Several have said that they fear wars starting in Europe if the EU breaks up. - Page 3 - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#15035346
Presvias wrote:^ Unbelievable. All of it.

If you do know about the Troubles, then you have absolutely no excuse for defending Loyalist paramilitaries. I'd get permanently banned if I said what I'm thinking, so best just completely dismiss your frankly evil posts/beliefs. But just in case you're engaging in sophistry, and patching over your ego (which I hope is the case), I'll try one last time to show you exactly what you're mistakenly defending..

https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/events/bsunday/chron.htm

Successive Tory and Labour govts and Ulster University have agreed upon those events.

Show me where I've defended Loyalist terror and atrocities. I'm not willing to let you hide behind wrong accusations because you apparently can't come up with a rebuttal.

Presvias wrote:It's completely clear that the invading & occupying British started, continued and gladly carried out the actions mentioned in the article. The Irish were oppressed for hundreds of years prior to the formation of the Free State; and the predecessors to the IRA; the Fenians, were absolutely justified in their campaign against tyranny. The early IRA of James Connolly and 'big jim' larkin were also pretty heroic, it was comprised of men & women who valiantly fought the occupiers' racist tyranny. The only people who still defend the British involvement in Ireland, are far-right fascisti and the ignoranti.

I encourage you to come and live in the present.
#15035358
Your post is just complete lying rubbish now.

You have absolutely defended and endorsed loyalist terrorism and the terroristic policies of the British state, over and over again.

That's interlaced with exasperating levels of ignorance like this:

"The IRA is of course also unmatched when it comes to the death toll, torture, murders and disappearances. And what have they achieved? Nothing at all"

There would be no power sharing executive in Stormont if the IRA did nothing. Just like there would be no free state if Connolly, Larkin et al hadn't have resisted the British state.

You really haven't got a clue. The IRA formed to protect themselves and their communities from the original terrorist loyalists.

These are the people you're supporting:.
Image
Image
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The modern cuddly loyalists. Nothing to do with the past, those pictures are recent.

In conclusion...fick them and their apologists and supporters. They deserve to be the victims of their own karma wrt their evil beliefs.
#15035369
Presvias wrote:Your post is just complete lying rubbish now.

You have absolutely defended and endorsed loyalist terrorism and the terroristic policies of the British state, over and over again.

That's interlaced with exasperating levels of ignorance like this:

"The IRA is of course also unmatched when it comes to the death toll, torture, murders and disappearances. And what have they achieved? Nothing at all"

There would be no power sharing executive in Stormont if the IRA did nothing. Just like there would be no free state if Connolly, Larkin et al hadn't have resisted the British state.

You really haven't got a clue. The IRA formed to protect themselves and their communities from the original terrorist loyalists.

These are the people you're supporting:.
Image
Image
Image
Image
Image
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The modern cuddly loyalists. Nothing to do with the past, those pictures are recent.

In conclusion...fick them and their apologists and supporters. They deserve to be the victims of their own karma wrt their evil beliefs.




Hey, those are some nice photoshop jobs you posted.

Of course it was the Irish RA that had connections to the nazis.

[url]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Republican_Army–Abwehr_collaboration[/url]

But why let historical facts get in the way of one’s bias.
#15035376
Presvias wrote:Your post is just complete lying rubbish now. You have absolutely defended and endorsed loyalist terrorism and the terroristic policies of the British state, over and over again.

You give the terms "pragmatist" and "non-tribal" a completely new meaning. Can you actually have a debate without making bogus accusations?

Presvias wrote:That's interlaced with exasperating levels of ignorance like this: "The IRA is of course also unmatched when it comes to the death toll, torture, murders and disappearances. And what have they achieved? Nothing at all"

There would be no power sharing executive in Stormont if the IRA did nothing. Just like there would be no free state if Connolly, Larkin et al hadn't have resisted the British state. You really haven't got a clue. The IRA formed to protect themselves and their communities from the original terrorist loyalists.

No. The IRA has always had a united Ireland as its aim, but you are right that they were successful in recruiting lots of people who felt they had to protect their communities. However, the exact same is true for loyalists who also managed to recruit a large number of people for the same reason. There was also a civil rights movement in NI, much like in the rest of the UK and the western world, and it is extremely unlikely that it wouldn't have led to greater democratic participation, as it did everywhere else, had the violence and tit-for-tat retributions on both sides not led to the troubles. The terrorists, again on both sides, may well have delayed progress in that respect, but they certainly caused a lot of unnecessary death and destruction. A cynic might also note that a successful peaceful civil rights movement was actually not in the interest of the IRA and its objective.

Presvias wrote:These are the people you're supporting:.

[lots of unsourced pictures]

The modern cuddly loyalists. Nothing to do with the past, those pictures are recent.

Pathetic. :lol:

Presvias wrote:In conclusion...fick them and their apologists and supporters. They deserve to be the victims of their own karma wrt their evil beliefs.

I recommend you step away and calm yourself if you cannot debate this in a rational manner.

*************************

foxdemon wrote:Hey, those are some nice photoshop jobs you posted.

It's quite obvious in the second image. The same image without the guy photoshopped in also appears in the left bottom corner of the third image. Which doesn't help @Presvias' credibility.

