Newsmedianews | Northern Ireland - a perspective by Sean Mc Aughey

by Sean Mc Aughey
Sean Mc Aughey is a former University of Ulster Student's union President and has worked in public relations.
He is now a freelance journalist and a regular contributor to the Blanket, which describes itself as “a journal of protest and dissent”.
His material is published unedited on this page.
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At Least 32% of U.S. Mass Shooters Trained to Shoot by U.S. Military
10 May 2023; posted by the editor - General, Features, International, United States

By David Swanson
It’s been two years since I wrote on this topic. At that time, at least 36% of U.S. mass shooters had been trained by the U.S. military. Since then, a grand total of nobody at all has written on the topic.

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Tags: mass shootings, David Swanson, United States

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Reaper Madness: Counterproductive Drone Wars printable version

09 Nov 2015: posted by the editor - Features, International

By Doug Noble, Upstate (NY) Drone Action Coalition
“Our entire Middle East policy seems to be based on firing drones,” Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency, told The Intercept. “They’re enamored by the ability of special operations and the CIA to find a guy in the middle of the desert in some shitty little village and drop a bomb on his head and kill him.”

Targeted killing by drones remains the US weapon of choice, famously called “the only game in town”, by former CIA director Leon Panetta. This despite a decade of worldwide moral outrage over its overwhelming civilian casualties, violations of international law, disregard for national sovereignty, dismissal of due process, and continuing secrecy. The Obama administration recently announced that the drone killing program will in fact be increased by 50 % in the coming two years.

Now government documents leaked to the Intercept show conclusively that the US drone program kills thousands of innocents on bad intelligence and careless targeting while being falsely portrayed as a program of impeccable planning and precision execution. The recently leaked “Drone Papers” reveal the extent of willful ineptitude in US drone operations in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, which rely on systematically faulty intelligence and astonishing inaccuracies in identifying targets. These revelations only further confirm what many of us already knew about the appalling failure, relentless deception and criminal lethality of the US drone program.

But it’s even worse. Careless execution and public distortion are one thing. If the US were in fact relying on a proven military technology and strategy to defeat terrorists and “keep America safe”, despite setbacks and innocent lives lost, there are those who could justify the cost.

But what is perhaps most insidious of all is the fact that many studies long available to military planners have shown decisively that the use of weaponized drones in counterinsurgency and counterterrorism efforts is both ineffective and counterproductive. Even more, the historical record and recent research shows quite clearly that the “decapitation” strategy driving such drone use—the assassination of high value targets—has itself been both unsuccessful and counterproductive in defeating insurgent or terrorist organizations.

So the drone warriors have known all along it wouldn’t work: that killer drones and kill lists would slaughter thousands of civilians but never defeat terrorists. They’ve known this conclusively from decades of military experience and volumes of research studies. Yet they continue to do it anyway, ever more expansively, ever more mindlessly. Why? Because they can (and because they have no Plan B).

Weaponized drones were in fact first proposed by the US military in 2000, prior to 9/11, as a means to both target and kill, with the same aircraft, the Number One high value target, Osama Bin Laden. For this purpose, Predator surveillance drones were fitted with Hellfire missiles still available from the Gulf War. The name “Hellfire,” an acronym for “heliborne-launched fire-and-forget missile”, was originally designed as an “anti-tank guided missile (AGM)”, somehow now redeployed for remote precision killing of individuals, or, as one Air Force article called it, “warhead to forehead”.

These weaponized drones have been used ever since, as the weapon of choice in US operations all over the Middle East and North Africa. Now, given all the moral and legal controversy surrounding their use, some have begun to question if these weaponized drones have even been effective in defeating terrorists. As Los Angeles Times columnist Doyle McManus asked recently, “Are we winning the drone war?”

It’s hard to know since, as a recent Stimson Center Task Force on US Drone Policy report explains, “after more than 10 years of use, the U.S. drone program remains so shrouded in secrecy that we do not have enough information to make an educated assessment of its effectiveness … Without a clear understanding of the drone program’s strategy, goals, and metric(s) used for evaluation, … experts … cannot make informed assessments regarding the program’s efficacy.”

