Nice language BTW! Even using your own source of information you can see the majority of civilians killed in the troubles were by Loyalist paramilitaries. They also accounted for twice as many of their own as they did Republican paramilitaries and even a smattering of British security forces. Hardly sustainable was it?

The reason that the army were there in the first place was to protect the Catholics from loyalist gangs, you could say they were the real start of the troubles. Also the UVF and UFF weren't as well organised or as well equiped as the Provos due to not having thousands of plastic paddy yanks and a certain, recently deceased African dictator proping them up.

Look - I realise that you're just trying to be 'edgy' and 'cool' but stop and think about what you're posting. Then have a word with yourself.

Deary me.

It only works one way with Republicans, just think of the stink they still kick up about Loughgall.

The issue of legitimate targets is very simple it is about what they represent , it is about the propaganda value, morale and the symbolism.

If you cannot see mebers of the royal family as meeting these criteria you are completely blind.
Even now the issue of symbols is hugely important to people in NI. Argements about the name of the Police RUC or PSNI, having a crown on the police badge, the name of N. Irelands second biggest city Derry are or have been huge issues which slowed down the peace process.

In Ireland they even had a civil war after the war of independence not about whether Ireland should be partitioned but about whether Irish leaders should swear an oath of allegiance to the British Crown.

Your simplistic arguements do not add up and just show your prejudices.

You are also wrong about the criminal element to the IRA they actually tried to prevent drugs etc becoming a problem as it undermined the cohesiveness of their support. You are mixing up the roles of other organisations and British propaganda. One day you will learn to think for yourself.

No. No it isn't.

Someone else too busy being right-on to think about what they're suggesting.

I didn't say they weren't 'legitimate targets', did I? No. But listening to plastic paddies like you banging on about them in order to feel hip and right-on is a bit tiresome. It may be trendy to side against the British establishment and use British scandals as some flawed argument, but you don't half come across as prat.

Read this carefully: Classifying someone as a legitimate target does not legitimise the attack.

I assume you obey British law? You don't drive too fast? Deal drugs? Rape small children? No? Yet for some reason it seems to be ok in your mind for Irish Republicans to blow up and shoot people and property, including innocent civilians, for the simple fact that they have a cause?

And you don't think former Provos/Real IRA are running criminal gangs, including the drugs rings? You're very sadly deluded. I have many ties over in Belfast, including family. I've stayed on the Falls Rd at the home of a man who's run one of the infamous Catholic taxi firms for 30 years and know his daughter well. Oh, there was some propaganda about them keeping drugs out of the estates but that was actually about keeping control of the trade. You're well wide of the mark. But carry pretending you know what you're talking about.

Yes it does.

It was a war . In a war targets are legitimate. It all depends on which side you are on.

Was Saddam Hussein a legitimate target, was Gaddafi a legitimate target

You saw Republicans as legitimate targets i saw their opponents as legitimate targets. simple. I supported Irish Freedom fighters, You supported British interests. In the same way i would support Palestinians, ANC, Tamil Tigers Iranian Fedayeen or the french resistance

And as for your about being trendy and right on, give your head a shake.

100 stitches in my face being stabbed twice and shot at suggests i was a bit more than trendy and right on.

. Your just a Plastic limey who sound like a Sun editorial.

Quote ="wigan_rlfc"The reason that the army were there in the first place was to protect the Catholics from loyalist gangs, you could say they were the real start of the troubles. Also the UVF and UFF weren't as well organised or as well equiped as the Provos due to not having thousands of plastic paddy yanks and a certain, recently deceased African dictator proping them up.'" You ought to read a little more. The army went in because the Police could not cope with the civil unrest. They may have been initially seen as neutral arbiters but very quickly showed their real role and that was to maintain the status quo in Ireland. They did not protect Catholics at all. As for the Loyalist paramilitaries not being organised you should check out their history. Many of them were armed and supported by the British establishment from the RUC, Special branch, Army intelligence the UDR etc. Most of this was part of British counter insurgency strategy developed in Malaya and Kenya. The main tenet of this was to support anti insurgent groupings you should read Frank Kitsons books ( he was the founder of British Insurgent policy) particularly his approach to Pseudo gangs. Here is a link. aangirfan.blogspot.co.uk/2005/09 ... itson.html. Fascinating stuff about arming pseudo gangs to do the dirty work and then allow the official State forces to present themselves as neutral.

