South Armagh - "Bandit Country" (1976)

good evening tonight in panorama we see the security problem on the ground in south arma and we have an interview with the prime minister and we returned to some of the victims of the economic recession who last summer were leaving school one day and joining dole q's the next now a new scheme is offering youngsters a number of specially invented properly paid jobs nice work if you can get it as they say themselves we'll be asking how many people this job creation plan is really helping this afternoon in the house of commons harold wilson announced still more measures to tighten up security in south arma more checks more surveillance and we'll be talking to him later about both security and the political future of ulster there was going to have been an austin debate today anyway to talk about the future government of the province but events in our ma the least typical part of austria many ways have made it especially important south ammar down here is almost holy roman catholic and the border area with the south down here has been a provisional ira stronghold with ambushes sectarian killings ferocious gun battles across the border here last year sea spa really meant very little indeed merlin reese the minister for northern ireland called southam our bandit country as the sectarian killings of both protestants and catholics spiraled after the murder of five catholics one night a week ago today there was the white cross massacre when 11 protestants were lined up and shot at an isolated crossroads after these outrages the government took the view the immediate task in our mile was to protect lives michael charlton reports the sudden and dramatic reinforcement of troops has doubled the army's strength in south ammar in the last week it's too dangerous for the army to move in vehicles along the border roads of this county without presenting the ira with easy targets and thus propaganda victories wherever possible the army ghost i am colonel phillip davis commands the royal scots battalion in our community minds this area and of course extremely difficult to provide adequate protection to anybody of any persuasion living in these isolated areas there is a great deal of fear in this part of the united kingdom 100 people have been murdered since 1970 56 in the last six months the immediate interest in saitama is whether following the spate of sectarian butcheries along these lonely country roads it will mark the descent of ouster into an even more degrading chaos but amar also dramatizes afresh the issue of the border itself and to the mounting restiveness of the protestants small british towns like murray and cross mcgregor openly flaunt the republican flag we are able to operate it takes all the professional skills of the army to make it safe enough for the royals to constabulary to walk around the town where they are charged with maintaining law and order two of them have been gunned down here until last september the police had not been able to carry out any police duties for more than two years it's a catholic republican stronghold and only one protestant lives here it's been possible to reintroduce the police to their own town only with army security bristling like porcupine quills all around them in amar unlike the rest of the united kingdom there is no question of the population as a whole lining up behind the forces of law and order for that authority itself is the very thing which is so bitterly disputed in class mcgregor not only can the ira find safety it's in effective control of the population sergeant when you bring the eye you see constables out like this what sort of things are they asking in the shop for example well sometimes you come along the serve um road summonses for motoring offences uh that's mainly the task you need to come out meet the people talk to the people and just to show our presence on the ground the security forces in south ammar and particularly here get no help at all in arresting the drift to a state approaching anarchy both communities when under the thumb of the gunman seem determined to prove their incompatibility and that is the basic dilemma of the liberal approach in britain's present policy which expects compromise and reconciliation and so the security forces are thanked by no one and are either accused of falling down on security or violating civil rights oh police stations in northern ireland like the law itself are under siege 57 policemen have been killed since the ira began its latest campaign in 1970 like the troops who guard and support them as the civil power the police are lifted in and out by a helicopter in the fortified police barracks at cross mcgrenn and in the town colonel davis and the soldiers of the royal scots can maintain their military presence without difficulty but they make it clear that they can do nothing about the times republican allegiance and that is the political problem ira that is not to say that there are not enough minor operations which are actually planned carried out within terms of i think the really hard the army believes one of its principal security difficulties is the sanctuary available for the ira just across the border in the republic and there are just not enough soldiers to police the maze of roads and crossings the colonel has one battalion of 600 men how many more would be needed uh newton hamilton is another of south america's small towns it's been bombed so much that today it's a hollow shell of a place for respect for arms clearly spring the charge magazine load this royal scots patrol is about to set up a checkpoint on the roads outside the town said so many car bombs and the davis face in the town itself it's just unbelievable there's something like yeah one of every ten buildings left standing another nine are just rubble that's lying what do you think life is like for them well it can't be much i mean they're stopped at a barrier when they go out in the morning when they come over and work in the evening they'll stop their body and their car seats but just if you're over the adapter it doesn't worry them anymore it doesn't seem to anyway following the sectarian massacres of last week the most visible of the army's activities is a deluge of road checks throughout our mark the army is conducting these around the clock and during the week they've been stopping and searching up to five thousand vehicles a day these checks seldom if ever reveal anything but their psychological effects are judged to be important they don't just make it harder for the terrorists to move about but their principal intention is to reassure this battered population that something is being done the soldiers work the longest most dangerous eyes in the united kingdom when they're not out they're shut up inside the cramped barracks of their outposts if you're about 16 hours a day you know and that's every day and by the end of the first week you're feeling tired but in the second week you're feeling tired in the last week and it just goes over there you know so how many vehicles do you think you've checked and all the time you're being oh it's wonderful well if i got a couple of bob you know for everyone i'd be quite happy with that i've got paid for the other thing i'm putting in stopping them but the powers that be you know if you've got any ideas about the situation does it appear to be one to you that you can which you can help or make better or how does it seem