Bombings and the Irish struggle

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I do think that your corres. pondent gave in this article a very brief and blurred picture of the role of the IRA in Northern When the war developed out of the Civil Rights struggles, the IRA. as Captain Terrence O'Neill said, 'had ceased to exist' The Protestants had run the country for 50 years.

Protestant mobs backed by a heavily armed police force, 99% protestant, and the armed thugs known as the 8' Specials launched vicious attacks on the Catholic community.

After the burning of the Bogside where they met no resistance to their murderous actions, they returned the next night to finish the job.

Young and old

They were met by barricades manned by young 10.g Bernadette Devlin) and old alike.

Those people knew what to expect from the Orange mobs from the experience of their parents and grandparents-they know how to improvise, hence the petrol bombs, etc.

Even after the disbanding of the B' Specials the thugs were active again in the newly formed and better armed Ulster Defence Regiment or one of the Loyalist para-military groups such as the UVF, etc.

The recent case of the Shankill Butchers, who wore uniforms and carried arms supplied by HM Government, and the actions of the troops themselves shows the situation in which the IRA operates, in which it has grown and now commands the support it does in the Catholic areas.

A war of attrition is being carried out in the 6 counties and the British labour movement has by and large remained silent.

The IRA has appealed to the British trade unions and where has it got them?

As to the bombing in Ulster, the IRA have repeatedly said that they will make it impossible for the British to rule Ulster, and they echo the thoughts and hopes of the vast majority of catholics in the North.

They are not issued with arms or armoured vehicles by HM Government, nor do they hava frach hattalinne nf rain VE IGHT forcements flown in from England and Germany.

They do the best they can with what they can make themselves, and the stuff they make seems to improve as time goes Lynch I am sure that they aren't happy about civilian deaths in England or Ireland, and I'm sure that they must be very bitter about the Catholic dead in Ulster.

They have seen their people machine-gunned on their way to work, at work, on their way home from work, machine. gunned and bombed sitting having a drink.

I am sure they felt it when Marie Drum was shot in a hospital which was under military control. Her only crime was telling the British to go home and that if they didn't that the IRA would knock Belfast down stone by stone.

people like Mrs. Drum left and they can't shoot them all.

Your correspondent never mentioned the bombing of Dublin when 34 people died, or the role of the Littlejohn brothers in bank robbing and bombings and who their masters were in England.

'Bunch of killers'

Of course the irish people know that the Dublin bombing waş a joint Irish-British affair to make the IRA appear just a crazy bunch of killers and to give the Puppet government of Ireland an excuse to introduce their infamous Emergency Measures.

If you must criticise the tactics of the IRA you have a responsibility to stress the background • against which IRA actions in Britain take place.

You must give plenty of examples to drive home tó the British people the facts-that it is t he Prote stant mobs and the troi ›ps who are responsible for the , and that the IRA are fighting for the defence of the Catholic community.

Willie Moloney, Coventry As a regular reader of Socialist Press, Willie Moloney must have recognised that our sharp criticisms of some of the tactics employed by the IRA take place within the context of our unconditional support for their right co struggle for national liberation in Ireland, and our fight for the defeat of the British imperialist army.

It is of course absolutely correct for socialists to recognise the material conditions and the sheer weight of military repression that drives some of the most militant of the Catholic minority into armed struggle.

We stand unreservedly on the side of those that are forced to take up arms to defend the Catholic ghettoes from the vicious attacks of Loyalist murder squads, army gunmen and RUC/ UDR thugs.

But our support for such struggles does not oblige us to support every aspect of the tactics adopted by the republican

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SOCIALIST I Wednesday 20 'RESS, A monumental rise in the cost of living • faces the working class in the aftermath of the Tory Bulget, though only a fraction of these increases are openly admitted by Tory leaders.

Of course the raising of VAT to an across-the-board 15% will add dramatically to the cost of necessary household items.

But the Budget also included a series of measures that will increase local authority rates; increase the prices of gas, electricity and public transport; more than double prescription charges; further Howe increase the formidable cost of dental treatment; drive up mortgage rates and the cost of bank overdrafts; and add another increase to the soaring price of petrol.

This spate of price increases-which directly or indirectly affect every working class family-comes on top of existing rates of inflation-currently estimated at 10.3%.

Indeed the arrival of the Tories .in office has prompted every employer to whack in price increases, secure in the knowledge that they will not have to undergo even the token scrutiny of Labour's toothless old Price Commission.

Last week alone saw a staggering 463 price increases. This of course is long before the inflationary effects of the Budget or the rocketing price of oil, petrol oil, petrol and diesel begin to make themselves felt.

On top of all this, Agriculture Minister Peter Walker has announced the tactfully-delayed devaluation of the "Green Pound" which will raise prices of staple fresh foods-including butter, cheese, bacon and pork-and thus gradually drive up also a whole range of processed foods as well.

While • Treasury figures disputed whether the annual rate of inflation would turn out to be 16% or 172%, there can be no serious analyst who doubts that the figure must exceed 20%threatening to cut the buying power of workers' wages by one fifth!

Against this the ludicrously tiny token tax concessions to workers in Howe's Budget can be seen in their proper context-as a sop designed to head off an inevitable tide of militancy on wages in the coming months.

Clearly major wage ncreases are going to be necessary if workers are to catch up with inflation. But simply demanding fixed-figure increases in a period of runaway inflation offers no real guarantee of

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