[Closed] Bloody sunday was unjustifiable and unjustified

Has all the hallmarks of a lynch mob to me 😕

I don't envy our troops in Afghanistan (or any conflict arena past/present/future) trying to make life or death decissions in the heat of battle that may come back to haunt them in 30 - 40 years time 🙄

Only those who were there know the real truth, and I suspect neither side will have matching recollections of that days events.

£200 million wasted for nowt IMHO

[i]I'm hoping these 'Paras' will be brought to justice.[/i]

I thought the current policy was to release all the terrorists, so presumably you'd want these given the same justice.

the report stated that the officers involved were found to have given conflicting and erroneous accounts of what happened to justify their actions.

£200 million wasted [b]for nowt[/b] IMHO

Really???

"For nowt?"

Or because "Gov'ts of the day" find it rather uncomfortable to establish / grasp / communicate the truth at the time.....

£200m to establish the f-ing obvious. Great use of public funds.

I think that the £200m spent, whilst excessive, has brought justice to all those affected during and since the massacre. that in itself is priceless

Bollocks! £200million is a lot of heart bypasses paid for.

Ok, so a massacre of [i][b]UK citizens[/b][/i] occurs on the doorstep. But we shouldn't spend anything finding out why and how it happened?

I don't want to get dragged into a slanging match on a cycling forum, after all everyone is entitled to their own opinions, but I fail to see how spending £200 million has brought justice to anyone.

I actually find it hard to believe how terrorists (Gerry Adams and crew) are rewarded and now have MP status, and soldiers, many of whome were little more than boys, employed by the government, serving their country are now being branded criminals. At that time the Army were engaged in an armed conflict much like they are now and it worries me that actions taken "under fire" could be scrutinised so far down the line.

Both sides are likely to have embellished the truth; or just forgotten/confused events of a day that happened decades ago.

Like I said, I'm not saying my view is right or wrong, it's just that, MY opinion.

we are fixating on the wrong thing here. it doesn't matter if it cost £200 or 200mil. a result has been achieved that will hopefully lead to some solace for the family of the victims. The report has established that at no point did any of the victims have weapons that would make the paras believe they were a threat.

Has all the hallmarks of a lynch mob to me

yeah, those poor hapless paras were lynched by having their harmless bullets willfully intercepted by people 🙁

I actually find it hard to believe how terrorists (Gerry Adams and crew) are rewarded and now have MP status, and soldiers, many of whome were little more than boys, employed by the government, serving their country are now being branded criminals

Both sides are likely to have embellished the truth; or just forgotten/confused events of a day that happened decades ago.

Those young boys shot unarmed civilians what do you want to call them then heroes

Did the IRA ever NOT kill either unarmed or defenceless people? And they haven't just been "let off" as these soldiers may have been, but actively released from prison early, and rewarded with legitimate power, position and authority?

they were civilians with a clear intention to PEACEFULLY demonstrate against the laws preventing them from protesting.

[i]we are fixating on the wrong thing here. it doesn't matter if it cost £200 or 200mil. a result has been achieved that will hopefully lead to some solace for the family of the victims[/i]

No, you are wrong.

There are two issues here, what happen in Londonderry on that day and why did it take £200m and 12 years to find out.

Irrelevent of what did or did not happen, and as I wasn't there I really don't have a view on it, but somebody quite frankly has been taking the micheal:

[i]On 8 February 2008, Secretary of State, Shaun Woodward revealed that the Bloody Sunday Inquiry was still costing £500,000 a month although it has not held hearings since 2005.[/i]

At that time the Army were engaged in an armed conflict much like they are now and it worries me that actions taken "under fire" could be scrutinised so far down the line.

They weren't "under fire"

A large number of those shot were running away and were shot in the back

How unfortunate the sniper in Armagh and the rest of his sidekicks who killed 12 soldiers served less than three years in jail, yet they went out with the intent of killing and benefitted from the Good Friday agreement. Unfortunate a Battalion of soldiers who just happened to be Paras were sent to a new conflict, without specific in theatre training and reacted to enemy fire in the same way they had been taught to do so in the previous conflicts.