That said, it's true that Nazi flags sometimes appear in the vicinity of loyalist bonfires and such. I guess I'm supposed to take responsibility for that in some way. Still not sure what it has to do with the debate though.
#15035425
foxdemon wrote:Hey, those are some nice photoshop jobs you posted.


Really? Photoshop jobs?

What rubbish you have posted.

Are you one of those posters that dismisses any evidence as fake?

Of course it was the Irish RA that had connections to the nazis.

[url]https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_Republican_Army–Abwehr_collaboration[/url]

But why let historical facts get in the way of one’s bias.


That was wrt the Irish free state, not in northern ireland...and it was in the late 30s and 40s. If you knew anything about history, you'd know that jim/connolly's time was long before that.

You'd also understand that there have been several iterations of the IRA and multiple factions; each completely different to the other.

But congratulations for supporting and defending British terrorists yourself, you have a username to live up to I guess.



https://www.channel4.com/news/racist-fl ... onfederate

Have fun lying to cover your utterly utterly pathetic lies about pictures being photoshopped.

Do you even know what taig means?

And it's absolutely disgusting to smear all Irish republicanism with the Nazi association between one lot of the IRA in the 40s.

There's clearly no point in debating people who openly and proudly defend terrorists. You should be ashamed of your evil and ignorant beliefs.

I'm done responding to people who think that signs saying 'taigs will be crucified' are 'pathetic' and 'fake' without even bothering to check it out. It's sickening.

PS: More 'fake' pictures here
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Image (they're squaddies in afghanistan apparently)
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( a march in Belfast with a far right Unionist cllr; https://republican-news.org/current/new ... belfa.html )


Atlantis wrote:I believe in the pragmatic application of the social free market economy to avoid the pitfalls of socialism, on the one hand, and neoliberal-style capitalism, on the other hand. Since most countries have now introduced some form of welfare, it can be considered the most successful system in existence. I also believe in pan-European democracy as it mitigates the extremes and because purely national democracy has not future without an international or regional framework that protects it from adverse external influences.


Fair enough.

The EU system isn't perfect but it's the "best we've got", that's the way I look at it.

And as you know, they've transformed the fortune of the ex yugoslav bloc and eastern europe; poland, romania etc.
#15035435
Presvias wrote:The EU system isn't perfect but it's the "best we've got", that's the way I look at it.
...
The EU still needs plenty of reform but the EU has gotten a lot better over the last 10 years, and I hope that no two-three countries will ever dominate the politics of the union.


The EU is as perfect as it can be in an imperfect world. In fact, the EU is changing more than most national governments, in particular Westminster. Change means reform. It is constantly changing to adapt to a changing world and the changing consensus of EU members.

What does it mean when people say they want to reform the EU? It means they want to change the EU according to their own political ideology: the Tories want to make it Neoliberal while Labor wants to make it more socialist. The two are mutually exclusive. Thus, the EU can only change as a consensus of its members, which keeps it in the center between the extremes.

On the one hand, British eurosceptics accuse the EU of not changing enough, on the other hand, these same people accuse the EU of having changed too much (from an economic to a political organisation). That goes to show the contradiction of the EU's enemies.

The EU basically provides a permanent framework of cooperation to avoid the conflicts of the past. How that cooperation takes place changes according to the changes in the world. I really don't see what anybody would want to change about that.

I don't like some of the changes. For example, I don't like the current rise of the populist right; however, they are part of the consensus building in the EU. I don't worry about it because they will only be successful if they can propose workable solutions.
#15035441
That's all pretty much true.

The populist right do worry me, because if they 'are' the consensus ie they become the consensus; then the whole Union will either crumble or become poisonous. I don't think that's going to happen, luckily.

That's why I don't like being governed according to populist rightists' beliefs, they're saboteurs who are only interested in attaining power.

David Cameron actually started a far right bloc in the EU. The Tory party IMHO are far right pretending to be moderate centrists, and Tony Blair & Gordy Brown were centre-rightists.

But the billionaire owned media appear to have successfully convinced people that the Tories are moderates.



PS: Just quickly; the 'RA pretty much lost their 'revcom' roots around the 1930's and descended into gangsterism, and other nasty stuff.

The 'RA of the 60s-00s was pretty corrupt, some of them were just gansters, some of them attacked civilian protestants and there were atrocities committed on both sides. And the IRA did kill civilians in bombings outside of NI, although they did express regret about this.

That still doesn't mean that some IRA militants were wrong when they attempted to defend their communities from the loyalist terrorists, the ruc and british soldiers. That's what happened, it's the truth.

I don't 'support' the ira, but I completely understand why they did what they did.

No one has the right to oppress and terrorize a minority (NI Catholics) and get away with it.
#15035480
Presvias wrote:Completely false points.

- They want to trade with the RoW instead of Europe, and sod the consequences.

Take it from Pascal Lamy; ex WTO head; it ain't gonna work, trade deals are about CLOUT, as he says; they're not about one small country against huge ones.

- What part of the 'euro crisis' was specifically caused by the EU? Are you American?

