Paratrooper Apology
There is a lot of good stuff in there, most of it not related to Bloody Sunday, per se but to being a soldier.
Nevertheless, in quiet moments, we could all concede that something had gone very wrong. Whenever I asked soldiers who were there on that day what had really happened, the reply was always pretty much the same: "A couple of twats from Support Company lost the plot."
Thirty-eight years on, and £200m later, the official inquiry is finally over and has reached what amounts to the same conclusion. It also concludes that the soldiers of 1 Para lied and tried to cover up their actions. And again – there's no denying it anymore. They did. And if I'm honest, had I been present on that day, I would have also lied. It might be nice to imagine that in the name of truth and justice, I would have started pointing fingers, but I wouldn't have.
Because what sort of paratrooper would that have made me?
This is a really hard thing, and a big part of how such things get to be what they become; soldiers, more than anyone else I know, have a bond. Firefighters don't have it. Cops don't have it. Firefighters face an elemental force. It's lethal, but impartial. Cops, they do face people, but the job description isn't, "go kill people who are allowed to kill you back."
Soldiers do that. Death isn't incidental to our jobs, it's part and parcel. We know that, and we depend on our fellows to help us avoid it. There are a number of soldiers with whom I've served whom I don't like, some of whom I despised. There are only a handful I wouldn't trust with my life. That makes one protective of them, even when they screw up.
There is, however, a bit of his argument which goes awry.
At the forefront of the celebrations in Londonderry this week was the one-time IRA commander Martin McGuinness. If only the families of the Bloody Sunday dead were able to have said, "The British army wrongly killed our sons. But you, Martin, have wrongly killed sons too, and so also we want nothing to do with you." It might have made our admission of guilt easier.
So, we are sorry for Bloody Sunday and for the innocent lives that were taken on that day. And this we can say, even though we know that no one is ever going to set up an inquiry or give an apology to the 52 families of paratroopers who were murdered by the IRA.
He's wrong. The IRA doesn't need to apologise for the dead soldiers (not just the Paras). They were rebels. It's what rebels do. It's part of what soldiers are paid for; to be killed in the defense of the state (the US oath of enlistment says, "all enemies, foreign and domestic"). It sucks, but it goes with the territory.
Rebels get caught, they get punished (the traditional punishment is death). We praise rebels (The American Revolution was Rebels, so too were the Confederates [and no one can honestly say there aren't praises of them, both the high, and the low; The US has named a number of Army posts after them, Forts Jackson and Lee, as well as tanks {the Stuart} as official examples] the Jacobite rebels of the Rising of '45, and Culloden).
So the killing of soldiers isn't really something the IRA needs to apologise for. Certainly I don't think the families of those killed in Bogside need to take time to apologise for the actions of other people. That's a cruel thing to ask.
Did the IRA do bad things? Yep. Moving the campaign from soldiers/gov't officials to everyday people was moving from rebellion to terrorism. For that they are to be blamed for the rest of time. But for being rebels, and acting like rebels, for deciding (be it just or not) that these words applied,... We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. ?
Nope.
Those are potent words, they can (and have) led to a vast amount of evil deeds; but in them are precious kernels of truth. If redress of grievance is not available, and abuses are practiced, the response will come, and there is justification.
So, the questions become, did the Republicans have grievance? Was there a reasonable chance for redress?
If yes, to the first, and no to the second, then force is no longer out of bounds.
Which means the question is... did they use that force in a reasonable manner? Soldiers are legitimate targets of rebellions; insofar as they targeted soldiers, they were not out of bounds, and the soldiers have no claim to an apology.
There is a lot of good stuff in there, most of it not related to Bloody Sunday, per se but to being a soldier.
Nevertheless, in quiet moments, we could all concede that something had gone very wrong. Whenever I asked soldiers who were there on that day what had really happened, the reply was always pretty much the same: "A couple of twats from Support Company lost the plot."