Dont nobody tell me they were not shot at that day. When i joined my Battalion there were still guys in the unit who had been there.

No winners lots of loosers. But dont apply todays standards on incidents that occured in the past.

Utrique Paratus

Dont get me started on Maguiness and Adams - Twunts of the highest order.
And its Londonderry not Derry 😉

if 200million and legitimising ****s like adams or mcguiness is the price for peace in NI then its still worth it

and the inquiry is just part of the peace process that has to be one of nulabours greatest legacies

all though its kind of ironic that the introduction of internment without trial among many other disastrous interventions by the heath tory government sounds more like something from nulabours war on terror

And its Londonderry not Derry

maybe to you, but not to those who live there.

Dont nobody tell me they were not shot at that day. When i joined my Battalion there were still guys in the unit who had been there.

Why did no one bother to tell the Saville inquiry then?

Londonderry all the way pal and you know it, or handback all the money you and Maguiness take quite happily from London

actively released from prison early, and rewarded with legitimate power, position and authority?

Rewarded? By who? I'm sure there were free and fair elections held where those who stood for election were then either elected or not elected according to the electorate's wishes...an electorate who had been jerrymandered for decades.

robdob
did you not read my post here you cut it at an odd point here is the rest

[b]Atrocities were committed on both sides and we should not ignore those committed by the state just because we perceive the IRA crimes to be worse [/b]

The official army position, backed by the British Home Secretary the next day in the House of Commons, was that the paratroopers had reacted to the gun and nail bomb attacks from suspected IRA members. However, all eyewitnesses (apart from the soldiers), including marchers, local residents, and British and Irish journalists present, maintain that soldiers fired into an unarmed crowd, or were aiming at fleeing people and those tending the wounded, whereas the soldiers themselves were not fired upon. No British soldier was wounded by gunfire or reported any injuries, nor were any bullets or nail bombs recovered to back up their claims

Londonderry all the way pal

😀

Free Derry.

Tough call really. A mate of mine served in NI and he said he and his colleagues spent their days and nights on tour, in a state of permanent fear. You never know where the next bullet was coming from nor who was going to fire it.

One of my school masters had his head blown off by the IRA. He had been in the army and also said they spent their time in what he called a "heightened state of anxiety".

None of this condones illegal killing but it might go some way towards letting us empathise with the soldiers on the ground.

Interestingly, Max Hastings said this morning that he refused to testify as he no longer trusted his recollection of events to be accurate. He was offered a copy of his testament to the earlier enquiry but refused again because he did not want to simply parrot his previous comments. What he did say though was maybe the paras were the wrong regiment to be deployed in that sort of situation as they did not have a history of measured response to events, indeed they were trained to react first, think later.

I think if you mix armed soldiers and an angry mob for long enough, shit is always going to happen. I really don't know enough about events in NI to even pretend to understand but bad things happened to everyone which is why negotiated peace was the only way forward. Both sides were to blame in many ways, no one came out smelling of roses but we can't crucify the soldiers now.

There's a [url= http://report.bloody-sunday-inquiry.org/ ]£200million pound enquiry just reported on this[/url], and we're quoting wikipedia? 🙄

[url= http://report.bloody-sunday-inquiry.org/volume01/chapter005/ ]We have concluded that the explanation for such firing by Support Company soldiers after they had gone into the Bogside was in most cases probably the mistaken belief among them that republican paramilitaries were responding in force to their arrival in the Bogside. This belief was initiated by the first shots fired by Lieutenant N and reinforced by the further shots that followed soon after. In this belief soldiers reacted by losing their self-control and firing themselves, forgetting or ignoring their instructions and training and failing to satisfy themselves that they had identified targets posing a threat of causing death or serious injury. In the case of those soldiers who fired in either the knowledge or belief that no-one in the areas into which they fired was posing a threat of causing death or serious injury, or not caring whether or not anyone there was posing such a threat, it is at least possible that they did so in the indefensible belief that all the civilians they fired at were probably either members of the Provisional or Official IRA or were supporters of one or other of these paramilitary organisations; and so deserved to be shot notwithstanding that they were not armed or posing any threat of causing death or serious injury. Our overall conclusion is that there was a serious and widespread loss of fire discipline among the soldiers of Support Company.[/url]

I think if you mix armed soldiers and an angry mob for long enough, shit is always going to happen

you are implying that british soldiers have the integrity of a wet paper bag.

