A Secret History of the IRA

Ed Moloney's fine history of the Provos' voyage from revolution to reform puts Danny Morrison's old-style republican polemic to shame.
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Panorama missed the real story of collusion in Ulster. Adams was reported to be furious at the bungling of Bloody Friday in , when the Belfast Brigade sent 20 of the new car bombs into the city and detonated them in just over an hour, killing nine and injuring But Moloney argues that while Adams may not have initiated Bloody Friday, he must have had knowledge of its organisation. Toleration followed by criticism emerges in the book as a strong pattern in Adams's relationship with IRA violence.

Readers might find themselves questioning whether Adams had any innate moral objection to the IRA murder of civilians, or simply came to dislike the counter-productive publicity which was the inevitable fall-out. His political astuteness, however, led him to see that a purely military campaign would not yield the maximum results for the IRA. Moloney supplies the reader with a rather simplistic potted history of post- partition Northern Ireland - which fails to take much account of the existence of a Protestant working class - but he is much stronger on the gripping behind-the-scenes detail of the "peace process".

Jenny McCartney reviews A Secret History of the IRA by Ed Moloney

The IRA - facilitated by their trusted go-between, the Redemptorist priest Father Alec Reid - first made guarded suggestions of a ceasefire to the then Taoiseach Charles Haughey in But even before then, in , there was a secret line of communication between the IRA and the British government: Tom King, as Northern Ireland Secretary, furiously snapped it in when he discovered that the IRA was also making efforts to kill him. Moloney opens his Secret History of the IRA with a prologue of how the Provisionals' most ambitious gunrunning operation - the shipping of tonnes of guns, surface-to-air missiles, millions of rounds of ammunition, hundreds of grenades etc on board the Eksund from Libya - was betrayed.

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Realising that the explosive devices on board had been sabotaged, the IRA's director of engineering, Gabriel Cleary, now on the open seas off the French coast, planned to scuttle the Eksund. Instead the boat carrying the largest arms and explosives shipment ever sent from Colonel Gadaffi's dictatorship to the IRA was intercepted by the French navy, under the watchful eye of RAF spotter planes, with British intelligence monitoring the vessel all the way from Tripoli to Ireland.

The author points to this drama as proof that someone in the highest echelons of the IRA in Ireland had compromised the mission and thwarted what Moloney calls the Provos' own 'Tet offensive' against the British Army in Ulster. Beginning with a nautical story is appropriate because it also provides the best metaphor for describing the modern IRA's and Sinn Fein's degree turn from so-called armed struggle towards the politics of peaceful persuasion.

The vast lumbering entity known as the republican movement, an alliance of conservative rural Catholic nationalists and angry young men from Belfast and Derry who grew up under unionist discrimination and British Army repression resembled an oil tanker. From its inception on the burnt-out Catholic streets of the Falls Road in August until the mid-Eighties the Provisionals were steering towards an unreachable harbour - a united socialist all-Ireland republic. But with the oil tanker sailing towards the rocks of defeat, the vessel was turned around towards the port of historic compromise.

And at the helm for the last 20 years has been the one man capable of changing that course, the Sinn Fein president, Gerry Adams. Moloney argues that Adams could never have turned the vessel around unless he was a leading figure on the IRA's ruling body, the Army Council. The mother of 10 children was buried in secret, a policy established by the Belfast Brigade; of which Adams was a member of at the time. Return to Book Page. Gerry Adams and the Thirty Year War 3. For decades, the British and Irish had 'got used to' a situation without parallel in Europe: At the heart of that campaign lies one man: From the outbreak of the troubles to the present day, he has been an immensely influential figure.

The most compelling For decades, the British and Irish had 'got used to' a situation without parallel in Europe: The most compelling question about the IRA is: Moloney's book is now updated to encompass the anxious and uneasy peace that has prevailed to Paperback , pages.

