An attack of sabotitis
John Linklater Doctors are trained to assess prognosis in part by the degree of healthy reaction to an infection. If the reaction is weak, or equivocal, the tissues -have not adequately recognised the danger from the invading organism which will probably coutinue to flourish, while the condition of the patient will deteriorate unless an outside factor is introduced, say in the form of an antibiotic. A parallel situation occurs when a subversive organisation infiltrates the tissues of a nation. The saboteurs must first be recognised, surrounded, rendered harmless and then either destroyed or evicted in the same general way that bacteria are recognised and coagulated by anti-bodies, and then engulfed by one of the white blood cells or phagocytes.
There is, however, no antibiotic panacea to destroy the IRA in our midst and we must rely upon the activity of our internal security organisations in the form of special branch and CID, the phagocytes and antibodies of the state. In addition, the sense of purpose and identity or morale of the population plays an important part; almost as important as the morale of the patient suffering from infectious disease. The comparison is useful, because it enables us to see the problem of the IRA bomb attacks from a new angle, and to offer a line of approach where present policy seems to have failed.
It is well-known, and characteristic of subversive operations, that the saboteur can only operate successfully over long periods with some help from the local population. Sabotage was organised with relative ease and success in German-occupied Europe, for example, especially when it became clear that the war was not going to be won by Germany overnight, whereas our sabotage efforts remained hazardous and relatively impro
ductive within Germany itself, where national sense of purpose and patriotism was high.
The infecting organism likewise depends upon its host, our patient, at least for nutrient and oxygen. One of the effects of the inflammatory tissue response is to localise the infection and wall it off, thus reducing nutrient and oxygen in that area. A government faced with large-scale sabotage, which persistently refuses to tackle the problem ruthlessly, in the end merely confuses the issue. The population becomes resentful and frustrated, and then tends to opt out, instead of wholeheartedly supporting the internal security organisations.
The sick apathy of the present government towards the IRA will simply arouse their contempt, and encourage further outrages. We have heard a number of statements, giving reasons of expediency for not declaring the IRA to be an illegal body, but such reasons are irrelevant since any organisation which intends to implement its political aims by force of arms, covertly, is engaged in a conspiracy. Under common law, any man who aids and abets a conspiracy whether financially or otherwise, or who connives, is guilty of the whole crime. The IRA and all its helpers already are guilty of such a conspiracy.
The IRA is already illegal, regardless of any statement to be made by Mr Jenkins. Anybody who gives the IRA any support whatsoever, could perfectly well be arrested and tried for conspiracy to bear arms against the Crown. Suggestions that the status of the IRA should be reviewed or debated in Parliament are examples of unrea
listic, Alice-in-Wonderland thinking. What would we think of the advice of a surgeon who was unwilling to excise some parts of a proven cancer merely in order the better to keep an eye upon it?
The trouble is that we have all been brainwashed by a succession of ,mealy-mouthed post-war governments and have lost our sense of national identity. We have confused our immune and foreign protein response, rather like a patient who has been treated with massive doses of steroids, such a cortisone, and whose tissue can no longer clearly distinguish between self and not-self. We thus bitterly lament the recent vicious IRA outrages in Birmingham, where a persistant incendiary and shrapnel bomb caused untold misery to innocent citizens, while debating the advisability of allowing an IRA saboteur's body to be paraded through the streets surrounded by his known conspirators. Whose country is this? Meanwhile the government object to the name of one of our own soldiers who died for his country being inscribed on a public memorial.
This inability to discriminate between what is ours and what is not is probably partly responsible for much of the vandalism today, and is causally related to such anti-revolutionary measures as the Race Relations Acts. Legislation that prevents all discrimination by definition outlaws patriotism, since the patriot will consider his own country and its products, generally, to be at least slightly better than others.
Unless we can get away from crazy non-patriotic thinking and develop a healthier and more lucid reaction to any invading organism, whatever it may be, we shall continue to run the grave risk of disintegrating as a nation.
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