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↓British "Moving the Goalposts on Collusion" (26.5.11)

By Kieran Hughes, North Belfast News

The grandson of a victim of the McGurk’s Bar Massacre has hit out at the Northern Ireland Office for “moving the goalposts” on collusion after the publication of the Rosemary Nelson inquiry report this week.

The public inquiry found that there was “no evidence” that state agencies directly facilitated the murder of the Lurgan solicitor in 1999 but that there were omissions by state agencies which made her more at risk.

Ciarán MacAirt’s grandmother, Kathleen Irvine, was one of fifteen people killed when the UVF blew up McGurk’s Bar on North Queen’s Street in 1971. In February a Police Ombudsman’s report into the McGurk’s atrocity found that the original police investigation was biased because the RUC were predisposed towards the view that the IRA were responsible for the bomb.

Mr. MacAirt said he was dismayed after reading the Nelson report because the failure of the RUC to act on information they received amounted to collusion.

“I listened to what the Owen Patterson had to say (on the Nelson report) and I was dismayed. Then I read the report and was more dismayed than ever,” he said.

“There are plain facts that are being glossed over. It really is a damning, damning indictment, not only of the RUC but of the NIO. They moved the goalposts for what qualifies as collusion.”

He said the recommendations made by Canadian judge, Peter Cory on collusion have not been followed.

Judge Cory published a report into four deaths in 2003, including the murder of North Belfast solicitor Pat Finucane.

“The upper echelons of the British establishment have not been able to face up to the wrong-doings of the past. We live in a society where the state still cannot face up to the truths of the past. Judge Cory’s recommendations as to what collusion is, have not been followed - the goalposts have been moved.”

He also added that the McGurk’s families are still seeking a meeting with Chief Constable Matt Baggott to discuss the Police Ombudsman’s report on McGurk’s atrocity. When the report was published in February Baggott refused to apologise and said all lines of enquiry in the case had been exhausted.

“We want to meet with him as soon as possible. Rest assured we have been chasing him and the sooner we meet with him the better.” Asked whether he was confident that Baggot would apologise to the families he said, “An apology should be offered - it should not be sought”.

↓MRF Leader Exposed (9.1.11)

We had known from our research that James (Hamish) Alastair McGregor CBE MC was not in charge of the British army's shadowy MRF at the time of the McGurk's Bar Massacre, having succeeded a named SAS Commander. Nevertheless, we had no other primary or secondary sources to support the naming of the original MRF CO by a former charge.

Until now.

The name of the MRF commander at the time of the McGurk's Bar Massacre was Captain Arthur H. Watchus.

Watchus, whose parent regiment was also the Paras, was a commander of 22 SAS. He is described in the secondary sources below as a Major although he was a captain at the time just as his successor was too. He was made a Major on 31st December 1974 (source London Gazette).

He is recorded as "an Intelligence expert" by the well known Breton investigative journalist, Roger Faligot (The Kitson Experiment, p173). John McGuffin (Internment, Chapter 11 accessible here) states that he was commander of the MRF "torture compound" of Palace Barracks who was "associated" with the Joint Services School of Intelligence (now Joint Services Intelligence Organisation), Templer Barracks in Ashford Kent (see Hansard reference). This is where Fred Holroyd trained too.

Lessons in interrogation and torture techniques could have stood Watchus in good stead as he applied Frank Kitson's counter-insurgency template to the streets of Belfast. The torture of the 12 "Hooded Men" following Internment on 9th August 1971 involved the experimental use of physical and psychological violations. An RUC Special Branch officer who was involved in the interrogations, S.H. Kyle, admitted that MRF operatives were present in Ballykelly British army base. Faligot says that the squad involved was actually led by Watchus himself (p173 as above).

Our families have contended that the McGurk's Bar Massacre was an MRF operation that used a UVF counter-gang and was designed to stir up internecine strife between the Official and Provisional wings of Republicanism. The bomb plan was to hit the Gem Bar close-by which had known Official associations and blame it on the Provisional IRA. The UVF gang could not get close to the Gem Bar so they hit the McGurk's family pub instead.

The psychological operation which originated in Palace Barracks and relied on the complicity of the RUC and Unionist cabinet ministers merely adapted to a change of plans. The innocence of every single person in McGurk's Bar that night meant as little as bringing the real culprits to court. What mattered was that military strategy under Kitson had primacy.

We had learned that Arthur Watchus is deceased. That is why we would still like to engage with his successor as commander of the extra-legal MRF, Brigadier Hamish McGregor, CEO of the Business Council for Africa (current in late 2010 at least as no-one from BCA will comment).

↓ Northern Ireland Prime Minister Implicated in McGurk’s Bar Cover-Up (4.12.10)

On this, the 39th anniversary of the atrocity, a startling archive find has proved that the McGurk’s Bar Massacre cover-up involved none other than Brian Faulkner, Northern Ireland Prime Minister at the time. Not only is he recorded lying to the British Home Secretary that the bomb was an IRA own-goal but, in a glaring admission of political interference in a police investigation, Faulkner tells those present in Whitehall that he has directed the RUC “to find out whether anything was known about the associations of the people who were killed or injured”. The complete innocence or Human Rights of fifteen men, women and children who were butchered or the sixteen who survived meant nothing to him. All that mattered was the success of his deception and the consequent upholding of the discriminatory Interim Custody Orders (Internment without Trial) which he directed solely against Irish Roman Catholics.

On the 6th December 1971, Faulkner travelled to London to meet with the British Home Secretary, Reginald Maudling, for what would have been crunch talks on the security situation in the north of Ireland. Two days previously, fifteen men women and children had been massacred by loyalist terrorists in a no-warning bomb attack on bar run by the McGurk family. Faulkner could not allow blame to rest with loyalists, though.

When Internment was introduced in August 1971 the British authorities had urged Faulkner to include alleged Protestant extremists in the trawl so that it could be argued that the special orders were not designed to be directed solely against the Catholic community. Faulkner refused as he knew that he would not have the support of his party or the RUC. Instead, an “Arrest Policy for Protestants” was raised and meant that no loyalists were interned until 1973 even though they had killed well over a hundred people by then. Therefore, if it was admitted that loyalists had perpetrated mass murder on the 4th December 1971, the Northern Ireland government’s assertion to Whitehall that they were “no serious threat” would be completely untenable. Together with the tumultuous rise in violence since August 1971, Whitehall would have viewed Internment without Trial an unmitigated failure. The British Prime Minister, Edward Heath, would have had to step in and take direct control just as he was forced to do a few months later in March 1972.