to well we might be able to make it better because that's why they send us here in the first place i mean i hope we're making it better but just the objective being here is just feel how many people do you believe you're up against how many gunmen are there i think the israeli splits into two parts we believe that those responsible for the psychopathic sectarian killings in our area operating from the south probably in a group of about 12 strong as far as the straightforward ira terrorist is concerned it's very difficult to estimate exactly how many we're up against but i would believe a figure of around 30 would be fairly accurate not very strong colonel how important is it to you and your men here to have more cooperation than you're getting from across the border in the irish republic with the security forces there at the present time we have very good cooperation with the guard eye through the ruc the irish police that's right and i'm quite confident that really does work well does it work quickly enough for you it does work quickly and when we are operating actually in the border area we can talk to the guard eye on our radio sets and uh we certainly work together as far as the irish army are concerned regrettably at the moment there is no cooperation between ourselves and the irish army is it desirable and necessary that it should be in your view i think it's highly desirable and indeed necessary the official due in the republic has been that cooperation between the two armies is not necessary i don't see the point of it we have a mission to perform presumably they have a mission as well what their mission is i don't know and i don't wish to know we have a job to do we do it in our own way i'm satisfied that we do it well and i'm satisfied that we're doing it effectively and what about the sas squadron that you're said to be to be getting is it here as you know mr wilson has said that the sas will be operating in south armor and i'm afraid i cannot say any more about it but and what what specific capability can they do they have and and which they will employ that you haven't done so far uh very little that we haven't done so far but a particular role of theirs is covert surveillance which they're very expert at which is going to give you information that you haven't been able to get so far from the local community to a certain degree there one's got to be very careful about bringing in the local community here because in the south of our area it is strongly republican in sympathy and no security forces will get very much help from the local community in that area day and night in the wind and the rain of our ma the royal scots the oldest regiment in the british army are doing what they can to cope with britain's oldest problem trying to damp down bigger fires which might glow at any moment after last week's murders the army is now galloping all over this little turbulent patch of the united kingdom a great deal has been tried in northern ireland and nearly all of it has failed for many months there's been no british policy in the province other than to leave it to the people and politicians themselves to see what they could come up with and what they've come up with so far to start the new year is sectarian butcheries what we offer what we offer okay government policy allows the army only to respond to events it can't take preemptive action and the policy is under increasing attack for in the present political vacuum it's the gunman who seem to control and force the debate the freshly dug protestant and catholic graves in south america will not change the basic situation in the province their attitudes are only heartening but their principal political effect may prove to be in dublin and westminster where the more cooperation between them has been made possible by the widening ring of murder in our mind michael charlton in south armor in the commons tonight they're still debating northern ireland after the opening statement on security by mr wilson and one by mr reese on the future government of the province as expected mr reese announced that the government was reconvening the northern ireland convention for four weeks from february the third he'd be asking them to consider a white paper to be published soon which called for more widespread acceptance throughout the community of some proposed system of government and some form of acceptable partnership and participation mr reese stood firm on british presence in northern ireland he said a british withdrawal would be a grave mistake it would lead to violence on an ever greater scale equally he said a united island is not in the gift of this government there's been a generally quiet reaction from northern ireland so far indeed one of the leading protestant paramilitary organizations the uda went so far as to welcome the government statements michael charlton has just talked to the prime minister at 10 downing street prime minister despite the tribute you paid to the dublin government in the house this afternoon do you believe that what is happening in our mind over the border could be better contained with coordinated help from the irish army and is it a matter of regret to you that that so far has not been possible we are satisfied with the big improvements that have been developing including those worked out by the secretary of state for northern ireland with the southern ireland minister of justice as recently as last thursday that is police cooperation and of course it can be flashed through and i think this is going to improve the problem about the their army their army has a different kind of role from ours uh traditionally they have no legal powers under their acts of parliament uh to enable them to get involved in anti-terrorist activities of this kind yes i think it could help if they had those powers though what we are in fact very pleased about is that they are and i hope this will go through carrying legislation which will enable them to put on trial in the south people who commit crimes like those ghastly brutalities last week uh that you went over to inquiring tool uh following which the perpetrators then sort of cross the border perhaps a few minutes later now they can be put on trial in the south under this new legislation but the army made a pretty strong point i think in the film that assistance from the irish army coordinated help would be would be assist of assistance to them and i wonder whether you feel it it would regret it's not possible it would i don't think there's much prospect of it at the moment but we have greatly stepped up the cooperation which can be within a matter of seconds now between the police forces on both sides now prime minister looking back over the last 12 months i think many people must be very perplexed and baffled by what's happened you you've bent over backwards in buying time in northern ireland you you've ended detention and yet we've had a ceasefire in which 246 people have been killed and 1600 injured in that period hasn't the present policy of buying time about come to an end oh we haven't had a ceasefire nothing to do with us the uh ira provisionals announced they were having a ceasefire and there wasn't much sign of it last week in the scenes we've just witnessed on the film in fact there were considerably fewer deaths last year and many of those were well the um ultra protestant shooting it out with the ultra catholics and sometimes fighting within the two