The Stimson Report observed that “on 23 May 2013, President Obama delivered a major speech at the National Defense University in which … he pledged to continue the difficult task of ensuring that the use of lethal UAVs is .. strategically sound.’ The Report’s authors recommend that the US government conduct a thoroughgoing evaluation of the impact of UAV strikes on terrorist organizations, with regard to capabilities, threats currently posed, morale and recruiting, as well as their impact on public opinion, litigation, and defense policy.” Nothing is expected to be forthcoming any time soon.

President Obama did provide a metric of drone effectiveness in a major speech in 2014: “Our actions should meet a simple test: We must not create more enemies than we take off the battlefield.” Though hardly a robust definition of victory, even by this measure, given the growing numbers of new recruits in Al Qaeda, ISIS and other groups, it would appear that the US strategy has been decidedly ineffective. But since there are no clear numbers from the Obama administration of enemies killed and new recruits created, this metric of effectiveness is decidedly unhelpful.

Historical precedent and longstanding military doctrine, though, offer insight into the potential effectiveness of Obama’s drone war. What follows is a brief sampling of conclusions drawn by research scholars, both within and without the military, who have examined the historical record and the military evidence. These scholars all agree that drone strikes are useless to defeat counterinsurgency and counterterrorism, but they all concede as well that the US military will continue into the future to rely on them anyway, as “the only game in town.”

James A. Russell, a researcher at the Department of National Security Affairs at the Naval Postgraduate School, concludes in his article “The False Promise of Aerial Policing,” that “the idea of aerial policing is dangerous and deeply flawed, yet mysteriously it has become a panacea for states seeking to apply force in the modern era…. Aerial policing is an intellectual and strategic house of cards built on shaky foundations … represents the triumph of tactics over strategy, turning fundamental truths about the nature of war on their head.”

Aerial policing grew out of theories of airpower that the airplane had revolutionized war by making it unnecessary for armies to clash on the ground and destroy one another. Instead, they argued, an opponent’s armies, his means of waging war, and even his will to fight could be destroyed from the air via strategic bombardment. The conduct of this strike war, they argued, reduced operations and warfare to an engineering problem of identifying and striking targets.

World War II was the great laboratory to try out these ideas, as the United States and Britain sought to pound Germany into submission via strategic bombing. The lessons of the war for strategic bombardment, however, went unlearned. The allied bombers missed most of what they were aiming at, did not end Germany’s means to wage war, and did not convince the German people to give up the fight.

The mythology of the airpower advocates endured through the Vietnam War, despite another failure of airpower to achieve strategic effect. More recently, America’s special forces set about creating an insurgent targeting methodology that had its roots in the engineering approach employed by the airpower advocates. The targeting methodology was eagerly seized upon by airpower enthusiasts to assassinate suspected terrorists around the world with America’s new generation of robots in the sky.

America’s strategic retreat from Iraq and Afghanistan after 15 years is a monument to the failure of … clever tactics championed by counterinsurgency advocates and their precise targeting methods. Yet America’s response to this strategic failure has been to double down, showering more money and responsibility on the Special Forces and similar organizations that achieved no positive strategic effect in battle over the last 15 years.

James Igoe Walsh, U.S. Army War College Strategic Studies Institute, wrote a comprehensive article entitled, “The Effectiveness of Drone Strikes in Counterinsurgency and Counterterrorism Campaigns”.

He concludes that “… drones are at most, weak substitutes for traditional counterinsurgency operations. While drones have the capability to punish and deter insurgent organizations, they do not alone contribute to the establishment of effective state authority in direct and meaningful ways, which … requires large numbers of ground forces and civilians to provide services to, and gain intelligence from, the local population.”

The groups targeted by drones operate in areas where the United States and the national government cannot or will not engage “on the ground” in large numbers. Drones are most useful in precisely such areas, since they allow the United States to project force when it and the national government have few other options

But the absence of boots on the ground makes it more difficult to gather human intelligence on the activities of militant groups that can be used to target drone strikes. Ungoverned spaces also can allow armed groups to proliferate and form complex and short-lived alliances that are difficult for outsiders to understand, increasing the challenge of targeting only militants who oppose the United States. Drones, then, are most useful for counterterrorism in precisely those settings where the challenges of counterterrorism are the greatest, and the ability to collect intelligence is the weakest. This means that the bar for the successful use of drones to counter terrorism is set quite high.… The evidence from the most sustained campaign to rely on drone strikes to deter and punish insurgent organizations in Pakistan suggests this technology has limited capacity to achieve these objectives. Despite these limitations, drone technology seems very likely to spread both within the U.S. Armed Forces, the armed forces of other countries, and even insurgent organizations.