The notes of Faulkner’s meeting with the British Home Secretary were discovered by the Pat Finucane Centre at the National Archives at Kew and are of especial importance to the family campaigners today. Not only do the records prove them completely correct for asserting that the McGurk’s Bar cover-up went straight to the top of the political establishment but they also again raise some serious questions regarding the so-called professionalism of the present British investigations (Historical Enquiries Team and Police Ombudsman Northern Ireland). Yet again it is the families and their friends in Human Rights activism who are uncovering such salient evidence and placing it in the public domain.

These archives prove that the Northern Irish Prime Minister:

• Deceived Whitehall that the massacre was the result of an IRA own goal

• Dramatically directed the RUC to check the associations of the innocent victims, dead and injured

• Was indeed briefed by the RUC

History is a cold judge so Faulkner’s deception is as stark as Maudling’s supposed gullibility. Faulkner avowed:

• His surprise if the IRA were able to keep up their campaign beyond February 1972

• His belief that he had “substantial Catholic support” which could not be vocal because of intimidation

• That the “political initiatives which had been taken had not yet had the opportunity to work”

A war that lasted a generation and led to well over 3000 deaths is the legacy of this cover-up. If only Brian Faulkner had upheld the basic Human Rights of our loved ones then, history may read differently now. If only…

On this, the 39th anniversary of the atrocity, the family members once more call on John Taylor, Baron Kilclooney, owner of Alpha Newspapers, to come clean about his role in the dissemination of black propaganda and disinformation at a time when we were burying our loved ones. As a Cabinet Minister under Faulkner and as the head of the Ministry of Home Affairs (with Security as his brief), there is no better living person to interview regarding this high-level political cover-up.

I personally and publicly challenge him to answer one question and one question alone:

Are you a patsy or a liar?

 

Read Allison Morris' historic news-piece here

Review the relevant section of this startling archive here

Review full pdf version of archive here

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↓ MI5 in the Frame for Black Propaganda

This latest archive find by the families, detailed below, is a HQNI INTSUM (Intelligence Summary) that records a second piece of British black propaganda and its attempts to brand the innocent victims terrorists. Spectacularly, in what must be a massive goof by the British Ministry of Defence, the families have been able to trace the lies back to MI5.

We should never have been able to retrieve this decisive and historic piece of evidence.

HQNI INTSUMs were prepared in Lisburn Headquarters by a team under the Director of Intelligence. Other archive evidence in our possession relates that this man was a Security Service officer, an MI5 operative. For his role in the north of Ireland in 1971 he assumed the equivalent military rank of Major General. Furthermore, we learn he ran a department made up of other MI5 operatives and military officers. He liaised daily with the RUC, especially its Special Branch, "to co-ordinate the intelligence gathering efforts of the various elements of the security forces operating... at the time". Black propaganda was drip-fed through intelligence information streams such as these HQNI INTSUMs, disseminated not only throughout the intelligence community but also lofty Whitehall. MI5 were seeking to dupe their own paymasters in 10 Downing Street so they could wage their war in Ireland as they saw fit and without political interference.

This was how easy it was to synchronize the psychological operation of the McGurk's Bar Massacre. Our families' basic human rights meant as little as perverting the course of justice.

Then again, we were of a particular faith.

Read Allison Morris' ground-breaking article in the Irish News: here

"McGurk's cover-up justified nationalist-only Internment: MI5 involved in pretext of IRA own-goal claim"

↓ Black Propaganda Archive Discovery

This latest archive find (click here to read) is from a British army Headquarters Northern Ireland Intelligence Summary (HQNI INTSUM), dated 9th December 1971, 5 days after the McGurk’s Bar Massacre. It represents British black propaganda in stark terms as they seek to criminalize innocent civilians to fit twisted military strategy.

HQNI INTSUMS were written by British army Intelligence and MoD London and distributed province-wide throughout the military and RUC. We have since asked for the Brigade INTSUMS as these were the raw intelligence fed up through Brigade and supplemented by RUC Special Branch before it was managed, ignored or re-written by the British Intelligence services. I have already fore-warned the MoD that we will be looking for any differences between the two.

The first piece of black propaganda was promulgated in an RUC duty officer’s report on the 5th December 1971 and released by the families last year. In it the groundless “bomb in transit” lie was forwarded. This archive find is startling too as it depicts another dimension to British black propaganda and psychological operations.

In section 6, HQNI muddy the waters of the McGurk's bomb claim and ignore key witness testimony before stating bluntly:

Forensic and EOD reports (Explosive Ordnance Disposal) tend to indicate that the explosion was caused accidentally inside the public house by premature detonation amongst a group which contained an identified IRA victim.

Obviously this is yet another heinous lie. Not only are they asserting that at least one of the victims was an IRA member and therefore complicit in their own demise but forensics were not released until February 1972. In no way did the forensic report substantiate any such lie. Also, we have proved in the Director of Operations Brief (5th December 1971) which we, the families, found, that the Army Technical Officers (ATO) told their General Officer Commanding, Lt. General Sir Harry Tuzo, that the bomb was not inside the main bar area. This HQNI INTSUM, therefore, is the infamous lie that had the customers being schooled in bomb-making skills. The British authorities and RUC imply that our loved ones were at the very least guilty by association if not complicit in acts of terrorism. Either way, they intimate that the victims had a hand in their own death.

In a modern example of information feed and media control, it was left to the Guardian to produce the most profligate and dissolute article on Christmas Eve 1971:

Security men and forensic scientists have finished the grisly investigation of the explosion in Paddy McGurk's Bar, which killed at least 15 Belfast Catholics earlier this month. If they are to be believed - and in this case they probably are - this figure will have to be revised upwards. They claim to have established that five men were standing round the bomb when it went off inside the crowded bar in North Queen Street. All five were blown to pieces.

The scientists have been able to identify one of them as a senior IRA man who was an expert on explosives and was on the government's wanted list.

Of all the conflicting theories about the explosion, the security men are now convinced that the bar was a transfer point in the IRA chain between the makers and the planters of the bomb. Something went wrong and the bomb exploded.