They are trained to differentiate between clear imminent danger and an angry mob and to deal with it in a way thats appropriate and justified. They failed and as a result people, innocent people, died through poor judgement and/or trigger happiness

Bigdummy - The Bogside should think itself lucky then as Support Companies usually deploy Mortars and Heavy Machine guns.

Thankfully training is specific to task now and hopefully this incident wont be repeated.

well it was slightly easier to quote as I have not read the 11 volumes yet have you or anyone posting here BD ? ****ing fast readers then I iwll find th ebit on whether the soldiers were shot at will that do for you or perhaps you could post up something to counter what I said?

I have had to re-read the second last sentence in BD's extract quite a few times and I'm still struggling to get the meaning of it - perhaps that is because it is around 100 or thereabouts words long FFS. 😯

The Bogside should think itself lucky

I'm not sure the Bogside was ever an area that thought itself "lucky".

54.3 While two soldiers (Private R and Private T) sustained minor injuries from acid or a similar corrosive substance contained in bottles thrown down from a balcony of Block 1 of the Rossville Flats, none of the soldiers of Mortar Platoon in Sector 2 sustained any injury from nail or blast bombs, or firearms, despite the fact that most of them were in close proximity to those they said were deploying these weapons and despite the substantial amount of incoming fire which some said they encountered. On the other hand, according to their accounts, the soldiers of Mortar Platoon were able to shoot seven or eight people in the area of the Rossville Flats car park, all of whom were armed with lethal weapons.

54.4 We have already concluded, for the reasons we have given,1that we have found no acceptable evidence that there was incoming fire before these soldiers opened fire or that a nail bomb exploded as described by Private Q.

It has not been suggested, nor is there any evidence to suggest, that any of the known casualties was armed with a lethal weapon or doing anything that could have justified any of them being shot

http://report.bloody-sunday-inquiry.org/volume03/chapter054/

Like reading two totally different accounts point taken 😉

EDIT: AH you edited whilst I was reading the report suggesting you had not even read it either 😯

 

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein, was present at the time of the violence and "probably armed with a submachine gun" but did not engage in "any activity that provided any of the soldiers with any justification for opening fire"

Interesting quote from the BBC report on the matter.

Seems to me that both positions cannot be correct, i.e. there were no armed indivduals present other than the army and then the above.

Ultimately, the bottom line IMHO is that the person who deployed shock troops who are trained to react with extreme predjudice, into a policing role is the culprit here. Young, and often a bit south of intelligent thugs with guns are not going to be very good at nice cuddly roles. Self evident frankly.

Can I offer up a bill for £200 million too please??

Junkyard - I have not read it, and was not getting at you particularly. It amuses me that this heated debate is going on here (and in plenty of other places) generally without reference to the immensely thorough and expensive report, which we have not read and are mostly never going to.

No offence intended. 🙂

when said like that it sounds so reasonable BD keyboard laid down in peace 😳
That report is ****ing huge is there a brief summary somewhere?

There doesn't seem to be a manageable "executive summary", although the bit I quoted above is part of an "overall assessment" in volume 1.

I'm afraid I think I'm going to have to wait for someone to publish a book summarising the report. Which is annoying.

Bloody sunday was unjustifiable and unjustified

+1. I can't stand U2.

summary on wikipedia

Is this just a re-run of the micro-waved babies thread?

It amuses me that this heated debate is going on here (and in plenty of other places) generally without reference to the immensely thorough and expensive report, which we have not read and are mostly never going to.

If it uses language and sentence construction like above, then I'm certainly not going to read it. Debates like this are no fun if we choose to leave our positions of entrenched bigotry and meet somewhere in the middle anyway 🙂

That report is ****ing huge is there a brief summary somewhere?