Philosopher and historian Gregoire Chamayou, in his book A Theory of the Drone, cites a 2009 op-ed by David Kilcullen, influential US military advisor on counterinsurgency, which called for a moratorium on drone strikes in Pakistan. Kilcullen viewed them as dangerously counterproductive, driving the population into the arms of extremists. Kilcullen drew direct parallels between the current drone program and the infamous failures of earlier French and British aerial bombardment campaigns in Algeria and Pakistan. He also opposed the technological fetishism of drone use, which “displays every characteristic of a tactic—or, more accurately, a piece of technology,—substituting for a strategy.”

Gregoire notes that “air force strategists are well aware of the objections that theorists never fail to raise, …that what is being presented as a new strategy has already been tried out, with remarkably disastrous results.” He cites in military doctrine the “truism that COIN is about boots on the ground and that airpower is counterproductive.”

Gregoire observes,”Dronized manhunting represents the triumph… of antiterrorism over counterinsurgency. According to this logic, the total body count and a list of hunting trophies take the place of a strategic evaluation of the political effects of armed violence. Successes become statistics.” Never mind that drone strikes multiply new enemies. The strategic plan of drone counterinsurgency now seems to be that an armada of killer drones is capable of eliminating new recruits as fast as they are created: “as soon as a head grows back, cut it off,” in a pattern of ongoing eradication. This assessment coincides with the Stimson report conclusion that “the availability of lethal UAVs has fueled a ‘whack-a-mole’ approach to counterterrorism.”

The whistleblower source for the Drone Papers concludes: “The military is easily capable of adapting to change, but they don’t like to stop anything they feel is making their lives easier, or is to their benefit. And this certainly is, in their eyes, a very quick, clean way of doing things. It’s a very slick, efficient way to conduct the war, without having to have the massive ground invasion mistakes of Iraq and Afghanistan. … but at this point, they have become so addicted to this machine, to this way of doing business, that it seems like it’s going to become harder and harder to pull them away from it the longer they’re allowed to continue operating in this way.”

In addition to research on drone killings, some scholars have been researching the strategy underpinning US drone strikes, namely, the “decapitation” strategy (our own manner of beheading the enemy). This strategy assumes that the assassination of leaders and other key players—so-called “high value targets” (HVTs)—within an enemy insurgent or terrorist group will eventually defeat the group itself.

Scholars, though, come to the opposite conclusion.

RAND researcher Patrick B. Johnston, in his article “Does Decapitation Work? Assessing the Effectiveness of Leadership Targeting in Counterinsurgency Campaigns,” notes:

“Regardless of whether a government’s adversary is a state, a terrorist organization, or a guerrilla insurgency, the scholarly opinion has been that high-value targeting is ineffective at best and counterproductive at worst. … The data also show conclusively that killing or capturing insurgent leaders is usually not a silver bullet, since governments were only around 25% more likely to defeat insurgencies following the successful removal of top insurgent leaders.

In his review of the relevant literature, “The ABCs of HVT: Key Lessons from High Value Targeting Campaigns Against Insurgents and Terrorists,” Matt Frankel of the Brookings Institution, concludes:

“The final implication for the United States is that it is vital that any HVT campaign take place as part of a larger strategy, not merely as an end to itself. Remote strikes and targeted raids need to be combined with broader operations, both military and non-military, to achieve maximum effectiveness.

The United States will face an uphill battle in utilizing HVT campaigns successfully, since it will always be operating as a third-party force. If the goals of the host government and the third-party force are divergent, there is little chance for success.

It is clear that as long as Al Qaeda remains a global force, U.S.-sponsored HVT operations will continue. But if the United States continues to conduct HVT operations in a vacuum, …it will continue to be doomed to failure.”