As this lie also gathered momentum throughout the province, the real culprits within the UVF counter-gang escaped justice with little fear that they would be apprehended.

SIMPLY PUT, THIS IS A PERVERSION OF THE COURSE OF JUSTICE AND AN ABASEMENT OF BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS.

A massive find this may be but evidently nothing in comparison with the information that is being withheld from the families at the moment. The document was undoubtedly fed to us piecemeal instead of more damning archives.

In the News

Read Kieran Hughes' North Belfast News report: here

Alban Maginness MLA has voiced his support: here

↓ Police Ombudsman Fiasco (July 2010)

The release and abortion of the Police Ombudsman's report (8.7.10) into the Royal Ulster Constabulary's (RUC) investigation of the McGurk's Bar Massacre was an ill-conceived, unmitigated fiasco. The report and their media stage-management was Kafkaesque at its most benign.

The Police Ombudsman railroaded our families, many of whom are aged, into this very public miscarriage. Without reference to any of them or respect for their very human grief and fears that this process was seriously flawed, Mr. Al Hutchinson tried to bury this report before Orangefest.

His office's treatment of the families who collected the report at an allotted time merely added grievous insult to injury. These are bereaved relatives who have fought constitutionally and with dignity for nearly four decades for the truth and have waited patiently for over four years for this so-called investigation to conclude.

Thankfully, it was a desk-top review, riddled with so many grave blunders that Mr. Hutchinson could do nothing but retract it. To his detriment, he had also underestimated the resilience and fluency of ordinary families in their management of information distribution channels and the media.

Not only has this debacle highlighted glaring problems in the Ombudsman's standard operating procedures, but also crises in the organisation itself.

It is true that the Ombudsman's office is under-staffed and under-funded. It is also true that the choice between policing the past and and policing the future is stark.

Nevertheless, neither surprise this author. The Police Ombudsman's office, regardless of the fanfare of so-called independence, is a British organisation set up partly to review the excesses of a British police force in the past. As far as these legacy cases are concerned it is reviewing a police force that surrendered itself to British military primacy. Its remit, though, does not include investigation of this military so it is immediately stunted and powerless. Why would a so-called democratic, first world, western country wish to fund or empower any organisation to uncover evidence that it, in effect, killed its own citizens, controlled the media and misdirected a malleable police force?

A sizeable section of the public also believe that the past is past and should be consigned to there, especially in these trying economic times. Nevertheless, this is not simply about closure for fellow human beings. History informs the present and, from it, future generations learn its mores and moral obligations. If we do not uncover the abuses now, this rogue British state will be free to violate human rights any time, anywhere in the world.

Emotions aside, I believe that the damage done to any credibility the Ombudsman had is irreparable. In any other walk-of-life, this lack of professionalism, this shambolic incompetence, would be disciplined as negligence. The same performance tests that apply in the real world should resonate here too.

Mr. Hutchinson now pays lip-service to our anguish and disquiet but I believe it is too late. I think that it matters little whether this report is corrected and published or not. If he alters it, then commentators could argue viably that he reacted to undue family pressure. If he does not, then it is yet another body blow to the bereaved. Neither outcome assures the public of his office's impartiality or effectiveness. Neither helps our campaign for truth satisfactorily.

What we need is a truly international, independent and transparent investigation with powers of subpoena. No British organisation will be empowered to give us the truth concerning a British war crime.

Therefore, I for one have no confidence whatsoever in anything Mr. Hutchinson wants to say or any duty his office performs.

↓ Police Ombudsman Fiasco in the News

What other family members had to say:

"It smacks of the police trying to absolve themselves of all responsibility for any wrong-doing" Patrick McGurk to the BBC: report here.

"It's the proper thing to do for the ombudsman to take this report back and have a look at it seriously". Alex McLaughlin to the BBC: report here.

"This is a slap in the face for the victims' families". Gerard Keenan in the Belfast Telegraph: report here.

"This was the mass murder of fifteen innocent victims whose good names and reputations have been tarnished for the past forty years by those who... were supposed uphold the rule of law, not manipulate the facts for their own twisted political ends". Pat Irvine to the North Belfast News (Aine McEntee, 10.7.2010)

"We need a full, independent investigation into what happened, not a report which is basically old police officers investigating old police officers". Robert McClenaghan to the Andersonstown News: report here.

What the politicians said:

"It is now necessary for the Prime Minister to apologize directly to the families for the monumental act of deceit". SDLP's Justice spokesperson and MLA, Alban Magennis: report here.

"It has caused justifiable anger and it is only right that the Ombudsman bins this deeply-flawed report". Sinn Féin's North Belfast MLA, Gerry Kelly: report here.

 

↓ James Alastair McGregor CBE MC Unmasked

Research into the McGurk’s Bar Massacre has uncovered the family history, military career and modern business life of a leader of the shadowy British special force unit, the Military Reaction Force (MRF).

This covert operative is a man that the McGurk’s campaigners have long since demanded is questioned regarding British “black ops” at the time of the atrocity and beyond.

He is the Director General /chief executive officer of a powerful organisation that lobbies for British, capitalist interests in Africa.

His name is James (Hamish) Alastair McGregor CBE MC.

We have tried to contact him many times but he has ignored us. Nevertheless, his is a story that should be told:

From Palestine to Belfast: Post-War Counter-Insurgency - A Very British Family Affair

↓ INQ 1873 Unmasked

He was known only as INQ 1873 to the Saville inquiry into the mass murder of innocent civilians during Bloody Sunday. He was questioned regarding his role in PSYOPS. We have also uncovered archives that link him and his Information Policy unit to black propaganda in the aftermath of the McGurk's Bar Massacre.

Our extensive research leads us to unmask Lt. Col. Bernard Renouf Johnston as INQ 1873. We had asked that he was questioned, together with Hugh Mooney and his boss, Colonel Maurice Tugwell, regarding their roles in disseminating false information about our loved ones. Unfortunately, he died last year before he could be held accountable. The other two are still alive.

↓ Ombudsman Whitewash

The Ombudsman gave families who have been waiting two generations for the truth and over four years for this long overdue report, just one day to read it before it was released to the public.