And it's the UK's fault there's no solution; the only workable solution' is the backstop or something very similar, there are no other magical technological solutions. That's a lie. Btw they(uk gov) just wanted the backstop removed....That's alice through the looking glass stuff; if the next stage of negotiations stalled or failed, then a hard border would automatically kick in; damaging the ROI economy, ours, and the rest of the EU.

- It's true that those who fight the EU don't want peace.

They are far-right libertarian ideologues.

There used to be a lot of kommunisty and trade union old laboury types who supported Brexit, but they'd never support this power grab by the far right. Cos that's what it is.


- Johnson doesn't want economic cooperation with Europe under the conditions imposed by the EU. Eurosceptics reject the EU in its current form. They exist not only in the UK, but also on the continent and not only on the right. Not all of them are as confrontational as Johnson obviously.

- The euro crisis was caused by the Euro, obviously.

- There are workable alternatives to the backstop proposed by experts, e.g.
https://verfassungsblog.de/an-offer-the ... ot-refuse/ (see also the follow-up post)
https://www.politico.eu/article/experts ... u-ireland/
Meanwhile the EU has rejected customs checks away from the border for no discernible reason
https://www.ft.com/content/a9c6c0d4-dbb ... 216ebe1f17
#15035491
Presvias wrote:Have fun lying to cover your utterly utterly pathetic lies about pictures being photoshopped.

Well, the second from the top was clearly photoshopped. This one:

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Presvias wrote:I'm done responding to people who think that signs saying 'taigs will be crucified' are 'pathetic' and 'fake' without even bothering to check it out. It's sickening.

The problem with your pictures is that they are irrelevant to the discussion. I'm sure I would be able to find something vile that republicans have done recently too if I looked, but that would just lead to more irrelevant mud slinging. And yes, it's pathetic that you claim I'm defending loyalist and by virtue of the Nazi flags perhaps even Nazis. It's even more pathetic that you now claim your feelings are hurt. You really need to get a grip. :lol:

Presvias wrote:That still doesn't mean that some IRA militants were wrong when they attempted to defend their communities from the loyalist terrorists, the ruc and british soldiers.

The IRA killed more Catholics than all British security services combined during the Troubles. Some defence... :roll:

Image

Presvias wrote:That's what happened, it's the truth.

Most of the successful recruitment on both sides was based on the perception that they had to protect their communities from the other side. That's the truth.

Presvias wrote:I don't 'support' the ira, but I completely understand why they did what they did.

If you really wanted to understand the conflict, you'd have to apply that sentiment to all sides involved instead of treating everybody except for the IRA as cartoon villains. As a start, you could read the following extract from this book about the events that led to the deployment of British troops to NI.


Given that the parade [Apprentice Boys’ parade in Derry] was an explosion waiting to happen, it is astonishing that it was not banned and the situation defused. The Stormont Government had the power to do so, but was reluctant to use it lest it be seen as yet another sign of weakness, and the new Prime Minister, Major James Chichester-Clark, had no wish to go the same way as his predecessor. Harold Wilson’s Labour Government could have saved Stormont the embarrassment by banning the march itself but the Home Secretary, Jim Callaghan, was not inclined to do so. ‘I’m a libertarian,’ he said. ‘I don’t like banning marches.’ Under the circumstances it would have been remarkable if Derry had not exploded on that day, Tuesday 12 August 1969. The 15,000 Protestants who marched round the walls now felt that the siege was real, while the Catholics of the Bogside who watched resentfully below saw them and the police who protected them as their oppressors. Both sides had good reason to feel as they did. Before the parade began, a few Apprentice Boys disdainfully tossed some coins from the walls down into the Bogside below, an action that was hardly designed to relieve the tension. With the march under way, a handful of nails was thrown at the police from the Catholic side of one of the barricades the RUC had erected to keep the two sides apart. Soon the Apprentice Boys themselves were attacked, and the two days and two nights of ferocious rioting that became known as the ‘Battle of the Bogside’ began. As the police pursued the rioters into the Bogside once more, they ran into a hail of petrol bombs hurled from the ground and from the roof of Rossville Flats that overlooked the entrance to the area. This time the Bogsiders were ready. The police were not. Despite the introduction of water cannon and CS gas, now used for the first time in the United Kingdom, the riot continued unabated. In frustration, the police started to throw the stones back. Gregory Campbell, who was then a young shop assistant in the city centre, remembers feeling a mixture of horror and anger.

"I had a grandstand view of all this and I can recall making excuses to leave the shop to go to the ‘Free Derry’ corner to help the police. If there was a turning point for me, it was probably when I saw the violence up front, right there within yards of me. What I saw was an insurrection. I saw groups of people defying law and order, trying to destroy Northern Ireland, and the police were the bulwark against them. The police were coming under severe pressure because at that time I think there had been rioting for about three days and nights and they had been on duty twenty-four hours a day for all that time. They were fatigued and it was difficult for them to hold the line. I felt then that they needed all the help they could get. They needed to cope with and repel the rioters and I felt what I was doing was helping them and a lot of others felt likewise."

What was going through your mind when you were throwing stones behind the police?