Professor of International Affairs Jenna Jordan, concludes in her article “Why Terrorist Groups Survive Decapitation Strikes”

“The targeting of terrorist leaders affiliated with al-Qaida has been the cornerstone of U.S. counterterrorism policy since 2001. ..Targeting al-Qaida is not likely to result in organizational decline or long-term degradation its bureaucratic organization and communal support have allowed it to withstand frequent attacks on its leadership.”

However, she cautions, “Regardless of the effectiveness and potential for adverse consequences of its decapitation strategy, the United States is likely to continue targeting al-Qaida leaders because U.S. policymakers view the killing of high-level targets as successes in themselves.”

Conclusion
The publication this year of the Drone Papers reveals that the Obama administration, the US military, and the CIA have been lying all along about the drone assassination program, its targets and its civilian casualties. These documents also expose the obscene disregard for human lives pervading the entire operation, as the drone warriors pursue their technological dreams. “Throughout human history,” the Stimson Report reminds us, “the ability to project force across significant distances has been a much sought-after military capability… and since the dawn of mechanization, militaries have sought to replace people with machines.” In this context, drones are the unholy grail. The Drone Papers reveal that in its pursuit these Dr Strangeloves have been well aware of the horrific human costs of their enterprise and that they couldn’t care less.

What I’ve tried to show here is something more: that these military miscreants have also known all along that their drone technology and targeting strategy are militarily bankrupt. They could not but be aware from military history and doctrine that these approaches have absolutely no possibility of defeating terrorist groups or keeping America safe. They must know that in fact the opposite is true, that their nefarious enterprise only further endangers us all. And yet they will continue ever more brazenly their Reaper madness, the scholars here all agree, until we find some way to stop them.

_______________________

References

Recommendations and Report of the Stimson Center Task Force on US Drone Policy, Second Edition. Research Director: Rachel Stohl, April 2015 http://www.stimson.org/images/uploads/research-pdfs/task_force_report_FINAL_WEB_062414.pd

Rachel Stohl, “Just how effective is the US drone program anyway?”

https://www.lawfareblog.com/foreign-policy-essay-just-how-effective-us-drone-program-anyway

Doyle McManus, “Are we winning the drone war?” Los Angeles Times, April 24, 2015

Patrick B. Johnston, “Does Decapitation Work? Assessing the Effectiveness of Leadership Targeting in Counterinsurgency Campaigns,” International Security, 36(4):47-79, 2012

Frankel, Matt(2011) ‘The ABCs of HVT: Key Lessons from High Value Targeting Campaigns Against Insurgents and Terrorists’, Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 34: 1, 17—3

Jenna Jordan , “Why Terrorist Groups Survive Decapitation Strikes,” International Security, Vol. 38, No. 4 (Spring 2014), pp. 7-38,

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Friday, January 14, 2005
Leading Human Rights Solicitor "Shut Down” by Law Society
Society claims ‘substantial history of complaints going back ... years’
Exclusive report by Sean Mc Aughey
Sources and friends close to lawyer Padraigin Drinan are saying the official reasons behind an enforced closure by the Law Society of the offices of Ireland’s foremost human rights defender and solicitor remains wide open for damaging speculation.

Former clients who contacted the Law Society say they were immediately re-directed to a voice mail inbox belonging to the Deputy Secretary; Suzanne Bryson who was unavailable.

On Wednesday a Law Society spokesman was asked if Ms Drinan’s certificate to practice been fully revoked. The spokesman described the measures against Ms Drinan as a “removal of her provision to practice.” and added that a full Law Society press statement on the matter would be available.

In a statement released on Friday, January 14, 2005, the Law Society said: “Ms Drinan has a substantial history of complaints going back a number of years. These have led to a series of decisions by the Law Society to bring proceedings against Ms Drinan before the Disciplinary Tribunal, established for this purpose by the Solicitors (NI) Order 1976, as amended. The Disciplinary Tribunal operates independently of the Law Society.”