It was not enough that they were treated so disrespectfully when they were railroaded into this release, but then they were handed an ill-prepared and factually incorrect whitewash. Thankfully, it is so weak, transparent and littered with errors that it will never stand up to scrutiny. The few hours that the families have had it and the demolition exercises they have executed even before its release, means that the Ombudsman report has expired before it has seen the light of day. No slick PR will revive it.

There are many untruths but I shall leave you with one before we have studied it thoroughly:

The Ombudsman states categorically that John Taylor, the minister for Home Affairs at the time, was not debriefed by the RUC with disinformation. The police report that the families released was lodged in the ministry of Home Affairs and records the first instance of the bomb-in-transit lie. Have the Ombudsman not made the connection?

We have another chapter in control of the media and information mismanagement, it seems.

↓ British Army and RUC Cover-up

With the publication of this RUC Police Report, we demand that the four named duty officers are questioned if they are still alive. Let them answer for the lie that formed the bedrock of RUC collusion with British terrorism.

With the publication of this Director of Operations Brief, we once more call for the British MoD to be questioned.

Specifically, using their ranks at the time, we would like to hear from Hugh Mooney (Information Advisor to the General Officer Commanding) and Colonel Maurice Tugwell of the General Staff (Lt. Col. B. R. Johnston is now dead) . Few other persons would be better placed to tell us about the information policy of the British army and government at this time.

Also, at this juncture, the families of the McGurk's victims would like it placed on public record that we want Captain James Alastair McGregor and Sergeant Clive Graham Williams of the British army's MRF questioned about this particular organisation's paramilitary operations at the time.

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In the news

The news items below represent a snapshot of the work that has been done over the last few years when the campaign gathered force and momentum. It does not represent, though, the relentless effort carried out by the all of the families for nearly two generations prior to this.

Also, long before the campaign garnered national and international attention, it was local newspapers and reporters who kept our story alive. The items below do not attest to how indebted we are to them.

For example, Andrea McKernon and Aine McEntee of the Belfast Media Group deserve especial praise for their hard work and support over the years.

BBC Onboard! McGurk's reports "black propaganda"

22nd March 2010BBC Radio 4 Document

 

Britain's Propaganda War During the Troubles (Mark Thomson, BBC, 22.3.10)

The introduction of internment in Northern Ireland in August 1971 in response to growing violence from the IRA had backfired. The violence got even worse and British forces found themselves losing the battle for public opinion. Concerned that the IRA was using the policy to further its propaganda war, London decided to fight back.

It set up what was known as the Information Policy Unit, or IPU, at the Army's headquarters in Lisburn. Its job was to discredit the IRA wherever possible, often by holding special briefings with journalists.

This was joined soon after by another group, the Information Research Department or IRD, a behind-the-scenes branch of the Foreign Office created in 1948 to counter communism. Both groups were now to engage in a full-blown propaganda war against the IRA and some other paramilitaries.

In December 1971, a month before Bloody Sunday, an explosion ripped apart McGurk's Bar, a Catholic pub in Belfast - killing 15 people and wounding 17 more. The Army and police claimed to have found evidence that the bomb that caused the blast had gone off inside the bar.

Given that McGurk's was a Catholic bar, this implied that it must have been an IRA device that went off accidentally. Forensic evidence later proved that the bomb had clearly been placed outside the pub. Finally, seven years later, the loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force was convicted of the attack.

For full article, please follow this link

To listen to the complete Radio 4 Document programme, please follow this link

Secret documents shed light on shadowy force

March 2010 Irish News

 

Following from a lead story in the Irish News (Allison Morris, 3.3.10):

Army knew about two of the Disappeared 38 years ago

The documents unearthed by Justice for the Forgotten and the Pat Finucane Centre and offered to the McGurk’s campaigners have proved invaluable to our research of the MRF (Irish News 3.3.10).

Their immediate importance is startling if only because they have cast light upon this shadowy offshoot of the SAS and the dirty war they waged against Catholic civilians in the early seventies: British army plain-clothed, patrols, the deployment of “enemy” weapons and the management of “Freds”, or turned informers, like Seamus Wright and Kevin McKee, are discussed openly.

The MRF’s two leaders, Captain James Alastair McGregor and Sergeant Clive Graham Williams, are now in focus due to their shooting of four unarmed civilians on the Glen Road on June 22nd 1972. They had used an “unapproved” weapon in the attack, a Thompson SMG, favoured by the IRA at the time, and Palace barracks had tried initially to cover up British army involvement. Also under the spotlight is the British authorities’ cynical defence brief and information policy regarding the incident, never mind their contemptible acquittal of the pair in 1973.

These are the same two covert operatives that we have demanded for years are questioned regarding black ops at the time of the McGurk’s Bar Massacre and beyond. In one of the military documents Captain James Alastair McGregor is recorded “as leader/commander of the MRF in Belfast”. It is essential, therefore, that he is questioned as McGregor’s MRF, we believe, planned the operation that lead to the death of these fifteen innocent men, women and children on the 4th December 1971.

It was an atrocity that showcased not only the potency of British collusion with their UVF counter-gang but also British control of the media, the RUC and malleable cabinet ministers. I believe, though, that the greater significance of these documents is manifest when we consider the attempted murders in their historical context.

The McGurk’s Bar Massacre, as discussed on our campaign website, was a bloody marker of how badly Catholic civilians were going to suffer in any escalation of war. The first few months of 1972 proved that further still as the North sank into an ever-increasing spiral of death and destruction. Nevertheless, there may have been a glimmer of hope that peace would break out when the IRA announced on the 22nd June 1972, two days after secret meetings with British officials from William Whitelaw’s office, that they would call a ceasefire from the 26th, four days later. This, of course, was the bi-lateral truce that was a prelude to IRA talks with the British government in London on the 7th July 1972.

On the day that the IRA announced their ceasefire, the British military had unfettered their MRF death squad and randomly tried to kill the four unarmed civilians in the incident on the Glen Road detailed above. They not only conspired to stoke further sectarian violence at a time when civilians may have hoped for peace, but also connived to ensure their covert operatives were never to be held accountable in a fair court of law.

Then on the 23rd June 1972 in North Belfast, just one day later and in another attempt at mass murder, a young 17 year old, called Patrick McCullough, was murdered in a copy-cat drive-by shooting of a group of Catholic youths whose age or sex was of little concern for the assassins – even a 14 year old girl was wounded in the neck.

