[Marxism] This country has 32 Counties but still a British Problem

["DoC" <donaloc@xxxxxxxxxxx>]

JD questions my words: "... the British problem in this country..."?

The problem for you is that your not thinking 32C here. The first thing
we've got to do is decolonise our minds - I've made myself get my head
around (to use an oft-quoted manner of speech) the idea that we're 32Cs
here. The British problem in this country is militarily confined to 6 of
our counties but it impacts throughout our nation.

You appear to think that I would refer to the occupied 'statelet' as a
country. That period is long passed - since the GFA indeed.

As for the rest of your email...

JD ...By the way, for the PUP/UVF "this country" is "Ulster" (all six
counties of it). That was the position of the Stalinist party to which
Paul Cockshott belonged, the now defunct British and Irish Communist
Organisation (BICO), which held there was an Irish Protestant nation,
which was entitled to its national territory, the six counties of
Northeast Ulster. (Its leaders have now gone on to form the Ernest
Bevin society, named after the 1945 Labour Cabinet member who declared
about British nuclear armament "I will not go naked into the
conference chamber"). Another member was the execrable Bill Warren,
whose thesis was that imperialism is progressive. Unfortunately, the
New Left Review's influential Tom Nairn also adopted the BICO
position. I am sure Conor Cruise O'Brien also was influenced by it. It
seems to have influenced the SSP as well.

What seems to be the problem with these people is that they've bought
into the British idea about an 'Irish problem' which requires the
division of our country by the benevolent British Imperialist state.
That, somehow, there are two 'peoples' in Ireland and that as a result,
there is somehow justification for two 'statelets'. The reality is that
national identity here has roots in the socio-economic advantage
experienced by the 'planter' class. This may have been eroded (slightly)
by things like access to free education (1948) and by small advances
made through things like the Anglo-Irish Agreement (which attempted to
buy-off Nationalist support for the National Liberation campaign by
small benefits e.g. commitments to 'equality of opportunity') or even
the new GFA (in which they unsuccessfully tried variously to 'suck in'
and divide Republicans by making them take a responsibility for running
their statelet and not causing too much trouble). Despite all this, the
culture of 'Britishness' (something most English would not recognise as
such) is sustained by a fundamentally inequitable society - I read
recently a Unionist economist trying to explain the communal
unemployment difference (which has remained constant for the last three
decades about 3:1 in terms of percentage) as deriving from differential
emigration rates between communities!!

I am not surprised that another party of the 'far left' has failed to
distinquish itself from the politics of the social-imperialist British
left. They talk mighty about imperialism when it's someone elses -
little about the importance of revelations on the death-squads run by
the British state agencies. Their state is rotten to the core - true
Scottish revolutionaries should see the sense in using these revelations
to advance the cause of Scottish independence and socialism (a la
Connolly).

JD> If Sinn Fein could be invited along with the PUP/UVF, could that be
because in practice if not in theory the acceptance of Stormont is
compatible with the two nation position?

As you might or might not understand the GFA actually fundamentally
changed the situation with regard to the constitutional status of the
6Cs. Just re-read this...

"it is for the people of the island of Ireland alone, by agreement
between the two parts respectively and without external impediment, to
exercise their right to self-determination on the basis of consent,
freely and concurrently given"

To me that looks a lot more like a two-state rather than a two-nation
solution. When you think about this next statement of the GFA...

"the NSMC (All-Ireland Ministerial Council) and the NI Assembly are
mutually inter-dependent"

and further...

"so closely related that the success of each depends on that of the
other".

The GFA proposes a hybrid 2-state, 1-state solution. All-Ireland and
Internal links are interdependent. A totally instable situation, subject
to 7 yearly plebiscites on whether this will transform into a united
Ireland.

To me, that and the balance of military power is pretty much necessary
reasons as to Republicans signed up to it. Not surprisingly, the whole
Agreement has been one long and at times tiresome conflict. The result
of which, is 7 years on, SF and the anti-Agreement DUP are the twin
biggest powers and the whole process has come to a halt. The nature of
British involvement through the 6C statelet is clear and perhaps those
with eyes to see can see the nature of the British State itself in all
the revelations.

