At 9.30 a.m. he was shown into a small, bare room about ten feet by eight feet with a single radiator which gave out remarkable heat. The man had dried off in the warmth of the base and his tea and bacon sandwich had made him feel better but he still relished the heat coming from the radiator. Sitting behind a small table were two stoutly built men in their early forties, both wearing civilian clothes, with no suggestion that they represented the army, the police or any of the security services. They appeared somewhat brusque, even annoyed, as though they had been woken too early on a morning when they would have expected a lie-in, a little time to recover from the Christmas festivities. These men were from the Force Research Unit who had responsibility for dealing with all Loyalist paramilitary-related activities.
They had already been briefed by the duty sergeant and been handed computer files on their early-morning visitor revealing his name was probably Brian Nelson, aged thirty-six, a former member of the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), a hardline Protestant terrorist organisation whose members were fiercely Loyalist. From a quick reading of the bare facts before them, the intelligence officers could see that Nelson’s army record with the Black Watch had been abysmal. He had not only refused to obey orders but had appeared regularly on company orders for minor misdemeanours, resulting in many weeks in the glass house. He had continually gone absent without leave until the army decided, in 1969, that they no longer required his services. In 1975 Nelson had been jailed for five years for possession of arms and explosives. On his release after serving three years in prison he had immediately rejoined the UDA and, by 1980, had been appointed one of the organisation’s intelligence officers.
‘What can we do for you?’ asked one of the thick-set officers.
‘Do you want to know who I am?’ Nelson asked.
‘No,’ he replied, ‘we already have your details on this print-out. You’re Brian Nelson, right?’
‘Correct,’ he said. ‘I’m an intelligence officer with the UDA’.
‘Yes, we know,’ said the officer. ‘Now, how can we help?’
‘I might be able to help you,’ said Nelson. But before he continued, he wanted to check he really was speaking to British Intelligence. ‘You are with Army Intelligence?’ he said.
‘Yes. Why do you ask?’
‘Because I don’t trust the RUC or Special Branch,’ he said. ‘That’s why I’ve walked here this morning, to this place in New Barnsley, a Catholic area, although I was born in the Protestant Shankill Road and I live on the Silverstream estate. It must have taken me an hour and a half to get here and most of the time it was pissing with rain. But I hoped there would not be many people about at this hour on Boxing Day so I took the risk. I knew I was stupid walking through a Catholic area but I was determined to see someone from Army Intelligence because if I had spoken to the peelers or the Special Branch it would have gone straight back to the UDA and I didn’t want that.’
‘We’re both from British Military Intelligence,’ said the first officer, ‘We were both army, like you.’
‘How do you know I was in the army?’ he asked, a little belligerence creeping into his voice. Nelson’s reaction revealed he was not thinking straight – either through exhaustion or too much alcohol. He had forgotten he had given the sergeant his army details only hours before.
‘Black Watch. You were stationed in Scotland,’ replied the officer. ‘Does that satisfy you?’
‘All right,’ Nelson replied.
‘So what’s up then?’ the officer enquired.
‘I want to get even,’ replied Nelson.
‘With whom?’
‘With the UDA and the UVF, of course,’ Nelson said.
‘Why? What’s the problem?’
‘It happened this morning at a party,’ he told them in a matter-of-fact voice with little or no passion or emphasis. ‘I was at this UDA party on the Silverstream estate with my wife. There were about forty people there. We had a few drinks and everyone was laughing and some were dancing, while others were getting pissed. This particular man kept dancing with my wife, Jean, flirting with her, trying to smooch her, feeling her up – you know the sort of thing.
‘I didn’t mind at first and continued to drink until I began to feel a bit pissed and suggested we should go home as she too was feeling the worse for wear. This man volunteered to walk both of us back home and it seemed a good idea for I was feeling legless. When we arrived home we felt better – the walk in the fresh air must have helped – and I offered him a drink. I had been in the kitchen mixing drinks for a few minutes when I heard Jean scream. At first I took no notice, thinking they were just larking about. Then I heard her shouting, “No, no, no, get off!” and knew there was trouble.