Whether it was the MRF or their UVF counter-gang who perpetrated this killing is moot because the political intentions, the modus operandi and the terror were the same - certain sections of the British military obviously wished to thwart any burgeoning peace process.

Their success, in their own terms, was immediate. The truce collapsed and July 1972 became a graveyard for hope as all sides escalated the horror – nearly 100 souls were killed, amounting to the most violent month in the history of a war that lasted another generation.

Ciarán MacAirt, 7th March 2010

RUC put out false story within hours of McGurk’s bar attack

28th October 2009 Allison Morris, Irish News

 

New documents relating to the Mc-Gurk’s bar bombing in 1971 show how the false claim that it was an ‘IRA own goal’ was being circulated within hours of the atrocity.

Campaigners for victims of the loyalist attack, which claimed the lives of 15 innocent civilians including two schoolchildren, have unearthed the RUC duty officers’ report from the day. The massacre on December 4 1971 at the public house in North Queen Street, Belfast, was one of the worst single acts of violence during the Troubles.

The police report, written within hours of the explosion, ignores information provided by British army technical experts who had examined the scene and determined that the bomb had been placed outside the building. Instead it states that just before the explosion:

“a man entered the licenced premises and left down a suitcase presumably to be picked up by a known member of the Provisional IRA. The bomb was intended for use on other premises. Before the ‘pick-up’ was made the bomb exploded.”

Earlier this year The Irish News revealed that a confidential briefing note was presented to Harry Tuzo – the British army’s general officer commanding in Northern Ireland at the time – within hours of the blast stating that the 50lb bomb had been planted outside the building.

The latest document was obtained by Caroline Parkes of British Irish Rights Watch. The claim made by security forces at the time that the bomb had been part of an IRA operation gone wrong caused untold hurt to the families of those who died. Last year security minister Paul Goggins issued an apology. “We are deeply sorry, not just for the appalling suffering and loss of life that occurred at McGurk’s bar, but also for the extraordinary additional pain caused to both the immediate families and the wider community by the erroneous suggestions made in the immediate aftermath of the explosion as to who was responsible,” he said.

This followed a Historical Enquiries Team (HET) investigation into the atrocity. The HET had dismissed as “irresponsible and inaccurate” the authorities’ IRA claim, saying it “could not be based on facts but instead reflected a desired outcome”. A UVF loyalist received 15 life sentences in 1978.

Ciaran MacAirt, whose grandmother Kathleen Irvine (53) was among the victims of the massacre, said the latest documents raised questions about who benefited most from the circulation of the false information.

“There are some very serious questions that need to be answered here,” Mr MacAirt said.

“A good start would be for the HET to question the four duty officers named as authors of this police report. This police report was obviously written minutes after as 11 named victims are re-corded in the same order, along with required corrections, and four victims, including my own grandmother, are still to be identified.

"Nevertheless, the police report’s recording of the bomb’s placement is diametrically opposed to the truth within the original military brief and also with each and every one of the dozens of witness statements the RUC were already beginning to gather.”

Mr MacAirt added: “It leaves us with two unanswered questions – who benefited from the disinformation and who, therefore, created these lies?”

Following Stories:

Press Release 27.10.09

This R.U.C. police report to the Ministry of Home Affairs book-ends our finding and recent release of the British military’s Director of Operations brief.

It shows starkly how quickly military decisions to misinform and to collude are made, unless, of course, those decisions were pre-planned.

With the Director of Operations Brief as its template, this police report was obviously written minutes after – eleven named victims are recorded in the same order, along with required corrections, and four victims, including my own grandmother, are still to be identified. Nevertheless, the police report’s recording of the bomb’s placement is diametrically opposed to the truth within the original military brief. In fact, not only is it flagrantly at odds with the expert and first-hand evidence of an Army Technical Officer to the General Officer Commanding, Lt. General Sir Harry Tuzo, but also with each and every one of the dozens of witness statements that the R.U.C. were already beginning to gather.

A cursory examination of the heinous lies within this police report casts a pall over the so-called professionalism of twenty detectives working under Chief Inspector Abbott. Whilst there are no corroborating statements to support their tale of a man who “entered the licensed premises and left down a suitcase, presumably to be picked up by a known member of the Provisional I.R.A.”, the R.U.C., again without evidence, even record that the “bomb was intended for use on other premises”.

We have two simple questions that are imperative to any examination of collusion and cover-up:

1. Who benefited from the disinformation?

2. Who, therefore, created these lies?

Only the British army and their U.V.F. counter-gang benefited from the promulgation of these lies. The Intelligence services wished to stir up internecine strife between the competing wings of Irish Republicanism and/or decimate the support each may have had within the Irish, Catholic community. The massacre and the British authorities’ handling of the atrocity thereafter was a showcase for the potency of British terrorism in collusion with her loyalist counter-gangs.

In fact, the U.V.F. murderers directly responsible for the slaughter in McGurk’s Bar were allowed to kill dozens and dozens more than died that cold night in December 1971, accounting for some of the most gruesome sectarian killings perpetrated throughout all of the war.

Once more we have put Colonel Maurice Tugwell and his section of the Information Research Department squarely in frame for managing this disinformation from the Director of Operations Brief onwards.

Otherwise, the R.U.C. will have to explain the lies within this report to the Ministry of Home Affairs as being of their own making and not from a military briefing (a good start would be to question the four duty officers named as authors of the police report).

What they and, consequently, the Historical Enquiries Team will definitely have to account for thenceforth is an unprofessional, botched and misdirected investigation that abased the basic Human Rights of our loved ones.

Sir John Stevens, the former Metropolitan Police Commissioner who was charged with uncovering collusion between the RUC, British army and loyalists, gave this definition in his third inquiry:

Collusion is evidenced in many ways. This ranges from the wilful failure to keep records, the absence of accountability, the withholding of intelligence and information, through to the extreme of agents being involved in murder.

With this as a benchmark, therefore, the difference between the truthful, expert witness testimony of an A.T.O. as recorded within the Director of Operations brief and the unqualified lie within the R.U.C. report is striking. It is salient evidence of collusion and cover-up.

What remains for the campaigning families to discover is the depth of this collusion among British terrorists. Without fear of being repetitive, we demand that specific members of the British military whom we have named on our campaign website are questioned regarding British information policy and black ops at this time. We would also like to ask the H.E.T. where this leaves their flimsy desk-top review and empty praise of an R.U.C. investigatory team.

