You’ve probably heard by now – there’s to be a fresh inquiry into the Kingsmill massacre. Ten Protestants were killed after they’d been ordered from their van. There was one survivor. It happened back in 1976 but in May of this year, the PSNI said they had a “potential DNA match” relating to a palm print on the getaway vehicle used in the attack. Danny Kennedy of the UUP welcomed these developments: “The families and sole survivor have waited forty years in their pursuit of maximum truth and justice for this brutal and barbaric crime. We must now wait and allow the police investigation to take its course.”
The killings have generally been attributed to the IRA, even though that organization has never admitted to carrying out the massacre. The fact that one of the leaders of the attack unit spoke with an English accent has raised the possibility of British army involvement. While nothing could justify such nightmarish blood-letting, it is worth noting that the Kingsmill killings took place the day following the shooting dead of six unarmed Catholics in their homes by the Glenanne gang, comprised of loyalist paramilitaries, members of the RUC and British soldiers.
The families of those shot dead at Kingsmill have had to wait a long time for justice, and Mr Kennedy is right to point this out. In 1999, Ian Paisley used parliamentary privilege to name one of the Reavey family as having “set up the Kingsmill massacre”. The Historical Enquiries Team investigated this claim and found that Eugene Reavey had no such involvement. Ian Paisley was called on to retract his accusation but refused to do so. No one has ever been charged with the deaths in the Reavey and O’Dowd families.
It’s interesting to compare the slow pace of justice in the Kingsmill massacre with another massacre: that of Bloody Sunday in Derry in 1972, when a total of fourteen people were shot dead by the British Parachute Regiment. Decades later, the Saville Inquiry found members of the Parachute Regiment guilty of firing without warning at people who were running away from them. Unlike at Kingsmill, those who carried out the killings were known by everyone – they were British Parachute Regiment members. The families of those killed in 1972 had to wait until 2010 before the Saville Inquiry was published. At that point the British prime minister, David Cameron, apologized for the actions of the Parachute Regiment.
The core differences between Kingsmill and Bloody Sunday is that the former was the work of paramilitaries. Their identity hasn’t been established and so the families of victims have not received justice. The same can be said of the Reavey and O’Dowd killings. In contrast the identity of the killers on Bloody Sunday has never been in doubt : the crime was committed by the British Parachute regiment. As to justice, the families had to settle for a Tory PM’s apology.
Let’s turn this around. Supposing the people who carried out the Kingsmill massacre were known and the IRA or former IRA men said they were sorry. Would such a response have satisfied the families and the general public? I think not.
But that’s what’s happened with Bloody Sunday. In addition, we’re not talking about a motley crew of illegal paramilitaries – we’re talking about the forces of law and order. Yet many people appear content that the truth has come out and the British Prime Minister has been gracious enough to say “Sorry”. The people paid to protect us have gunned down fourteen innocent Catholics in broad daylight and an apology rights the wrong.
There’s only one thing worse than justice delayed and that’s justice erased.
While I agree those guilty of Bloody Sunday should be prosecuted, it was undressing that the BS families used to say they weren’t interested in prosecutions, only the truth. Then they got the truth and started demanding prosecutions.
Completely correct MT a point Jude completely forgets.
And they are well within their rights to demand prosecutions for the murders of their loved ones by British forces.
What’s your point?
My point is, why weren’t they honest from.the start about their desire for prosecutions?
Who cares why they changed their minds?!
Well apart from you.
They deserve the justice that has been denied them for decades.
You seem to have a problem with that, which speaks volumes about your own mindset.
“Who cares why they changed their minds?! Well apart from you. They deserve the justice that has been denied them for decades. You seem to have a problem with that, which speaks volumes about your own mindset.”
I’m not clear why you would think I have a problem with the families getting justice when I said I supported prosecutions?
If someone in your family had been murdered you might be inclined to change your mind!
Or possibly you’ve forgotten Maggie Thatcher’s words: ‘Murder is murder, is murder’.
“If someone in your family had been murdered you might be inclined to change your mind!
Or possibly you’ve forgotten Maggie Thatcher’s words: ‘Murder is murder, is murder:
I’d have wanted prosecution from the start and wouldn’t have changed my mind.
“I’d have wanted prosecution from the start and wouldn’t have changed my mind”
It says more about you MT that you want to use this as a stick to beat the Bloody Sunday families, whilst ignoring the murderers who actually committed murder. Of course if it was the IRA who committed it then I’m sure we would’ve heard a lot more about them from you MT….
