Tag: martin galvin

Belated truth on MRF proves that republican claims were right!!!

Letter which was published in today’s Irish News – Monday December 16 2013 – Martin Galvin, Bronx, New York.

FERGAL Hallahan was more right than he imagines (November 25) about the derision accorded anyone with the temerity to accuse Britain of deploying a Military Reaction Force (MRF) of plain-cloths British troopers who gunned down unarmed nationalists using non-military weapons.

British State Sponsored Murder

During my years as both editor of the Irish People weekly American newspaper and national director of Irish Northern Aid, I was tasked with presenting such facts to the American public and especially congressmen. The contention we republicans repeatedly made was that the crown had sent out the MRF and later wiped British fingerprints from their killings by shifting from the MRF to having the shots fired by loyalist proxies. This tactic had obvious advantages, including avoiding British army ccasualties like those inflicted by the IRA at the Four Square Laundry. It allowed the British plausible deniability. Collusion in murders carried out by loyalists could be denied outright and blamed on a cadre of crown force bad apples, no matter how much targeting intelligence, agent control or safe passage the British had supplied. Britain’s answer to these charges never changed. British officials would declare, self-righteously that “Her Majesty’s government” would never stoop to deploy such a unit. The British army ‘yellow card’ rules were sacrosanct, they scoffed and this code was rigorously applied whenever British troopers opened fire.

These sanctimonious British denials were believed by the public, politicians and journalists to the extent that this handpicked death squard remained largely unknown to the public. Panorama’s Britian’s Secret Terror Force proves that republicans were right about Britain’s deployment of a terror force, the MRF. It proves that those high-ranking British officials who denied that the crown would stoop to such tactics were either deliberately misled by the crown or deliberately misleading others on the crown’s behalf. Members of this British terror squad have no worries that they will face justice for killing unarmed Irish civilians like Daniel Rooney or Patrick McVeigh. They freely boast of their misdeeds, for the television cameras. Confident that they enjoy a selective immunity and impunity, not granted to republicians like Gerry McGeough, Seamus Kearney or John Downey.  We republicans were right about Britain’s tactical shift from the MRF terror force to doing their ‘dirty war’ work through loyalist proxies. Must we await another documentary before people face the facts about Britain’s complicity with loyalist killers in collusion murders?

With many thanks to: Martin Galvin.

Related articles

Related articles

BRITISH INTERESTS BEST SERVED BY PRESENT ARRANGEMENTS !

 This letter appeared in the Irish News today and I thought I would share it, it’s written by – Martin Galvin– New York.

WHY would the British ever heed Brian Feeney’s call to Wipe the Slate Clean ( March 27 ) much less risk any honest truth process, when BBritish interests are better served by the present arrangements ? The ‘ unspoken amnesty ‘ which Brian Feeney says veteran republicans were led to expect, has been twisted by the British into a selective one-sided immunity or ‘ impunity ‘ for Crown Forces.

221771_432865913468562_1040716410_n

Britain may dole out the occasional hard won apology burt need not arrest uniformed members of the British army or Constabulary (RUC), who carried out or colluded in sanctioned murders, which Cameron terms Unjustifiable Killings. The British have systematically stonewalled the families of collusion murder victims, like that of Pat Finucane among so many others. Some bereaved families will count it a victory to see an inquest, much less see the culprits in the dock. Even Saville stopped at scapegoating the troopers who carried out the orders on Bloody Sunday.

What makes anyone beleive the British would ever risk, much less encourage, any independant truth search which required troopers and constabulary (RUC) members to lead us back up the chain of command and indict those who gave orders or set policies ? On the other hand, quarter-century-old charges can be unearthed to send inconvenient republicans, like Gerry McGeough to Maghaberry, should they dare speak too strongly against such injustices during an election campaign. Britain’s lateset innovation of internment by licence & remand, today practised upon Marian Price and Martin Corey, was devised to threaten others. For example, should Gerry McGeough stand for election to Stormont or a council seat and campaign against British injustice, will constabulary (PSNI/RUC ) members await him at the polls claiming secret evidence to revoke his licence ? Why would they ever cede exclusive control and risk a genuine independent search for truth ? Surely those who negotiated such terms for republicans ( $hame £ein ) did not see this coming. Surely they have a moral duty to do more to undo these twisted terms than sitting still for them at Stormont.

Related articles

Free Gerry McGaough campain letter

MARTIN GALVIN
ATTORNEY AT LAW

SHERIDAN AVENUE
BRONX, NEW YORK,

G McGee claims in his (21 APRIL) polemic against Gerry McGeough that “anyone can be convicted for actions prior to 1988.” Perhaps he could explain to the families and friends of victims of Bloody Sunday, the Ballymurphy Massacre, Nora McCabe, Majella O’Hare and a long list more, when “anyone” in the British Army or RUC will be convicted for any of these “unjustified and unjustifiable killings”. Perhaps he could explain to Sam Marshall’s family among others why anyone alleging collusion by crown forces seems to be stonewalled. Perhaps Republicans should unite in anger against what increasingly appears to be an undeclared policy of selective immunity for line of duty killings by British Army or RUC constabulary, instead of dividing over apparent selective prosecutions of Republicans.

Many years ago Republicans rethought a position of not recognizing British courts and empowered solicitors such as Pat Finucane for one, to fight for justice with every legal weapon that British courts permitted. Gerry McGeough tried to force the British to count the years he served in German and American prisons on IRA charges to meet the early release threshold. His solicitors cited more than a dozen prominent Republicans released in this fashion. Why should any of these prominent Republicans lose standing, as McGee claims, because the British name such credit a “Prerogative of Mercy?

Finally and sadly, McGee asks what Sinn Fein could do, beyond making muted representations which are apparently disregarded or dismissed out of hand by the British. Once the party would have flooded the streets in protest against injustice and called upon the SDLP to withdraw from offices which bound them in complicity to the policies of the British administration. Now it would seem that those British officials who directed imprisonment for Gerry McGeough, Marian Price and Martin Corey, or the naked brutality of Maghaberry strip-searches have little to fear.

Slan

MARTIN GALVIN

Related articles
%d bloggers like this: