Political Commentary

The view from Dublin

Patrick Cosgrave

I arrived in Dublin—glad, despite the excitement here, to get away from the political hothouse of London for a couple of days — immediately after Mr Faulkner's resignation from the leadership of the Unionist Party. I found straight away that, whatever their strategic preoccupations, politicians and people of the Irish Republic were tactically concerned quite centrally with Mr Faulkner's future. To some the survival of the chief of the Ulster Executive in that post, and the provision for him of enough breathing space to attempt the creation of a new Protestant Party which would command the majority of the majority in Northern Ireland was essential: without that there could be only ruin, destruction, and the rise of the gunmen. For others the latest episode in Mr Faulkner's chequered career was but a further step to his final downfall; the quicker he came to an end the better; and the closer Ireland and Britain alike would be to an ultimate confrontation. People in the latter group are not necessarily purveyors of the apocalypse. But they are seized of two ideas. First, they reckon that, until Unionism is destroyed, or destroys itself, the various sections of Irish society will not be able to come to terms with one another, whether bloodily or otherwise. Second, they are convinced that the final destruction of Mr Faulkner will cause the British at last to wash their hands of the island, and leave the Irish to their own fate—which they'd welcome.

Broadly, those who want to preserve Mr Faulkner are to be found among the two parties — Labour and Fine Gael — making up the coalition government, while the majority of those seeking his destruction are to be found in the Opposition Fianna Fail. No Irish situation is simple, and that distinction, being simple, does not wholly reflect the truth, useful though it is as a guide. Many sea changes, for example, have been taking place in Southern Irish politics over the last decade or so, some of which have little to do with Northern Ireland, and they have their bearing on the state of mind in the Republic now. Thus twenty, or even ten years ago Fianna Fail were, apparently, the indestructible party of power, at once the revolutionary party—at least in terms of the claim to the North — and the conservative party, practically bent on preserving the character of Southern Irish society. Fine Gael were a businessman's rump, and Labour a bunch of provincial hobbledehoys. Then Fine Gael and Labour alike were invaded by gifted liberal intellectuals — Dr Garrett Fitzgerald, the present foreign minister, and Dr Conor Cruise O'Brien among their number — and together the parties became an alternative government of conviction, perhaps largely because they were led by a man of the Fine Gael old guard, Liam Cosgrave, who has displayed unexpected resilience and appetite for power. Once beaten Fianna Fail looked shadows of their former selves. In opposition their famed leader, Mr Lynch, has appeared (and is rumoured in reality) to be physically an inferior man; and his colleagues have found it well nigh impossible to keep up in intellectual publicity with their rivals in power. Like all oppositions Fianna Fail have been torn between the instinctive pretence that they are still a responsible government, and the desire to seek some purist redefinition of their old revolutionary character.

None of this is, perhaps, easily comprehensible to the British reader who, correctly, sees the IRA as equally a threat north and south, and who is impatient with any Dublin government which continues to seek British favours, and is nonetheless lackadaisical in its pursuit of terrorists. The ambiguities of the Lynch government, as we now know, led some despairing British ministers to embark on adventures of questionable use. The Cosgrave government has seemed different, but its resolve to deny the IRA sanctuary has sometimes seemed to dissolve in action. Yet, as one coalition politician bent on saving Mr Faulkner observed, the best thing the coalition could do towards that end would be to arrest and hold Mr Martin McGuinness — an able Londonderry gangster and the new chief of staff of the Provisional IRA — Mr Twomey, the Belfast thug who escaped from a Dublin goal, and Mr O'Connell, usually described as the political brain of terrorism, and best known in Britain as one of the lovers of Miss Maria McGuire. Still, IRA leaders seem to get arrested and released at an immoderate rate in the Republic. And one acute Irish commentator remarked to me that no Dublin government will act really sternly against the terrorists until it is clear that the structure of the Irish state itself is directly threatened, and that by bombs. Because of their history the Irish people can never see things quite the way the British see them: to the British Ulster violence is abhorrent, to the Irish, a part of the weave of history.

