For decades Roman Catholics in Ulster had faced discrimination from the Protestant majority but then, in 1968, as violent left-wing protests spread across Europe, Irish radicals formed the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association. When it was joined by the Campaign for Social Justice in a march in Dungannon, the Association developed into a populist movement, but the Northern Ireland Government at Stormont assessed it to be a republican and communist front. The loyalist Ulster Volunteer Force, which had been formed in 1912, resurfaced with bombings in early to mid-1969 and then on 14 August, the Apprentice Boys paraded provocatively close to the Catholic Bogside estate in Londonderry. The overstretched Royal Ulster Constabulary was unable to prevent the disorder that escalated into Catholic families being forced from their homes. Comments by the Irish Prime Minister Jack Lynch that Dublin could ‘no longer stand by’ was interpreted as military intervention and when Stormont asked London to provide military assistance to the civil authorities, Prime Minister Harold Wilson prophetically said to his Cabinet, ‘If we go in, it will take years to get out’. Nevertheless, at 4.30pm on 14 August, the Ministry of Defence was instructed to reinforce Northern Ireland District in the deployment known as Operation Banner. This decision is generally regarded as the beginning of the thirty-seven year ‘Troubles’.
Before the deployment, the Intelligence Corps presence was confined to an officer and seven other ranks of the Counter-Intelligence Detachment (Northern Ireland) and two other ranks with HQ 39 Infantry Brigade based in Thiepval Barracks, Lisburn. Driving to Dundalk for Sunday lunch was not unknown.
Within hours of Wilson’s decision, the Spearhead Battalion, 3 Light Infantry, deployed. HQ 24 Airportable Brigade, and its 1 Intelligence and Security Section, were recalled from exercise in France and flown from Plymouth to RAF Ballykelly ready to cover Londonderry, Fermanagh and Armagh. But intelligence, mostly supplied by the Royal Ulster Constabulary, was not always credible, some of it dating to 1939/40 bombings in England and Flying Columns raids during the 1956/62 Border War. The Army quickly restored order and, although impartial, Catholics generally viewed their presence with some relief. But those with republican beliefs saw the Army as occupiers.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
The Regular Years The 1970s
Most conclusions appear deceptively simple, unlike the complex process by which they are acquired
Paul Crick
Northern Ireland
The tension in Northern Ireland remained unresolved and when, at the end of January 1970, HQ 24 Brigade exchanged with HQ 8 Brigade, 1 Intelligence and Security Section had found the situation to be ‘intricate and complicated and even at the end of the tour, no single root cause or solution had emerged’. So began a series of six month rotations between the Strategic Reserve brigades and HQ 16 Parachute Brigade. Inquiries into the violence published in early 1970, the consequent restructuring of the Royal Ulster Constabulary and disbandment of its reservist B-Specials led into loss of intelligence, albeit not always unbiased, although it was ameliorated by the raising of the reservist Ulster Defence Regiment. Primacy for internal security was transferred to the Army.
The adoption of the Intelligence Cycle by HQ Northern Ireland in Lisburn and the Brigade Intelligence and Security Sections, laid the foundations for the provision of the intelligence product for Operation Banner. Collation began with the recording of information onto cards cross-referencing to other files, for instance, incidents, personalities, weapons, vehicles and addresses, each entry dated and graded according to the quality of the source and credibility of information, and which was then disseminated in Intelligence Reports and weekly Intelligence Summaries.
Ideological disagreements during the year saw the IRA split into the Official IRA and the hardline Provisional IRA, with its aspirations to establish a 32-county Marxist Ireland and declarations of ‘No Go’ areas in several nationalist estates defended and policed by the IRA. A gable wall in Columba Street, Londonderry announcing ‘You are now entering Free Derry’ was an early example of the sectarian murals. The republican Easter Marches induced further violence and an escalation of gunmen firing across the sectarian divide. In June HQ 8 Brigade moved into Ebrington Barracks, Londonderry, formerly Naval Base HMS Sea Eagle. The planned infantry company search for weapons in a house in Balkan Street in the Lower Falls, Belfast on 3 July escalated into a four battalions operation and gave the Provisional IRA the opportunity to accuse the Army of not being impartial. Nevertheless, the first Protestant marching season in July passed ‘without too much upset’.
