Martin McGuinness and that troubling early violence

There have been a lot of assessments of Martin McGuinness over the past week. Apart from Jim Allister, virtually all commentators and politicians have praised McGuinness’s commitment to peace and reconciliation over the past 10-20 years. Where real division occurs is in terms of his IRA involvement. Many say that he had a choice – John Hume, his fellow-townsman, didn’t resort to violence, so McGuinness must bear the guilt for the loss of many lives, including those of civilians. Others say that he was caught up in a situation – on the receiving end of British and unionist violence – which drove him to violence. As Gerry Adams said, McGuinness didn’t go to war, the war came to him, to his city, to his street.

So in some ways, those who are opposed to McGuinness and Sinn Féin are right when they say that efforts are being made to explain away his violent early years. At his funeral Mass on Thursday, the presiding priest acknowledged that his military years resulted in victims who “find it hard to forgive and impossible to forget.” Likewise the Rev Harold Good and Rev David Latimer, hailing McGuinness’s achievements, had to acknowledge that these were preceded by an IRA past involving much blood.   Commentators marvelled at the change that had overcome him, during the years he worked for peace and reconciliation. McGuinness, we were told, was an immensely complex man and, it was implied, unique in his conversion to peace.

Present at the funeral Mass was Taoiseach Enda Kenny, who has in his office a huge painting of Michael Collins, the most revered figure in Fine Gael history. Collins didn’t live long enough to do what McGuinness did, and become a pillar of the Irish political world. So Collins is revered because he was what many today would call a terrorist. And a very successful one. He led and organized lethal attacks with bomb and bullet. Spies and informers were, at every turn, taken out and shot. Bomb attacks inevitably involve the collateral death of civilians. In particular Collins targeted the local police, the RIC. These were invariably Catholics and Collins’s fellow-Irishmen.

Enda Kenny is proud to have the portrait of this man in his office.

Also at the funeral was former US president Bill Clinton, who gave a superb speech. When he entered the church there was thunderous applause and even some excited squeals. Afterwards, he was mobbed by people, mainly women, in search of selfies.

During his eight-year presidency, Clinton maintained satellite surveillance and regular bombing attacks on Iraq, attacks which often resulted in civilian casualties. In 1999, according to UNICEF, more than one million Iraqi children under five suffered from chronic malnutrition, and between 4,000 and 5,000 children died per month from malnutrition and disease. This was a direct result of US sanctions against Iraq, including vital medical supplies.  Overall, Clinton is accused of the deaths of more people in Iraq than were killed by weapons of mass destruction, nuclear and chemical, throughout all of history.

Compared to such men, universally lauded for their part in Irish and US history respectively, even if Martin McGuinness were responsible for every IRA killing during the Troubles, he would be left floundering in the wake of Collins and Clinton.

And yet when have you heard an Irish or British politician lament the lives taken by Collins and Clinton? Or a priest speak of the hurt inflicted by them, a hurt difficult to forgive and impossible to forget?

George Orwell had a word for it; doublethink.