+1

yes I am scanning as well that report is huge - as you would expect for 200 million- read your quote only another 189 chapters to go

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein, was present at the time of the violence and "probably armed with a submachine gun" but did not engage in "any activity that provided any of the soldiers with any justification for opening fire"

Although I cannot easily imagine what it must be like to be under fire, had I a machine gun and were I to see my fellows being shot down I think I would try to kill as many soldiers as possible

[url=

and hides*[/url]

Although I cannot easily imagine what it must be like to be under fire, had I a machine gun and were I to see my fellows being shot down I think I would try to kill as many soldiers as possible

Conversely if I were a SOLDIER, warned of potential violence against me and then became aware of someone with a submachine gun, I might just be tempted to kill as many people that I perceive to be a threat as possible.

Berm Bandit + 1 and also Maguiness been the inherant coward he is knew only too well he risked having his crust taken off with one of Radway and Greens 7.62mm specials if he put his head on display holding said SMG.

The only winners in this one are the lawyers 8 million paid to two lawyers, good gig if you can get it.

As a soldier, especially at that time, it must have been a very difficult situation to find yourself in. The local population, or at least the people you saw on a regular basis, hated you with a passion, which they were at pains to make obvious everyday.

Then you're told repeatedly how dangerous these people are, before confronting what amounts to an angry mob. Yes, the demonstration may have been peaceful, but even peaceful demonstrations can be intimidating to those tasked to police them when they're significantly outnumbered.

Unless you've been there, it's very difficult to understand just how intimidating, and frightening, it can be.

Should the soldiers have opened fire if they weren't in imminent danger? No, of course not. Should individual soldiers be prosecuted after all this time? Personally I don't think so.

As others have had to accept the release of convicted terrorists under the Good Friday agreement, would it be wrong to expect the people of Derry to accept the vindication of their account of that day without pressing for prosecution of individual soldiers?

I guess we'll find out soon enough...

My guess - the inquiry was demanded as part of the "peace" process, no doubt those demands also included a scapegoat, and one will be found.

Sorry if that's a bit simplistic, but I'm a simple chap 🙂

Conversely if I were a SOLDIER, warned of potential violence against me and then became aware of someone with a submachine gun, I might just be tempted to kill as many people that I perceive to be a threat as possible.

except that their nominal job is to protect, not slaughter, but I agree it would be better not to have any, or if they'd stayed in the barracks polishing their boots, or never been recruited it would have been better.

Like I said SFB, the person responsible is the one who decided to deploy shock troops in this situation, they just responded in the way they had been trained.

they just responded in the way they had been trained.

oh yes, the Hitler defence...

If either of you had actually bothered to read the summary of the report online you'd know it lays blame with *both* the commanders (in particular the CO of 1 PARA who sent them in despite an order not to) *and* the troops who opened fire.

But don't let that stop you banging on.

No Hitler was in charge, these guys are in fact brainwashed and desensitised through their training to do this stuff. In fact, I think you would find if the Nuremburg trials were held today a lot less people would have been hung, for the same reason.

My view is there are no bad teams, just bad management. No doubt you will disagree, but to blame the squaddies on the ground is a cop out. The fault clearly lies higher up the ladder.

there are no bad teams, just bad management

Spoken like a true buck-passer.

Go and read the [url= http://report.bloody-sunday-inquiry.org/volume01/chapter001/ ]report[/url].

http://www.singletrackworld.com/forum/topic/cavendish-in-tour-de-suisse-crash
Priorities please. This is a cycling forum!

Northern Ireland's Deputy First Minister Martin McGuinness, Sinn Fein, was present at the time of the violence and "probably armed with a submachine gun" but did not engage in "any activity that provided any of the soldiers with any justification for opening fire"

Interesting quote from the BBC report on the matter.

Seems to me that both positions cannot be correct, i.e. there were no armed indivduals present other than the army and then the above.

I can't find it now but there was a bit on the BBC earlier that said that there were armed IRA members around but that there was no evidence that they'd actually shot at the army.