JD > The conflict resolution approach to the "Ulster" problem requires
Sinn Fein to put itself on
the level of the UVF and the UDA as "paramilitaries". It also requires
Sinn Fein to decommission and become "democratic", ignoring the fact
that the partition of Ireland which set up the six counties as a
political unit was brought about by the very real conspiracy and
imminent threat of civil war, the conspirators being supported by top
echelons of the British Army, which mutinied against the Liberal
government, and refused to stop the the running of guns and ammunition
from Germany.

For a start, you seem to be drawing some big line of demarcation between
the Loyalist death-squads and the British Army units who (i) organised
(ii) trained (iii) armed and (iv) presented them with intelligence. A
recent report, only published in a 'doctored' format - the Cory Report
by a Canadian Judge - stated this openly. Recently published diaries of
British agent, Brian Nelson (now deceased), who was a senior member of
the UFF detail just how the British intelligence units used to ensure
that their training exercises (which involved training by ex-British
Army men) didn't happen to bump into any passing Brit Army patrols.

To somehow complain that the IRA are at the same level as the loyalist
paramilitaries when these facts are now commonly accepted as routine
descriptions of the history of the conflict over the past 20 years - is
to be blind to the fact that the IRA are at the same level as the
British Army by the matter of fact that it was the IRA (and to a limited
extent) the INLA who took the war to the enemy units - whether
death-squad, paramilitary police, domestic Unionist militia
(B-specials/UDR/RIR) or British army. Of course, the IRA are the heroes
here - they fight for National Liberation against the imperialists.

JD > The "internationalised" conflict resolution "federalist"
approach of the former leadership of Sinn Fein led them to give most
strict orders that PROs were never to refer to a United Ireland, but
were to refer to a United Ulster or a Greater Ulster.

Quite what planet you are on with this is just something else - last
year I was a PRO and I've never heard anything so ridiculous. The only
thing I can think of is that perhaps you might just be referring to some
O'Bradaigh policy from the late 1970s when they were trying to get
Protestants to 'buy into' a federalist vision of 'Eire Nua'. Later
entirely dispatched by the RM under the leadership of people like Gerry
Adams. It was a shite policy then and remains so. We can't afford a
federalist solution if Unionists retain control of things - that's
precisely why the Unionists couldn't accept the GFA - because their
control over the 6C statelet is challenged.

Just look at yesterday's DUP submission on all-Ireland integration -
well that's putting too fine a point on it. They prefer to see 'British
Isles' integration through a Council of the British Isles. Just look at
what they're saying about Minister's being accountable to the (Unionist
Controlled) Assembly. The whole agreement concentrated the power in the
hands of the Ministers - which allowed people like de Brun and
Maguinness the opportunity to push integration and all-Ireland policies
in the areas of Health and Education.

JD > You didn't answer my earlier point about the grand old Duke of
York.
What good are numbers (whose feet are heard again in your latest post)
if they're going in the wrong direction? How can an election in which
Sinn Fein gets more votes than the SDLP be considered a success (as
was claimed by Sinn Fein), when it brings Paisley's irredentist and
exclusionist party, as a popular reward for its defiance of the peace
process, to the dominant position in Stormont? (It also cost the PUP
its seat -- does that mean that party can't go to the next SSP
conference?)

First of all. I view growing political strength as a bonus rather than
adopt the reflex-left response of saying that there must be something
wrong if you're getting too popular. You maintain SF is just leading
people up a hill - but where's the evidence? The party is too
electorally-oriented - I don't deny that one bit - but it is proactively
developing and implementing internal strategies to avoid becoming
'Fianna Fail for slow learners'.

The rise of the DUP is more of a problem for the two Govts. They will
either have to face down the extreme Orange card or be seen to be
aligning with them. They have legal commitments under the terms of the
agreement - if they don't fulfil those - which they won't, then we're in
a new situation - of their own creation.

Note: It is my understanding that the PUP retained one seat and lost
one.

Is mise
DOC

James Daly

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