"I suppose it was righteous indignation working its way out in a physical way. I felt these people are trying to destroy Northern Ireland. They are marching for rights that I don’t have. They’re saying that I’m preventing them from getting the rights and now they’re trying to destroy the country. I felt I had to do something and it was all that I could do at that stage and it was just about bordering on what was morally acceptable for me to do."

I asked Gregory Campbell why he had not gone on to join the loyalist paramilitaries as so many of his contemporaries had done. ‘I just felt that if I joined a paramilitary organization, I may well end up doing what the IRA were doing,’ he said. ‘I took a conscious decision not to on moral grounds.’

After hours of rioting, the police, who were not equipped or trained to cope with civil disturbance on such a scale, were exhausted and their reinforcements took heavy casualties. One unit of fifty-nine police officers brought in from rural County Down lost two-thirds of its number through injuries.12 Finally, Stormont authorized the mobilization of the ‘B’ Specials, having been reluctant to do so before knowing the likely effect of their introduction. The message went out over the radio, calling on all special constables to report for duty. The effect, of course, was that the Bogsiders knew they were coming. Sixty Specials were deployed, armed with batons and pick-axe handles.13 Their introduction had the predictable result, and the violence intensified as the Catholics of the Bogside now had their most hated enemy in their sights. Shortly afterwards, the army arrived on the scene to ‘assist the civil power’ as clearly the civil power was unable to cope. But the arrival of a company of soldiers from the First Battalion of the Prince of Wales did not represent at this stage the mobilization of troops from England as they were part of the resident battalion in Belfast who had been moved to Derry to be on standby. According to the Scarman Report, the Government’s official inquiry into the dramatic events of that week, the arrival of the soldiers in Derry in the middle of the riot had an instant effect. ‘Whatever and wherever the soldiers appeared, rioting ended. It is true to say their arrival was welcomed. The city was tired and the army presence afforded a sound reason for going home.’14

Meanwhile, on the evening of Tuesday 13 August, the rioting had begun to spread to Belfast. There had always been a fear that, if it erupted in the city, it would ignite sectarian tensions along the ‘Orange–Green’ line where the Protestant Shankill Road meets the Catholic Ardoyne on one side and the Catholic Falls Road on the other. Protestants on the Shankill felt themselves to be the meat in the sandwich. Although there was a certain inevitability to what eventually happened, the violence in Belfast was in fact triggered by nationalists and was not sectarian but initially directed against the police. It happened after the call had gone out from republicans in Derry to their NICRA comrades elsewhere to hold meetings in other parts of the province to stretch police resources and take the heat off the besieged Bogsiders. To be fair, NICRA made a decision not to do so in Belfast because of the potential danger of igniting the sectarian powder-keg. Nevertheless some elements ignored the advice and on the evening of Wednesday 13 August held a meeting in the vicinity of Divis Flats to protest against ‘police brutality’ in Derry.15 Shortly afterwards, the Irish Prime Minister, Jack Lynch, made a television broadcast that did anything but calm the situation. The Taoisach’s words only confirmed loyalists’ worst fears that their community was faced with an insurrection backed by Dublin.

"The Stormont Government is evidently no longer in control of the situation. Indeed the present situation is the inevitable outcome of the policies pursued for decades by successive Stormont Governments. It is clear that the Irish Government can no longer stand by and see innocent people injured and perhaps worse …

Recognizing, however, that the reunification of the national territory can provide the only permanent solution for the problem, it is our intention to request the British Government to enter into early negotiations with the Irish Government to review the present constitutional position of the Six Counties of Northern Ireland.16"

Lynch’s words were tantamount to pouring petrol on the flames. He also announced that he was sending ‘field hospitals’ to the border to treat casualties from Derry and elsewhere. To loyalists, this was nothing less than a cover for using the Irish army as a prelude to an invasion.

After Lynch’s broadcast, the crowd that had gathered at Divis Flats marched to Springfield Road police station to make their protest against ‘police brutality’. Missiles were thrown at the corrugated-iron hoarding protecting the front of the new station and there was the sound of breaking glass.17 The crowd then proceeded down to Hastings Street police station where three RUC constables were standing outside ready to receive their petition. But certain elements were clearly no longer interested in petitions but bent on attacking the police and hurled ‘pieces of grating, stones and petrol bombs’ at the officers, who made a hasty retreat inside the station. Armoured vehicles, designed for use along the border and not urban riot control, were ordered to disperse the increasingly volatile gathering. Predictably, the vehicles were pelted with stones and petrol bombs. Then, ominously, shots rang out as the IRA brought out the few old guns it had and opened up on the police and their vehicles. It was the first shooting incident of the week in Belfast. The violence escalated as a car showroom on the Falls Road was looted and set on fire. One Catholic eyewitness described the scene as ‘a mob out of control’.18 In response to the growing violence, the police deployed Shorland armoured cars and a full-blown confrontation developed, in which both the IRA and the police opened fire. At this stage, as the Scarman Report acknowledges, the rioting ‘involved the activities of Catholic crowds in Catholic areas’, and there was no evidence of any sectarian clash on that first night of violence in Belfast.19

Loyalists, already incensed by Jack Lynch’s television address, looked on late that Wednesday evening with increasing anxiety as the rioting and shooting raged in the nationalist communities on both sides of the Shankill Road. The scenes left a lasting impression on young loyalists like Eddie Kinner. ‘I can remember there was a lot of rioting going on up in Derry and there were rumours that there were going to be riots in Belfast in order to weaken the police, and the next minute the car showrooms were burned out in Conway Street. Loyalists were waiting patiently and said, “Well, we’ll make them pay for anything that they do.”’ Eddie Kinner came from a family steeped in the UVF tradition and later went on to join the organization himself. He subsequently served a life sentence for murder. William ‘Plum’ Smith was also a young teenager on the Shankill Road at the time and watched his community prepare for the anticipated nationalist attack.