so-called religious communities i think what's going on is a very big perversion of what all of us understand uh by religion uh what has been i think very successful i showed getting people up in court getting them found guilty and sentenced by the courts themselves that's far better than discretionary internment or detention by the secretary of state but you have tried a very great deal as i say tension ended you've bent over backwards to uh to remove the principal obstacle as far as the irish nationalists were concerned and yet the province comes up with massacres to begin the new year so i mean again i ask you hasn't the present policy just about come to an end no no indeed what we are doing and tightening up all the time has been going on we i announced in parliament today seven broad areas where we're really toughening it up in addition to sending the spearhead battalion to county armor and of course the the sas uh whose role was just touched upon in your interview and uh neither the colonel quite right in or i was gonna say any more about it than that but you rightly said in the province you see these murders were on both sides the first five was funerals we saw all were moved by it on television last week those are five catholics shot in the home the following day there was a vicious reprisal and ten protestants peacefully on the way home from work the amar problem is a special one that is why we are treating it as a special emergency area with very special and all the time tightening uh security and military controls with the daily mirror which is a strong supporter of the labour party and the government's juno came out this week and said that you had no fresh thinking um throughout this last few months and that the only realistic course for you to take now is to set a timetable and hand over inevitably to a protestant state that perhaps in the north i mean are you contemplating anything like that with public opinion polls supporting whatever you're saying that is in fact what the ira demanding if if we had said publicly in the hearing of the ire ira on radio television or statement in parliament that we are going to pull out our troops in a measurable period of time they would have said this is what we're after and then of course all hell would have been let loose when we carried it out but there are two communities the extremists of both of them are utterly evil and it is the duty in a united kingdom which we are of the state of the government of the security forces to protect the lives of peaceable people i think one gain last year very clear game uh and this is why things have been a bit different in some parts of northern ireland apart from county yamaha has been that more and more for example of the catholic population but not only then i've got sick to the teeth of gunmen and are not providing them help not providing them a shelter to go to when they're being chased by the security force who are trying to arrest them but um and we've got to win mines here as well as well as uh but there's not much evidence that's having any effect is it you see the general structure it is because in fact the ira for example last year were much more confined and concentrated had to rely much more on going down to the south but i just would like to return to the principal thrust of the policy is that to leave it to them they must come up with a solution in the province themselves and yet day after day they prove that they can't things seem to be getting worse and we're getting into i think you've got to divide this there are two things i said in parliament it doesn't matter what political or constitutional solution somebody thinks up or agrees on if we can't if we don't get the security situation right by enabling people to move freely without the danger being shot but equally all the security measures in the world are not going to provide an answer just by the repression we have to try to do suppression but here is a challenge until last year successive governments we strongly supported the conservatives they've supported us equally fairly we're trying to get a solution that we worked out in westminster last year it all broke down 1974 out of the middle of 74 so we said all right get on with it you elect yourself a convention produce an answer they've produced one now and parliament at this moment is debating the solution they put up and we've asked them to meet again and try and iron out some of the trying to remove some of the bugs in that proposal we'd be glad if they can produce a solution because there's one thing about ulster uh whether they're catholics protestants ira uda uvf they're not gonna have westminster telling them what to do on the other hand as part of the united kingdom we can't allow anyone to impose a solution now which is not fair to all communities but are you prepared to to rule and impose a solution in the wider interests of civilized water in this country and in the world we've tried to impose one we're now trying to we're giving them a chance to work it out they say let's have another solution well all right let's see how that goes i think we're right to do that meanwhile we are uh in a very determined way tightening up security particularly in this area the difficulties of which were very very clear very clear to me from this film and we're doing this to get the security situation as far as possible naive proof and foolproof but isn't the reality that your face now was an indefinite period of direct rule and shouldn't you be alerting the people of this country uh to the consequences it isn't necessarily a new diary campaign more deaths it isn't necessarily the case that will be a long period of their rule we want to see them have some kind of government of their own province subject to the overriding power of westminster and the overriding authority of the united killed kingdom parliament and government uh we've given them a chance to work out a solution it's too early to say well they'll succeed in getting one that can be accepted by organizations but isn't that just a a tactical um position that you've taken i mean do you look beyond the next month or six weeks to a solution beyond that i'm well known for always looking uh beyond their tactical solutions but that didn't stop me spending nearly all of last week dealing with the immediate tactical solution uh which was highlighted by those brutal murders last week merlin wreath secretary of state said in the house this afternoon united ireland he said is not in the gift of this parliament does that mean that despite all this um the intransigence of the protestants that you're still not prepared to rule that out sometimes in opposition we discuss the possibility there's one thing perfectly plain to me the uh southern irish parliament the nice government wouldn't seem dead with a lot in the north as they regard them uh certainly this is not a practical proposition it's not one that any party in britain would want to impose unless it were accepted i don't rule it out as a solution in the millennium and i hope for rather shorter period than that someday but it is not part of our present policy the north doesn't want it big majority do not want it in the north and many catholics don't the south certainly don't want it they only wish they could be a few thousand miles further away from the people in the north and probably vice versa prime minister thank you prime minister talking to michael charlton