‘This bloke was lying on top of her, trying to screw her. Her dress was halfway up her body and he was trying to force himself on top of her, pulling at her knickers, while she was trying to push him away. I exploded, yelling at him, asking what the fuck he thought he was doing, trying to screw my wife.
‘“Fuck off back to the kitchen,” he said, “we’re just having some fun.”
‘“Just having fun,” I shouted, “you’re trying to rape my wife.”’
Nelson continued, still speaking without passion. ‘Jean had managed to extricate herself from beneath the man, and was pulling down her dress, trying to make herself respectable while the fucker kept trying to pull down her knickers.
‘“Get the hell out of here now,” I shouted at him. “Fuck off and don’t come back.”
‘“Don’t talk to me like that,” said the man as he climbed to his feet. “I’m UVF and no one talks to me like that.”’
Nelson explained that as soon as the UVF officer got to his feet the man lashed out at him with his fists, sending him sprawling across the room. Nelson got to his feet and tried to hit the other man who was stronger, taller and heavier. Within seconds he had hit Nelson a number of times around the head and he had gone down again, his head reeling from the effects of the drink and the punches. Jean had rushed to help her husband but had been brushed aside by the man who announced that he was fucking off.
But Nelson wasn’t finished. He was determined to get his own back. His pride wounded, and his attempts at teaching the man a lesson having failed, he had stormed back to the party, the blood from his encounter spattered on his shirt. He had demanded from the senior UDA officers attending the party that they should discipline the man or arrange for the UVF to discipline him. They refused, saying the matter was personal and private and nothing whatsoever to do with the UDA.
‘I had just told senior UDA officers that a man had tried to rape my wife, the wife of one of their intelligence officers, and they didn’t want to know,’ he said. ‘They simply did not give a damn. And that’s why I’m here. If there is any way I can get back at either the UDA or the UVF then I will gladly do so. Tell me what you want, what information you require, and I will supply it. I hate them for dismissing the attempted rape of the wife of one of their officers as something of no interest, no concern to the organisation. Well, if they want to play the game that way, I’ll make sure I get my own back. Whatever you want me to do, I’ll do it.’
‘If the UDA wouldn’t help,’ the officer inquired, ‘why didn’t you go to the police?’
‘The peelers?’ Nelson said, his voice raising an octave with surprise. ‘Fuck off! A man with my record go to the police and complain? You must be fuckin’ nuts. They would have just kicked me out of the station. Don’t you realise the RUC are up to the hilt with the UDA and the UVF? They provide the Loyalists with all their information.’
‘You did five years for possession; is that correct?’
‘Yes,’ Nelson replied, ‘I thought you might know that.’
The two officers asked Nelson questions concerning the hierarchy of the UDA and the UVF and of recent changes. His answers were impressive, suggesting that he knew the facts, answering all the questions quickly and accurately. They weren’t yet certain that Nelson
was a UDA intelligence officer, as he claimed, but he certainly knew details of both the UDA and the UVF leadership.
The two officers asked Nelson if he would like another cup of tea as they needed to check some facts.
‘Yes,’ he replied, ‘I’m thirsty.’ Then, in a somewhat more aggressive vein, he asked, ‘What are you going to check? Don’t you believe me or something?’
‘Of course we believe you,’ the officer said, ‘why wouldn’t we?’
‘I don’t know,’ he said, ‘but you’re acting suspiciously. I thought I could trust the army.’
‘You can trust the army,’ the officer replied, ‘but of course we have to check facts.’
‘All right,’ he replied, sounding as though he wasn’t too happy with the way things were going.
Within ten minutes the officers returned and told Nelson that everything he had told them had checked out.
