Provisional Irish Republican Army: Encyclopedia II - Provisional Irish Republican Army - Weaponry and operations

Provisional Irish Republican Army - Weaponry and operations

In the early days of the Troubles from around 1969-71, the IRA was very poorly armed, having available only a handful of old fashioned weapons left over from the IRA's Border campaign of the 1950s. Such weapons included Lee-Enfield rifles, Webley revolvers, and Thompson submachine guns. Their explosives were primarily gelignite - a commercial explosive which they either bought or stole from civilian sources. In the first years of the conflict, the Provisionals' main activity was providing firepower to defend nationalist areas against attacks from loyalists, the Royal Ulster Constabulary, the B-Specials and the British Army. The IRA gained much of its support from these activities, as they were widely perceived within the nationalist community as being defenders of nationalist and Catholic people against aggression.

As the conflict escalated in the early 1970s, the numbers recruited by the IRA mushroomed, in response to the nationalist community's anger at events such as the introduction of internment without trial and Bloody Sunday (1972) when the Parachute Regiment of the British army shot dead 13 unarmed civil rights marchers in Derry. The IRA leadership took the opportunity to launch an offensive, believing that they could force a British withdrawal from Ireland by inflicting severe casualties, thus undermining public support in Britain for its continued presence. To this end, they secured large amounts of modern weapons from supporters in the USA and Libya - most notably AR-180 rifles. During this period, a typical IRA operation involved sniping at British patrols, killing local police and soldiers when off-duty, and the bombing of commercial targets such as shops and businesses. The most effective tactic the IRA developed for its bombing campaign was the car bomb, where large amounts of explosives were packed into a car, which was driven to its target and then exploded. The bloodiest example of the Provisionals' commercial bombing campaign was Bloody Friday in Belfast, where 9 people were killed and many more injured. In rural areas such as South Armagh, the IRA units most effective weapon was the "culvert-bomb" - where explosives were planted under drains in country roads. This proved so dangerous for British army patrols that all troops in the area had to be transported by helicopter, a policy which they have continued down to the present day. Another very effective IRA tactic devised in the 1970s was the use of home-made mortars mounted on the back of trucks that were fired at police and army bases.

The early 1970s were the most violent years of the Troubles, with 1972 being the most bloody single year - over 500 people being killed. As well as its campaign against the security forces, the IRA became involved, in the middle of the decade, in a "tit for tat" cycle of sectarian killings with loyalist paramilitaries. The worst example of this occurred in 1976, when a IRA unit in Armagh shot dead ten Protestant building workers at Kingsmills, in reprisal for Ulster Volunteer Force killings of local Roman Catholics. As the IRA campaign continued through the 1970s and '80s, the organisation increasingly targeted off-duty RUC and Ulster Defence Regiment servicemen. Because these men were almost exclusively Protestant and unionist, these killings were also widely portrayed as a campaign of sectarian assassination. Towards the end of the troubles, the Provisionals widened their campaign even further, to include the killing of people who worked in a civilian capacity with the RUC and British Army. The bloodiest example of this came in 1992, when an IRA bomb killed eight building workers who were working on a British Army base at Teebane. Again, since Protestants and unionists were more likely to work for the British Army and police, this was widely seen as part of a campaign against Protestants. For the IRA, such attacks may have been counter-productive, as incidents such as these facilitated the British government's aims to "criminalise" the IRA and portray the conflict as one between sectarian gangs, and itself as a neutral arbiter.

Another plank of the IRA strategy developed in the mid-seventies was the bombing of civilian targets in England. On at least two occasions, at Birmingham and Guildford, bombings of pubs (on the basis that they were used by British soldiers) caused large-scale civilian loss of life.

In the 1980s, the IRA obtained very large quantities of weapons and explosives from Colonel Gadaffi's Libya. These included Kalashnikov rifles, rocket propelled grenades, heavy Soviet made DShK machine guns and the plastic explosive Semtex. In spite of this, the IRA was unable to substantially escalate its campaign due to the increased efficiency of the British security forces in infiltrating its structures. The organisation also suffered repeated losses at the hands of British special forces like the Special Air Service, the most spectacular being the ambush and killing of eight armed IRA members at Loughall in 1987 (see shoot-to-kill policy in Northern Ireland). The IRA and its political wing, Sinn Féin also suffered heavily from a campaign of assassination launched against their members by Loyalist paramilitaries. It has been alleged that the loyalists were aided in this campaign by elements of the security forces (see Stevens Report).

From 1990 until the ceasefire of 1994, loyalists killed more people every year in Northern Ireland than republicans, largely due to a large shipment of arms loyalists received from the South African apartheid government (see Short Brothers), enabled by MI5. However, during the same period, the IRA also became very effective at bombing commercial targets in England, particularly London, which caused a huge amount of damage to property. Among their targets were the City of London, Canary Wharf and Manchester city centre. It has been argued that this bombing campaign helped convince the British government (who had hoped to contain the conflict to Northern Ireland with its Ulsterisation policy) to negotiate with Sinn Féin.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Weaponry and operations", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki