FREE THE TRIGGER MEN: ASSASSINS AND TERROR BOSSES IN THE IRELAND CONFLICT PDF Martin Dillon | 320 pages | 31 Oct 2004 | Mainstream Publishing | 9781840189025 | English | Edinburgh, United Kingdom Milltown Cemetery attack | Military Wiki | Fandom They are regarded as two of the best books written on the Ireland conflict. Martin Dillon. This eBook is copyright material and must not be copied, reproduced, transferred, distributed, leased, licenced or publicly performed or used in any way except as specifically permitted in writing by the publishers, as allowed under the terms and conditions under which it was purchased or as strictly permitted by applicable copyright law. This edition, ISBN 1 9. Reprinted No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for insertion in The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict magazine, newspaper or broadcast. A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Undercover Trigger Men. Assassin in the Ranks. Paedophile Terrorists. Legal Trigger Men. Killers in the Family. Terror Bosses. Stone Cold Assassin. A Murderous Military Agent. Memories Dark and Bloody. Appendix 1. Appendix 2 Select Bibliography. To interviewees and secondary sources I would like to express a debt of gratitude, without them my task would have been much more difficult. Many had been questioned before but felt that because a decent time interval had elapsed, they could provide me with additional information with the benefit. Some still work in the security forces and, like others who have retired from intelligence work, they wanted their identities protected. I also owe a great deal to my publisher, Bill Campbell, for his. My wife, Violeta, slaved over the manuscript as it progressed and kept me focused while she constantly checked facts and syntax. It would not be possible to write books about the Ireland conflict without. Jim Campbell is mentioned in this book because his courageous reporting and his friendship have always been important to me. He was one of the few journalists shot and injured because of his writings. The attempt on his life did not deter him from pursuing the truth even though a bullet remains lodged in his spine. Ed helped bring my story of the Shankill Butchers to a wide audience. In Augustfollowing an invasion of Catholic districts in Belfast by Protestant mobs, British troops arrived in the city as saviours of the Catholic community. Initially, the troops The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict welcomed like long-lost cousins from across the Irish Sea but that was not to last. Perhaps there was an inevitable naivete on both sides. The British Army knew little about the variables in the Ireland historical mix and Catholic nationalists and republicans were still imbued with an inherited anti-Britishness. Despite its record of bigotry and political repression, it was allowed to remain in place. That was the beginning of major political blunders. Leaving the Stormont Government in place permitted Unionists to continue to rule and influence British policy-making in 10 Downing Street. It reflected the unchanging Unionist thesis from the setting up of the State half a century earlier. The analysis ignored the origins of the ongoing conflict — the abdication of responsibility by successive British Governments in London. For decades, British political leaders viewed Northern Ireland as a seemingly intractable problem and preferred a hands- off policy. British political leaders cared little that Protestant majority rule was maintained through repressive legislation, resulting in the denial of British civil rights to Catholics. Therefore no one in Westminster saw the writing on the wall when Catholic civil rights marchers took to the streets in the mid s. There was no recognition that all those historical variables in both communities were the sparks that would ignite a. In and in the The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict months ofas civil rights protests led to conflict between the two communities, politicians in London looked on in disbelief. There was a distinct lack of political intelligence within the British Labour Government led by Harold Wilson. In a bitterly ironic twist of history, the Labour Home Secretary, Jim Callaghan, decided to brief himself on the situation. To his astonishment, he found Northern Ireland listed in a single, dusty file in an office cabinet. Other files in that cabinet dealt with the issuing of dog licensing laws and rules governing London taxis. Clearly, from a British perspective, Northern Ireland had really been a place apart where other rules had applied. That arrangement had been fine as long as the Unionists across the Irish Sea kept the historical enmity between the two communities under wraps. But that all changed in August when the Unionist Government could not hold the line against increasing violence, especially from within its right- wing supporters on the ground and the B Specials, its anti-Catholic paramilitary police force. The invasion of Catholic areas in West Belfast by Protestant mobs assisted by the B Specials led to the burning of hundreds of Catholic homes and the displacement of thousands of Catholic families. Old hatreds were reactivated, forcing the British Government to end its hands-off policy and send in troops. For a British Army that had only previously been involved in colonial emergencies in Kenya, Oman, Aden and Cyprus, its generals and soldiers on the ground in Northern Ireland seemed, at the outset, to enjoy peacekeeping duties. Soldiers positioned themselves between the warring Protestant and Catholic factions and were welcomed, particularly by the Catholics. But that was merely the calm before the storm. Had the Unionist Government been immediately abolished when the British Army moved in and a meaningful dialogue instituted to create a fair political framework to accommodate the loyalties and cultural traditions of both communities, a long war might never have begun. Instead, in Junethe Labour The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict in London was replaced by a Conservative administration led by Edward Heath whose Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, unlike his predecessor, Jim Callaghan, had no desire to find a political solution. Maudling, Heath and Unionist leaders in Northern Ireland felt it was up to the British Army to solve the problem and there was. The Army had been the means by which Britain had extracted itself from other colonial situations. However, the British Government had no wish to abolish Stormont even though it had a structure which replicated former colonial outposts like Aden and Cyprus. It had been the tried and tested method elsewhere and it had worked. By telling the Army to find a solution, the British Government failed to recognise that there were several dangerous ingredients inherent in that policy. The Army would instinctively rely on its colonial experience to shape its strategy and, like any army, it would need to define its enemy just as successive British generals had done in Kenya, Aden and Cyprus. By the time the Army was asked to find a solution, some of the historical variables within Catholic nationalist politics had begun to coalesce to shift the focus from civil rights to traditional anti-Britishness. Throughout the s, the IRA had moved to the political left, experimenting with Marxist— Leninist principles. It had placed its traditional Irish republicanism, with a The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict of a united Ireland at its core, The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict the back burner. There were few weapons in its arsenal in Belfast and the IRA leadership in Dublin was reluctant to provide weapons which might lead to a bloodbath in the north of the island. They immediately assumed the mantle of romantic nationalism with its blood sacrifice tradition and trigger man ethos. In the early months of the birth of the Provisionals, the majority of recruits were not motivated by any deep philosophical commitment to republican ideals. However, a massive influx of recruits was the dynamic to energise a republican movement which had been The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict decline throughout Ireland for two decades. Overnight it was propelled towards the traditional republican thesis of uniting Ireland through armed struggle. The The Trigger Men: Assassins and Terror Bosses in the Ireland Conflict event that characterised. An arms raid by troops on the Lower Falls, where the Official IRA — not a potent threat to the Army — had its headquarters, led to confrontation and developed into a full-scale riot followed by a gun-battle. The British Army, in a massive show of strength, sealed off the Lower Falls, fired at least 1, canisters of CS gas, imposed a curfew and the following day ransacked houses in the neighbourhood. The military operation, with its excessive use of 3, soldiers, terrorised children and elderly people. It further alienated Catholics and appalled moderate Catholic opinion throughout Ireland. For journalists like me who observed it, there was sufficient evidence to conclude that the Army had been given free rein to act out its colonial experience. The use of Scottish soldiers, who had an historical