Extracts from the report taken from the Guardian website:

This is paragraph 3.102 from the "principal conclusions" report:

As to the further shooting in Rossville Street, which caused the deaths of William Nash, John Young and Michael McDaid, Corporal P claimed that he fired at a man with a pistol; Lance Corporal J claimed that he fired at a nail bomber; and Corporal E claimed that he fired at a man with a pistol in the Rossville Flats. We reject each of these claims as knowingly untrue. We are sure that these soldiers fired either in the belief that no one in the areas towards which they respectively fired was posing a threat of causing death or serious injury, or not caring whether or not anyone there was posing such a threat. In their cases we consider that they did not fire in a state of fear or panic.

And this is paragraph 3.113:

We have no doubt that Lance Corporal F shot Patrick Doherty and Bernard McGuigan, and it is highly probable that he also shot Patrick Campbell and Daniel McGowan. In 1972 Lance Corporal F initially said nothing about firing along the pedestrianised area on the southern side of Block 2 of the Rossville Flats, but later admitted that he had done so. No other soldier claimed or admitted to firing into this area. Lance Corporal F's claim that he had fired at a man who had (or, in one account, was firing) a pistol was to his knowledge false. Lance Corporal F did not fire in a state of fear or panic. We are sure that he fired either in the belief that no one in the area into which he fired was posing a threat of causing death or serious injury, or not caring whether or not anyone there was posing such a threat.

Go and read the report.

As indeed you have..... not!

If you care to read my posts, I've made no reference to the report, and in fact am posting an opinion, that is to say that to blame the squaddies on the ground is passing the buck, the real error of judgment being in putting shock troops on the ground to deal with a civilian population. It is not what they were trained to do. Simple, it was just a matter of time before something nasty occurred. Nothing to do with the report, merely an observation on my part, mainly based on living and working in an area where the buggers are based.

Gerald Donaghey

Somehow, the report has concluded that his shooting was [b]not[/b] justified, but at the same time confirms that he [b]was[/b] armed with Nail Bombs at the time of his shooting...

😯

Impressive conclusion that one!

He was running away - shot in the back.

Bah, if your confronting ARMED police soilders and kicking off/throwing stuff etc, expect to get shot, typical limp wristed appologist crap.

woody2000 - Member
My guess - the inquiry was demanded as part of the "peace" process, no doubt those demands also included a scapegoat, and one will be found.

No guessing, it was one of the agreed parts of the peace process, but the cost & length of time to reach a conclusion was not expected.

Northern Ireland will always produce quite polar & passionate opinions, it does for me, I have half my family living in Omagh and can't quite believe that there have still been no prosecutions after the 1998 bomb, despite a lot of evidence as to who was involved - that appears to be a very political decision.

My father had left Ireland before the shootings in Derry, but he's always described it as a "where were you when......." event.

Regarding the actions of soldiers, got friends who have served/are serving, and fully recognise that they have an incredibly difficult task, if the "troubles" kicked off today then the military involvement probably wouldn't occur to the same level, but equally the british military is now more prepared generally for such taskings than they were in the early 1970s.

2 Lawyers earned about £4 million each according to BBC ... hhmmm ... Laaaawwwyyyyyyersssssss ... Ker-ching £££!!!

🙄

Anokdale i only hope none of your family gets murderd and you have to wait 40 years for the truth

Sorry I know nothing about bloody sunday as I was not alive but I went to have a read and spotted this gem of wiki editing.

[img] [/img]

Well said, Conaid. Londonderry my ass

Priests never escort terrorists eh - remember Claudy?

so the consensus on the report is tl;dr, then?

Dont nobody tell me they were not shot at that day. When i joined my Battalion there were still guys in the unit who had been there.

Nothing more annoying than internet experts, in this case because I grew up in Belfast.