However, no clarrification of the substance or nature of the ‘complaint’ was given. The statement continues: “Complaints against Ms Drinan came before the Disciplinary Tribunal in May 2004. On considering the evidence presented by the Law Society, the Tribunal found that the complaints had been duly substantiated. It may be helpful to explain that in addition to imposing certain fines and costs penalties, the Tribunal Order records as follows; ‘The Tribunal noted with regret the Respondent’s (Ms Drinan) previous history of proven complaints before the Tribunal which were all similar to the complaints today. They formed the view that the Respondent was not functioning at any acceptable level as a single practitioner and that in the interest of the public and the Respondent herself, they are ordering that she is restricted from practising on her own account or in partnership. She may accept employment from another solicitor provided they have at least seven years post qualification experience. The Tribunal also orders that she shall not work in any practice using her name on the title or as one of the principals.’ The Tribunal were prepared to defer the implemantation of the Order for a reasonable period to allow Ms Drinan to make alternative arrangements. This deferment initially applied until September 2004 with a subsequent deferral to a date than fixed by the Tribunal at 6 January 2005.

“As and from that date, Ms Drinan is not entitled as a matter of law to practise on her own account. If she continues to do so, she will not only be in breach of the Order of the Tribunal, but will also be committing a criminal offence. In these circumstances the Law Society is under an obligation to see that the terms of the Tribunal Order are complied with.

“Ms Drinan is not inhibited from practice as an employed solicitor.

“The inability of Ms Drinan to continue in practice on her own account is not an action taken by the Law Society but is a function of an Order made by the Disciplanary Tribunal. Ms Drinan has not to our knowedge at any time sought to contest or appeal the Orders made by the Disciplinary Tribunal.” The statement was signed by Don Anderson, for the Law Society.

An informed source close to Ms Drinan said it was believed that as a result of her civil rights involvement she was seen by the establishment as an embarrassing and troublesome ‘thorn in the side’ who had done nothing wrong other than to try to provide legal advice to those who could not otherwise afford it.

IRSP spokesperson, Terry Harkin described Ms Drinan as “someone who was on par with James Connolly especially in terms of helping the poor and the voiceless all over Ireland” and he asked “where will the most vulnerable in our society get legal help now ”?

“Padraigin Drinan,” he continued, “is a once in a lifetime heroine who ought to be recognized and elevated for her tireless work and not punished, bullied and intimidated by some of her colleagues, who have left her open to a humiliating whisper campaign. ”

A Spokesperson for the Anti Racism Network described The Law Society’s actions as “questionable” and she asked where was the Law Society’s energy when legal immigrants were imprisoned with their children, being bombed from their home or loosing their legs due to frostbite. The immigrants she said are only a small example of the many communities throughout Ireland who are indebted to Padraigin Drinan. ”

Padraigin Drinan speaking from her Belfast office said: “At this stage it appears that I am accused of being a poor business manager but not guilty of any financial impropriety. I have been instructed also that I must amalgamate with other solicitors. ”

But she added: ”I am heartened by the hundreds of calls from well wishers and supporters from all over the world including a call from among others, Gareth Pierce.”
background items

Thursday, 28 October 2004
Féile an Phobail, West Belfast
By Sean Mc Aughey
The West Belfast community was demonised for many years by both the establishment and the media and this reached fever pitch in March 1988 as a result of the tragic events which followed the SAS killings of three unarmed IRA volunteers in Gibraltar. In reaction to this unparalleled negative and damaging portrayal of the West Belfast community, local groups and their MP, Gerry Adams, decided to organise a festival. Its purpose was to celebrate the positive side of the community, its creativity, its energy, its passion for the arts, and for sport. And it aimed at providing events and entertainment at a price that the majority of the community could afford.

*1 The West Belfast Féile which is entering its 17th year is the largest community (people) powered festival in Europe. It is internationally regarded as a ten day long festival "on par" with the best community festivals in England and Ireland. The Féile includes, a colourful carnival parade, discussions, debates, concerts, exhibitions, children's events, i.e street parties, bouncy castles etc, sports, literary and drama events, Féile radio, widespread community events on a street to street, pub to pub basis and various political, cultural or historical tours and walks.

