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In
a welter of media activity today’s papers made
the codename Stakeknife synonymous with that of a
former republican prisoner, Freddie Scappaticci. Despite
briefings by British state security personnel that
Freddie Scappaticci had been spirited away to the
safety of some British military base, the man at the
centre of today’s media frenzy was still reported
to be in Belfast on Saturday. Ironically, one of the
papers making the allegations against him provided
interview and photographic evidence that he had not
yet fled the city.
Much
of the parrying of the media thrust from the republican
perspective has been conducted by Danny Morrison.
His approach has been prudently governed by caution.
He has expressed reluctance to accept media claims
that Stakeknife has been definitively unmasked until
substantial evidence is forthcoming. Few could fault
him for that. His hesitancy is based on experience
of the media which in the past alleged that a West
Belfast republican, Con McHugh, was engaged in an
English bombing campaign when it was conclusively
demonstrated that McHugh had in fact been signing
on the dole in Belfast. Morrison cannot be accused
of evasiveness by his use of such evidence. My own
response was exactly the same when asked earlier about
the Stakeknife allegations - I too referred to the
case of Con McHugh. And it can hardly be suggested
that myself and Morrison worked out an agreed line
on the matter. We are not in contact with each other.
Nor do our views on the general state of republicanism
coalesce. Our shared view on this matter has been
shaped by a republican experience of the media having
in the past been improperly eager to engage in speculation
without consideration to the facts of a particular
case or concern for the consequences of ‘name
and shame.’
In
other briefings to the media Sinn Fein have been attempting
to minimise the significance of Freddie Scappaticci.
Additionally, the RM Distribution described him as
an ‘unfamiliar individual.’ Seemingly, if
press interviews with republicans throughout the North
are to be believed, this has not offset the ‘shock
and awe’ experienced by them at the possibility
of the IRA having been so extensively compromised
by the existence of Stakeknife, whoever he is, within
its ranks. Nevertheless, Danny Morrison appears to
have taken considerable solace from the dismissal
of Scappaticci’s relevance when he claimed that
the man alleged to be Stakeknife was not close to
the leadership of Sinn Fein. Morrison’s concern
here is prompted by a desire to protect Sinn Fein
from unsubstantiated insinuations that Stakeknife
was one of its leaders who was central to guiding
the party’s peace strategy. There is no evidence
to suggest that Morrison is anything other than right
on this matter.
But,
unfortunately, from the point of view of the republican
leadership, this is a hurdle that is not going to
be easily crossed, shaken off and left behind in the
distance. In their considerations it matters not that
Freddie Scappaticci may be the much maligned victim
of media sensationalism and could in fact be totally
blameless. Of greater concern is a growing public
belief that Stakeknife has been central to the IRA’s
internal security department for the best part of
two decades.
Strategically
positioned in such a commanding height Stakeknife
would have had unmitigated access to the innermost
workings of the IRA. His ability to inflict havoc
on the organisation’s structural integrity and
its military capacity would have been unparalleled.
His information, passed as it is alleged to have been,
to the British cabinet would have enabled the latter
to formulate a dual track strategy aimed at emasculating
the IRA while simultaneously encouraging political
movement in a direction conducive to British state
designs rather than republican political objectives.
In this perspective, running Stakeknife was integral
to the overall British game plan of managing their
end of the peace process. When republicans confidently
assert that Stakeknife was not part of the republican
management of the Sinn Fein peace strategy, they are
most likely right. Yet they miss the point. He did
not have to constitute a physical presence in the
‘think tank’ nor function as an intellectual
lynchpin of its strategy - his information and the
people to whom he imparted it were all that was required
to effectively constrain Sinn Fein and narrow down
the party’s options.
Those
critics of the republican leadership who are tempted
to hope that the allegations pertaining to Stakeknife
may cause incalculable and insurmountable problems
for it will be disappointed. Despite the potentially
devastating effect on IRA morale the leadership will
weather the storm both in terms of its peace strategy
and its own hegemony within republicanism. Where it
will face difficulties is in the serious embarrassment
resulting from accusations that the British state
in collusion with a senior republican operative engaged
in activities that led to the deaths of many people
including IRA volunteers. Can the party continue to
occupy the moral high ground afforded it as a result
of the demands it has made on the British for transparency
on matters of undoubted collusion in the deaths of
people like Pat Finucane and at the same time thwart
or fail to support similar demands for clarity when
the victims were killed by the IRA?
The
families of many IRA volunteers including those executed
for allegedly informing will have every reason to
demand explanations. Can it now be said with any certainty
that they were not the expendable victims of British
state strategy who were put to death or set up for
death by a British agent deep within the heart of
the IRA? It is an appalling vista but one which the
republican leadership cannot be allowed to approach
with eyes wide shut.
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