By early 1971, HQ 16 Parachute Brigade was based in the former seven storey hosiery factory in Lurgan that became known as the ‘Knicker Factory’. Attacks on the Security Forces escalated, with Gunner Robert Curtis, of 94 Locating Regiment, being the first soldier to be killed on active service in February. The first incendiary devices in early March and the first directional anti-personnel device (a claymore) on 8 May led to an average of twelve major incidents per month, including protracted firefights. As internal security deteriorated and reinforcements poured into Northern Ireland, Intelligence Corps units in the United Kingdom and West Germany supplied personnel, particularly SNCOs, on emergency tours of usually between four to six months. This resulted in other intelligence and security sections operating at about fifty per cent capacity for several years. As battalions rotated on six month tours, Protective Security concentrated on security surveys of requisitioned schools, factories and disused mills being used as Security Forces bases, with the Northern Ireland Security Standing Instructions proving valuable in convincing HQ Northern Ireland to finance recommendations. While 3 Infantry Brigade was reforming in Portadown, a sergeant, on an emergency reinforcement posted to the Counter-Intelligence Detachment (Northern Ireland) in Lisburn, was visiting Bessbrook Mill with the Brigade Major and used his recent experience of Oman to recommend that a single storey building selected as the cookhouse should be reinforced against mortars. The Brigade Major scoffed at the very suggestion that the IRA had mortars and were capable of using them. By the summer Operation Banner had developed into a counter-insurgency operation with both IRA wings forming bodies controlled by identifiable command structures which ranged from companies upwards to Army Councils, and politics managed through Sinn Fein. The workload was relentless, nevertheless, Corps Day 1971 in Lisburn provided a ‘welcome break’ for about thirty Intelligence Corps able to attend, a tradition that was repeated throughout Operation Banner.
In August, Stormont Prime Minister Faulkner assessed that the IRA intended to make Northern Ireland ungovernable and on 5 August he persuaded Prime Minister Edward Heath that internment, under the 1922 Special Powers Act, was the only option. Historically, the measure had previously proven effective, most recently in the 12 December 1956 – 26 February 1962 Border War. Although Lieutenant General Harry Tuzo, the General Officer Commanding, believed that the IRA threat could be undermined with intelligence gained from fifty suspects, he had no option but follow the political lead, but the HQ 39 Infantry Brigade Intelligence Section team assembled information supplied by the Royal Ulster Constabulary, it was noted that some was historical.
Operation Demetrius commenced early on 9 August with about 340 suspects arrested amid unrest. About half were released within twenty-four hours, however, Sinn Fein allegations of Security Forces brutality led to a complaint being filed with the United Nations by the Social Democratic and Labour Party. In his Report of Enquiry into Allegations Against the Security Forces of Physical Brutality in Northern Ireland Arising out of Events on 9th August 1971, dated 16 November, Sir Edward Compton, the Northern Ireland Ombudsman, acknowledged that while the Army had exercised significant restraints, some techniques used in holding centres constituted physical mistreatment. Matters worsened after Bloody Sunday on 30 January 1972 when a Minority Report penned by Lord Gerald Gardiner of Kittisford as an addendum to the Lord Chief Justice Hubert Parker Report of the Committee of Privy Councillors Appointed to Consider Authorised Procedur
es for the Interrogation of Suspects of Terrorism concluded that no crucial intelligence had been gained and blamed:
those, who, many years ago, decided that in emergency conditions in Colonial-type situations that we should abandon our legal, well-tried and highly successful wartime interrogation methods and replace them by secret, illegal (methods), not morally justifiable and alien to the traditional methods used by the greatest democracy in the world.
As political and diplomatic pressure forced Prime Minister Heath to accept the Minority Report, he announced in the House of Commons that these techniques ‘will not be used in the future as an aid to interrogation’. Two years later the European Court of Human Rights convicted Great Britain on a charge brought by Ireland of ‘inhumane and degrading treatment’. During 1972, there were 10,628 terrorist incidents involving firearms resulting in 129 soldiers killed in action compared to forty-eight in 1971.
