Socialist Appeal - On the 25th Anniversary of the Irish Hunger Strikes of 1981

On the 25th Anniversary of the Irish Hunger Strikes of 1981

By Gerry Ruddy, Irish Republican Socialist Party

Monday, 25 September 2006

It has been twenty five years since the hunger strikes of 1981 resulted in the tragic deaths of Republican prisoners fighting for elementary democratic and human rights. It is our duty on this anniversary to look back to those events, to learn from them, to draw out all the necessary lessons from then, and all that has happened since, in order to advance the struggle for which they gave their lives, the struggle for Ireland's freedom and for socialism.

During the early days of the civil rights movement in the North of Ireland republicans had gained “special category” status through a long hunger strike in 1971 by republican prisoners in Crumlin Road Jail."Special category status," allowed them to be treated as prisoners of war, providing them with the ‘privileges’ of POWs such as those specified in the Geneva Convention. But in the mid-seventies the British Labour government having failed to face down a loyalist lockout in 1974 was determined to face down Irish Republicanism and, under Roy Mason, the Northern Ireland Secretary of State, special category prisoner status was abolished for all offences committed after 1st March 1976. Henceforth all prisoners were regarded as criminals by the state.

The prisoners, convicted by non-jury courts, presided over by judges appointed by the Unionist establishment, after interrogations and torture from RUC Special Branch - who were collaborating with loyalist murder gangs - were transferred to the H-blocks of the renamed Maze prison.

Women republican prisoners, who suffered the same conveyor belt justice, were held in Armagh jail. Although there were two republican groups, (the IRA (Provisional) and the INLA)ⁱ and the prisoners were divided into different H blocks, they were united, as prisoners, as blanket men and women, and as republicans, in opposition to British criminalisation. By 1978 over 300 republican prisoners were refusing to wear prison clothing or do prison work. Prison guards tried to halt the protest by beating the Blanket Men when they went to shower or use the toilets.

In March 1978, the prisoners responded by refusing to leave their cells, no longer washing and using buckets as toilets. The guards then stopped bringing buckets to the cells, the prisoners replied with the "Dirty Protest". This lead to excrement smeared to the walls of the cells and prisoners wearing only a blanket languishing in bare, freezing cells in winter.

Slowly, very slowly, street protests in support of the prisoners began to gather adherents. Relatives Action Committees were formed in nationalist areas to support the prisoners leading eventually to the establishment of National H-Block Armagh Committee, which made steady progress in gaining support for the prisoners. That committee was composed of republican activists, trade unionists, socialists and human rights activists. It had the active support of the IRSPⁱⁱ and other radical bodies. Six members of that Committee were shot - five dead at the hands of loyalist and British intelligence agents. The demands of the prisoners were not extraordinary. They were reasonable and were fixed around five points:

1 The right to wear their own clothes.

2 The right to abstain from penal labour.

3 The right to free association.

4 The right to recreational and educational facilities in conjunction with the prison authorities.

5 The restoration of remission (lost because of the Dirty Protest).

Eventually the patience of the prisoners ended in October 1980. Seven went on hunger strike including INLA prisoner John Nixon. The strike began on October 27th and ended after 53 days when apparent concessions were made including civilian type clothes being worn by the inmates.

But the so-called concessions were a sham and, feeling betrayed, the prisoners began the second hunger strike.On Sunday 1 March 1981 Bobby Sands, then leader of the Provisional Irish Republican Army (PIRA) in the Maze Prison refused to take food. Over the next weeks and months other prisoners joined the hunger strike in a staged fashion. Thatcher, the British Prime Minister, decided that no concessions must be made to the prisoners. With cold, calculated cruelty, she and her clique decided to allow them to die. Even despite Bobby Sands being elected to Westminster in the Fermanagh/South Tyrone by-election, the Thatcher administration remained obdurate. Margaret Thatcher stated: "We are not prepared to consider special category status for certain groups of people serving sentences for crime. Crime is crime is crime, it is not political." The only change it made was to publish proposals to change the Representation of the People Act making it impossible for prisoners to stand as candidates for election to parliament!

