Pragmatic murderers
The Provisional IRA has often found it difficult to win enough support, not because it resorts to violence — that has always made it glamorous to the outside world, and has made it feared by the com- munities among whom it operates — but because it has appeared ideologically rigid. By pressing its claim to be the sole custo- dian of the Irish nation, and so repudiating the existing Republic, and by drawing up fanciful plans for its regional government of Ireland, Sinn Fein tended to look cranky and impractical. By failing to distinguish, in its terrorist attacks, between security forces and ordinary civilians, the IRA seemed to put violence above concern for the Irish people.
The victory of Mr Gerry Adams at Sinn Fein's annual conference in Dublin this week represents the defeat of that sort of ideological rigidity and its replacement by a pragmatism which is in the end far more dangerous for Northern Ireland and for Britain than what it has gradually replaced.
Mr Adams and his party, based in Belfast (until now, the command has worked from Dublin), have been careful not to renounce any of the sacred tenets of IRA mythology. They have preferred to change priorities and emphases. A Belfast command is bound to see the struggle in the North as far more pressing than anything happening in the South, and so to argue that Provo strategy should put the North first. It follows from this that Sinn Fein's ancient and unbroken policy of abstentionism should be slightly revised. It remains im- possible for Sinn Fein members to consider taking their seats in the British or Irish Parliaments (or the Northern Ireland Assembly), because to do so would be to recognise the legitimacy of those Parliaments. But membership of the Euro- pean Parliament is another matter. It is not, despite what it calls itself, a proper parlia- ment, but a consultative assembly. It does little of practical importance. But it would provide Sinn Fein with a fine chance to at- tack the British Government to an audience which could be guaranteed to be ignorant, sentimental and influential.
But a seat in the European Parliament would be only a fairly minor part of the softening up of British and international opinion which is the main purpose of Mr Adam's superficially more gentle approach. By playing down the more obscure Celtic fantasies of Republicanism, and by en- couraging the murder of policemen and soldiers, rather than sectarian or random bombings, Mr Adams is trying to present himself to the world as one of those ter- rorists through necessity who is really a statesman in disguise. Already people are comparing him with Mugabe, Kenyatta and other leaders of 'liberation' movements driven by 'oppression' to desperate methods. He speaks more in the interna-
tional terms of social justice than with reference to complicated quarrels in Irish history. One has a horrible vision of Mr Adams being fawned upon at the United Nations or the World Council of Churches.
In Northern Ireland itself, the tactics of the new Provisional leadership will be to ex- pand Sinn Fein's electoral base. The hard work in constituencies, a version of the Liberals' community politics', will in- crease. Roman Catholics in the slums of Belfast and Londonderry will be encourag- ed to look to the Provos not only as their savage policemen, but as their civic doctors as well.
Many people will believe that this in- volvement with local issues and with democratic processes will make it impossi- ble for the IRA to continue fighting. Such as assumption may have been part of what underlay Mr James Prior's scheme for a Northern Ireland Assembly. The exact op- posite is the case. A continuing ability to kill and destroy is the only thing that will convince Roman Catholics in the province that the Provos are formidable. If Mr Adams does nothing more than act the con- scientious councillor, he will appear the in- ferior of his rivals in the SDLP who, after all, still command the larger percentage of the Nationalist vote. Indeed, it makes sense for the Provos to combine growing electoral success with a higher level of violence, aim- ing carefully at police and military installa- tions, giving the impression to the world that a popular front for the liberation of Ireland is being held back by imperialist force alone. Besides, it is a sad fact that only violence makes the Republican cause interesting to the world.
There is no evidence at all that this Government knows how to resist the pragmatism of the Provos. In some ill- judged remarks at the weekend, the Nor- thern Ireland Secretary, Mr Prior, held out hopes of fostering what he called 'constitu- tional nationalism' in the province by per- suading the SDLP to take part in the work in the Northern Ireland Assembly. It is in- conceivable that this would happen. The Assembly's existence has strengthened Sinn Fein and driven the SDLP into the arms of Dublin, and more unequivocal nationalism. If the SDLP were to take their seats, they would be accused of supporting Britain, and would lose still more ground. If the Provisional strategy succeeds, it will only be a few years before Mr Prior's successors, influenced by the Foreign and Northern Ireland Offices, will find it possible to describe Sinn Fein as the voice of 'constitu- tional nationalism', summon a Lancaster House conference, and arrange to transfer Northern Ireland to a minority which will have won its way through violence. If that does not happen, it will not be thanks to the wisdom of British governments, but to the loyalty of Ulster.
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