I passed the dreaded 11-Plus examination in 1966 and was sent to St. Columb’s College ‘grammar school’ in Derry as a day-boy where students of the calibre of poet Seamus Heaney, singer Paul Brady, playwright Brian Friel and politician John Hume had lately preceded me. Two ‘dead’ languages were obligatory at St. Columb’s College in those years, Latin and Irish. By ‘dead’ I mean that … Continue reading The Irish Language in Derry in the late 1960s/70s

Much of the international reportage of 29-year-old Lyra McKee’s murder centred on descriptions of her as a ‘ceasefire baby’, a woman whose early years were brightened by what was promised to be peace during the post-Belfast Agreement period when the IRA movement was supposed to end all hostilities. Much of the international reportage of 42-year-old Thomas Ashe Mellon has centred on his leadership of the … Continue reading Thomas Ashe Mellon III – the new Martin McGuinness

It is no surprise in 2019 that Derry City nurtures the nascent IRA, as it nurtured the nascent IRA in 1969. In the late 1960s there was a certain novelty about the Civil Rights’ Movement in Derry because the Civil Rights’ movement had to be imported into Derry City from outside. There was a palpable feeling abroad in middle-class Derry that the Civil Rights’ movement … Continue reading The Town That Loves the IRA So Well

Witness ‘O’ gave what purported to be ‘evidence’ to the Birmingham Pub Bombings’ Inquest recently. There were some rather obvious inconsistencies in his strange tale. Firstly, he said he was on remand in Winson Green prison at the time of the Birmingham Pub Bombings awaiting trial on what must have been prior IRA bombing charges. He was billed as a convicted IRA bomber – so … Continue reading The Strange Case of Witness ‘O’ at the Birmingham Pub Bombings’ Inquest

Kieran Conway was billed as a former IRA GHQ Director of Intelligence who was willing to participate in the Birmingham Pub Bombings’ Inquest on various conditions: He would only speak via video link from an unidentified location (presumably in Dublin) hiding behind the Irish border he fought so hard to remove. He would not identify any living IRA volunteer related to the Birmingham Pub bombings. … Continue reading Kieran Conway – Credible Witness at the Birmingham Pub Bombings’ Inquest?

Having cheerfully murdered members of the RUC, of An Garda Síochána and of the Metropolitan Police for some thirty years, it does not sit easily with the IRA movement to support police forces in general and its lumpen rank and file has never actually been converted to love for ‘peelers’. On January 29, 2007, at an extraordinary Ardfheis (party meeting) at the Royal Dublin Show, … Continue reading IRA vs PSNI

Martina Fitzgerald, RTE’s recently-axed political correspondent, published an analysis piece in July 2018 stating that Mary Lou McDonald was “a strong media performer and has no links to the IRA”. Is it credible to declare that Mary Lou McDonald has “no links to the IRA”? Forget all about embittered former SDLP commentator Brian Feeney writing in “The Irish Times” in August, 2015 that the IRA … Continue reading Mary Lou McDonald – No Links to the IRA?

Professor Peter Finn, Principal of St. Mary’s University College, Belfast. Dear Professor Finn, I was shocked at your decision to host in St. Mary’s University (Catholic) College the IRA movement’s “Annual Pat Finucane Lecture” where one could see prominently in the audience leaders of the IRA’s 30 year campaign of abductions, torture, extra-judicial executions, disappearances of civilians/corpses, mass-casualty anti-civilian bombings – in fact leaders who … Continue reading Open Letter to Professor Peter Finn, St. Mary’s University College, re Hosting the Hypocritical “Pat Finucane Annual Lecture”

The IRA movement’s Sinn Féin political front is built on a vast foundation of lies, really big lies. There are so many lies associated with the IRA/Sinn Féin movement that I wrote an entire Blog post about the most blatant ones – it may be read here. Derry/Londonderry [forgotten Londonderry already, Mary Lou?] is a locus of some of the grander lies at the heart … Continue reading Sinn Féin’s new Ethel Lynch Cumann in Derry and the Cult of Lies

Introduction The Provisional IRA breakaway movement was sprung from the largely Marxist-leaning IRA in 1969 which had reassessed Northern Ireland after the failed 1956-62 IRA “Border Campaign” and decided that class war and non-sectarian agitation might work better than armed activities which had so recently failed. [The Official IRA’s position dramatically changed when it had to compete with the Provisional IRA for young volunteers and … Continue reading Paradoxes of the IRA’s ‘Armed Struggle’