Sir, - Dennis Kennedy (Opinion, January 5th) questions why the Irish government made plans to train and arm some of the minority from the North in February 1970. He suggests that these plans were inappropriate and possibly instrumental in forming the Provisional IRA.
I lived in Ardoyne at that time and remember the terror and fear which prevailed in the minority community. From January 24th to 27th there were four nights of rioting when loyalists tried to break through into Catholic areas. Ordinary, good people were actually glad to have crates of milk-bottle petrol bombs given to them so that they could defend their homes.
Mr Kennedy believes the Irish Government behaved wrongly because British troops had arrived and various reforms had been announced. August 1969 is looked upon as the beginning of the present troubles. There was widespread rioting and the RUC toured Catholic areas in armoured cars, firing machineguns into Catholic dwellings, killing one man in Ardoyne and a child in Divis flats. Of the 1,800 families who fled their homes, 1,500 were Catholics. On August 14th, 1969, the Tynan Platoon of the B Specials murdered John Gallagher and no one was charged with his murder. The new police chief appointed by London, Sir Arthur Young, wanted to call in Scotland Yard to investigate but unionists would not agree as they were unsure what would be uncovered.
The latter part of August 1969 was reasonably quiet but there was violence - most of it from loyalists reacting to the reforms to which Mr Kennedy refers. During the October 11th riots loyalists shot dead the first RUC man to die in the troubles and the British army shot two loyalists rioters dead. On October 15th William Craig said the country was on the verge of civil war.
It was against this background that the Irish Government decided to prepare for a doomsday situation in which law and order had broken down and life and property were at risk. It could be argued that it would have been remiss not to prepare contingency plans, given this situation.
After 32 years of violence, 4,000 people dead and 10 times that number maimed and injured, I believe we all long for peace and reconciliation, but there will be no peace if a sham political correctness or historical revisionism leads to the denial of the terror experienced by the minority community at that time or of their ongoing experience of violence and discrimination. - Yours, etc.,
Bernadette Toal, Whitechurch Road, Dublin 16.