Eoghan Harris on Cruiser, the anti-colonial hero

Harris

THE Siege of Jadotville, directed by Richie Smyth, inspired by Declan Power’s fine book, is the best battle film since Zulu, a powerful tribute to the courage of Commandant Patrick Quinlan and the troops of A Company, 35th Battalion.

But the politics of the screenplay by Kevin Brodbin are the most perverse since Oliver Stone’s ridiculous JFK. They amount to a hatchet job on the late Conor Cruise O’Brien.

From start to finish, the film scapegoats O’Brien so that he comes across as a bumbler and a bad guy.

This is a travesty of the truth and defames a great Irishman who is no longer around to defend himself. So let me try, starting with some barebone history.

On June 30, 1960, the Congo gained its independence from Belgium under its elected president, Patrice Lumumba. But the Belgians did not really leave. To retain their rich mineral mines they set up a secessionist state, Katanga, under a puppet leader, Moise Tshombe.

The United Nations sent in troops from 17 nations, including Irish soldiers, to preserve the integrity of the Congo and end the Katanga secession. This meant taking on the machinations of former colonial powers.

That’s how Conor Cruise O’Brien saw the big picture when Dag Hammarskjold appointed him as his Special Representative in the Congo. Futhermore, O’Brien believed that Hammarskjold had authorised him to use all force necessary.

The foes ranged against O’Brien were formidable: they included the troops and mercenaries of Belgium and France, British diplomats minding British interests in Rhodesia, Lord Beaverbrook’s yellow press in Britain, and an America fearful of Soviet influence.

That was why liberals and socialists, like myself, saw Conor Cruise O’Brien as a heroic, anti-colonial fighter and Moise Tshombe as scheming puppet. But I had three other reasons to take a special interest in the film, The Siege of Jadotville.

First, back in 1961, as an FCA officer commanding a section who trained with vintage Vickers .303s, I proudly watched the Irish troops depart from Collins Barracks, Cork. The same antiquated weapons were all A Company had against the mercenaries’ .50 calibre Heavy Machine Guns at Jadotville.

Second, also in 1961, as editor of the UCC paper the Quad, I ran articles defending the UN and O’Brien from the powerful right-wing senator Professor Patrick Quinlan who manipulated the majority Catholic students into holding mass meetings against the UN and O’Brien’s alleged attack on Catholic Belgian settlers.

Courageously, both John A Murphy and Fr Vianni, a Capuchin, organised a minority rival meeting of republican, socialist and pro-UN students. Afterwards, our small platoon burned copies of the Daily Express in the quad of UCC.

Finally, as a screenwriter of the Sharpe series, I went to see The Siege of Jadotville because I was professionally interested in how both the political and military stories would be handled.

Given the intrinsically dramatic nature of the confrontation between Conor Cruise O’Brien and colonial agents, I saw no need for the screenwriter to take too many liberties.

Naturally, the film would need both heroes and villains. As O’Brien’s role is still controversial, I did not expect to see him wearing a white hat all the time.

At worst, I thought he might be depicted as a flawed, tragic hero out of his military depth; at best as a full-blooded Irish hero of the anti-colonial struggle.

But to my shock, screenwriter Kevin Brodbin, instead of solely singling out Tshombe and his colonial masters as the villains, comes down hard on O’Brien, too.

Now in real life Tshombe was a nasty bit of work. But in a film the casting conveys the political subtext.

Played gently by the great Danny Sapani, we are soon half-seduced to Tshombe’s side.

Conversely, Mark Strong, playing O’Brien, is given only unsubtle lines portraying him as unfeeling and uncaring of the plight of A Company.

As the film went on, I began to see a persistent pattern of selective distortion. From a long list, let me select three filmic smoking guns that I believe betray bias.

First, there is a blurring of the actual chain of command so as to isolate O’Brien and reduce the military responsibility of the Battalion Commander, Lt Colonel Hugh McNamee.

To help hide the chain of control, McNamee’s name is changed to “McEntee” — possibly as a sly, insider reference to Maire MacEntee.

Presumably that weird change was made to protect any reflection on the reputation of Lt Colonel McNamee and to spare his family from any adverse speculation.

But Brodbin did not bother to spare O’Brien’s reputation or the feelings of his family — his son, daughter and aged widow.

Second, O’Brien is the only figure in the film to have his shoes shined by a black person — a subtext that makes him look bad. But in the real world, O’Brien admired Africans and was admired by Africans.

In proof of this, O’Brien adopted two African children, one of whom was called Patrick in honour of Patrice Lumumba. Later, Kwame Nkrumah made Conor chancellor of the University of Ghana.

Finally, the scrolling text at the end tells us that O’Brien resigned from the UN and became a cabinet minister in the Irish government in a fashion that makes us feel he was well rewarded for his bad behaviour.

There a schizophrenic vibe in the screenplay. A determination to demonise O’Brien in defiance of the facts which borders on Beaver-brookian. Here let me hasten to say that Declan Power was not consulted about the depiction of O’Brien’s behaviour.

Power has been critical of O’Brien’s handling of the Jadotville affair. But he has no other agenda and admires O’Brien for his pluralist approach to Northern Protestants.

But Brodbin’s screenplay seems blind to any merit in O’Brien’s character, and his courage in taking on the colonial powers.

Because in many ways O’Brien faced the same secessionist dilemma as Abraham Lincoln. And used the same military means in an attempt to end it.

O’Brien can be faulted for not realising he had not sufficient forces to smash the secession. But he cannot be faulted for wanting to put down a puppet government.

On the basis of this screenplay, if Brodbin had written Spielberg’s Lincoln, the slaver Jefferson Davis would have been the hero and Lincoln would be having his shoes shined.

In fairness, it’s possible that Brodbin’s perverse portrayal of O’Brien comes from having a political tin ear. Certainly he has a cultural tin ear. Although billed an Irish writer, he has Irish troops talking about a girl they saw at “chapel” instead of at Mass or in the church.

But whether motivated by ignorance or ideology, The Siege of Jadotville hails the physical courage of one group of Irishmen only to hide the moral courage of another great Irishman.

To those responsible I say this: Sta, viator, heroem calcas. Stop traveller, thou treadest on a hero’s dust.

‘Brodbin’s screenplay seems blind to any merit in the Cruiser’s character, and to his courage in taking on the colonial powers’