Quote ="wigan_rlfc"The reason that the army were there in the first place was to protect the Catholics from loyalist gangs, you could say they were the real start of the troubles. Also the UVF and UFF weren't as well organised or as well equiped as the Provos due to not having thousands of plastic paddy yanks and a certain, recently deceased African dictator proping them up.'" You ought to read a little more. The army went in because the Police could not cope with the civil unrest. They may have been initially seen as neutral arbiters but very quickly showed their real role and that was to maintain the status quo in Ireland. They did not protect Catholics at all. As for the Loyalist paramilitaries not being organised you should check out their history. Many of them were armed and supported by the British establishment from the RUC, Special branch, Army intelligence the UDR etc. Most of this was part of British counter insurgency strategy developed in Malaya and Kenya. The main tenet of this was to support anti insurgent groupings you should read Frank Kitsons books ( he was the founder of British Insurgent policy) particularly his approach to Pseudo gangs. Here is a link. aangirfan.blogspot.co.uk/2005/09 ... itson.html. Fascinating stuff about arming pseudo gangs to do the dirty work and then allow the official State forces to present themselves as neutral.

Again you do not understand the issue.

If it was a war in NI Loughall was legitimate , if it was a law and order issue then it was not. Republicans accept this. They just do not accept the hypocrisy of British politicians.

I love reading Durham Giant's nonsense. Whenever I feel a twinge of guilt about the behaviour of some individuals in the British Army, as soon as I get to the end of his first paragraph, all doubts are gone.

Here we have a guy born and brought up in England, and about as Irish as my last bowel movement, happily regurgitating a mixture of cut and pasted Wiki extracts and Republican nonsense as told to him by his inebriated Dad on a Friday night.

Then I remember, is this the same Durham Giant who was lead up the garden path a couple of seasons ago on the Virtual terrace page, when he fell hook line and sinker for the Classic Bailey thread?

I believe it is!

and when you cannot deal with the arguements you resort to insults. Classic plastic Limey. Get back to your comics and drawing with crayons. Leave the debates to the adults.

This is your rebuttal? Pathetic!

As government leaders, policy makers and the actual commanders of their armed forces, of course they were. The Queen is none of those. She's simply a figurehead. Attacking the Queen wouldn't be an act of war, it would just be an attack intended to cause nothing but fear and distress - that's known as terrorism.

And banging on about 'legitimate targets' is pretty irrelevant when they thought nothing of blowing up innocent people in any number of 'illegitimate' attacks. You can't ignore those crimes and support the attacks you decide you approve of according to your f*cked up moral compass.

Oh and I must have missed the bit where war was declared by both sides.


Oh no, of course not, nowt to do with being trendy: "Everyone look at me! I support freedom fighters! Right-on!"
You seem to have a problem with authority and an unhealthy and rather sad desire to be hip. Rebel without a clue perhaps?

Rubber dinghy rapids, bro.


It suggests you weren't very good at it and it's a pity someone hadn't put in a few more hours down the firing range.


Plastic limey?



I can only assume you don't understand the use of the word 'plastic'? You: plastic wannabe paddy. Me: actual limey.

I know exactly what the plastic bit means and i reckon that is what you are a real Limey whose biggest contribution to the British state is being a keyboard warrior . That is plastic. I would have lot more respect for you if you had actually put on a uniform and fired a gun. You would probably have peed your pants though. Plastic limey boy.

Don't presume to know who or what I support.

Here's a simple definition. Military targets generally involve weakening the enemy's capabilities. Terrorism is aimed at spreading fear and intimidation by violence. The British and Americans in Iraq and Afghanistan don't deliberately target civilians, whereas your 'freedom-fighter' heros celebrate blowing up kids.

I can only assume from the above that you were happy with 9/11, 7/7, Enniskillen, Pan-Am 103, Warrington, etc? You 'have no problem' with those acts? That's your f*cked up moral compass.


You make no differentiation between acts yet you accept some were legitimate and some were not yet you accept the good with the bad? Make your mind up. You sound confused. I'm not sure you know what you accept, you just know you feel cool supporting freedom fighters.


'Support' is a strange word to use. Loughall was a well executed operation to destroy an IRA team and I have no sympathy for the IRA dead whatsoever. If you choose to carry out attacks with guns and explosives you can't complain. But I deplore the fact 2 civilians were caught up in the action.

Bloody Sunday was a terrible event. Simple. But I don't buy the paddy propaganda that everyone present that day was 100% innocent and no threats were directed at the Paras.


Nah, you just remind me of the daft ones in the film.

Rubber dinghy rapids bro.


