Sinn Fein IRA

The Truth          

The truth about Gerry Adams, IRA Sinn Fein

He is the President of Sinn Fein, and it was of him that the New Statesman said "... if the libel laws inhibit speculation as to his exact relationship with the IRA, they do allow one to say that his support for that organisation is unequivocal and his knowledge of it well informed." (New Statesman 22.7.83).

The Sunday Times declared that "the British (government) also believed Adams to be overlord of both the Provisional's military and political wings. (Sunday Times 8.5.83).

Adams, who has also been described by the Irish Foreign Affairs Minister, Peter Barry as a "Gunman" (An Phoblacht .16.6.83) vas interned by the Northern Ireland Government in 1971 and released in 1972. He was later in 1973 to be a member of an IRA team which carried on negotiations with William Whitelaw when he was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland.

At the launch of the Sinn Fein June 1983 election campaign, Adams defended the Provisional IRA's campaign of violence, which, he claimed was "legitimate." (Irish Times 27.5.83).

Adams entry into politics has not meant any departure from encouraging violence for his aim as he explains, "is to confront the British with an ongoing armed struggle which is enjoying popular support and a principled political party which refuses to compromise on the basic issue of British involvement in Northern Ireland." Ultimately he adds, the British "will be unable to govern." (Sunday Times 8.5.83). Thus, as Adams' says, the political role is merely to "broaden and popularise the struggle. For in the end the movement will have to depend on whatever armed pressure the IRA can bring." (Sunday Times 8.5.83).

His election in June 1983 as an MP has not moderated him, for as Adams has declared at a Republican rally since then, "the IRA needs no electoral mandate for its armed struggle;" (Irish Times 20.6.83)

He opened his speech to that rally by saying "friends fellow gunmen and gun-women," and concluded "victory to the IRA." Adams's stance on violence, it would appear has not changed much, since when in 1981 at Bobby Sands funeral he said, "the organisation to which Bobby Sands belonged (the IRA) will make its own response in its own time." (Fortnight July/August 1981).

The next day a policeman was murdered in an attack which also injured a woman constable and young boy; another policeman was shot in the chest as youths built barricades in Crossmaglen, Co Armagh. The culmination of Adams' career vas his election as Sinn Fein President in November l983. He marked the occasion with the declaration that "armed struggle is a necessary and morally correct form of resistance in the six counties", and that he was " ...glad, therefore, of the opportunity to pay tribute to the freedom fighters - the men and women volunteers of the IRA". (Belfast Telegraph 14.11.83).

In November 1983 a series of particularly brutal murders resulted in a challenge to Gerry Adams and Sinn Pein from Seamus Mallon, deputy leader of the SDLP, that Sinn Fein condemn the killings Adams gave his reply at a meeting in Cork in November. Throughout his speech he asserted the right to carry on the armed struggle and proclaimed his belief that in a state of war it is legitimate to kill either British soldiers or RUC men. Referring to the murder of Charles Armstrong, chairman of Armagh Council, and a part-time member of the UDR, he said that Mr Armstrong was a legitimate target because he was an officer in the UDR.

Like so many victims of the so-called "armed struggle" Charlie Armstrong was going about his quiet civilian duties (leaving a council meeting) when he was blown to pieces by a booby-trap bomb. - Where is the connection between such cold blooded, cowardly bloody murder and an "armed struggle?".

At the same rally Adams was asked if he himself was prepared to murder a soldier or policeman be replied: "If my role lay within the IRA and within an armed struggle, I would have no compunction at all. As I said before, I have no reluctance in my support for the armed struggle and if that's where my role lay, then that is where I would be." According to the 'Irish Times', Mr Adams said he had not stopped short of bearing arms; the position was that he was doing a good job in his political role at the moment.

 

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