The Festival aims to provide events of interest for everyone at a price that the majority of the community could afford while simultaneously serving also to elevate a positive West Belfast self image contolled by its people despite the forces acting against the people and the official resources denied them. The Féile continues to grow into a major tourist attraction. The August Féile continues also to easily attract "top of the range" participation from local and International entertainers, artists and commentators. This year's Féile line up included, Arthur Scargill leader in 1984 of the National Union of Mineworkers presenting The 10th Annual Frank Cahill Memorial Lecture and The P.J. McGrory Memorial Lecture - Long Road to the Truth delivered by Mrs Geraldine Finucane who was shot and wounded at the time of her husband Pat's, assassination 15 years ago. Top British band Big Brovaz, Irish Traditionalist singer/songwriter, Donal Luney and Andy Irvine, Christy Moore and Declan Sinnott, novelist Roddy Doyle, comedian Rich Hall and Bob Marley`s band, the Wailers demonstrating that the Feile is going from strength to strength and most definitely growing in popularity not only among the audience but the artists, as well. The choice of August for the Féile by the West Belfast Community and many other Republican communities like Ardoyne and New Lodge is pertinent. Because, August 9th 1971, brought a re-introduction to nationalist areas of widespread house raids, arrests and imprisonment without trial or a release date. The yearly anniversary of Interment was previously marked in the community by a display of bonfires of defiance. But, the bonfires provided the RUC and British Army with the ideal opportunity for provaction and delivered in British terms "a fool proof" excuse for the entire "Mechanism of the State" to "justify" any injury or death perpetrated by State violence and especially the use of plastic bullets, when framed within the same context of a nationalist bonfire.

Teenager shot dead returning home from Internment night bonfire.
The DPP refused to initiate proceedings on the grounds that it was impossible to establish which RUC officer fired the fatal shot. The jury found that at the time of Seamus' killing that he was not engaged in any rioting and that there was no rioting at the time of his killing.

*2 "The fatal shot" that killed 15 year-old Seamus Duffy from the Oldpark area was fired from a passing RUC patrol on August 9th 1989. The plastic bullet crushed his heart and tore a four-inch laceration in his left lung.

*3 Seamus Duffy was returning home from an internment night bonfire and there was no rioting in the area. The initial RUC response indicates according to The Relatives for Justice group, the RUC believed Seamus Duffy did not die as a result of being hit by a plastic bullet and that they would appoint a 'top policeman' to investigate the exact circumstances of the death.

*4 Secretary of State, Peter Brooke said: 'There are no grounds for suggesting their use (Plastic Baton Rounds fired by RUC officers) last night was other than in accordance with the law'.

*5 Darkness
Over a very short period of time, bonfire culture in most Republican communities has been easily transformed to the community-orientated ethos that permeates participative festivals. Bonfires were already long since stigmatised as negative and destructive by the collective wisdom and experience of the community and most especially by those members of the community who vividly recall how life once was before the bright lights and colour of the Féile. A time, when, West Belfast was in darkness because the various combatants shut down the streetlights and fear was a way of life. The local dogs barking were for those of us making our way home hoping to avoid a beating from the British Army patrols, a most welcomed concert of sorts, alerting with pin point accuracy the exact location of the four, eight, 16 or 32 blackened faces of the British Army foot patrols in the area.

“Riddles' Field" - Daddy Makes A Dream Comes True (Thanks to the Féile)
When I reflect on the quality of life my teenage children are currently enjoying and compare this to my teenage days, I owe a lot to the efforts of the many people behind the West Belfast Féile who are continually raising the esteem of our people and enhancing our quality of life. There is clearly a massive gulf between my teenage days and that of my teenage children today in terms of confidence, opportunities and simply attending a concert by their favourite "pop stars" in West Belfast. This in itself remains a source of immense joy and pride. Especially, when I think about what used to be -"Riddles' Field", (Beechmount Leisure Centre) and look at the here and now concert venue, where teenage dreams are fulfilled. My daughters were in seventh heaven a few years ago at the Féile in "Riddles' Field" during a Westlife concert and then the Atomic Kitten concert. My teenagers' expectations are obviously higher today and undoubtedly more realistically obtainable thanks to the Féile. My children's confidence is part of the vibrancy that makes West Belfast Féile buzz. This buzz has been harnessed, channelled and most importantly of all, encouraged by the various F éile projects and events.