On 1 April 1972, seven years after the Group system was first mooted, Lieutenant Colonel D.R. Holmes formed Intelligence and Security Group (United Kingdoms) to support the Strategic Command and Home Commands:
• 8 Intelligence Company to support 3rd Division and NATO, the British Army of the Rhine and Out-of-Area commitments. It included 84 (Allied Mobile Force (Land) and 89 (16 Parachute Brigade) Parachute Intelligence and Security Sections. 3 Commando Brigade had reverted to a Royal Marines Intelligence Section with limited Intelligence Corps support.
• 9 Security Company formed up with Security sections in Colchester, Taunton and Bulford, Preston, York and Edinburgh.
• 162 Special Military Intelligence Training Section moved from Repton Manor.
• 163 (Counter-Intelligence) Section formed in September and became the specialist counter-sabotage section with a role to survey national Key and Vulnerable Points against attack by Soviet Special Forces, or Spetsnaz, during the Transition to War phase.
The term ‘Detachment’ was dropped in favour of ‘Section’. During 1973, Security as a skill underwent an important evolution when the term ‘counterintelligence’ was dropped in favour of Security Intelligence in recognition that hostile intelligence services operations could be neutralized by ‘gathering timely and accurate intelligence concerning the organization, methods and motives’. Security Intelligence applied the offensive function of security while Protective Security applied the principles of the Intelligence Cycle and Defence in Depth was the defence to ensure that:
Classified information and material are successfully protected from loss, disclosure, espionage and sabotage, and personnel are protected against subversion. (Security Handbook for Tradesmen (Intelligence Corps))
On the same day, 12 Intelligence and Security Company was formed in Northern Ireland with most of its soldiers posted on two year tours, some accompanied by their families, thus:
• Company HQ in Thiepval Barracks, Lisburn.
• 120 Security Section, co-located with Company Headquarters, followed the standard practice of dividing into Protective Security and Counter-Intelligence detachments to support the brigades. Prior to computerization in 1980, its Records Section vetted 250,000 locally employed civilians and Ulster Defence Regiment applicants.
• 121 (Headquarters Northern Ireland) Intelligence Section in Lisburn.
• 122 (8 Infantry Brigade) Intelligence Section in Londonderry.
• 123 (39 Infantry Brigade) Intelligence Section also in Lisburn.
• 124 (3 Infantry Brigade) Intelligence Section in Portadown and then Lurgan.
The impartiality expected of the Army saw the Intelligence Sections, which were often commanded by warrant officers, divided into Nationalist and Loyalist detachments. Staff clerks administering classified information and photographers were provided by the Royal Army Ordnance Corps. Problems of missing intelligence in the early 1970s as roulement units in the infantry role rotated every four to six months was resolved by the development of Continuity NCOs who were made responsible for ensuring that the pace of intelligence collation was maintained and that records were not removed from Security Forces bases when units rotated. Most were Intelligence Corps senior corporals. During late 1974, a system of Liaison Intelligence NCOs (at first Intelligence Corps SNCOs but later other cap badges serving on two-year tours) acted as advisers to roulement regimental and battalion intelligence officers and at military units providing guard forces at the prisons. The Special Military Intelligence Unit was reformed and configured a network of Military Intelligence Officers to liaise with Royal Ulster Constabulary Divisional commanders. The Field Intelligence NCOs concept that had worked so well in Borneo supported Special Branch. In 1974, HQ Northern Ireland and the brigades formed Research Offices and as intelligence became embedded into the military culture, Regimental Intelligence Officers and NCO Courses were conducted at the School of Service Intelligence. The meticulous intelligence collection and collation lasted throughout Operation Banner.
In addition to the routine of the intelligence offices, some NCOs joined patrols to ‘chat up’ people and gauge opinion and were thus expected to be competent infantrymen. Several joined Royal Navy minesweepers patrolling the Irish Sea and boarded vessels ranging from yachts to merchant ships seeking intelligence, in particular connections between Northern Ireland terrorism and other parts of the world. Brigadier Colin Wallis-King, who commanded the five battalions in 3 Infantry Brigade from 1972 to 1974 and later became Director of Service Intelligence, regularly took an NCO on his weekly helicopter visits to units. One important resource was the development of maps by Royal Engineers surveyors and draughtsmen showing sectarian demarcations street by street – green for Catholic, orange for Protestant and white for mixed. Civilian clothes and fashions of the eras were widely adopted, as were ‘civilianized’ Army cars. Shoulder or belt-holstered 9mm Brownings and Walther 7.65mm PPK pistols and the occasional .38 revolver were personal weapons.
