WE’VE BEEN THRO WN TO THE HYENAS
Joe McCann was known as the ‘Che Guevara of the IRA.’ They still sing ballads about his ‘bravery’ during The Troubles (‘he scorned Britain’s might’...) in pubs along the Falls Road in Belfast. A plaque honouring his memory has been put up in the city centre. It features a silhouette of McCann crouched with an M1 Carbine semiautomatic rifle resting on his knee.
The photograph was taken during a stand-off between his infamous IRA unit (Third Belfast Battalion) and 600 British troops who had flooded into the Market district to arrest a local man after internment was introduced.
The picture appeared in a spread in Life Magazine and secured McCann’s place in Republican folklore. on the commemorative plaque bearing the ‘iconic’ image is the inscription: ‘Joe McCann, Staff Capt IRA, Murdered by British paratroopers 15th April 1972.’
Interesting, isn’t it, how all IRA men who died were ‘murdered’, but the men, women and children they slaughtered were legitimate ‘casualties of war’ or just collateral damage.
Nowhere is this hypocrisy more evident than in the mythologised life — and death — of 24-year-old ‘Staff Capt’ Joe McCann.
‘Joe was a true Republican Socialist and a genuine working class hero,’ reads the eulogy to him on his official website.
In fact, McCann’s unit used children to lure British soldiers into deadly ambushes, a ploy which sits uneasily with the romanticised narrative peddled by his supporters.
McCann might never have been arrested, charged or convicted of killing anyone — as his family are at pains to point out — but ‘no convictions’ is not the same as being innocent.
He was at the top of the Royal Ulster Constabulary’s most wanted list and was strongly suspected of being involved in numerous killings and terrorist outrages, including the shooting dead of a corporal and attempted assassination of a prominent Unionist politician.
There could also be another, more notorious entry on his CV, the Mail has learned.
McCann is rumoured to have been one of the masterminds behind a car bomb attack on Aldershot barracks in 1972, an atrocity which claimed seven lives, all civilians. ‘Joe McCann has always been linked with Aldershot,’ a former IRA operative told us this week. Remember this when you read what follows. Today, more than 40 years after Joe McCann met his death in Belfast — a place where so many IRA bombers still walk the streets as free men — two former paratroopers have been charged with his murder.
McCann must be laughing in his grave. For in a few weeks’ time, the ‘defendants’, pensioners known only as Soldiers A and C, will be summoned before a court in Belfast where they could be publicly identified.
THeRe’S a ‘very real chance’ they will not be allowed to retain their anonymity when they stand trial, even though they would fear not just for their own safety, but that of their families, if named. ‘I feel angry and betrayed that our own Government has allowed this witch-hunt to take place against myself and fellow veterans,’ said Soldier A, now 67, who recently lost his wife to cancer.
‘Nearly half my adult life has been spent serving Queen and country. I think it is immoral and disgusting that we’re being treated like this.’
Soldier C, 65 a husband, father, and grandfather, added: ‘I was awarded the British empire Medal. And yet here I am, being persecuted. I would like someone in power to explain in detail how this has been allowed to happen.
‘Why are they not going after the IRA men and women who carried out their campaign of murder, bombing and maiming?’
Their visceral fury, bitter frustration and burning sense of injustice are borne out of their conviction that they have been betrayed to appease the nationalists.
Republican support is vital to the peace process — even, it seems, if it means sacrificing men who served their country with fearlessness and pride. As Soldier A says: ‘We have been thrown to the hyenas.’
Soldiers A and C have been living under the shadow of prosecution for months, but only recently found out the case against them was going to proceed.
At the heart of the scandal is a cruel irony. The two willingly agreed to co-operate with Northern Ireland’s Historical enquiries Team (HeT), set up in 2005 to investigate fatal shootings by British troops during the Troubles.
The inquiry, staffed by detectives from outside Ulster, was meant to provide answers for the families of those who had been killed. Witnesses could not be compelled to testify, but many veterans, among them Soldiers A and C, did so in the spirit of openness.