‘We’ll have to work something out,’ one told Nelson. ‘Can you give us a call in about a week and perhaps come back and have another chat? When you phone just ask for Mick and wait on the line. It might take a minute or two to get the call put through but please just wait. Here’s the phone number; keep it to to yourself, okay?’
‘Okay,’ Nelson replied, ‘but you won’t forget?’
‘We won’t forget’.
Brian Nelson was an Ulsterman born and bred. Born in 1950, he had two brothers and a sister. He attended primary and secondary schools in Belfast and in 1965, at the age of fifteen, left school without a single qualification. His father, a shipyard worker, arranged for the young Brian to begin four years’ training as a joiner but within eighteen months Nelson became bored with the job and quit.
He fancied becoming a soldier and joined the Black Watch, the Scottish infantry regiment, but it seems he wasn’t cut out for the discipline and rigorous training of such a regiment. Brian Nelson had a problem – he couldn’t and wouldn’t take orders. He was constantly going absent without leave and would be picked up by the police or military police and returned to his regiment for disciplinary action. Constantly on company orders for minor misdemeanours, Nelson would spend many months paying for his crimes, peeling potatoes, scrubbing floors, sweeping the parade ground, weeding gardens and painting coal white. Fed up with such a recalcitrant recruit, the Black Watch gave him his marching orders in 1969. He was just nineteen.
Back in Belfast, Brian Nelson found himself attracted to the Protestant cause as the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association, a mainly Catholic-supported organisation, was about to be forced into the background by the IRA who had belatedly realised that the civil-rights rebellion of the Northern Ireland Catholic minority had provided an extraordinary opportunity to push the Republican cause. These were the days of civil-rights marches, peaceful demonstrations and justified demands from Catholics for greater equality – in jobs, housing and, more importantly, the democratic process.
Brian Nelson joined the Ulster Protestant Volunteer Force (UPVF), which had been founded by the Revd Ian Paisley in 1969. Paisley’s idea was to establish sections of the force on every Protestant housing estate in Belfast to act as a defence unit in case of attack from Catholics. Everyone who joined signed a form stating their name, address, age, occupation and, more importantly, whether they had any experience in the police, army, fire brigade or medical services. Brian Nelson, allegedly a veteran private in the British Army, was exactly the sort of experienced young man Paisley’s UPVF wanted. Later, most of the young men who had registered with the UPVF would join the Ulster Defence Association.
About this time, Brian Nelson met and fell in love with a pretty teenage Belfast girl named Jean from a sound Protestant family. Jean, only seventeen, was described as bright, personable, impetuous, sexy and fun. They seemed to hit it off and within a few months of meeting, the rather nondescript Brian Nelson, with no qualifications, no training, no job, little future, zero prospects and with an uncharismatic personality, proposed to the vibrant young girl. Only a few months later they were married. In time, Brian and Jean Nelson would have four children and would live on the all-Protestant Silverstream estate in the Shankill area of Belfast. They rented their small, unpretentious home from the Northern Ireland Housing Executive.
Nelson’s induction into the UPVF gave him the much-needed credibility he yearned for. Now, finally, he was a man of some importance. He had spent time in the British Army, had undergone basic weapons training using rifles and Bren-guns, knew how to drill and march, survive forced marches and the basics of field training and camouflage. He had, of course, never actually been involved in active service but, in the ranks of the Ian Paisley’s volunteer force, Nelson was someone to whom the rest of the raw recruits looked up to with respect. Within months, he was promoted to street defence leader, a sort of NCO, in charge of the street in which he lived, organising meetings, exercises, drills and weapons training and in charge of discipline. He revelled in his new-found status and during the next few years he would become far more confident, even arrogant. In the UDA he would become authoritarian, not wishing to have his views challenged by others in the organisation whom he believed did not have his experience or his military background.
When patrolling the streets of Protestant north Belfast, Nelson and his defence unit would wear masks and carry pickaxe handles. They would carry out nightly street patrols, cordoning off the area, organising look-outs, watching for any sign of an attack from Catholic areas. Whenever rumours spread that the Catholics were about to launch an attack, Nelson would organise the distribution of Molotov cocktails, iron bars and wooden staves.