“It says more about you MT that you want to use this as a stick to beat the Bloody Sunday families, whilst ignoring the murderers who actually committed murder. Of course if it was the IRA who committed it then I’m sure we would’ve heard a lot more about them from you MT….”
I’m not sure how calling for prosecutions of those guilty of the Bloody Sunday killings could be interpreted as ignoring them.
Unlike you, I’m against murder and unlawful killing and support the bringing to justice of those guilty of such crimes.
“I’m not sure how calling for prosecutions of those guilty of the Bloody Sunday killings could be interpreted as ignoring them”
Come on now MT, you should know by now token gestures don’t fool anyone. I would tend to believe your honestly if this blog wasn’t full of you attacking the Bloody Sunday families instead of those who actually shot and killed people running away.
“Unlike you, I’m against murder and unlawful killing and support the bringing to justice of those guilty of such crimes”
Unlike me? You don’t even know me MT. Your starting to sound like the DUP. They use to say all those rosy words but their actions was the opposite. Ulster Resistance alone proved that. Unlawful killing? So your for “Lawful” killing then? Do I have to lecture you again on the morality of legality MT? It does get tiring trying to teach that Law makers have no more moral right to kill than me or you. By your logic Kim Jong Un has the right to kill, why not? He makes the Law in North Korea. And no, being a democracy doesn’t make a difference. The Public cant give you the right to kill either. 1000 individuals have no more moral power than 1 individual.
I wish the Troubles never occurred in the first place but unfortunately the causes were outside of me and my communities control.
“Come on now MT, you should know by now token gestures don’t fool anyone. I would tend to believe your honestly if this blog wasn’t full of you attacking the Bloody Sunday families instead of those who actually shot and killed people running away.”
Far from this blog being full of me attacking the families, there is nowhere in which I attack them. Even if you (unreasonably) characterise my querying of their mind-changing as an “attack”, it is only one post among thousands on this blog.
“Unlike me?”
Yes. You’re pro-terror.
“You don’t even know me MT.”
I don’t need to know you. You’ve articulated your pro-terror views on this blog.
“Your starting to sound like the DUP. They use to say all those rosy words but their actions was the opposite. Ulster Resistance alone proved that. .”
I had no involvement in Ulster Resistance and, in fact, opposed it. Therefore I’m not sure why you say I’m sounding like the DUP.
“Unlawful killing? So your for “Lawful” killing then?”
I’m not “for” any killing. But unfortunately sometimes it is necessary and justifiable. .
“Do I have to lecture you again on the morality of legality MT? It does get tiring trying to teach that Law makers have no more moral right to kill than me or you.”
Lawmakers don’t, no, but in a democracy, certain bodies are given legal authority to kill in certain defined circumstances and subsequently do have a moral right to kill insofar as they do so lawfully. Individual citizens may also lawfully kill in certain circumstances such as aelf-defence.
“By your logic Kim Jong Un has the right to kill, why not?”
That makes no sense at all. What logic?
“He makes the Law in North Korea.”
That on its own doesn’t give him the right to kill nor make it lawful for him so to do. But North Korea isn’t a democracy so laws there don’t carry the same moral weight, if any weight at all, as they do in a democracy.
“And no, being a democracy doesn’t make a difference.”
Of course it does. You’re suggesting that, say, a secret policeman killing a political dissident in North Korea has the same more weight as, say, a policeman in Switzerland shooting dead an assailant as he’s about to murder a child? If so, your values are warped, but perhaps I shouldn’t be surprised given your support for terror.
“The Public cant give you the right to kill either. 1000 individuals have no more moral power than 1 individual.”
I’ve no idea what that means. It doesn’t make sense.
“I wish the Troubles never occurred in the first place but unfortunately the causes were outside of me and my communities control.”
That doesn’t excuse your support for terror.
You don’t mind besmirching the families for changing their minds though do you?
Disgusting!!
These people had their families murdered on the street likes dogs by government forces, were lied to for decades, had their own reputations and the reputations of their dead loved ones questioned, had the truth denied, had justice denied, had obstacles put in front of them at every turn to find answers, had unionist leaders deny the truth and yet you have the gall to come on here and tell us but..but..but they didn’t say they wanted prosecutions at the start.
This is exactly the type of thing Jessica and Jude regularly touch upon.
This exact attitude.
Absolutely disgusting.
Its either a wise man or a fool who KNOWS what he would do in circumstances he has never experienced!
