The Troubles: Ireland's Ordeal 1966–1995 and the Search for Peace

by Tim Pat Coogan

The points about resisting interrogation and alienating support merit comment. Taking the last first: the IRA on occasion have enlarged their list of ‘legitimate targets’ at will and sometimes with disastrous effects. They have indulged in kidnappings to raise funds; forced informers to drive proxy bombs to targets, where the bombs blew up killing both bomber and victims; shot contractors who carried out work on barracks for ‘helping the enemy war machine’; and enforced order in ghetto districts by dropping concrete blocks on the limbs of alleged criminals. All this, of course, in addition to judges, policemen, soldiers, members of the UDR, innocent victims caught in crossfire, and so on. Even the IRA would not claim that most of these actions ‘enhanced’ anything. The fact that the movement has survived these actions of its own, rather than the onslaughts of its enemy, probably says more for the strength of its support than any claim that has ever appeared in An Phoblacht.