Most of the time he carried with him a .22 starting pistol, not that such a weapon would have been much use in a gun battle, but to Nelson the pistol showed that he had power and, if necessary, could always be used to scare people. Because of his slight build he knew that in a straight fight he wouldn’t stand much of a chance; but a pistol to hand, even a .22 starting pistol, gave him a weapon he would not hesitate to use.
In 1975 Nelson’s fascination with handguns and his apparent addiction to the Protestant military cause went too far and he found himself in court charged with possession of both arms and explosives. He had been caught with three handguns and three sub-machine-guns, as well as a small amount of explosives. It was suggested that he might have been acting as the quartermaster for the UDA. He was sentenced to five years in jail but, with good behaviour, he was out again in 1978 when the sectarian war was at its height.
He returned to the UDA and asked to become involved once again with the Loyalist cause. By then, Nelson was seen by senior UDA officers as a man to be trusted; a man with a military background, who had organised his street defence force in the 1970s with efficiency, and who had been prepared to risk his freedom and go to jail carrying out operations on behalf of the Loyalist cause.
In the meantime, Nelson took jobs laying floors, mainly in industrial buildings, and earned good money, but the work wasn’t regular and he would often be short of cash. The Nelson family, like tens of thousands of other Northern Ireland families, survived on state benefits.
As promised, seven days after that first Boxing Day meeting Brian Nelson phoned the New Barnsley special number and, as instructed, asked to speak to Mick. He was asked to wait and two minutes later found himself talking to one of the same handlers he had met previously.
‘Would you like to drop by some time for another chat?’ Nelson was asked.
‘No,’ he replied, ‘I don’t fancy visiting the Catholic area again; it’s too risky. Can’t you meet me around the Shankill or somewhere?’
‘Yes, of course,’ came the reply, ‘I was going to suggest that in any case. There’s no point in taking unnecessary risks.’
A meeting was arranged. Nelson was told to stay in the Shankill area and walk down a particular road alone at a given time on a given date. If his two handlers had not picked him up before a particular crossroads he was to understand that the meeting had been aborted and return home,
and phone the New Barnsley special number the following day. It was explained to him that the meeting would only be aborted if something untoward occurred. He was told to take no notice of anyone and not to get into any car unless one or both of the handlers he knew were in the vehicle. In the event, Nelson was on time and picked up by his handlers, Sean and John. He was then driven to a safehouse and, over tea and biscuits, the three chatted for more than two hours. As usual, after that meeting, as after every meeting he attended, the Nelson file was updated. After consultation with senior officers, the decision was taken to go along with Nelson. It was obvious to FRU senior officers and the handlers who had interviewed him that Nelson was knowledgeable about the UDA hierarchy, including the most recent events. They weren’t sure at that stage if Nelson genuinely wanted to help the security forces or whether he was playing some game. FRU officers always worked on the assumption that any stranger who walked in off the street with an offer to help had to be watched most carefully. It wouldn’t have been the first time that someone had offered to work as an informer when they were really operating as a double agent. They all thought it most bizarre that Nelson had turned up alone, dishevelled and the worse for wear, so early on Boxing Day morning. But it made the officers think that maybe he was genuine. They decided to give him as much rope as necessary in the hope of bringing him on side.
By January 1986 the army was desperate for good contacts inside the Loyalist paramilitary organisations. Before the decision to form the Force Research Unit, all intelligence on the Loyalist organisations had been collected and disseminated by the RUC Special Branch. Some army officers believed that vital intelligence concerning the Loyalists was not always passed on to the army, making them feel as though they were trying to keep an eye on the terrorists wearing blindfolds. Some officers even wondered whether parts of the RUC’s intelligence about the IRA were in fact not being supplied by agents and informants inside the Republican movement but by the Loyalists.
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