Derry it is, London is in England, Glad to hear many folk in the North are having a drink to celebrate that it has been finally recognised as unlawful murder.
Paddy Doherty (31) Gerald Donaghy (17) Jackie Duddy (17) Hugh Gilmour (17) Michael Kelly (17) Michael McDaid (20) Kevin McElhinney (17) Barney McGuigan (41) Gerald McKinney (34) Willie McKinney (27) William Nash (19) Jim Wray (22) John Young (17) and John Johnston (59)

INNOCENT. MURDERED UNLAWFULLY BY BRITISH PARATROOPERS ON THE STREETS OF DERRY 1972.

MAY THEY FINALLY REST IN PEACE.

Saleem, you're a genius!!! 🙄

Now can you remember all the names of the innocent British civilians murdered by the IRA?

No but I can name 1 para who openly brags about bagging a few paddys as he puts it and he's the only ex-para I know so I'd say if that is the mind set why let these people have guns in the first place. After living in south Derry in a town where the shops would advertise for staff with a sign saying catholics need not apply how do you expect people to respond.

Toddboy - Member

"Now can you remember all the names of the innocent British civilians murdered by the IRA?"

The day this argument starts making sense might be the day I put myself in a care home. "Oh, it's OK for the british army to kill people because terrorists do it too!" FFS. If there's ever even the slightest trace of moral equivalence between our armed forces and the IRA and their like, we're ****ed.

Well it should be time for people to respond by moving on, and not start throwing accusations around. Innocent people both British and Irish died at various stages of the conflict. Not everybody will agree, but it is time to put all of this sad episode behind.

Well it should be time for people to respond by moving on, and not start throwing accusations around.

And like I said, not everybody will agree.

So what's the alternative? We now find the Paras responsible, and punish them, we also find the people responsible for issuing the orders and punish them. That's a lot more expense, a lot more tax payers money.

And to be totally fair...

Then we should also look at all the unsolved murders by the IRA. Find the people responsible, and punish them. Find the people who ordered the attacks, and punish them. But wait, aren't some of those people now in Sinn Fein and MPs?

Quote from an article that I read earlier.

Major-General Julian Thompson, a Royal Marines commanding officer in south Armagh during the Troubles, said that if Saville found troops guilty then McGuinness should be prosecuted.
"In that case, let's prosecute the IRA as well, men like McGuinness. How about drawing a line under this unless we want to go and prosecute all the IRA guys who murdered as well? It's ironic that these guys [British soldiers] could be prosecuted and the people who've murdered 20 times more than they have are being allowed off ," said Thompson.
Colonel Richard Kemp, a Northern Ireland tour veteran, said it was a "serious error" to prosecute soldiers so long after the event.
"And let's not forget that we have had IRA murderers let off and not prosecuted and brought into government," he said.
"Let's open an investigation into some of Martin McGuinness's activities, shall we?"
Politicians in Belfast and London now fear that the recommendations of the Saville report may cause huge problems for the peace process with soldiers ending up in the dock.

highclimber and conaid in Londonderry it is quite obvious where you loyalties lie, fair enough. My loyalties lie directly opposite yours and would like to see justice for all the soldiers who died in cold blooded murder,(Warren Point for example if you want a link to Para Reg) i want to see justice for all the RUC officers murdered in their houses in front of their famillies who incidentely protected you as well, i want to see justice for all the civillians from both sides who died going about their business. (What did Lord Mountbatten do to deserve what he got)

This inquiry was political from the start and to see you lot celebrating the outcome with glee when your fellow countrymen of a certain persuassion seem happy to forget the other injustices they perpretated is an offront to decency, mind you when i served there decency was thin on the ground but overshadowed by some fine Irishmen i was proud to serve with and call my friends to this day.

Well said Anokdale.

[i]they just responded in the way they had been trained.[/i]

isn't one of the conclusions of the report the fact that so many innocent civilians died precisely because these soldiers didn't follow their training.

It was the softly softly approach were the Army played by the rules and PIRA murdered at will that caused the problems. Never a better time in the troubles than when the SAS were allowed to dish out some of their medicine but even that was brought to an end. How can we say that the deputy first minister running around with a sub machine gun is ok (and put in office)? Nick Clegg ever tried to murder fellow MPs? Or maybe some Met police perhaps? No no only tolerated in Ulster.