Ciarán MacAirt, 27th October 2009

Colonel claimed paper was IRA mouthpiece (Allison Morris, Irish News, 29.10.09)

A briefing document written almost four decades ago by the British army’s then head of information, Colonel Maurice Tugwell, accused The Irish News of being an “organ for printing IRA propaganda”.

The document – dated November 9 1971 – was uncovered by the campaigning families of the victims of the McGurk’s Bar bombing in Belfast.

Just weeks before the loyalist bomb that claimed the lives of 15 innocent civilians exploded on December 4 at the North Queen Street bar, Tugwell prepared the confidential document. It gave his views on how to beat the IRA, not militarily but on the propaganda front by influencing public opinion.

The document said the IRA had been engaged in attempting “the destruction of public morale in Northern Ireland by a campaign of terror”. “At times it has came close to succeeding,” the colonel wrote.

Tugwell also listed a number of organisations and individuals he claimed were used as “front organisations”. “Republican sympathisers who, having themselves been taken in by the propaganda, are willing to spread the word,” he wrote. Among them Tugwell listed the Association for Legal Justice and several Catholic priests including the late Fr Denis Faul. He also said The Irish News was “a newspaper that has for long represented republican opinion in Ulster and is now an organ for printing IRA propaganda”.

Tugwell was known for his controversial insurgency tactics. Following the murder of 13 unarmed civilians by the Parachute Regiment on January 30 1972, Tugwell claimed four of the Bloody Sunday dead were IRA members. He went on to retract the statement in 2002 under questioning at the Saville inquiry. “Later, I am not sure when, I discovered that the allegation that four men were on a wanted list could not be sustained. It was an honest mistake,” he said.

Following the bombing of McGurk’s bar in December 1971 the British army and RUC released false information claiming the bombing had been an IRA ‘own-goal’ and that the bomb had been placed in the bar for transportation to another target. Last year Secretary of State Shaun Woodward was forced to issue an apology to the victims’ families for the “erroneous” information circulated at the time by the British army and RUC.

Yesterday Irish News editor Noel Doran said Tugwell’s comments were “ludicrous”. “While at one level the comments from the British army source are amusing, it still has to be alarming that such ludicrous attitudes could be found at a senior level in the security establishment of the period,” Mr Doran said. “This was a time when The Irish News was holding the line for constitutional politics in very dangerous circumstances and being castigated by republican and loyalist extremists as a result. “Our office was wrecked by a republican bomb in 1971 and it was also separately entered at night by members of another republican group who threatened journalists at gunpoint precisely because the paper refused to carry their propaganda statements in the way they demanded. “I think that the Irish News staff of the era deserve the highest credit for their dedication and professionalism against the most challenging of backgrounds.”

GB Army knew bar blast not IRA fault

29th July 2009 Allison Morris, Irish News

 

THE British army knew within hours of the McGurk’s Bar massacre that the bomb had been placed outside the bar and that the innocent victims were not responsible for an alleged IRA ‘own goal’, a newly uncovered document proves.

The document, dated the day of the bombing, clearly states that the bomb – which claimed the lives of 15 people– exploded outside the building. The confidential briefing note was presented to Harry Tuzo, then the British army’s general officer commanding, within hours of the bombing.

Following the UVF massacre of December 4 1971, both RUC and army intelligence services put out misinformation claiming the explosion had taken place from within the building, possibly as a result of an IRA bomb-making factory. News of the document comes within days of a British government expression of regret to the family of Co Tyrone man Aidan McAnespie, shot dead as he walked through an army checkpoint 20 years ago.

Just days after the bombing an army memo was circulated claiming the bomb must have come from within the bar’s walls and was likely to have been carried by a customer. This false version of events was later put before the House of Commons at the behest of senior army officers.

The injured and bereaved have never received an official apology from the British government but NIO minister Paul Goggins apologised last year for initial false reporting. “Such perceptions and preconceived ideas should not have been allowed to cloud the evidence,” he said. The bombing was also subject to a Historical Enquiries Team (HET) review of the initial investigation.

Ciaran MacAirt, a grandson of McGurk’s Bar massacre victim Kitty Irvine, said the British government should apologise for the cover-up.

“What we have here is an official document viewed at the highest level confirming from the outset the British army were aware the bomb had been placed outside the bar,” he said. “Despite this, within hours the black propaganda campaign swung into action in an attempt to sully the reputations of innocent victims and to divert attention away from the true culprits.

“Both MoD and RUC resources were directed not at tracing the bombers but instead channelled into a cover-up operation. “I will be asking for the HET to re-examine their findings and call for a full and unequivocal apology from the British government admitting the very deliberate nature of the cover up.”

Following Stories:

Press Release 26.7.09

This briefing (Director of Operations Brief for the 4th - 5th December 1971), prepared for Lt. General Sir Harry Tuzo, General Officer Commanding of the British forces in the north of Ireland in late 1971, is a breakthrough document for the families of the innocent victims slain or injured in the McGurk's Bar Massacre.

It was prepared a few hours after the atrocity and includes the expert opinion of an Army Technical Officer. It states starkly:

"A bomb believed to have been planted outside the bar was estimated by the A.T.O. to be 30/50lb of HE (high explosive)".

This is diametrically opposed to the lies that the British military, the RUC and cabinet ministers spun in the wake of the slaughter.

These smears abased the basic Human Rights of our innocent family members.

These smears purposefully and wilfully channelled a flimsy police investigation away from the true culprits, negating dozens of eye-witness accounts.

These smears formed the backbone to British army collusion with their loyalist counter-gang and the foundation to a premeditated cover-up.

This document lays these lies bare.

The British military's Information Research Department (PsyOps) is now squarely in the frame for managing the disinformation from this point onwards. The bomb may have been placed in or at the doorway of the family pub, but not within the bar area as their black propaganda would have had the world believe. This document proves, without a shadow of a doubt, that they knew that too as they scripted their lies.

Therefore, specifically, we demand that Hugh Mooney (Information Advisor to the General Officer Commanding), the General Staff Officer known to the Bloody Sunday inquiry as INQ 1873 and Colonel Maurice Tugwell of the General Staff are questioned. Few other persons would be better placed to tell us about the information policy of the British army and government at this time.

