You just have to set the ball rolling and two organisations can destroy themselves. It has a completely demoralising effect on what anyway is a minority.
This simply adds to the weight of propaganda against the left and completely cripples the development of political work in Enis situation. •What progress do you think the IRSP has made in developing a revolutionary programme for Ireland and the kind of organisation that can put it into practice?
Well, we were formed originally in the middle of December and we've had our first national conference, which I think pointed very clearly to the massive job of internal education that we have to do. I think we also realised that we grew too quickly in the initial stages and have taken a more conscious step now towards organising much more slowly and carefully and working more with the membership we now have, working out our policy and educating our members, before we attempt to grow at that rapid pace again.
I think that the IRSP is probably about the healthiest development on the Irish political left over the past five years. •You mean that it is healthy because there is a political discussion and new thinking.going on within it? Yes, in the political sense, in that things are being discussed, there is a process of self-criticism, a reappraisal of issues, combined with a determination to be active, to organ ise, to work towards the building of a revolutionary party. Although we accept that, as of now, we are not the revolutionary party •Has the IRSP had any political contacts or discussions with organisations in other countries?
No. But we accept the necessity of moving in that direction. We accept the necessity of not being purely another Republican org ansation or anomer usa socialst orears ation, which demands solidarity from the world at large but doesn't want to become. involved in the issues.
We see ourselves as an integral part of Last week's arms raid at the Ulster Defence Regiment base in Magherafelt, County Derry, was clearly organised by a Loyalist para-military group. Furthermore there is no doubt that the Loyalists had been "put up to the job by their colleagues in the UDR.
mel UDR members are Protestants.
Three other arms raids on UDR centres have been organised by the Loyalists - all carried out state il the need arose nave been brushed aside by the brush Government Win me Uk with the Lovalists supplied 'top secret Army dossiers listing suspected IRA members to the Loyalist murder gangs.
by the British.
its dependence on the British for arms.
Loyalist para-militaries so that they can steal the 'official arms doled out to the UDR by the British.
Then the Ulster Army would join with recognised forces of law and order.
As Derek Brown, the Guardian correspondent in Belfast, commented: "The intruders clearly had some knowledge of the layout and security arrangements at the centre in Station Road. The UDR has 7,132 many of them former B Specials - and 564 women in its ranks. Ninety eight per cent of these with inside assistance. In each instance where arms were recovered they were found in Protestant areas.
Protests by SDIP member Ivan Cooper that the UDR would help Loyalists set up an independent They claim that transport, communications and weapons for the regiment are under the control of British officers and NCOs serving This hardly reassured the Catholics, who are only too well aware of the collusion of the British Army As the Sunday Times recently revealed, it can only have been the British Army who Our picture shows that the UDR does not in any case need to rely on guns supplied by the British The weapons that these UDR men are brandishing were seized by British troops when they raided IRA A arms dumps. Two of the guns on display are the Thompson and Armalite, neither of which are issued So the UDR operates a nice two-way traffic. It arms itself with former IRA weapons - thus reducing Then a number of its members arrange to "get raided by the No wonder UDA boss Andy Tyrie can boast: "If the civil war begins the equipment is already here. Confident of his allies he added: "If the British Army pulls out entirely, some force will have to be left
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