Policing and Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland PDF
Preview Policing and Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland
POLICING AND COMBATING TERRORISM IN NORTHERN IRELAND The Royal Ulster Constabulary GC NEIL SOUTHERN Policing and Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland Neil Southern Policing and Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland The Royal Ulster Constabulary GC Neil Southern Department of Psychology, Sociology and Politics Sheffield Hallam University Sheffield, UK ISBN 978-3-319-75998-2 ISBN 978-3-319-75999-9 (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75999-9 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018933054 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: Roger Hutchings/Alamy Stock Photo Printed on acid-free paper This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer International Publishing AG part of Springer Nature The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland This book is dedicated to my wife Julie, and my children, Emma, Benett, Bonar, Christian, Brontë and Honor A cknowledgements The following members of the Northern Ireland Retired Police Officers Association deserve thanks: Sam Lamont, Karen Moore, Austin Hetherington, and I am especially grateful to Raymond White for his continued support for the project and his efforts to make possible a series of fieldwork trips over the course of seven years. I am indebted to Anne McAnirn and Paul Donley of the Northern Ireland Disabled Police Officers Association and similarly to Sam Malcolmson of the Wounded Police and Families Association without whom it would have been dif- ficult to conduct the research with injured officers. The assistance of Margaret Cameron, Avril Roulton and Evelyn Willis deserves thanks for their assistance with the project and their role in extending the research amongst former women officers of the Royal Ulster Constabulary. The Police Service of Northern Ireland provided important statistical infor- mation, and in this respect, I am grateful to the efforts of one of its Inspectors. I would like to thank Dr. John Francis, Head of Department, Psychology, Sociology and Politics at Sheffield Hallam University, for providing departmental funds in support of a number of research trips to Northern Ireland. Finally, and most of all, I would like to thank my wife, Julie, for her uplifting spirit and unstinting emotional support vis-à-vis a very challenging project and my children are to be thanked for their revi- talising love and support. vii c ontents 1 Introduction 1 2 The Challenges of Policing in a Deeply Divided Society 9 3 The On-Duty Threat 45 4 The Off-Duty Threat 75 5 The Impact of Terrorism on Officers’ Families 105 6 The Experiences of Injured Officers 143 7 Women Officers and the Conflict 191 8 The Experience of Victimhood 225 9 Conclusion 269 Bibliography 283 Index 301 ix l f ist of igures Fig. 4.1 Cause of death 100 Fig. 4.2 Status of officers killed 101 Fig. 4.3 Age range of fatalities 101 Fig. 4.4 Number of fatalities on duty and off duty 102 xi CHAPTER 1 Introduction This book has been seven years in the making and focuses on the experiences of members of the Royal Ulster Constabulary GC (RUC) during the Northern Ireland conflict, otherwise known as the Troubles. There are a number of reasons for writing it. Firstly, RUC officers have an important story to tell and one that is worth documenting. Secondly, no serious academic attempt has been made to research the experiences of officers and their families. As such, the broader impact of terrorism on officers is little understood especially its familial effects. Thirdly, there is an academic leaning towards the study of terrorist organisations which has resulted in the serious neglect of the experiences of terrorists’ vic- tims. Lastly, considerable effort has been made by intellectual heavy- weights to highlight what they perceive to be the iniquity of state terror without adequately acknowledging the fact that victimhood has been experienced by members of the security forces and their families. This book on the RUC serves to counter-balance scholarly orientations that are critical of the state and its agencies. Certainly, the concentration on terrorist organisations rather than the agencies that combat them; the increasing interest in the phenomenon of state terror; and the neglect of the experiences of victims of terrorism, has created an imbalance in the academic literature which, it is argued, does a disservice to students’ understanding (as well as that of others). In university seminar discussions, for example, some students are challenged when it comes to discerning morally between the categories of victim © The Author(s) 2018 1 N. Southern, Policing and Combating Terrorism in Northern Ireland, https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-75999-9_1 2 N. SOUTHERN and perpetrator whenever a distinction seems somewhat obvious. Given the nature of terrorism studies, fuzziness in students’ understanding ought not to be an intellectual outcome with which a political science department is satisfied. An appropriate illustration of what contributes to students’ puzzlement is academic opposition to the British government’s counter-radicalisation programme, Prevent. Opposition has been played out across university campuses with some members of faculty resist- ing the programme’s implementation. Indeed, the ‘Together Against Prevent’ campaign has attracted scholarly support which has ignited suspicion amongst students as to the purpose of the government’s pro- gramme. This has shifted debate away from the responsibilities of citi- zenship, which unsurprisingly, includes students along with the rest of us. Given the fact that violent Islamic extremists see fit to target civilians of all ages and type, and that we are all potential victims, one might have expected a more supportive reaction from the educated class. In essence, terrorism studies has fallen under the influence of a left-wing sense of cri- tique that ill-equips students when it comes to making a confident moral differentiation between those choosing to wage terrorism and those com- mitted to combating it. There are other factors which give rise to a blurry analysis of terror- ism, which, in turn, renders students’ understanding hazy. Accordingly, Conor Cruise O’Brien (1977) identifies a few tendencies which terrorist organisations benefit from and two are especially pertinent to consider. One of these is academic neutrality and professional detachment. This is a scholarly condition which manifests itself in a kind of paralysis when it comes to making a moral judgment. The other inclination is that of sentimentalising the terrorist as someone who is ‘dedicated’ or a ‘mis- guided idealist’. O’Brien (1977, p. 66) suggests that these tendencies result in a critical focus that is morally misdirected: ‘We have noted … a kind of neutrality, and a kind of sentimentality, as among the tendencies in democratic society which encourage the terrorist as he fights against that society.’ These tendencies, O’Brien argues, are often: accompanied by an attitude of mind which might be identified as unilat- eral liberalism. This is the kind of liberalism which is sensitive exclusively to threats to liberty seen as emanating from the democratic state itself, and is curiously phlegmatic about threats to liberty from the enemies of that state.
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