The Saville report into Bloody Sunday

[Louis VI the Fat]

Those were the people the British Crown dealt with to create that peace.

All of the people His Majesty's Governments have ever dealt with for independence negotiations anywhere had been previously considered violent thugs, terrorists.

A few bombs explode, people get killed. Then the regular army is deployed to kill even more people, after which the Crown then negotiates a settlement - in an atmosphere of perceived moral superiority, and of concessions made to thugs, nobly granted to keep the peace.


That is how the big empire can think itself a beacon of liberty, a bastion of sanity and reason, in an otherwise insane world.

[Pannonian]

All the people His Majesty's Governments have ever dealt with for independence negotiations anywhere had been previously considered violent thugs, terrorists.

A few bombs explode, people get killed, then the regular army is deployed to kill even more people, after which the Crown then negotiates a settlement - in an atmosphere of perceived moral superiority, and of concessions made to thugs, nobly granted to keep the peace.


That is how the big empire can think itself a beacon of liberty, a bastion of sanity and reason, in an otherwise insane world.

If we're not thuggish enough to forcibly keep them down, then we'll need to make some kind of accommodation so they'll keep their thuggish elements in check. It's how any state is formed and kept together, ie. the monopoly of organised force. Your own city declared independence or semi-independence following the Franco-Prussian war, but got beaten down by the national government's forces. Tens of thusands dead to reach an absolute conclusion. I prefer our way of doublespeak and looking the other way where expedient. In Britain, double figures is a massacre.

[Louis VI the Fat]

If we're not thuggish enough to forcibly keep them down, then we'll need to make some kind of accommodation so they'll keep their thuggish elements in check. It's how any state is formed and kept together, ie. the monopoly of organised force. Your own city declared independence or semi-independence following the Franco-Prussian war, but got beaten down by the national government's forces. Tens of thusands dead to reach an absolute conclusion. I prefer our way of doublespeak and looking the other way where expedient. In Britain, double figures is a massacre.

One does not need to hold one's nose and look away when dealing with thugs.

Rather, states need to look in a mirror and wonder just who exactly are the thugs. Which holds true for both mine and your example.



No need to reach back all the way to 1871. Algeria is the festering wound, not ancient history!
To provide you with ammunition - the only two colonies that the two empires fully incorporated into their homeland are Ireland and Algeria. 1.5 million deaths, after 1945, for the latter. We couldn't have topped that number if we had got them all to come to rely on potatoes. Fourteen deaths is indeed one village on a tuesday morning. Heck, the French state murdered, tortured and put in concentration camps French citizens, by the thousands, in Paris, in the 1960's.
Are there prosecutions? Nah. It still takes the private memoirs of aging generals to confirm what everybody knows about state ordered torture and massacres.

It is a mad world. And madness is not just what the silly brownies do. In 38 years, our children will wonder why we collaborated with torture camps, illegal internment, massacres and cover-ups to wage 'war on terror'. But then, if we keep the lid on for all that time, we can maybe avoid prosecution.

[Vladimir]

It is a mad world. And madness is not just what the silly brownies do. In 38 years, our children will wonder why we collaborated with torture camps, illegal internment, massacres and cover-ups to wage 'war on terror'. But then, if we keep the lid on for all that time, we can maybe avoid prosecution.

Who could hate those sweet, innocent children who's only dream is to grow up and sell cookies?

[InsaneApache]

It's ironic that the army was deployed in the province in the first place to protect the catholics. Then four years later they end up shooting them. Something went badly wrong there.

As for prosecuting the soldiers, that's a difficult one. I heard Martin McGuinness was in possesion of a sub-machine gun that day, at that place.

So are we to get into a postion of locking up (retired) soldiers, whilst former bombers and gunmen sit in the pub?

I'm glad I don't have to make that decision.

[Louis VI the Fat]

Two persons share their thoughts about the report:




(Clickable) Father Edward Daly:

The day after Bloody Sunday, most of the priests who had witnessed the events met at midday in the parochial house of St Eugene's cathedral, located at the edge of the Bogside in Derry. There were seven of us. We were appalled by what we had seen the previous day. We shared the heartbreak of the families. We were trying to cope with our own heartbreak and felt a duty to tell the world the truth about what we had witnessed. We decided to issue a joint statement and to call a press conference in a city hotel that afternoon.

We made three points. We stated unequivocally that the army was guilty of wilful murder. We accused the army of shooting indiscriminately into a fleeing crowd, gloating over casualties and preventing spiritual and medical attention reaching the wounded and dying. We stated that none of the dead or wounded was armed.

Interestingly, the Saville report, 38 years later, after an investigation lasting 12 years, reached similar conclusions.

Last Tuesday was an unforgettable day. The vastness of the crowds in Guildhall Square, the great dignity of the families, the immense power and magnanimity of the prime minister's speech, the international media presence, the brilliantly sunlit afternoon, the ringing declaration of innocence of each and every victim and the minute of silence for all the victims of the past 30 years all added to the wonderful emergence of the truth after such a long time. It was theatrical, spellbinding and hugely moving. There was no triumphalism – just unadulterated joy and delight.



Edward Daly, then a curate at St Eugene's Cathedral in Derry, gives last rites to a boy injured in the Bloody Sunday shootings

(Clickable) Paratrooper Ken Lukowiak

I joined the Parachute Regiment in 1979. By then, within the ranks, Bloody Sunday was regarded as a sort of warped battle honour. The attitude was very much "That'll teach the Paddies to go throwing stones at paratroopers." The way we saw it, if anyone was to be held responsible for the deaths, then it was the people who organised what was an illegal march and the senior ranks that made the decision to send 1 Para from Belfast into Londonderry.

Thirty-eight years on, and £200m later, the official inquiry is finally over and has reached what amounts to the same conclusion. It also concludes that the soldiers of 1 Para lied and tried to cover up their actions. And again – there's no denying it anymore. They did. And if I'm honest, had I been present on that day, I would have also lied. It might be nice to imagine that in the name of truth and justice, I would have started pointing fingers, but I wouldn't have.
Because what sort of paratrooper would that have made me?




British paratroopers take away civil rights demonstrators after the Bloody Sunday massacre.

[gaelic cowboy]

It is the eternal problem that an Irishman remembers too much Irish history and an Englishman remembers none of it, this seeming advantage to not be tied down by history is a problem in Ireland where history is how your defined.

It is English incomprehension of Ireland that leads to both sides blaming the other for both the problems of the past and of today.

The North continues to move to a normal society by small steps lets rejoice at this.

[Megas Methuselah]

All the people His Majesty's Governments have ever dealt with for independence negotiations anywhere had been previously considered violent thugs, terrorists.

A few bombs explode, people get killed, then the regular army is deployed to kill even more people, after which the Crown then negotiates a settlement - in an atmosphere of perceived moral superiority, and of concessions made to thugs, nobly granted to keep the peace.


That is how the big empire can think itself a beacon of liberty, a bastion of sanity and reason, in an otherwise insane world.

I cannot possibly emphasize how true this statement is.