“Then they got the truth and started demanding prosecutions.”
I agree MT, how DARE they demand prosecutions of the soldiers who murdered their loved ones in cold blood, the cheek of them…..
On a serious note, Willie Frazer has rubbed off on you MT. That’s EXACTLY what he says in one of his videos released in the wake of Camerons apology to the families. In the video (still available on youtube, I believe) Willie is literally fuming that Cameron apologized for Bloody Sunday and he demands that Cameron doesn’t start prosecutions against the Bloody Sunday soldiers. It is a rather amusing video, watching a bloated, overweight Willie Frazer have a tantrum.
I certainly don’t speak for the Bloody Sunday families but I would at the very least want the soldiers named and shamed publically.
“I agree MT, how DARE they demand prosecutions of the soldiers who murdered their loved ones in cold blood, the cheek of them…..”
I support prosecutions, so I’m not sure how your apparently sarcastic statement could be interpreted as agreement with me.
“On a serious note, Willie Frazer has rubbed off on you MT. That’s EXACTLY what he says in one of his videos released in the wake of Camerons apology to the families. In the video (still available on youtube, I believe) Willie is literally fuming that Cameron apologized for Bloody Sunday and he demands that Cameron doesn’t start prosecutions against the Bloody Sunday soldiers. It is a rather amusing video, watching a bloated, overweight Willie Frazer have a tantrum.”
I don’t follow If Frazer was angry at Cameron’s apology and opposed to prosecutions how can that be exactly what I said, when (a) I didn’t comment on the apology and (b) I said I supported prosecutions?
“I certainly don’t speak for the Bloody Sunday families but I would at the very least want the soldiers named and shamed publically.”
So you take a position more favourable to the killers than I do.
“While I agree those guilty of Bloody Sunday should be prosecuted, it was undressing that the BS families used to say they weren’t interested in prosecutions, only the truth. Then they got the truth and started demanding prosecutions.”
I fail to see your point, MT – in accordance with the law of the country, the para’s who gunned down 14 innocent civilians in Derry should have been tried for murder, regardless of what the families wanted – the families don’t administer the law.
“I fail to see your point, MT – in accordance with the law of the country, the para’s who gunned down 14 innocent civilians in Derry should have been tried for murder, regardless of what the families wanted – the families don’t administer the law.”
Couldn’t agree more. But it’s still strange that the families said they didn’t want prosecutions and then changed their mind.
There’s absolutely nothing strange about families who had their loved ones murdered on the street, their names blackened, truth covered up and justice denied to at any stage demand that their murders be prosecuted.
Only YOU find that strange which reveals much more about you than you care to admit.
“There’s absolutely nothing strange about families who had their loved ones murdered on the street, their names blackened, truth covered up and justice denied to at any stage demand that their murders be prosecuted.”
Of course there’s not.
“Only YOU find that strange which reveals much more about you than you care to admit.”
Eh? But I don’t find it strange. I found it strange that they said they *didn’t* want prosecutions, then changed their minds.
When people are told their loved ones were shot dead illegally and in cold blood by identified soldiers of the State – they shouldn’t have to ask for prosecutions.
The fact these men and many more like them have not been brought to justice indicates where the real power rests in British democracy.
A power that hasn’t signed up to consent and could well try another curragh in the event of a vote for reunification.
I’ve often wondered why Ian Paisley was never pursued with more alacrity as to his false assertations that the Reavey family had somehow set-up the awful Kingsmills killings.Let’s face it , any murder is an horrific thing .Anyone capable of the act for whatever reasons is an individual of extreme actions.Where did he get that idea , for example? Did someone whisper this information in his ear? Who was that someone ? I’d like to know those answers. “Parliamentary privelege” in this instance seems to be a licence to tell lies and encourage murder without censure, does it not?.
Paisley wan an unrepentant liar who saw no reason for apologising.
His ‘Christianity’ didn’t seem to carry any Christian obligations!
Paddy
I’m reading that Anne Cadwallader book at the moment, it makes me think that some big wigs in the shadows don’t want to shine a torch any where near that particular can of worms.
Simply horrid stuff.
Who is her husband again?
Her husband I understand is some former Republican prisoner.
For the unthinking masses that comment on Northern Ireland’s politics that is enough to disenfranchise her opinion.
Likewise, if she wrote a book regarding the atrocities of the IRA she would be disenfranchised of her opinion on account of her parents, sister and brother all being former security force members.
