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10. Communal Conflict and Death in Northern Ireland, 1969 to 2001
- Indiana University Press
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182 Communal Conflict and Death in Northern Ireland, 1969 to 2001 The conflict in Northern Ireland known as the Troubles started in the late 1960s and largely ended following the Good Friday or Belfast Agreement of 1998, although a decade later violence continued to occur, albeit at a much reduced level. The violence led to over 3,500 deaths. This could be argued to be a small figure, far outweighed in importance by other causes of death such as cancer and heart disease. Even as a percentage of the population it may seem small, coming to only 0.23 percent of Northern Ireland ’s population. If this seems like a small figure, however, its numerical significance can be shown by calculating what this would mean if it were applied to British or U.S. populations. A similar death rate in Britain would lead to approximately 130,000 deaths, which equates to the loss of a town like Brighton or Peterborough. In the United States, with its larger population , the equivalent would be approximately 500,000 deaths, comparable to total U.S. military deaths in World War II. From this perspective, it is clear that conflict and violence have led to significant numbers of deaths in Northern Ireland. Moreover, as we will demonstrate, conflict-related killings were geographically concentrated in certain places, including parts of Belfast, some sections of mid-Ulster, and rural areas near the border such as south Armagh. This meant that the direct traumatic impact of the conflict was disproportionately felt by a relatively few communities. This unevenness of experience has heightened and concentrated the local consequences of violence. Some communities are still struggling to overcome the legacy of historic conflict and ongoing sectarianism, itself a current cause of bad community relations and an overhang from the past. Other communities have only felt the results of violence indirectly. Thus, in addition to the geographies of religion, identity, and politics identified in much of this book, this chapter explores a directly linked geography of violent death. Not surprisingly, given the numerical weight of violent deaths and their ongoing legacy for families and communities, interpretations of the conflict are controversial. Understanding the conflict is made more difficult because it was not a simple and two-sided dispute between republicans (Catholics trying to create a united Ireland independent from Britain) and loyalists (Protestants in favor of preserving Northern Ireland as part of the U.K.). The British state was also a participant in the conflict and was not a neutral third party, although it often would have liked to have been seen in this light. Even the terms used to describe the major protagonists are sometimes contested. “Loyalist,” for example, tends to be used to describe Protestant paramilitaries but would not usually be used for unionist Protestants as a whole, reflecting the uneven social and spatial incidence of violence. 10 183 Communal Conflict and Death in Northern Ireland, 1969 to 2001 Similarly, “republican” tends to only refer to groups who were prepared to use violence to further their aim of a united Ireland rather than the more moderate opinions held by much of the nationalist Catholic population. In many respects the Troubles involved two major separate but related conflicts and several more minor ones.1 The first major conflict involved fighting between republicans and the security forces.2 The second conflict comprised loyalists primarily using violence against Catholic civilians.3 At the same time, paramilitaries on both sides used violence to defend their own communities from other paramilitaries. Additionally, feuding between different factions of both republicans and loyalists meant that not all violence was external—directed at members of the “other” group—but was sometimes internal—loyalists attacking other loyalists or republicans attacking other republicans. Civilians were often casualties in most, if not all, of these conflicts. Sometimes this was the result of them being bystanders , but at other times there was more direct targeting. Riots and other street disturbances often resulted in the security forces killing civilians, particularly Catholics. Paramilitaries on both sides killed civilians on the other side either as a result of deliberate targeting or simply because they were bystanders. Additionally, paramilitaries killed civilians on their own side, sometimes accidentally but also deliberately in acts of “internal policing .” For much of the conflict both loyalist and republican paramilitaries acted as the de facto police forces within their own communities, imposing discipline in areas where they believed that the state had no legitimacy or authority. These paramilitaries delivered their...