We once more demand that the British government and MoD release all the documents and information they have concerning the massacre.

We further demand that the British government gives the victims and their families the closure that only truth will bring and an unequivocal apology for collusion and cover-up. Otherwise, we demand a truly international, transparent and accountable inquiry with powers of subpoena. We cannot trust the agencies or mechanisms the British have in place to re-investigate what we believe was a British war crime.

Ciarán MacAirt, grandson of Kitty Irvine, July 26 2009

Full disclosure should be forthcoming for McGurks Bar victims and families (www.sinnfein.ie, 30.7.09)

Sinn Féin MLA for north Belfast Gerry Kelly has stated that a full disclosure from the British Government and acknowledgement that the British army were involved in a cover up in the McGurk’s Bar bombing should now be forthcoming.

Speaking today Mr Kelly said: “The document surrounding what happened at the McGurk's Bar in 1971 points clearly to the cover-up that followed the bomb attack on the bar and the smear campaign, which attempted to blame the innocent victims for the bomb, went to the highest level of the British army and government.

“For the victims families this is hardly a revelation. It is what they have been campaigning on for over 37 years now – to highlight what happened and to seek a full apology and admission of what occurred on the night and in the subsequent weeks, and months.

“However what is dismaying is that it was a relative of one of the victims who uncovered this document and that it was not released by the British government who were clearly hiding the evidence and deliberately giving false information.

“What we need to see now is the British government releasing all the files surrounding this and many other cases in order to get to the truth. “Without this there will not be closure for the families of those who have suffered through collusion and the British states role in the conflict.”

We've established cover-up, now what about collusion? (Laura Friel, An Phoblacht, 6.8.09)

MORE evidence of cover-up regarding the bombing of McGurk’s Bar in Belfast in 1971 surfaced this month with the discovery of a British Army briefing document.

The internal British Army memo was submitted on the day of the bombing, 4 December 1971, as part of the daily briefings to the then British Army General Officer Commanding, Harry Tuzo. The memo includes information provided by members of the British Army’s technical officers who were at the scene. Significantly, the document states that the bomb was “outside the pub”. Where the bomb had been placed became a key factor in a subsequent campaign of misinformation involving the British military, Stormont ministers and the British Government.

Within hours of the bombing it was falsely claimed by the British Army that the 15 people who died in the bombing were killed as a result of an “IRA own goal”, the result of a premature explosion during a bomb-making exercise within the premises. It was a lie. At the behest of the British military, the British Cabinet, House of Commons and Stormont ministers all played a part in perpetuating that lie, reiterating completely false claims and citing spurious “forensic evidence” to back their story.

In fact, the bombing had been carried out by members of the UVF and the bomb had been placed in a hallway, outside the main inner doors. Ambiguity around whether the location of the bomb constituted “inside” or “outside” was used by the British Army to imply the explosion took place within the core of the building, a suggestion that enhanced their portrayal of an “IRA own goal”.

A recent ‘investigation’ by the PSNI's Historical Enquiries Team suggested that this “ambiguity” lay at the heart of any subsequent confusion about who carried out the bombing. For the HET it wasn’t a deliberate campaign of misinformation embarked upon by the British military and endorsed by the British state. It was simply “ill-informed speculation” resulting from a “lack of communication” by the authorities.

But this evaluation doesn’t stack up with the evidence.

Firstly, as this latest document confirms, the British Army, far from being “ill-informed” were from the beginning very well informed. Secondly, in the immediate aftermath, public speculation correctly identified the bombing as emanating from the UVF. Thirdly, “misinformation” did not occur as a result of “lack of communication” by the authorities but because of active briefing by the British Army, which also sought and secured official political backing.

In light of these considerations, the HET’s position itself smacks of further propaganda. On the back of the HET report, the then British Secretary of State, Paul Goggins, said sorry to the families of the McGurk’s bombing victims. But Goggins’s acknowledgment restricted the British Government’s regret to “such perceptions and preconceived ideas” that had been “allowed to cloud the actual evidence”. Goggins’s view is a far cry from a deliberate campaign of misinformation initiated by the British Army and endorsed by their political masters. Pre-judicial preconceptions are a long way from cover-up and even further from cover-up as a part of collusion.

It is similar to the non-apology issued to the family of Aidan McAnespie last week, in which the current British Secretary of State Shaun Woodward expressed “regret” while maintaining the British Army lie that the victim died as a result of an accident rather than being murdered by a British soldier.

Increasingly, the role of HET appears to be to frame information already out in the public arena in such a way that allows the British state to issue words of “regret” and “sorrow” without conceding any ground that might be used to hold them to account. In short, a form of damage limitation. But the unfinished business of the McGurk’s pub bombing is not just about cover-up: it’s also about collusion.

In 2007, two articles appeared in the media, both quoting a former UVF member using the pseudonym ‘John Black’. In each of the articles, ‘Black’ claims the bombing at McGurk’s bar was organised by his handlers in the British Army’s notorious undercover Military Reconnaissance Force. The MRF was a covert unit of British Military Intelligence and a forerunner of the Force Research Unit. The MRF is believed to have been set up in the summer of 1971, using operational techniques based on British counter-insurgency expert Brigadier Frank Kitson’s strategy of recruiting ‘counter gangs’ to combat resistance movements. Exposure of the MRF as a covert assassination squad eventually led to its ‘disbandment’ and re-emergence as the Force Research Unit. The FRU reorganised, rearmed and redirected loyalist death squads and remains a key element in the collusion controversy.

A few months after the McGurk’s bombing, an undercover unit of the MRF attacked a group of unarmed Catholic civilians operating a checkpoint in west Belfast: 44-year-old Patrick McVeigh was killed and four others were injured. The unit used a Thompson submachine-gun in the attack, a weapon usually associated with the IRA at the time. A month later, the MRF mounted a similar attack against Catholic civilians, injuring four more people. The covert unit was exposed by the IRA in October 1972. No one has ever been charged with the murder of Patrick McVeigh.

In reference to the McGurk’s bombing, ‘John Black’ describes the motivation of the covert British Army unit as being “to discredit republican terrorists amongst the Catholic community by making the attack look like an IRA bomb”. Clearly, the MRF not only acted as a covert assassination squad but was also quite prepared to target Catholic civilians in its determination to discredit the IRA.

