A MAN WITH A GUN

I am struck by how unsuccessful and futile political murders are. They usually trigger a reaction which is entirely opposed to what the perpetrator desired and bring disaster on the community he may claim to represent. Thus John Wilkes Booth’s murder of Abraham Lincoln in 1865 solidified opposition to slavery and made the South a political pariah for generations. The assassination of Julius Caesar did nothing to save the Roman Republic, instead ushering in a long line of Emperors, exploiting the patrician and senatorial class .The luckless Archduke Franz Ferdinand fell to Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo in 1914; the ensuing war convulsed all Europe but the cause of Serbian nationalism was doomed, with Serbia totally overrun by the Central Powers.

Deplorable Khalid Masood

Violent misfit and loser Klalid Masood, British born, killed 4 innocents on 22 March on Westminster Bridge and at the entrance to Parliament. His weapons were a car and two kitchen knives, hardly sophisticated items. He achieved nothing other than exacerbating the hatred and contempt felt by the British for ISIL and jihadist extremists generally. The British are a phlegmatic people and readily come to each others’ aid and like to return to normality very quickly. That same resilience is evident in sorely tested France, Germany and Belgium, bravely carrying on business as usual.

Of course security can be tightened ad nauseum but government must be accessible to citizens of all kinds. The police cannot be everywhere. The disaffected and the alienated may need early support within their own circle of friends and family. Schools and social services have a role to play - many “communities” fall down on this duty. The whole nation needs to keep a sharp eye out for the odd and the unfamiliar and not “pass by on the other side”. The Law probably needs to be strengthened; incitement to violence is criminal but not easily invoked; perhaps that old Home Office favourite, “Conspiracy”, can be widened and fashioned into an effective weapon against the grooming of embryo terrorists. As a last resort, Internment without trial may be a way of taking dangerous but judicially unproven malefactors out of circulation. Liberals will suck in their breath noisily. Yet a society which is ruthlessly attacked must ruthlessly defend itself.

After all, did the murder of John F.Kennedy stop the spread of liberal ideas in America or that of Martin Luther King halt the drive for civil rights? No, quite the opposite. More to the point, did the long IRA campaign of murder and bombings from 1968 to 1998 in Northern Ireland and mainland Britain advance the cause of a united Ireland? Again, quite the opposite. 3,600 died and the Unionist majority in Ulster reacted savagely and single-mindedly with its own sectarian campaign and British opinion mainly opposed the nationalists. This week has seen the death of Martin McGuiness, once the IRA Chief of Staff, a gunman in his youth and a director of gunmen for decades. His violent green fantasies fuelled the conflict and nothing can condone his early bloody career, as Theresa May noted. He finally realised the only way to make progress was to end terror and negotiate.

Reformed gunman McGuiness with his pal Gerry Adams

The Good Friday 1998 Agreement followed bringing power-sharing to Ulster but preserving Northern Ireland’s British status. In time the relieved people of Ulster were to see an unholy alliance of rabid Presbyterian demagogue Ian Paisley as First Minister and unrepentent IRA leader Martin McGuiness as his Deputy ruling together rather amicably. At least the killing ended and I grudgingly give McGuiness some credit. The obituaries of McGuiness politely accentuated the positives – the Leftist BBC characteristically more or less deified the ex-terrorist and of course ineffable Bill Clinton could not resist grandstanding at the funeral.  The only publically discordant note came from Thatcherite minister Norman Tebbitt who wished McGuiness a hot time in Hell – not surprisingly as the IRA bomb in Brighton in 1984 had cruelly disabled his beloved wife, Margaret.

Violence can destroy but it cannot build. There used to be a defeatist saying in the  1930s The Bomber will always get through. Well that was not true, as Britain demonstrated by building Hurricanes and Spitfires and inventing radar. That same courage and ingenuity is deployed now against terrorists. There is an Irving Berlin classic You can’t get a Man with a Gun but we can and we do.

SMD

25.03.17

Text Copyright ©Sidney Donald 2017