The hunger strike continued to grow, and on May 5, Sands became the first of the prisoners to die, after 66 days on hunger strike. He was 26 years old. On Thursday 7 May 1981 an estimated 100,000 people attended the funeral of Bobby Sands in Belfast. Far from intimidating Republicans the death provoked a wave of revulsion and fury. In many nationalist areas riots became a regular occurrence.Nine other deaths followed, including that of three members of the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA), Michael Devine, Patsy O Hara and Kevin Lynch, in the hunger strikes. Michael Devine had been a former member of the Young Socialists in Derry City where both he and Patsy had been politically active on working class issues.

Events were laying the base for a mass movement of protest. Unfortunately, the Provoⁱⁱⁱ leadership had no use for the mass movement, except as an auxiliary to the “armed struggle”. Their leadership regarded themselves as the legitimate Government of Ireland and they saw little need to form alliances with lesser beings. They still had the illusion that the British army could be forced to pull out by bombing and shooting.

The mass movement around the hunger strikes showed enormous promise, but once again the opportunity was thrown away. Caught between appealing only to the nationalist population or to the wider masses of people throughout the island, including the wide working class movement, the leaderships of the H-block campaign proved incapable of involving wider sections. Sinn Fein seeing the political opportunities, seized control of the H-block struggle outside, and while posing as radical leftists, marginalised the genuine republican left and working class radicals^iv. Thus began their long march from republicanism to nationalism.

The left itself was confused about the hunger strike and little effort was made to influence the rapidly growing ranks of nationalist youth towards socialist thought. Action was the way forward or so the nationalist youth thought. Of course that action was perceived only in terms of armed struggle.

Little or no thought was given to reaching out to working class radicals from the protestant working classes, nor how to win allies within the broad trade union movement. Indeed some republicans became anti-trade union because the paid leadership of the Irish Congress of Trade Unions in the North was closely allied with the British establishment. Instead of working to win over natural allies in the working class movement many republicans retreated into working within “our communities” which was a euphemism for solely working within catholic communities. Given the serious divisions that had already existed between the PUL^v and the NRC^vi, the community approach itself became a self-fulfilling prophecy, which became institutionalised in the Good Friday Agreement.

The Republican Socialist Movement itself could not resist the emotions of the time and the INLA upped its armed struggle whilst the then leadership of the IRSP veered between left nationalism and republicanism. While recruits flooded into both Party and Army little was done to politically educate the new wave of cadres. This was to have almost fatal consequences for the whole movement in later years.

But as recruits flooded into republican organisations the hunger strike itself was slowly grinding to a halt. Sickened by the growing number of deaths and with no sign of concessions the families of those remaining on hunger strike began to intervene to take their sons off the hunger strike once they neared the point of death. The INLA, following the death of Mickey Devine, announced on September 4th that it was no longer putting volunteers forward for the Hunger strike. Eventually on Saturday October 3rd at 3.15 in the afternoon those remaining on hunger strike ended their fast. 10 republican hunger strikers had died and 62 others were killed during that turbulent period. A hunger strike is a desperate measure, which should only be undertaken when there is no other alternative. The death of cadres in the prisons is a very high price to pay. Was too high a price paid? There is no doubt that the prisoners having endured the blanket and dirty protest for so long felt that they had no alternative. Even today 25 years afterwards the consequences of that hunger strike are still being felt and that question still has not been satisfactorily answered.

What seemed at the time a major defeat for the prisoners soon became seen as a victory when following the ending of the strike the British introduced a new regime in the prison that effectively gave into the prisoners’ demands. On 6 October 1981 James Prior, then Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, announced a series of measures, which went a long way to meeting many aspects of the prisoners' five demands.

This year, 2006, has seen a multitude of commemorations, celebrations and fundraising banquets all around Ireland to “honour” the hunger strikers. To sell commemorative plates, blankets and arrange dinners all around the theme of the hunger strikes show just how cynical the current leadership of Provisional Sinn Fein is. In a massive attempt to rewrite history most of the events staged managed by Provisional Sinn Fein tried to justify their present political stance. They claimed that the hunger strikers would have endorsed the peace process strategy of Sinn Fein^vii.