"In those days it was the word of the jungle where rumours spread very quickly. People were under the impression that the Protestant parts of the Shankill had been attacked on the Wednesday night and that more was to follow. I remember Protestants at that time making petrol bombs and getting ready for an attack that they believed would come on the Thursday night from the Falls. We were kids and we were watching the older ones and everybody seemed to be excited. Everybody was involved – the whole community. Basins of water were set out and doors left open for people to run into. Everybody was bracing themselves for what they believed was going to be a massive attack from nationalists on the Falls Road in order for them to spread the violence and therefore help other nationalists in the Bogside."

The showdown came on Thursday evening as nationalist and loyalist crowds faced each other at opposite ends of Dover Street and Percy Street, the narrow roads of terrace houses which run directly from the Shankill to the Falls. Catholics lived at one end and Protestants at the other. Any move by one crowd, whatever its intention, was seen as a threat by the other. The Shankill was soon swelled by loyalist football supporters fired up from supporting their team, Linfield, at an away match in Newtownards. By now, both sides were spoiling for a fight.20 Inevitably, given the circumstances, the crowds clashed. Catholics thought Protestants were invading the Falls, and a handful of IRA men, with guns still warm from the previous night, opened up to repel the invaders.21 The police responded to silence the gunmen but with much heavier fire, including rounds from .30 Browning machine-guns mounted on top of the RUC’s Shorland armoured cars. The Browning has a rate of fire of 500 rounds a minute. In the confusion and the exchange of gunfire that night, seven people died. One of them was a nine-year-old Catholic boy, Patrick Rooney, shot through the head by a stray round from one of the Brownings while asleep in his bed in Divis Flats. Of the other six, Hugh McCabe (20) was a soldier home on leave in Divis Flats; three were Catholics – Samuel McLarnon (47), Michael Lynch (28) and Gerald McAuley (15), who was a member of Na Fianna Eireann, the junior wing of the IRA;22 and two were Protestants – Herbert Roy (26) and David Linton (48). Four were shot in the Divis Street–Falls Road area and three in the vicinity of the Crumlin Road–Ardoyne area on the other side of the Shankill where there was simultaneous rioting and shooting. Eddie Kinner has vivid recollections of the night and the small part he played in it.

"We gathered up the bottles and then went and got the petrol and sugar and we made up petrol bombs to be used that night. How did we make it? We put in a level of sugar, petrol, put in a slip of rag with petrol and tied it round the top of the bottle."

Had you ever made a petrol bomb before?

"No. I mean I did it for the first time."

Did you throw them?

"No, we weren’t allowed to throw them. Whenever they were being used, we would have been well out of the road."

Eddie also remembers the trauma of almost losing his father and sister to an IRA bullet.

"I can remember standing on the corner of Dover Street watching the tracer bullets flying up the street feeling totally terrified – and my mother pulling me in and putting me into the house. Then my sister came in in hysterics. She had been down at the bottom of the street with my father and they’d been standing alongside ‘Herbie’ Roy when he was shot dead. My sister had seen that. She had turned away for a second and then turned round again and ‘Herbie’ Roy was gone. At first, she thought it was my father who had been shot. She was in complete hysterics and it took a number of days for her to recover."

Protestant crowds, believing with some justification that they were now under IRA attack, surged into the Catholic areas of the streets that run between the Shankill and the Falls, setting fire to Catholic homes as they went. In Conway Street, forty-eight houses were burned to the ground and in Bombay Street, further up the Falls Road, 60 per cent of houses were destroyed by fire. The night entered nationalist folklore as the loyalist pogrom. But loyalists did not see it like that. They believed they were defending their area and responding to the IRA attack. William ‘Plum’ Smith remembers watching Bombay Street burn.

"Bombay Street exploded when the two sides started throwing stones at each other. As far as I can remember there were a few petrol bombs thrown at the first couple of houses and they spread right up the whole street because of the way they were built with two houses sharing the same ‘loo’ space [in the back yard]. Protestants threw petrol bombs over the yard walls and the flames spread up the whole street. Shots were fired and I remember two Protestants getting hit by shotgun pellets and the situation developed from there. But at no time did Protestants actually have weapons in Bombay Street."

By this time, with Belfast ablaze, a decision had been made to call in the British army to prevent what looked like becoming a civil war in a part of the United Kingdom. The Stormont Prime Minister, Major James Chichester-Clark, who had fondly hoped that things would get better when he took over, had already made the historic phone call to the British Home Secretary, James Callaghan, to seek authorization to use the resident Belfast Battalion to come to the aid of the police in Derry. He might not have envisaged they would soon have to be used in Belfast too.

