Irish Republicans have never had the same fixation with catching the zeitgeist that afflicts some of the far left. In fact you have to be impressed with the resolutely untrendy use of language in phrases like “the Free State Administration” and "Martin McGuinness is a British Crown minister… his job is to administer the Queen of England’s writ in Ireland”. Cruel but true.
So what are we to make of the Real IRA’s announcement that it is rebranding itself as the armed wing of the anti-capitalist movement? There is some truth in their analysis of the big picture.
“Most people can see the picture: the bankers grease the politicians’ palms, the politicians bail out the bankers with public funds, the bankers pay themselves fat bonuses and loan the money back to the public with interest. It’s essentially a crime spree that benefits a social elite at the expense of many millions of victims."
It’s their conclusion that shows a severe inability to learn from the previous decades of their movement’s history.
"We have a track record of attacking high-profile economic targets and financial institutions such as the City of London. The role of bankers and the institutions they serve in financing Britain’s colonial and capitalist system has not gone unnoticed.”
They also have a track record of shooting men delivering pizzas and abandoning bombs outside primary schools but that sort of thing doesn’t have the same cachet as declaring all out war on British capitalism.
The whole interview is as barmy as it is opportunist. They are probably telling the truth when they say that they are turning recruits away but even the much more proficient and better resourced IRA bombings in England at Canary Wharf and Bishopsgate can’t be said to have done much damage to finance capital.
What gets left out of most Republican accounts of their armed struggle is the complete dead end it represented. Many of those who served long prison sentences are now suffering from alcoholism and other effects of post traumatic stress disorder. The utter futility of their campaign is obvious to all but that handful who deceive themselves that having Martin Mc Guinness in a supporting role to Peter Robinson’s organ grinder represents any sort of victory.
Fifty quid says that they will keep their promise and launch some sort of attack in England within twelve months. It may even be against a financial institution. Equally certain is that a lot of young militants who refuse to learn the lessons of Republicanism’s failure will spend many wasted years in jail repeating every mistake that Adams and Mc Guinness made before them. Wrapping it up in a bit of anti-capitalist rhetoric does not make it any sort of new political thinking or an attempt to engage with the working class in Britain or Ireland. It’s dead end adventurism.
Liam redux 
Leave a comment