The bombing of the HQ 16 Parachute Brigade Officers Mess in Aldershot in March saw the Security Companies worldwide develop and adopt counter-terrorist measures, which saw armed sentries guarding barracks for the first time since the Second World War, increased security technology, the checking of vehicles against improvised explosive devices and the banning of the Army, in particular, walking out in uniform and hitch-hiking, a measure that saw the Armed Forces disappear from the streets of England until Iraq and Afghanistan returned Service personnel into a high profile not seen since National Service. Templer Barracks removed any indication that just outside Ashford was a sensitive military installation.
When the 1973 Emergency Powers Act gave the Army legal powers to detain those suspected of terrorism for a maximum of four hours before transfer to the Royal Ulster Constabulary, ‘screening’ emerged as a Human Intelligence asset. Patrols acknowledged the value of the rapid transfer of suspects to Unit headquarters where some might be debriefed by Brigade Intelligence Sections and Continuity NCOs before transfer to the police. Those arrested in rural areas had the advantage of competing against the clock. The 1988 Criminal Evidence (Northern Ireland) Order instructed that refusal to answer and the right of silence could be held against suspects.
The first public inkling that the Army was engaged in covert operations emerged in October 1972 when the story of the Four Square Laundry broke. In early 1971, Brigadier Frank Kitson, then commanding 39 Infantry Brigade and author of the iconic Low Intensity Operations, used his counter-intelligence experiences in Malaya, Kenya and Cyprus to form the Mobile Reconnaissance Force to conduct covert surveillance. The Intelligence Corps supplied some operational support. When residents in the nationalist estate of Twinbrook were suspicious of a brother and sister employed by the laundry doing brisk business from a Bedford van, Belfast Provisional IRA Brigade investigations concluded that it was associated with the Army and, during the morning of 2 October, launched three co-ordinated attacks that included ambushing the van and killing the ‘brother’, a Royal Engineer from Co. Tyrone, and wounding his ‘sister’, a Women’s Royal Army Corp
s lance corporal attached to the Royal Military Police. Their Intelligence Corps controller left their office shortly before it was attacked. The rationale of the operation was to use forensics to examine laundry and link evidence of explosive or weapon handling to addresses. While the Provisionals claimed the ambush was as devastating a blow against military intelligence as the attack on the Cairo Gang in Dublin in 1920, that the Army were prepared to deploy covert operations led to lasting suspicion throughout republican factions. When Brigadier Kitson learnt that HQ Intelligence and Security Group (Germany) had a surveillance capability, namely 8 Detachment, and inquired if it could be transferred to Northern Ireland, an operational assessment concluded that it would take three months to convert it; in the meantime monitoring of the Soviet Military Mission would lapse. Although surveillance had been an Intelligence Corps skill since the Second World War, its global deployment and small size prevented its ability to mount rescues. This led to surveillance before arrest by uniformed Security Forces and the protection of people and property under threat being passed to a HQ Northern Ireland asset. An important part of intelligence collection was air imagery.
By 1973 the ‘No Go’ areas had become politically unacceptable. After NATO had permitted Great Britain to reinforce Operation Banner, in a reinforcement that demanded tight Operational Security, 12,000 troops, mostly from West Germany, took force level to 28,000 and included the delivery of four Armoured Vehicles, Royal Engineers from 28 Amphibious Engineer Regiment in Hamelin. Early on 31 July, Operation Motorman dismantled the barricades in Londonderry and several other towns. Meanwhile, meticulous intelligence collation was achieving notable results. During an operation targeting the Belfast IRA in the spring of 1974, the arrest of four IRA at a ‘snap’ vehicle check point led to 123 Intelligence Section providing sufficient information for the arrests of three successive IRA Brigade commanders and 106 officers. Security Forces operations reduced the operational survival rate of Provisional officers in Belfast to the same as subalterns in 1916 on the Western Front – about four weeks – to the extent that, by December, the Provisional IRA had been so weakened by attrition, internment and Volunteers ‘on the run’ in the sanctuary of Ireland that a ceasefire was agreed over the Christmas period. But intra-faction and inter-sectarian violence continued largely unabated.
Sharing the Secret Page 37