A Teenage Nightmare I hold by comparison to my children, a teenage tale of woe. One of my favourite Rock n' Roll bands in 1975, Showaddywaddy had agreed to play in Belfast at the ABC. I was all set for my face to face with my teenage "Top of the Pops" idols and unfortunately this was as near as I got. Showaddywaddy pulled the plug on the Belfast tour when news surrounding the murder of the Miami Showband reached their agents. I was shattered. The people responsible for killing the Miami Showband musicians were pro-British and some were also members of a British Army Regiment. Showaddywaddy were a Sheffield Band.

On the 31st July 1975, a Loyalist gang murdered three members of the Miami Showband. Tony Geraghty (23), Fran O'Toole (29), Brian McCoy (33). Two of the UVF gang were also killed, Harris Boyle, described as a UVF Major from Portadown, and Wesley Somerville, described as a UVF Lieutenant from Caledon, Co Tyrone. Two men from the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) were jailed for 35 years in connection with the murders of members of the Miami Showband. The Miami Massacre, a part of our past, had also a lasting impact for many engaged in the Arts and for one Belfast man the Miami murders would bring about his film debut.

Angel - Galway Film Fleadh Michael Dwyer: The thing that triggered Angel was the murder of the Miami Showband musicians...
Neil Jordan: Kind of. I was playing in a band and we used to travel up and down to Belfast and Derry and places like that and we'd be driving back late at night. It was in the 1980's when all those sectarian killings were happening. It was very black; you always presumed it wouldn't happen to you - that you were safe - and when the Miami were shot it seemed quite shocking. They were innocent and I felt totally numb I suppose and that put images in my mind. I like to write things with people in mind and I had written Angel with Stephen Rea in mind

*6 How are ye Jeffrey? - West Belfast Féile Talks Back
During the Féile Talks Back debate, a former IRA POW, Seanna Walsh—who was sentenced to twenty-two years when he was caught making explosives and mortar bombs— courteously welcomed The DUP's Jeffery Donaldson to the Féile debate. Mr Walsh then asked: “Jeffrey, when you talk about the IRA's capacity to make war, I can go out of here tonight with a couple of hundred pounds in my pocket and purchase the equipment to make Baltic Exchange/Canary Wharf type bombs. How are you going to remove that capacity? "

*7 The DUP man addressed the question in repetitive mantra. Seanna Walsh also said: "The point I was making was that I can produce homemade explosives and mortars. You cannot decommission that knowledge. What is more important is our commitment to peace and to politics. But all of the initiatives taken by the IRA to date have had absolutely no effect on the unionist community. Trust is a two-way street. We suspect that at the root of it unionists cannot deal with equality and sharing power and that the idea of republicans being in government was a bridge too far for them. Everything else is an excuse not to go there. ”

*8 The IRA and its weapons is being used as an excuse
About 24 hours after the Festival debate, Mr Gerry Adams, The West Belfast MP and President of Sinn Fein told PA News:
“ While I would not like to minimise what may be genuine fears and concerns within unionism, I do think the issue of the IRA and its weapons is being used an excuse.” The Sinn Fein president commended Mr Donaldson on his appearance at the festival and paid tribute to his colleagues on the committee, which organised the event. Mr Adams also said he would like to take part in a similar event in a loyalist area.

*9 Community Empowerment
Mr Adams sums up the spirit of the Féile in a sentence by saying he = would like to take part in a similar event in a loyalist area. Community festivals bring as in this case politicians face to face with the voter in the voter's home territory. The Shankill Road and East Belfast "Think Tanks" did likewise to enpower the community and expose the politicians. The voice of the community can be best heard at festival time.

References and sources used in this article:
*1 http://www.feilebelfast.com/ourhistory/
*2 http://www.relativesforjustice.com/victims/seamus_duffy.htm
*3 http://www.relativesforjustice.com/victims/seamus_duffy.htm
*4 http://www.relativesforjustice.com/victims/seamus_duffy.htm
*5 http://www.relativesforjustice.com/victims/seamus_duffy.htm
*6 http://www.iol.ie/~galfilm/filmwest/fleadhjordan.htm
*7 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3543518.stm
*8 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/northern_ireland/3543518.stm
*9 http://news.scotsman.com/latest.cfm?id=3D3300413

by Sean Mc Aughey