Speaking to the media after the families' discovery of the British Army memo of the day of the bombing, a relative of one of the victims, Ciarán MacAirt, called on the British Government to admit that the deliberate cover-up took place to divert attention away from the murder gang. “I believe the cover-up and black propaganda was part and parcel of the collusion involved in the murders of 15 people including my grandmother, Kitty Irvine.”

McGurk’s bomb relative gives damning verdict of police unit

2nd December 2008 Allison Morris, Irish News

 

THE campaigning family of a woman killed in the McGurk’s Bar bombing have called for the cold-case team tasked with investigating historic killings to be “dismantled”. This week sees the 37th anniversary of the no-warning bar bombing that claimed the lives of 15 people including three women and two children.


Only one person, UVF man Robert Campbell, was ever convicted in connection with the atrocity after admitting to being the getaway driver for the loyalist gang who set off the bomb (note of clarification: Campbell only admitted to being in the car).

Earlier this year Secretary of State Shaun Woodward issued an apology from the floor of the House of Commons to the families of the 15 innocent victims. The apology came following the uncovering of government papers which revealed British army efforts to distort the true facts surrounding the atrocity.

Despite eyewitness evidence pointing to loyalist involvement, British army officials implied the IRA had been making a bomb on the premises at the time which had exploded prematurely.

The bombing, which led to one of the largest losses of lives of the Troubles, is currently subject to reinvestigation by the PSNI Historical Enquiries Team (HET).

However, Ciaran MacAirt, grandson of Kitty Irvine (53) who died under the rubble of the destroyed bar, said the cold-case team has proved to be a “futile, costly exercise”.

He also said that victims’ families should not have high hopes of convictions arising from current HET investigations.

One aspect of the HET investigation that the Irvine family are unhappy with is the failure to question surviving members of the British military who were involved with the original McGurk investigation.

They have also asked for getaway driver Robert Campbell’s background prior to bombing to be made public including any known details regarding his criminal and military background.

“At best the HET investigation was nothing more than a powerless, desktop review – at worst another cynical attempt by the British government to suppress or manage information,” Mr MacAirt told The Irish News.

“Its slickness and professionalism is seen in nothing except marketing and PR.

“Other victims’ families should beware – central to this approach is for individuals within the HET to gain the confidence of vulnerable families who then dare to hope,” he said.

“In my opinion the HET will fail to deliver.

“Families risk being left with less than nothing, their original loss and sense of injustice simply exacerbated.

“The Historical Enquiries Team should be dismantled straight away.

“Disregarding any attempt to bury the past and all memories of our loved ones with it, we, the family of Kathleen Irvine, demand a truly international, independent and transparent investigation with powers of subpoena.”

British Minister apologizes for "preconceived ideas"!

17th July 2008 North Belfast News, Editorial

 

Security Minister Paul Goggins has apologised in the House of Commons to families of the McGurk’s Bar victims for false claims made by the British in the wake of the 1971 atrocity (see the weak apology here).

It is tempting to speculate on whether or when this development would have occurred were it not for the intervention of a Scottish MP whose great-uncle died in the blast. No matter – the families have welcomed the apology while at the same time repeating their calls for hidden files on the bombing to be made public, and we share their view that the apology is a significant development.

The murder of 15 innocents in December 1971 was an appalling massacre, even by the brutal standards of early-70s Belfast. But what made it all the more remarkable was the callous disregard that the British government showed to the injured and to the families of the dead.

The absence of sympathy or support was utterly chilling – the only thing that mattered to the British government was that the incident be used as a propaganda tool to blacken the name of republicans. The carefully considered decision to dub the bomb an IRA ‘own goal’ – when British officials knew full well that it was their proxy agents within the UVF who planted the device – was effectively the starting gun for an all-out campaign of black propaganda and cynical spin that was to continue for decades to come.

Were it just the case that the British government was coldly calculating and utterly lacking in humanity, then that would be bad enough – but those are features that have been typical of many governments all over the globe down through the years. What made the behaviour of the British in the McGurk’s case all the more reprehensible was that it was in effect a rejection of the very concept of law and order.

Effectively, no investigation was carried out. That set the tone for a sad and sorry litany of loyalist murders which were all carried out by men who operated in the knowledge that, at worst, they would not be pursued with any energy or vigour, or, at best, in the knowledge that they were acting with the active backing of the British state. Today we are only starting to deal with the agonising legacy of the British government’s abrogation of the rule of law.

It’s now well over 30 years since that awful night, so there’s no technical reason for the British to continue to withhold the files of the government of the day, the British army and the Stormont Joint Security Committee relating to McGurk’s. No technical reason, but clearly there are other compelling reasons why faceless bureaucrats don’t want the files to see the light of day and we have our own thoughts on what those reasons are.

There are many holes in the dyke of secrecy that the British have built between us and the truth. The McGurk families will not rest until the files are opened, that much is clear. So get the finger out, Mr Goggins.

Minister's "sorry" for false claims about the bombing of McGurk's Bar (Sam Lister, Belfast Telegraph, 15.7.08)

Northern Ireland's Security Minister last night apologised for government claims made almost 40 years ago over one of the most notorious bombings of the Troubles.

Paul Goggins' words on the 1971 McGurk's Bar bombing followed demands for an apology from the Government for the Army's role in covering up the incident. At the time, the security forces said it had been an IRA "own goal".

Speaking in the House of Commons last night, Mr Goggins said officials had allowed "perceptions and pre-conceived ideas to cloud the evidence". "We are deeply sorry, not just for the appalling suffering and loss of life that occurred at McGurk's Bar, but also for the extraordinary additional pain caused to both the immediate families and the wider community by the erroneous suggestions made in the immediate aftermath of the explosion as to who was responsible," he said.

The IRA was accused of being behind the attack on McGurk's bar in north Belfast that killed 15 people in 1971 when it had actually been carried out by a member of the UVF. Michael Connarty raised the attack in the Commons last night after the Historical Enquiries Team found military officials at the time had falsely blamed the IRA, despite evidence pointing to loyalist involvement.

The Labour MP, whose great uncle Phillip Garry was killed in the attack, has received a letter of apology from Secretary of State Shaun Woodward but wanted the Government to make the gesture formally to the families of the victims. He said: "I am not sectarian and I take no sides in this. The families of the victims deserve an apology from the British government for the propaganda that was put about by the Army."

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