Thirty-eight years on, and £200m later, the official inquiry is finally over and has reached what amounts to the same conclusion. It also concludes that the soldiers of 1 Para lied and tried to cover up their actions. And again – there's no denying it anymore. They did. And if I'm honest, had I been present on that day, I would have also lied. It might be nice to imagine that in the name of truth and justice, I would have started pointing fingers, but I wouldn't have.
Because what sort of paratrooper would that have made me?
This is a really hard thing, and a big part of how such things get to be what they become; soldiers, more than anyone else I know, have a bond. Firefighters don't have it. Cops don't have it. Firefighters face an elemental force. It's lethal, but impartial. Cops, they do face people, but the job description isn't, "go kill people who are allowed to kill you back."
Soldiers do that. Death isn't incidental to our jobs, it's part and parcel. We know that, and we depend on our fellows to help us avoid it. There are a number of soldiers with whom I've served whom I don't like, some of whom I despised. There are only a handful I wouldn't trust with my life. That makes one protective of them, even when they screw up.
There is, however, a bit of his argument which goes awry.
At the forefront of the celebrations in Londonderry this week was the one-time IRA commander Martin McGuinness. If only the families of the Bloody Sunday dead were able to have said, "The British army wrongly killed our sons. But you, Martin, have wrongly killed sons too, and so also we want nothing to do with you." It might have made our admission of guilt easier.
So, we are sorry for Bloody Sunday and for the innocent lives that were taken on that day. And this we can say, even though we know that no one is ever going to set up an inquiry or give an apology to the 52 families of paratroopers who were murdered by the IRA.
He's wrong. The IRA doesn't need to apologise for the dead soldiers (not just the Paras). They were rebels. It's what rebels do. It's part of what soldiers are paid for; to be killed in the defense of the state (the US oath of enlistment says, "all enemies, foreign and domestic"). It sucks, but it goes with the territory.
Rebels get caught, they get punished (the traditional punishment is death). We praise rebels (The American Revolution was Rebels, so too were the Confederates [and no one can honestly say there aren't praises of them, both the high, and the low; The US has named a number of Army posts after them, Forts Jackson and Lee, as well as tanks {the Stuart} as official examples] the Jacobite rebels of the Rising of '45, and Culloden).
So the killing of soldiers isn't really something the IRA needs to apologise for. Certainly I don't think the families of those killed in Bogside need to take time to apologise for the actions of other people. That's a cruel thing to ask.
Did the IRA do bad things? Yep. Moving the campaign from soldiers/gov't officials to everyday people was moving from rebellion to terrorism. For that they are to be blamed for the rest of time. But for being rebels, and acting like rebels, for deciding (be it just or not) that these words applied,... We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. ?
Nope.
Those are potent words, they can (and have) led to a vast amount of evil deeds; but in them are precious kernels of truth. If redress of grievance is not available, and abuses are practiced, the response will come, and there is justification.
So, the questions become, did the Republicans have grievance? Was there a reasonable chance for redress?
If yes, to the first, and no to the second, then force is no longer out of bounds.
Which means the question is... did they use that force in a reasonable manner? Soldiers are legitimate targets of rebellions; insofar as they targeted soldiers, they were not out of bounds, and the soldiers have no claim to an apology.
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no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 09:23 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 10:00 pm (UTC)They are different sorts of thing.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 10:30 pm (UTC)My impression was that none of the guys who pulled the triggers could be identified for certain for any homicide charges; and I tend to agree with you somewhat about the perjury before Widgery; and in any case it seems they've all been given immunity, which I don't necessarily disagree with. But Saville seems to be saying the root cause was Wilford's decision to go into the Bogside, which apparently was direct disobedience; and that his troops lost discipline, which is his responsibility before theirs, in my book. Whether there's any criminal charges that can be brought against him, I've no idea.
Despite Cameron's apology, which I thought was very good, I'm appalled to see that the new Lord Chancellor, Ken Clarke, is still banging on about Saville having been a waste of money. I was very moved by the reaction of the families of the people who were killed, whose main reaction it seems, is that justice has now been done, in that their loved ones are finally exonerated of any blame for their own deaths.
no subject
Date: 2010-06-19 04:27 am (UTC)