Each to their own but I personally prefer to look at what a person says, what evidence they have to back it up and examples of bias and stretching the truth, hence I have no time for Tim Pat Coogan and his MOPEry and bias.
However, with Mrs Cadwallader it is an assault of logical fact attack but peppered with a lot of ‘pointing no elbows’ type insinuation and does tend to make up the reader’s mind for him/her.
That being said there is a LOT that needs to be addressed and examined and that includes the runaway conclusions that many nationalists come to when reading the book.
I strongly recommend the book and an examination of the sources.
It’s strange alright , Am Ghob…That’s the kind of detail that falls under te table but it’s the stuff i find most interesting.I must re-read that book again myself…horror stuff indeed. Too many have either never lived through the terror of those days or have simply blanked it from their minds.
It is disputable, MT, that the Bloody Sunday families and the public at large got the whole truth. They knew the truth in January 1972 .The evidence before Saville clearly demonstrated an audit trail which led to Whitehall, the MOD and Downing St. It is inconceivable that the PM was not briefed on the explosive potential of deploying the Paras in Derry. This was particularly pertinent, given their involvement in the Ballymurphy massacre 5 months earlier.Saville reported a partial truth; it is an issue for the families whether they wish to press for prosecution of identified squad does while the major perpetrators continue unscathed .
Without doubt, some in Hillsborough and Orgreave would agree with your final point. There is a body of opinion that the police at Orgreave were upholding the law in the face of intimidation from thousands of strikers. Some agree there was a riot. Some suggest it was a police riot.
In spite of Widgery, censorship and concerted efforts to be economical with the truth, tape recordings of military transmissions on Bloody Sunday reveal the colonial mindset that resulted in deaths in Derry. That same colonial mindset led to the shooting of eleven civilians in Ballymurphy in August 1971, also at the hands of the Parachute Regiment.
The BBC would no doubt dispute any suggestion of censorship. In May 1978, a decision was made to remove a reference in ‘The Irish Way’ which featured an inscription on a headstone in Derry which reads:
“Murdered by British Paratroopers on Bloody Sunday.”
The BBC made the following comment on the decision not to include the reference. (The Sunday Times, May 1978)
“This was essentially a process of editorial assessment and judgement on the part of the producer. In no way can it be regarded as censorship.”
Procrastination remains the hallmark of a failure to deal with legacy issues to the present day, no doubt based on editorial assessment and judgement and in the interests of national security.
Without getting a dose of whataboutery, but have the media ever mentioned the Reavey/O’Dowd families in context of Kingsmills apart from repeating the scurrilious lies peddled by the late Papa Doc about Eugene Reavey?
Some relatives wanted prosecutions. Some didn’t. But I agree with you, it was undressing.
To find the nearest equivalent of the Kingsmill Massacre of 1976 south of the Black Sow’s Dyke one must go back, Esteemed Blogmesiter, to Ballyseedy in 1923 when a like number of unarmed men were machine gunned to death on the side of the road.
Although there was one less victim at the Kerry venue (8) there was also, remarkably, a single survivor, the same as at the Armagh venue. There was another difference in detail: the Ballyseedy victims were first attached to a landmine, with the survivors, if any, being thoughtfully machine-gunned to extinction.
Where there is still an element of doubt about the perpetrators of Kingsmill no such mystery surrounds the killers in the Kingdom of Kerry: the morally superior soldiers of the Free State Army,
Curiously, the Chairman of the Advisory Group of Distinguished Historians on Centenary Commemorations (14-24) in Dublin , was minded during the week to look forward rather than backwards.
-Let us all be mature when the time comes to commemorate the Civil War.
Hmmm.
Could it have been that the floppy, velvet Tudor cap in academic black which he customarily wears as Chancellor of the National University of Ireland perhaps have put uneay thoughts of Ballyseedy/ Baile an tSioda/ Silk Townland into the chairman’s head?
Or, perchance, could Dr. Maurice Manning (for it is he !) former Fine Gael senator and, ergo, as blue in political hue as an eiderdowned duck’s egg, have been doing some sums in his historian’s ovoid head ? And who, after a deal of dogged yet reasonably accurate mental arithmetic , came up with the following figurative fact:
-In 2023, the events of Kingsmill will be as near half way between Ballyseedy and the ongoing neediness for moral superiority in the Free Southern Stateen, as makes no difference.
Un.comf.ort.tably. near.
