Like
Pol Mac Liam, I too lost relatives and friends in
circumstances similar to his during the long Irish-British
war. Thus I fully empathise with him on the murder
of his uncle. But, after long consideration over
whether to respond to his unfounded accusations
(April 8), I decided I must. I also dislike his
lack of contextualising between his uncle's and
Robert McCartney's murders.
A more open-minded reading of my March
25 letter would show Mac Liam that it is a critique
of the conniving and duplicitous handling by Sinn
Fein/IRA (SF/IRA) leaders of my nephew's slaughter,
and the omissions and insinuations in their Easter
statement. (Henceforth I refuse to play SF/IRA's
game of pretending they are two separate entities.)
Mac
Liam appears to resent me quoting a phrase, "our
patriot dead", from the Easter statement. But
to speciously declare my use of the quote demonstrates
that the McCartney family is trying to "demonise
the republican community" is utterly illogical.
Most, if not all, family members, immediate and
extended, are themselves republicans, as are countless
numbers of our supporters. Such a groundless allegation
implies that Mac Liam is engaged in the odious smearing
of the McCartneys, as well as cheap political point
scoring at the expense of a family that lost a much
loved member at the hands of knife-plunging IRA
butchers.
Mac
Liam seems particularly irked by my words, "most
fought and died, perhaps misguidedly, for what they
believed was a just cause." I stand over those
words, especially as I reflect on the young IRA
men and women lying in cold graves across the North
and beyond, while their leaders, largely responsible
for guiding them there, subsequently donned the
equivalent of Armani suits and began oppressing
their own communities. So, while the cause may have
been just, the guiding and outcomes were anything
but.
On
his claim, "many have tried and all have failed
to criminalise" the "republican cause",
I wonder where he has been lately. The present Republican
leadership is managing perfectly well to criminalise
a once honourable organisation in various nefarious
ways, including bank robbing, and smuggling, in
addition to admitting into its ranks sadists and
psychopaths who believe their membership empowers
them to intimidate, mutilate and slaughter their
own with impunity, a belief unfortunately verified
by events.
Since
organisation, membership and cause are inseparable,
the cause is tainted by association, a consequence
I abhor; some of my own relatives are dead patriots.
Mac
Liam states I "claim to KNOW which side our
patriot dead would be cheering for". I wrote,
"I THINK I know …" (my emphasise.).
I do not claim to speak for dead patriots, but do
believe they would be on the just side.
Turning to contextualisation, Robert's slaughter
did not, like Mac Liam's uncle's, occur during the
war years, but during a supposed new era of "peace,"
10 years into the supposed IRA "ceasefire."
He
was slaughtered, not by British forces, but high
ranking IRA "men"; members of an organisation
he viewed as nationalist/republican protectors,
allegedly aided by SF election workers; the party
to which he gave lifetime allegiance.
He
was slaughtered in full view of 72 witnesses, mostly
SF/IRA members and supporters. None has yet provided
an iota of information helpful in bringing the psychopathic
butchers of a SF voter to justice for what was,
in SF/IRA leaders' words, "a crime".
Even
while plotting to undermine the women's justice
campaign, SF/IRA leaders tried to exploit them for
political capital, alongside their bungled damage
limitation exercise. If SF/IRA leaders are 100%
behind the six women, as declared, I'll believe
Gerry Adams' ridiculous claims that he was never
in the IRA!
As
my niece, Catherine, put it, "What took place
on the night of the 30th January and subsequent
days were Murder, Collusion and Cover-up - crimes
usually associated with British forces, now being
carried out by republicans.
To
date republican representatives have responded to
Robert's murder in the same fashion as British forces;
smears, demonisation and attacks, anything but the
truth. The question every republican and nationalist
should be asking themselves is not why this family
is seeking justice, but why this family is being
denied justice?"
Perhaps
there are more similarities between both the two
atrocities, and British and Republican leaderships,
than first appeared.