"My recollection, as far as I can remember, was that I rang up Jim Callaghan and said that we felt we needed help and we needed some troops. I think he had indicated to me that troops would probably be available if the worst happened. Anyway, the next thing was he rang me back after some time and said that he had just got permission for me to use the troops from Harold Wilson. He said, ‘I’m actually in an aeroplane coming from the islands of Stilly.’ Harold Wilson was on holiday in the Stilly islands at the time."

Did you think it was a situation that could be contained?

"I thought that initially it would probably blow over but when we had a sort of ‘second calling’ of the troops into Belfast, I was beginning to wonder just a little bit where we were really going and whether we would really be able to solve all the problems."

On Friday, British troops flown in from the rest of the United Kingdom, marched into Belfast and took up positions on the Falls and the Shankill. Loyalists had mixed feelings about their arrival and Eddie Kinner, for one, was confused.

"I can remember the troops marching down Dover Street with fixed bayonets and steel helmets. My ma came and pulled me in by the ear. She was terrified. It was like an invasion. This was our own army coming in and it felt as though we were being invaded by them. They were fairly abusive towards us because they looked at the damage that had been done to the nationalist or Catholic community."

There is no doubt that at the time, surveying the smouldering ruins of what were once Catholic homes, most soldiers thought the Protestants were the villains because they inflicted all the damage. Not surprisingly, resentment on the loyalist side grew when they saw Catholics welcoming the soldiers as their saviours. ‘Plum’ Smith, however, knew it was not that simple.

"People were very fearful. There were a lot of people burned out on both sides of the community. There were Protestant families that were burned out of their homes as well. Law and order had just completely broken down and if the British army hadn’t have come in at the time, I fear it would have been far, far worse and more people would have been killed."

At the end of that nightmare week in August 1969, the British Government had become directly involved in Northern Ireland for the first time since partition because Stormont could not cope. At the time, there were those who advocated that Westminster should assume political as well as military responsibility for the province and abolish Stormont altogether. The proposal, which, with hindsight, should have been glaringly obvious at the time, was rejected. Harold Wilson had no wish to become embroiled in the Irish Question as his predecessors Gladstone, Asquith and Lloyd George had done, or to further antagonize unionists who would have been bitterly opposed to the idea of surrendering the parliament that was the cornerstone of their state. The price that was subsequently paid for not abolishing Stormont was heavy as loyalists now began to wonder about Britain’s long-term intentions for their province.


Presvias wrote:No one has the right to oppress and terrorize a minority (NI Catholics) and get away with it.

No one has the right to go on a terror campaign in response to discrimination, and people hardly ever do. Catholics had valid grievances, which as it happens were in the process of being addressed at the time, i.e. the main civil rights demand - one man, one vote - had been accepted by the Unionist party before the violence exploded, but they weren't being "terrorised". You might want to ask yourself why you are trying so hard to ignore the IRA's actual objective.
#15035513
Rugoz wrote:- Johnson doesn't want economic cooperation with Europe under the conditions imposed by the EU. Eurosceptics reject the EU in its current form. They exist not only in the UK, but also on the continent and not only on the right. Not all of them are as confrontational as Johnson obviously.


No he doesn't even believe in Brexit in the first place*, he's a cynical P.O.S who's backed by billionaires**.

And btw, there is such a thing as opt-outs and vetoes?

- The euro crisis was caused by the Euro, obviously.

No, the eurozone crisis was caused by endemic problems in a handful of countries, which they've had for a long time. The EU has actually tried to help quite a few of them.


- There are workable alternatives to the backstop proposed by experts, e.g.
https://verfassungsblog.de/an-offer-the ... ot-refuse/ (see also the follow-up post)
https://www.politico.eu/article/experts ... u-ireland/
Meanwhile the EU has rejected customs checks away from the border for no discernible reason
https://www.ft.com/content/a9c6c0d4-dbb ... 216ebe1f17


Well, seeing as the EU loses out (Ireland's economy most of all) just as much as the UK if there's a no deal Brexit; I'm sure that any workable alternative will be welcomed. But hey, of course all they want to do is sabotage us and themselves.....

*: https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.thegua ... ning-in-eu
**: https://bylinetimes.com/2019/09/11/brex ... e-backers/
#15035517
(facepalm)

The IRA killed more Catholics than all British security services combined during the Troubles. Some defence...


Image

That was a pretty catastrophic attempt on your part.

Still, even the amount of people the 'RA killed; that's nothing compared to the potato famine, centuries of bloody oppression and the fighting it took just to get the free state.

And your book excerpt is shit, the troubles started in 68 as confirmed by that CAIN site if you'd bothered to check....

Look, you don't know about this conflict or the history of the British in Ireland. You don't even understand what you're defending. If you knew, you probably wouldn't bother.
#15035518
Atlantis wrote:@Heisenberg, I never once portrayed you as a "hard-right fascist". Quite on the contrary, I always regretted that we can't get on, but your visceral anti-EU rants just brush me the wrong way. I guess it is second nature to many in the UK and that you aren't even aware of it.

:lol: Again, what you mean to say here is, "I don't like you because you disagree with me".