Channel: nh6milhistory

Views: 2,164,482

Keywords: northern ireland, ulster, the troubles, united kingdom, british army, irish republican army, ira, provisionals, pira, terrorism, harold wilson, army air corps, bandit country, nighthawk006, nh6

Id: wcS2LBx3nZ4

Length: 28min 29sec (1709 seconds)

Published: Tue Jan 29 2013

Reddit Comments

[u/Moveover33]

Interesting snapshot of that time and I respect how everyone is so well-spoken but there sure isn't any combat footage in this report.

[u/Quarterwit_85]

Bloody interesting from beginning to end, but there wasn't an ounce of combat in it.

However a few things...

1) Fucking hell well trained soldiers can move quickly when they're not carrying eight million ton of gear.

2) Fuck being in the RUC and patrolling with a No4.

3) Fuck carrying 1st gen night vision optics.

4) Why aren't they wearing protective headgear? They're patrolling with a MAG58 but still wearing cloth caps?

[u/REDFOX1916]

Living here today is much changed

[u/HyperU2]

The correct year was even in the title.

[u/SeannoG]

Does anyone know of any good books about The Troubles? Specifically the 60's and 70's era

[u/Felixader]

Holy shit, an interview with a politician that is longer then five sentences and with a journalist that isn't afraid to ask the same hard question over and over again if necessary.

[u/Scutterbum]

I didn't see one second of combat footage. Where in the video is it?

[u/bfbabine]

Interesting camo covers on their L1A1s.

[u/Wild_Hunt]

*1976