Soldiering Against Subversion: The Irish Defence Forces and internal security during the Troubles, 1969-1998
by Dan Harvey (Merrion Press, €19.99)
Joe Carroll
The role of the Defence Forces (the army, naval service, and air corps) in ensuring that the Troubles in Northern Ireland did not spill over into the Republic and undermine the stability of the State is not as well recognised as it should be according to the author, a former serving officer.
Lieut. Colonel Dan Harvey served on operations at home and abroad for 40 years, including tours of duty in the Middle East, Africa, the Balkans and South Caucasus. In his latest book he aims to correct this by detailed descriptions of operations by the military in guarding the Border, disarming bombs, suppressing prison riots by IRA prisoners and manning road blocks with the Gardai.
These were instances where the Defence Forces were called out as Aid to the Civil Power (ATCP), but the gardaí always played the lead role which was sometimes resented by the soldiers who were less well paid and did not qualify for overtime. But in general the cooperation between these two arms of the State was effective.
Nevertheless, the author constantly returns to his complaint that the role of the Defence Forces in this dangerous period (1969-1998) has been “minimised, overlooked and disregarded”. He hopes this book will help to remedy this.
He does this by quoting first-hand accounts, mainly by junior officers, of operations on the Border, dealing with prison riots, street demonstrations, kidnap operations and road blocks. Most, but not all, of these insider accounts are anonymous, but have the ring of truth.
In a book published in 2017, called Bombs, Bullets and the Border, Patrick Mulroe examined Irish security policy for the 1969-1978 period and provided a revealing political context by his research in Irish and British national archives. Dan Harvey fills in political and social background in broad brush strokes, but the book would gain by including more archival material.
The author could also have responded to the charge on page 135 of Mulroe’s book that “a high level garda report claimed that the Irish army had been ‘carefully infiltrated by the provos’”. Mulroe also quoted from British archives that the British had similar fears.
The present book reveals how unprepared the Army was to respond to the August 1969 outbreak of the Troubles and the Jack Lynch pledge “not to stand by”. This unreadiness was due to the neglect of successive governments to update military equipment and barracks. Civilians would not have lived in such conditions and for such poor pay.
He also refers to the impossible task that the Government in 1969-1970 asked of the Defence Forces to plan for incursions across the Border if necessary to rescue the nationalist population from pogroms in loyalist areas. How this could be done without clashing with British forces was not spelled out and the draft plans were quietly shelved.
The book describes the Dad’s Army conditions in which the army was ordered by the Minister for Defence, James Gibbons, in April 1969, to transport 600 rifles and ammunition to Dundalk barracks.
Six trucks set off on a tortuous route from Dublin. The convoy got separated in the darkness. A truck went missing. There was no radio contact so the officer in charge had to find a pay phone to call Dundalk to see if it had arrived. When the rest of the convoy arrived the officer in charge in Dundalk refused to take responsibility for it or unload the rifles. The trucks were parked and had to be guarded.
Suspicious
The army was right to be suspicious. It later emerged that while Jack Lynch was on holidays, it was the hawkish Neil Blaney, Minister for Agriculture, who persuaded Gibbons to send the rifles to Dundalk for onward smuggling to Northern nationalists. The plan was dropped when it was realised the numbers on the rifles would link them to the Irish army.
The book also details the heroism of the Explosive Ordnance Disposal team in dealing with the numerous bombs and booby traps left in Border areas by the IRA.
During the course of the Troubles, the IRA developed improvised explosive devices (IEDs) to such a degree that terrorists around the world have copied them. In turn, the EOD has developed such expertise in disarming these devices that foreign armies and police forces have attended the Irish refresher courses.