That deep instinct to avoid "bringing the war south" is indicative of something about Southern Irish politics which relates to the changes I mentioned earlier and which, I believe, is very little understood on our side of the Irish sea. Yet it permeates the life of politics in the Republic. It is, simply, the question of whether there is any longer a natural governing party in the Republic (like our Conservative Party) and, if there is, whether it is the coalition, or Fianna Fail. A few years ago the answer would, unquestionably, have been Fianna Fail. Anyway, it would have been said, a coalition cannot be a party. Now, a crucial question is whether the coalition is undergoing a process of solidification. The rise of the intellectuals is one indication that it is. The fact that its representatives sit with the left in the Stras bourg thingumijig is another, for that is formidable concession by Fine Gael, once the

Irish bearers of the banner in fascism, in the form of the Blueshirt movement, to their Labour allies.

If, however, the coalition is preoccupied with the problems of power, Fianna Fail is

even more so with those of opposition. IsAf Lynch was a man who glowed in office, but

who fades without it. What was an on"

dearingly ascetic appearance becomes s, haunted look. And what could be represent as the delicacy of statesmanship becomes the havering of a man at odds with himself, his role, and his party. It seems unlikely that Mr Lynch can hold the leadership of his party ft/r very long; and that he is staying on PrT, cipally to prevent the succession of Al' Charles Haughey, the former Finance Minister who was dismissed from office on a charge of being involved in a gun-running adventure but found not guilty of the charge in court' much as Attlee stayed on to spite Morrison; He, incidentally, is married to a daughter o' another former Fianna Fail leader, Mr settlio Lemass. But the real problem for Fianna FaA"

is the question of how to play the Ulster car The broad picture, then, is or a politico

situation in which the various factions 5re much less exclusively dominated by the o011, cept of achieving a United Ireland in Moos", tion to Britain than they were five years ag°,' but much less interested in pursuing a polic?

of mediation and peace in company with BO' tam n than they were even a few months ag°'

Thus, Mr Faulkner's speech last weekend, O„ which he threatened to decline his signature, to the Sunningdale agreement, recognised! f'

only his own need to try to recapture some the political ground he had lost, but also awareness of shifts in the Southern Irish

tuation, and a feeling, even, that the Dad° government had taken him for a ride at Suli: ningdale. Some indication of the decisioPe come to in Dublin about the extent of tl% support Mr Cosgrave and his colleagues ar`e prepared to give to the tripartite deal will ,_1) given when the Taoiseach announces the names of the coalition's representatives on th given when the Taoiseach announces the names of the coalition's representatives on th

projected Council of Ireland. t

Difficult thought it is to be certain awha,-„t not merely the intentions and policies, t" 'd also the almost subconscious instinct on„f impulses, ot southern Irish politicians, it i5;:e paramount importance not to forget We exclusively domestic forces at work, force't which to a degree exclude Ulster (though WI province can never be wholly excludecl)., must confess to being surprised by the extell'or to which I found that the Irishmen I talked were preoccupied with the evolving patterril politics in the south. But then, as was rig% pointed out to me, the same is true of,:,:e Heath in respect of Northern Ireland. 1"A, recall of Mr Whitelaw, however well advisee; and the reduction in the number of ministuot at the Ulster Office, were a clear signal ttPeo the Prime Minister had markedly dem° Ulster in his order of priorities — aga,ho whether rightly or wrongly. His action in respect convinced the Irish that we had respect another stage in the steady 1°5'top interest by London in Belfast, another so towards disgruntled withdrawal from IT oy affairs. Some Irish politicians, and esPecI8 of the men of great goodwill and horror ey violence, would be deeply distressed at at.,8i such development, but uncertain about 04:lig they could do, or what they would be wilititie to do, to prevent it. Others, assuming_t.s. withdrawal to be inevitable anyway, aria "of suming the inevitability of the colloP5e00, Unionism under the weight of its own .ctjo tradictions, might see in declining /31.1..00s interest the approach of a period of dangelust but exciting adventure in Irish politics. Vitn4t ever happens it seems clear that the n'io, few years will see further upheavals and .0 calculable developments in southern iri politics.