Long Kesh and the British in Ireland
Sir: John Graham's article 'Long Kesh ' (November 6), is admirable, not least because it is published by yourself, since no one could describe The Spectator as being dominated by the New Left or pro-IRA.
The nature of internment in the Six Counties of Northern Ireland is of the greatest importance not only to us Irishmen but, perhaps even more SO, to the United Kingdom and above all to the British armed forces. That internment without trial may, in certain circumstances, be politically necessary, is obvious even though distasteful to most of us in these islands. Maltreatment of internees, on the other hand, is always and everywhere unforgivable. It becomes repulsive when it appears to be policy and not just a nervous reaction on the part of individual soldiers or constables who, for years now, have carried out a nerve-racking task.
That perfectly harmless internees, whom only extreme Unionist papers in Britain could describe as "terrorists," have been tortured and released 9nly on the arrangement that they turn informer is established beyond doubt. This policy is as stupid as it is disgusting.
As a trained interrogation officer, trained by the British army in 1942, I know that information derived under physical strain is valueless. Many men, under torture, will say anything: the interrogator is therefore none the wiser: while as an informer the man who has been beaten, halfcastrated and urinated upon is hardly likely to be Of much use to his captors. We were therefore forbidden ever to lay a finger on any German prisoner, no matter how repulsive he and his record might be, under threat of immediate court martial. Nor did we. And every German always gave us all the information we required with re markably few exceptions. On the other hand German brutality towards the prisoners in their hands was, in general, counter-productive. With the result that the intelligence we derived from this source was better than the enemy's.
Lying propaganda is equally self-defeating. Why, when the internees are handed over for maltreatment to the men of the SAS Regiment in Palace Barracks is it maintained that unit is not in Ireland? Why indeed are they employed on interrogation duties. at all •in Ireland, after their abysmal failure in this field in Cyprus and elsewhere? Why does the Stormont government pretend that men — names and sworn affidavits available—now in hospitals in the Republic were not beaten up by the forces of the Crown but by the IRA?
When British soldiers shoot Irish women and children on Trish soil, do the British authorities really expect up to be grateful for their enforcement of 'law and order,' or do they wish to unite the entire Irish population, regardless of religion, behind the Provisionals? And do they, next time Britain is at war, expect us to come to their help with the use of Irish ports?
Few Britons care to boast of service in the Black and Tans. Why should the British army of today be degraded, by its own government, to that -level? It is not so much as an Irishman (we know how to survive) than as a former British army officer that I must make a protest that may sound, and indeed may be, almost hysterical. The British have no business in Ireland at all, and the sooner they stop being in any part of the island, the better for us all, and much the better for the British soldiers.
Constantine FitzGibbon St. Ann's, Killiney Hill Road, Co. Dublin
Previous page