Atlantis wrote:While Germany is the biggest economy in Europe, it in no way dictates the direction of the EU. Since the voting system in most EU institutions gives an advantage to smaller member far beyond their actual size, Germany is outvoted more often than not, as can be seen, for example, in the refugee crisis. Unlike the UK, Germany also submits to the rulings of European courts without complaining.

I think the claim that Germany is a passive member of the EU that has no influence on its direction is patently absurd.

Atlantis wrote:You are projecting imperial ambitions onto the EU which are inherently British.

:roll: Yeah, sure.

Atlantis wrote:I live at the outer edges of the EU in one of the poorest regions of the continent. The previous owner of my property signed the sales contract with his fingerprint as he is illiterate because during his childhood he was too poor to get a pair of shoes for going to school. This 3rd world-level of poverty is still in the living memory and contrasts sharply with the relative prosperity of today. Thanks to the economic convergence in the EU, poor regions have seen a remarkable increase in prosperity.

You're German. Spare me the pity party, please.

I must admit, the fantasy world you live in where Germany is a historically oppressed, anti-imperialist nation that has more in common with India and Nigeria than with Britain, is utterly hilarious to me. It fools absolutely no one.

Atlantis wrote:That is of course something the British vehemently oppose (like you oppose EU budget contributions and Freedom of Movement), because the brown people ought to stay in their place in your imperial worldview.

I don't have an imperial world view. I have repeatedly said I want nothing to do with the EU's expansion into Ukraine and the Baltic states, and I have repeatedly opposed every one of Britain's foreign military adventures on this forum. You simply haven't been paying attention, because your own world view is entirely binary. EU (read: Germany) = Good, Rest of World = Bad. :lol:

Atlantis wrote:The centralized British model impoverishes the regions while enriching the greater London area. The EU's economic convergence helps poor regions to benefit from the prosperity achieved by the richer industrialized regions.

I agree with you that Britain's economic model benefits London to the detriment of the rest of the UK. I disagree with the claim that the EU has done anything to counteract that.

Atlantis wrote:You are so ignorant of the EU that it is truly sickening. You just keep on repeating your ideological rants without any regard for reality. You can pose as a leftists all day long, at heart you are a closet imperialist who hates the EU because Britain can't use it at will for its geopolitical ambitions.

Sure, whatever you say, dear. What "geopolitical ambitions" do you think I have? Have you ever read a single post I've written on this forum? :lol:

By the way, EU golden boy Emmanuel Macron is one of the most actively Imperialist heads of state in the world. Would you mind explaining how the EU plans to check France's African policy? Or is it fine, just so long as he keeps praising the EU?
#15035529
Presvias wrote:(facepalm)That was a pretty catastrophic attempt on your part.

How so? You claimed the IRA defended Catholics against the RUC and British soldiers. In your world, that's apparently achieved by killing more Catholics than the people against which they needed to be defended.

Presvias wrote:Still, even the amount of people the 'RA killed; that's nothing compared to the potato famine, centuries of bloody oppression and the fighting it took just to get the free state.

Yeah, you guys always need to go back to the potatoe famine to justify IRA apologia, don't you?

Presvias wrote:And your book excerpt is shit, the troubles started in 68 as confirmed by that CAIN site if you'd bothered to check....

As I explained, this was about the events that led to British troops being deployed, but I'm increasingly convinced you are so emotionally involved that you don't even properly read my posts.

Presvias wrote:Look, you don't know about this conflict or the history of the British in Ireland. You don't even understand what you're defending. If you knew, you probably wouldn't bother.

Look, Presvias, you have not provided anything substantive in your responses to me. In fact, you have ignored most of my points entirely, opting instead to post some images that you presumably thought give you the moral high ground. Your rants and your insistence that you are some kind of authority are very tiresome. This is a forum dedicated to debate, so you should expect that at times people might actually disagree with you. The proper way to deal with this is to provide rebuttals and arguments, not emotional outbursts.

Heisenberg wrote:You're German.

He's German, but he lives in Portugal if I remember correctly.
#15035538
Lol. You posted a graphic that directly contradicts what you said...as I pointed out.

The only one who's not reading what you post, is you.

I can't be bothered continuing this; you just don't have any reply to the very substantive points made across just about every single post so far..

As for emotion, it's an emotive issue and you think that the quote 'taigs should be crucified' is quote "Pathetic :lol: ".

I don't find that funny. They don't find it funny.

They mean it.

So just don't come in with your unknowledgeable and inane prattle and expect it to be taken seriously.

And wtf is this shit?

"Yeah, you guys always need to go back to the potatoe famine to justify IRA apologia, don't you? "

Lol, good old fashioned anti-Irish vitriol.
(You failed btw..I'm not Irish).

But please, carry on revealing your true colours... and while you're at it, go and read up about the 'artificial famine' contrived by the Brits, then witness the same shit attitude being espoused by Priti Pratel o
150+ years later..

The former British international development minister has been condemned on both sides of the Irish Sea for her remarks in the Times that Britain could prevent the use of its country as a landbridge between Ireland and the continent.

She responded to a British government report stating that a no-deal Brexit might mean food shortages in Ireland.

