It’s 1970 & Irish army are plotting to invade Northern Ireland

Analysis: The prospect of Irish Defence Forces making incursions into Northern Ireland was mooted after violence erupted there in 1969

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By Michael Kennedy, RIA

‘A Government meeting is not a ballad singing session’, wrote an angry Minister for External Affairs Patrick Hillery in 1969. He had just listened to Minister for Defence Jim Gibbons in a Cabinet meeting ‘waxing patriotic and accusing us of recognising the border’. Venting by putting his thoughts on paper, he continued ‘country is full of heroes who are willing to wage total war in words now that somebody has decided on a line of action which protects them.’

As rioting and violence broke out across Northern Ireland in August 1969, the Defence Forces sent field hospitals and support units to the border to treat casualties who did not want to be treated in Northern Ireland hospitals. One of Hillery’s colleagues said the soldiers were ‘like hypnotised hens’ stopping at the border which was nothing but a line on the map and the Minister for Defence ‘should put it right’.

The future president was not impressed. ‘The mouthing of such inanities within Government and maybe without would make it impossible for any serious member to carry out a task on behalf of that government’, wrote Hillery. ‘Frankly, the Army was not equipped or capable of doing what some people would like it to do.’

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From RTÉ Archives, Taoiseach Jack Lynch announces in an August 1969 broadcast that the Irish Army will set up field hospitals along the border

But what if the political rhetoric became a military reality? The Irish Defence Forces have been historically and habitually let down by their political masters when it comes to funding. Despite some investment in modern equipment in the mid-1960s to enable the Defence Forces to continue to undertake service in United Nations peacekeeping missions – in particular in Cyprus from 1964 – actual strength was well below paper strength, equipment was old and obsolete, or completely lacking and combat efficiency was low.

In addition, the Defence Forces lacked heavy armour, air cover and naval assets. Most of all, they didn’t have the sheer numbers to mount any form of expeditionary force, let alone to invade even the smallest part of Northern Ireland. ‘Lashings of creamy patriotic ballad singing’ in Cabinet, as Hillery put it, masked this reality with naïve, green political rhetoric.

At a subsequent Cabinet meeting on February 6th 1970, Minister for Defence Gibbons orally instructed the Chief of Staff of the Defence Forces, Lieutenant General Seán MacEoin ‘to prepare and train the Army for incursions into Northern Ireland’. When asked by Gibbons what were the ‘critical deficiencies’ he faced, MacEoin replied ‘manpower, armoured fighting vehicles, transport’. In effect, the items even a basic mechanised infantry force requires to operate, not to mention air cover and heavy weapons of various types and combat engineering equipment.

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From RTÉ Archives, Tom McCaughren reports for RTÉ News from Derry in August 1969 on the barricades in the Bogside and demands from activist Bernadette Devlin for people to continue to man them.

MacEoin was politely telling his minister that his men could not undertake the task they might be called upon to undertake, but what exactly was the task? MacEoin looked for clarification and Gibbons provided this explanation on February 13th 1970. ‘Incursions would be mounted only in circumstances where there would be a complete breakdown of law and order in Northern Ireland and where the security forces were unable or unwilling to protect the minority. The sole object of the incursions would be the protection of the lives and property of the minority’.

Like all military forces, the Defence Forces plan for contingencies with operations it is never called upon to undertake. One such was called ‘Exercise Armageddon’ which war-gamed the case of ‘Armageddon’ in Northern Ireland. But it would, as the name suggested, be an apocalypse for the young soldiers of the Defence Forces if they were sent into combat against the RUC, the newly formed Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), the British Army and various other hostile groups including the UVF. The Government spoke of the Defence Forces undertaking ‘mercy missions’ into Northern Ireland; a suicide mission was a more appropriate term.

In summer 1971, in the context of ensuring the security of the Irish state in light of the worsening situation in Northern Ireland, a new Minister for Defence, Jerry Cronin, and the Chief of Staff of the Defence Forces, Major General Thomas O’Carroll, returned to the contingency of the Defence Forces having to cross the Border. Their hypothesis was that this might be required in the same ‘mercy mission’ scenario discussed in 1970.

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From RTÉ Archives, families escaping violence in Northern Ireland arrive at Gormanston camp in Co Meath in August 1971

There was the additional possibility that the Defence Forces might be ordered to act following the withdrawal of the British Army from Northern Ireland. Dublin was coming to realise that it was possible, though unlikely, that Britain could simply leave Northern Ireland and the province would descend into civil war.

O’Carroll’s analysis in these two scenarios was blunt and left his minister in no doubt. The British Army could field 12,500 men within Northern Ireland alone before reinforcement from the mainland, including artillery regiments, armoured regiments and Royal Marines. There was also 4,000 members of the UDR, 3,000 Army reservists and an estimated 100,000 unionists aged 18 to 30 who held many of the 102,000 licensed weapons in private hands in Northern Ireland. In contrast, the Defence Forces numbered 8,500 on paper and O’Carroll estimated the number of combat capable soldiers at 2,300. He knew that his force was ‘critically understrength’ and, in effect, disregarded his own reserves and the FCÁ.

Accordingly, any action by the Defence Forces in Northern Ireland would be ‘a gesture’. O’Carroll maintained that ‘no penetration in depth could be made and in the face of the superior forces which could be mustered against the invasion, destruction, capture or withdrawal of the Force would be inevitable.’ He concluded that ‘failure in any of these operations would be a blow both to military and national morale and to national prestige.’

Frankly, the Army was not equipped or capable of doing what some people would like it to do.

This last point, the blow to ‘national prestige’, was critical. In 1971, both Ireland and Britain were negotiating to join the EEC. A war or even a border skirmish between two EEC applicant states was unthinkable. Ireland, the aggressor, would wave goodbye to its chances of entering Europe, dashing a core goal of Irish foreign and economic policy going back to the late 1950s. It would also go against the very nature of Ireland’s UN membership and of Article 29 of Bunreacht na hÉireann which held Ireland to the peaceful settlement of international disputes.

While ‘ballad singers’ continued to assail Hillery and Taoiseach Jack Lynch, it was ultimately diplomacy and political means that Dublin used with greater effect to stabilise and bring peace to Northern Ireland. This was done across negotiating tables in Dublin and London and not across battlefields in Newry or Crossmaglen.

Dr Michael Kennedy is the Executive Editor of the Royal Irish Academy’s Documents on Irish Foreign Policy research programme and is one of the editors of Documents on Irish Foreign Policy Vol. XIV: 1969-1973.

Documents on Irish Foreign Policy is a partnership between the Royal Irish Academy, the National Archives of Ireland and the Department of Foreign Affairs

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The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