When it's Almost Spring in Belfast

On March 7, the Real IRA, a splinter of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, shot and killed two British soldiers as they retrieved a pizza from a deliveryman outside the Massereene army barracks in Antrim, about 25 minutes northwest of Belfast. Forty-eight hours later, another IRA splinter group, the Continuity IRA, killed a police officer as he responded to a call in Craigavon, a town about 40 minutes southwest of Belfast.

[shameless plug, the preceding summary was excerpted from an article written mostly about me by the lovely Megan Hupp in the St. Patrick's edition of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel]

Since then, there's been a 'security crackdown,' which in my experience so far has meant getting stopped in a taxi going home up the Falls Road and it getting searched, and having an increased amount of helicopters circling overhead.

It has also meant an increase in the rhetoric of politicians condemning the attack and firmly placing the 'dissidents' not only outside of the peace process - where they place themselves anyway because they don't agree with the direction it's taken - and outside of any kind of dialogue, steadfastly refusing to engage with those with differing opinions on any terms.

Do I agree with the violence? Absolutely not. Do I understand why it happened? Yes. Look, all you have to do to understand is read some of the statements from 'Republican' leaders (read: Sinn Féin, whom these attacks are REALLY indicting, not the Unionists) to understand the kind of dispossession, detachment, frustration, and anger experienced in some segments of the traditional republican populations. There's also talk that there's absolutely no support for these factions within the Republican community - then how do they have safe houses to disappear into afterwards, how did they have the space to plan the attacks?

The current political climate and the normalisation of the separation of the 2 main traditions here created the space for this violence to occur.

Another factor in this is the ombudsman's decision to reintroduce the SAS to Northern Ireland. I haven't the finger-typing power at the end of a long work day to explain the whole thing, but if you're interested, read 'The Dirty War,' by Martin Dillon. Excellent expose of British and IRA tactics during the Troubles; very disturbing. It leads you to wonder where this latest round is heading.

written by  ebienelson on March 23, 2009 from Belfast, United Kingdom
from the travel blog: "She is the Belle of Belfast City..."
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