What? What on earth are you waffling on about? I'm a 'real limey', then I'm a 'plastic limey'? Make your bleedin' pathetic plastic paddy mind up.

A real Limey by Birth and a Plastic Limey by actions You plastic Limey.

Can someone tell me what a plastic limey is please?

Thanks in advance.

A limey is a Brit as referred to by an American. Plastic means not a real one, someone who pretends to be one. It could be someone who was born in a country or someone whose ancestors were born there.

Is Durham Giant an American by any chance ?

There you go, making things up again. Just because you repeat it, doesn't make it so.


You do realise WW2 has precisely nothing to do with your argument, and it's a sign of desperation akin to Godwin's that you bring it up.

I look forward to your evidence proving us British have killed a million kids in Iraq.

Wogs, mussies, fuzzie wuzzies? Really, have you lost your argument so badly you've resorted to firing racist terms at me? Deary me.


What do taxi drivers have to do with anything? I understand the cause of Irish Republicanism just as well as I understand the cause of Al Qaeda. That doesn't mean I agree with it. It is possible to understand and disagree, you know.


Completely wrong. Of course you can dislike actions if you want to! Are you your own man or some f*cking slave? Don't you have your own mind? If you support Irish Republicanism but disagree with some of their actions that's your call. You'd get a lot more respect by living by your own morals rather than accepting disgusting attacks just because you feel hip supporting them.

Jesus man, grow a f*cking pair.


I make my own mind up, which seems to be more than you can manage.


You don't call warnings against terrorists armed with firearms and explosives, you kill them before they can carry out their attack. Sorry, but if your heros hadn't rocked up with a JCB and 200 lb of Semtex they wouldn't have been taught a lesson by the SAS.

And yes, Warrenpoint was a brilliantly executed operation. There's not much argument about that. Superbly done. Though I'd love to see you walk in certain pubs round here and say that.


What, like the Saville Enquiry that found 1 Para were responsible for the deaths? That sort of British propaganda?


It's a fooking comedy making a number of observations on all sides.

But you still come across as the daft one.


I realise you think 'Limey' is an insult. But is isn't. And I realise you think you've come up with something cool with the term 'plastic limey', but it just makes no sense and you sound like a fool.

.

As you are the one who started with insults based on Nationality and are quite happy to defend the morality of the British as opposed to us plastic paddies it seemed only right you would see all the others the Brits have fooked over in the past centuries in similar racial or national stereotypes. How else would you be able to justify your superiority when it comes to war terror and killing your opponents.

.

Because you think and express youyrself like a taxi driver where everything is black and white approach. Brits good, republicans bad.You certainly are no thinker. Your posts are littered with emotive terms just like a sun copywriter examples highligthed in red.

.

It is a lot easier to side with the popular view than it is to challenge it. But then again you would be quite happy to be associated with the Suns view of the Irish troubles.





I agree with you on this point. Hence it would support the arguement that it was a war rather than a mtter of Criminality or Law and Order. Mind you the IRA taught the SAS a few lessons about fighting as well. The story of Francis Hughes who used to walk around the filds in Armagh wearing a camo jacket with IRA written on the back in big white letters was a good one. He was ambushed by the SAS, shot one dead and injured the other two.



And yet depite the Saville inquiry you still believe that in some way the Nationalists who were marching provoked the British Army which led to them being shot. Look at your post where you talk about this

.'"

couldnt put it better myself

I hate to be the one who pishes on your campfire about Franny Hughes, but the soldier he shot and killed that night, before surrendering next morning was not SAS. They only lost 2 guys over there, and this wasn't one of them.It was Davie Jones, a Lance Corporal in 3 Para.

And the reason he was skulking about in the fields of County Londonderry, was because he was on the run for killing two RUC guys previously.

As you say, a good story and probably gets better the more you repeat it. Just a shame the bold Francis is no longer with us to enjoy it with you, eh?

I would just like to state, I'm no republican supporter, though I do sympathise with their cause, and I'm definnitely more of a fan of their diplomatic efforts than their military ones, but could I just ask one question?

If the Germans had won the 2nd World War and basically claimed Britain as a part of a Germanic empire and, along with this, proceeded to treat sections of the country appallingly, would the British people have really been expected to sit back and allow this to happen, without any form of aggressive response?

It seems, according to some on here, we would have just been expected to sit back and accept our defeat like complete saps, and we would have had to accept Hitler, and his successors, as our rightful leader, and any attack on his authority would have been totally wrong, as they would just have been a toothless face to a ruthless regime??