ON MANNING THE TRUTH PUMPS
Let’s all be more mature, calls Mo Manning
He who had no cure for Sinn Fein banning
Will it ,em, be in 3-d?
The M. of Ballyseedy
And other local sallies into Black and Tanning?
eamon mccann explains it and all the side deals on the pensive quill.cant seem to get the link up here.
I remember reading an article once about the “Hierarchy of Victims” of the Troubles.
The Hierarchy of Victims went something like this, from Top to Bottom:
1. English civilians killed by the IRA (They got disproportionate media attention/sympathy)
2. British soldiers/RUC/UDR killed by the IRA
3. Protestant civilians killed by the IRA
4. Catholic civilians killed by the IRA (deaths were used for propaganda against the IRA)
5. Catholic civilians killed by Unionist paramilitaries (the blame for these deaths were often put on the IRA, again there was an impression given that what the UVF/UDA were doing was “Justified”).
6. Catholic civilians killed by the British Army, RUC, UDR, etc (The impression given by the British Government, Unionism, etc was they didn’t get killed for nothing, they must’ve did something wrong. Bloody Sunday is a prime example).
So if you were an English civilian killed during the Troubles you got FAR more media sympathy/attention than an Irish Catholic civilian killed by the British Army. Indeed when the Warrington Bomb killed 2 English children, there was mass protests against the IRA in Dublin. There was no mass protests in Dublin when the British Army killed scores of Irish Catholic children in the North, the Irish media often condemned such killings but they essentially put the Ultimate blame on the IRA……indeed we now know Taoiseach Garret FitzGerald got into a very heated argument with the Bishop of New York because the Bishop insisted on condemning British Army actions. The Bishop couldn’t be swayed and FitzGerald stormed out.
Willie Frazer is a spokesman for the Kingsmills families. Just the other day I was on Willies Facebook page and he was asked if he still believed that Eugene Reavey was involved in Kingsmills and Willie replied “Yes I do”. Apparently a UDR member deliberately sought to blacken the Reavey family by accusing Eugene of committing Kingsmills. The UDR member was not named. Could that unnamed UDR member possibly be Willie Frazer? I’m not making accusations, merely speculating. Apparently this unnamed UDR member deliberately wanted to blacken the Reavey family in order to make people think that the murdered Reavey brothers deserved what they got, that the UVF/Glenanne gang was justified in what they did. Indeed when the RUC came out to the Reavey house when the murders were committed they were said to be giving the impression that the brothers “didn’t get it for nothing”. For years afterwards the Reavey family were mocked, especially their mother, by UDR/RUC members.
There is serious questions to be answered about Willie Frazer, the so called “Victims Campaigner”. The Garda said they had intelligence Willie was a member of the Red Hand Commando. The PSNI refused Willie a legal firearm, their reason was because Willie “was known to associate with Loyalist paramilitaries”. Willie was the Manager of a Night Club where two Protestant Teenagers were brutally stabbed to death by the UVF in the late 1990’s. Both teenagers had their throats hacked in the same way the Shankill Butchers operated. Willie was confronted on live radio by one of the teenagers father. Willie has spoken highly of Billy Wright. He also said that Unionist paramilitaries should “never have been locked up in the first place”. Numerous accusations have been made about his UDR father and uncles (killed by the IRA) that they were members of the Glenanne gang. Willie himself even admitted as a UDR man he would’ve passed information to the UVF/UDA…..so, did he?….did he also blacken the name of Eugene Reavey by falsely giving his name to Paisley?
There has been a deal done. I doubt very much anyone will ever be convicted for Bloody Sunday or Kingsmills. But does political parties have the right to stop justice for political convenience? They certainly don’t have the moral right. We seen how Paisley (as Jonathan Powell’s book proves, published in 2006) agreed to the On the Run letters (he also asked for the British Govt to blame it on the UUP if its ever exposed), so has nationalist parties agreed not to push too hard for convictions of British soldiers? I’m inclined to think they have. Danny Morrison has already said he believes an amnesty for all is inevitable, its just a matter of time before the paper trail of systematic collusion leads straight back to Downing Street….
Not enough but there were protests. The British embassy was burned down the night of Bloody Sunday.
A few lads climbed up to the second story window, smashed the glass and then turns to the crowd “I don’t have any fucking matches!” and a literal wall of matchboxes came up from the crowd.
The token Gardaí presence shagged off and the govt let the populace divert its anger into burning the place down. Of course the govt compensated the British for the damages.