Review: Politics: A Secret History of the IRA by Ed Maloney | The Sunday Times

Published August 26th by Penguin Canada first published October 1st To see what your friends thought of this book, please sign up. I know not much of the history of the IRA but I would like to learn. The schools don't teach this and my relative owns this book, but they don't think it's the best way because it might be too much to understand. Would I be able to understand some of what is going on? Bob Willett This book is no place to start. Lists with This Book. Jul 26, Amanda Mastran rated it it was amazing Shelves: One of the best nonfiction texts I've read.

This text gives a detailed account of the development and history of the Irish Republican Army during the Northern Ireland Troubles, as well as the development of their associated political party, Sinn Fein. However, the text doesn't feel heavy in the way that many historical texts do. It's very engaging and reader friendly, reading more like a novel than a history text. The only downfall of this book is that Ed Moloney is clearly a very big fan of Gerr One of the best nonfiction texts I've read.

The only downfall of this book is that Ed Moloney is clearly a very big fan of Gerry Adams. He paints Adams as the hero who led Northern Ireland out of the Troubles. Not exactly an objective view point, but then, Moloney's opinionated writing is part of what keeps this text from being just another dry historical document. Aug 12, Chris rated it it was ok Shelves: Interesting, if perhaps not quite what I expected.

Review: Politics: A Secret History of the IRA by Ed Maloney

Lots of backstory and history of Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein, which is of course an important part of the story, but it's missing a lot of the foreground. I suppose that's the point of calling it the "secret history," but I found it doesn't stand very well as a history on its own. Feb 28, Julie Bermond rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: The best way to undestand why these men and women took arms and fight Jul 01, Caitlin rated it really liked it.

The title is sensationalist but the book is written in a very dry, practical way. Moloney is a journalist who got close to different people in the IRA structure and has been following their moves throughout the Troubles of the s through the s.

Secret History of the IRA (Part 4 of 5)

He could have just written about the IRA and what he discovered about the organization and its crimes and aspirations, but instead he framed it in discussions about how the p Ed Moloney tackles a huge subject with his "A Secret History of the IRA". He could have just written about the IRA and what he discovered about the organization and its crimes and aspirations, but instead he framed it in discussions about how the peace compromise was created by Gerry Adams and his supporters in a secret way.

It is startling to see how a person like Gerry Adams can be so complex. He deliberately misled the IRA leadership and manipulated events and situations to create a system that would force peace and even more shocking than that, decommissioning. All while he was still actively in the IRA and participating or helping to plan the violence that shook the nation for so many decades. The book gets bogged down in details and is at times quite repetitive in its information. But it is well thought out, purposeful and thought provoking. At no time does he side with the IRA's violence, but he does not make too many judgment statements.

It is obvious that he can sympathize with the way that Catholics were treated by Protestants, and with Protestants who were victimized by IRA violence. What he does is put the IRA and Gerry Adams under a microscope and analyze the decisions and the effects of the choices that were made. Thankfully the book has an extensive appendix section that has a glossary of terms, a list of the dominant characters and a chronology of events for the violence and peace process in Northern Ireland.

The book doesn't need to be any longer than it is but I do wish that there was a beginning chapter that did a quick summary of the relationship between Britain and Ireland and how the people were put in the situation of needing an IRA in the first place. Nov 18, K rated it it was amazing. I read this book for academic and professional purposes. I ended up putting it done with a personal outlook on things that affected me so personally I ended up being removed from them entirely.


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Ed Moloney was as bold as to write the account of his twenty years spent undercover in the IRA as a novel, mixing personal stories of leaders and Irish history with a respectful distance. Never does he indulge into unnecessary judgement or overwhelming sensitivity, which is a testament to his talent as a I read this book for academic and professional purposes.

Never does he indulge into unnecessary judgement or overwhelming sensitivity, which is a testament to his talent as a journalist.

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From Gerry Adams' personal journey from the hills of Ballymurphy to the Stormont Castle, from Martin McGuinness' training to the fateful days of August , from army deals with Libya and tight connections with the United States, Moloney is not sparing anyone, nor is he willing to. The questions anyone would ask at the beginning are not answered, as it's not as much a political analysis as it is the quest to find legitimacy in action. Moloney keeps an open mind and tosses personal politics aside, while strongly encouraging the reader to do the same.