In such a scenario she suggested this possibility could be used to exert pressure on the Irish Government to drop its insistence on the backstop.

“This paper appears to show the government were well aware Ireland will face significant issues in a no-deal scenario. Why hasn’t this point been pressed home during negotiations,” she told the Times in reference to the report.


Please spare me your prattling about an issue that you clearly don't understand.

That's enough now. No more wasting time correcting your sophistries and guile.
#15035574
Heisenberg wrote:You're German. Spare me the pity party, please.

I must admit, the fantasy world you live in where Germany is a historically oppressed, anti-imperialist nation that has more in common with India and Nigeria than with Britain, is utterly hilarious to me. It fools absolutely no one.

Germany was historically oppressed by the Catholic Protestant split and the great powers that became dominant after that split, including Habsbrg Austria and Prussia. Germany's manifest destiny to lead central and Western Europe, as the USA lead the Americas and the Pacific was betrayed. Both India and Nigeria are multi racial, multi ethnic, multi religious empires with democratic deformations.
#15035612
Presvias wrote:The populist right do worry me, because if they 'are' the consensus ie they become the consensus; then the whole Union will either crumble or become poisonous. I don't think that's going to happen, luckily.


The populist right is not the "consensus" it is part of the consensus - and a minor one at that. I truly and honestly detest the populist right; however, I will defend their right to political representation. Once they are engaged in the political process, they only have two choices:

1) keep on spouting nonsense and end up in the dustbins of history,
2) become moderate and work for beneficial solutions.

In the two-party system of the UK, Ukip was excluded with the result that the populist right took power by coming in through the backdoor. They had no chance of gradually entering politics and adjusting their position to arrive at a workable Brexit. The UK now probably has the most right-wing government in the midst of a national crisis situation.

The EU cannot fall into this trap. One member may come under populist rule for a while, but the whole of the EU can never come under a populist right-wing rule. Following the Brexit debacle, the EU has now become irreversible. Even eurosceptic right-wing populists across the continent no longer advocate leaving the EU or the Euro. Instead, they want to use the EU to promote their politics, which as I said above won't succeed.

The EU is the most advanced form of human organisation in the economics, social and political fields. There is no way of going back to the previous stage of development, just like there is no way of going back from the nation state to previous tribal rule.

@Heisenberg, I didn't say you are an imperialist. I said you are a closet imperialist, which you aren't even aware of. Your anti-EU rants or your attempts at dividing the EU by portraying it as a Germany-dominated organisation are classical divide and rule tactics of the imperialists. German imperialism is dead. No need to beat a dead horse. UK/US imperialism is alive and kicking. I grant that Macron cannot but follow the imperial tradition of his country, but he won't succeed in moving the EU in that direction. That is perfectly in line with what I said earlier about the EU (like the HRE before) being a union of sovereign nations to defend against imperialism both inside and outside. Irrespective of your posturing, you are objectively aligning yourself with the imperialists. Just like Corbyn is a hypocrite when he advocates leaving Nato or scrapping Trident. He won't do it if he gets into No. 10. Instead he will follow neocon policies like previous Labor governments, just like Obama pursued the US's imperialist agenda, instead of working for nuclear disarmament.

The only way to get away from Nato and be complicit in the crimes of US imperialism is by building an independent European defense. The British government understands that perfectly well. That is the reason the British have always vetoed EU defense cooperation.
#15035656
Presvias wrote:No, the eurozone crisis was caused by endemic problems in a handful of countries, which they've had for a long time. The EU has actually tried to help quite a few of them.

Well, seeing as the EU loses out (Ireland's economy most of all) just as much as the UK if there's a no deal Brexit; I'm sure that any workable alternative will be welcomed. But hey, of course all they want to do is sabotage us and themselves.....


- Every economist will tell you that the crisis was caused and/or worsened by the monetary union respectively its inherent design flaws. This has beed discussed at absurdum.

- Both sides have other concerns than losing out economically. The UK wants to win back sovereignty and the EU doesn't want Brexit to become a dangerous precedent. It's not entirely clear what is going on behind the scenes, but from what I have read it's the EU (or Ireland) that stubbornly rejects alternatives to the backstop. This may change of course.
#15035735
Presvias wrote:Lol. You posted a graphic that directly contradicts what you said...as I pointed out.

You didn't know that the IRA killed more Catholics than all British security forces combined during the Troubles, did you?

Presvias wrote:I can't be bothered continuing this;

He said before he continued.

Presvias wrote:As for emotion, it's an emotive issue and you think that the quote 'taigs should be crucified' is quote "Pathetic :lol: ". I don't find that funny. They don't find it funny. They mean it. So just don't come in with your unknowledgeable and inane prattle and expect it to be taken seriously.

And wtf is this shit? "Yeah, you guys always need to go back to the potatoe famine to justify IRA apologia, don't you? " Lol, good old fashioned anti-Irish vitriol.
(You failed btw..I'm not Irish).

But please, carry on revealing your true colours... and while you're at it, go and read up about the 'artificial famine' contrived by the Brits, then witness the same shit attitude being espoused by Priti Pratel.

If you are willing to have a discussion I'd be happy to engage, but I'm not accepting self-righteousness instead of arguments, sorry.
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