Northern Ireland (merged thread)

[davidbfpo]

This was a 2012 conference, held in Austin, Texas, with Kings College London, University of Queensland and the hosts The Robert Strauss Center. Link:https://reassessingcounterinsurgency....com/articles/

There is a strong British emphasis and several on Northern Ireland - two of which caught my attention.

One on Operation Motorman: https://reassessingcounterinsurgency...long-drive.pdf and the second on the British Army's role after 1998 i.e. after the peace agreement:https://reassessingcounterinsurgency...n-army-swi.pdf

[davidbfpo]

A little reported matter till this week:

A former Northern Irish actor (James Corry)once tipped for fame has finally confessed he was involved in a 1996 IRA bombing of a British army base in Germany.....In 2003, former British soldier Michael Dixon was sentenced to six years and six months for his role in the 1996 attack.

Link:http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/ne...-35971861.html and http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-40733836

This was a PIRA mortar attack, by a team of five and Corry was extradited from the Irish Republic in November 2016. It is not clear why it took so long to identify him and apply for his extradition.

[davidbfpo]

See Post 166 above for my initial post; a serving Royal Marine helping violent Irish Republicans to be brief.

Well he was sentenced today, he pleaded guilty and declined to attend court so watched via video link and the headline:

Royal Marine who supplied arms for Irish republican attacks jailed for 18 years

A reasonably detailed report and the judge comments included:

Maxwell was a “quartermaster” to the Continuity IRA and engaged in “sophisticated offending on a substantial scale” for five years until his arrest in 2016. “A skilled bombmaker is of considerable importance to a terrorist organisation like the Continuity IRA....

Link:https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/jul/31/royal-marine-ciaran-maxwell-arms-irish-republican-attacks-jailed?

Note is was two chance discoveries by the public of his hidden arms dumps, in Northern Ireland (there were others in England) that led to the investigation and his DNA being on record id'd him.

The BBC report has more detail:http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-40774233