They tried to airbrush out the INLA participation in the hunger strike. They used commemorations to highlight their election candidates. But some truths are hard to hide. During the hunger strike the Provos were in direct contact with a Foreign Office contact known as the “mountain climber”^viii. He outlined to them in July, before the 5th hunger striker died, essentially the same concessions that Jim Prior outlined in October. Why did the Provo leadership not accept these terms then? The leadership of the INLA were never informed there was such an offer and neither were the INLA prisoners or hunger strikers. The strong suspicion remains that for electoral reasons the Provo leadership outside the jail wanted the hunger strike to continue.With the ending of the hunger strike Sinn Fein’s electoral rise continued until today they have replaced the SDLP as the largest nationalist party in the North. Their leaders now strut the world stage as ‘peacemakers’. But the actual reality on the ground points out the total failure of their strategy.

It is well to remind ourselves of exactly what the Sinn Fein peace process strategy has produced. Northern Ireland is now more deeply divided than it was during the conflict. Since the acceptance of the Good Friday Agreement walls dividing working class communities have gone up, not down. Sectarian attacks occur on a daily basis mostly directed against Catholics. Sectarian hatred has risen among both catholic and protestant youth. Politics is now polarised around the so-called “two communities”.Gerry Adams wants Ian Paisley as First Minister. MI5 are taking control of political policing. Sinn Fein have accepted a partitioned settlement and accepted the sectarian nature of the northern state. Sinn Fein, in a power sharing executive, introduced privatisation into both the health and education state sectors. Crime rates have soared in working class areas as has the suicide rate, drug taking, alcohol abuse and poverty. Most ironic of all, the gains won by the dead hunger strikers were negotiated away during the Good Friday Agreement talks. Contrast all that with what the prisoners, particularly the ten dead hunger strikers, were in opposition to 25 years ago:

1) Criminalisation;

2) a reformed local assembly at Stormont;

3) the unionist veto (so called consent principle);

4) a British police force enforcing the law of the British state in any part of Ireland;

5) British claims to sovereignty in Ireland.

They were also strongly in favour of a Socialist Republic on the island of Ireland. The contrast could hardly be greater. What lessons can Republicans and socialists take from the experiences of the hunger strike? Clearly the hunger strike is a weapon that should rarely, if ever, be used for, when carried to its ultimate conclusion, valued and valuable comrades are lost to the struggle. Ireland has too many maytrys.

It is now clear in retrospect that many who threw themselves into the struggle had no real grounding in revolutionary politics or brought a Marxist understanding of how society works into politics. They then became influenced by whatever became the latest fad. One day it’s the gun, then it’s the ballot box, then it’s the media and now it’s spin. Those who once claimed they would lead us to the “Republic” now are preparing to administer British rule in Ireland. Former anti-imperialists now pay homage to Bush and his administration. Republicans who once claimed to be non-sectarian now play the sectarian card. Over the past generations many republicans simply ignored the existence of the protestant working class writing them off simply as a reactionary bloc. Yet today in a few parts of the North young people in “kick the pope”^ix bands are being exposed to the ideas of James Connolly and other Irish republicans. Comrades from the IRSP have spoken to groups of young protestant workers as well^x.

In times of high emotion, such as during the hunger strike, nationalism can exert a powerful attraction. Republicanism in all its forms failed to resist that attraction and so lost its way during and after the hunger strikes.

Irish republicanism has always had an internationalist tendency and today that internationalism is best expressed through a firm commitment and grounding in Marxist ideas. There is no easy road to Socialism in Ireland. But with the growing interest in Marxist ideas worldwide more and more young people in Ireland are being attracted to the revolutionary ideas of James Connolly and other internationalist Marxists. The turning of those young people into a hardened revolutionary cadre is the task of today’s comrades. That is the only path that radical republicanism can take. It is a case of back to James Connolly and forward to socialism.

Notes

ⁱ IRA is the Irish Republican Army (provisional) or PIRA - INLA refers to the Irish National Liberation Army

ⁱⁱ IRSP Irish Republican Socialist Party - political wing of INLA in 1981

ⁱⁱⁱ Provo- Popular nickname for PIRA

^iv After the hunger strikes were over PIRA prisoners in the Maze began a campaign of undermine and absorb against INLA prisoners and refused to recognise them as political prisoners

^v PUL- Unionist Loyalist Protestant

^vi NRC-Nationalist Republican Catholic.

^vii Speech by Martin McGuiness in Derry 2006

^viii Blanketmen by Richard O’Rawe, Published by New Island 2005

^ix 'Kick the pope' bands are anti-catholic bands composed of young working class protestants.

^x Too much should not be read into these meetings but the fact that they have taken place shows the possibilities that could exist.