Had they refused, they would not now be facing the prospect of ‘retirement’ behind bars.
Soldiers A and C cannot speak about exactly what happened on that April 15 morning back in 1972 for legal reasons, as it might prejudice future proceedings.
But it has been widely reported that two RUC Special Branch officers recognised Joe McCann, a wanted terrorist, in disguise, and decided to arrest him on suspicion of attempted murder.
Soldiers A and C and another colleague (who is now dead) were on patrol nearby when they were ordered to help. As McCann was fleeing, it is said, the soldiers ordered him to stop. When he carried on running, one of the Paras fired two warning shots above his head. McCann did not take any notice, so all three soldiers opened fire.
He turned out not to have been carrying a weapon. Soldiers A and C could not possibly have known this. on the contrary, they had every reason to believe he had a gun.
‘Joe McCann,’ the HeT report states, ‘was a dangerous terrorist and someone who would be armed and would not hesitate to use his weapon to resist arrest.’
The report concurred with the findings of the initial investigation at the time of the shooting, that there was not enough evidence to pursue the case. Soldiers A and C were informed of the findings in 2010.
So why are they now being hauled back to Belfast?
The short answer is that following a campaign by Joe McCann’s family, the file was passed to the country’s Public Prosecution Service, which decided the two former Paras should be put on trial for murder.
The U-turn has appalled officers from the original Historical enquiries Team. one of those officers, formerly a detective chief superintendent, contacted this newspaper after reading about the plight of Soldiers A and C. He had helped review the evidence surrounding the Joe McCann shooting.
He said: ‘Unless the Police Service of Northern Ireland has discovered fresh and compelling evidence missed by the HeT (highly unlikely), there would be no justifiable grounds upon which to refer the case to the Public Prosecution Service for a prosecutorial decision. What has happened, in my view, is both unethical and an abuse of process.’
Could there be a more damning indictment of recent events?
The PPS say the decision to prosecute was ‘objective and impartial’ and only sanctioned by Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP) Barra McGrory after ‘independent legal advice from an english QC.’
LAST week, MPs in Westminster questioned whether the DPP’s decision had moved away from ‘credible evidence’ to ‘political decision making’ in a debate on the pursuit of British troops for historic offences in the province.
Before Mr McGrory was appointed to his current post in 2011, his clients in his then high-profile practice included Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness.
Gerry Adams has led Sinn Fein, the political wing of the IRA and Northern Ireland’s second biggest party, for 30 years. As a young man, he knew Joe McCann well.
Security sources believe Mr Adams was a senior IRA commander himself, a claim he has consistently denied. In 2007, Mr Adams was accused of neglecting to inform the police about his paedophile brother. Mr McGrory acted for him. His lawyer father (PJ McGrory) also worked for Mr Adams.
Martin McGuinness is now the Northern Irish Deputy First Minister at Stormont. Unlike Mr Adams, he admits to once being an IRA man (unionists labelled him the ‘IRA’s godfather of godfathers’).
Mr McGuinness was represented by Mr McGrory when he appeared before the Saville Inquiry into the 1972 Bloody Sunday shootings in Londonderry, as MP Sir Henry Bellingham pointed out in the Commons debate.
Still, the PPS stress that Mr McGrory is ‘not biased’ and say ‘the decision in question [to prosecute Soldiers A and C] was not made by the Director personally but rather was reached after application of proper procedure which is rigorous and robust to ensure fair and impartial prosecutorial decisions. This included the consideration of advice from experienced external counsel.’
The vast majority of violent deaths in Northern Ireland were the work of the men in balaclavas, not soldiers. Nevertheless, past terrorists crimes such as the bombs in Birmingham, Harrods in London, and enniskillen go unpunished.
The controversial peace deal drawn up by Tony Blair ensured an effective amnesty — widely dubbed Get out of Jail Free cards — for hundreds of IRA suspects.
Viewed through the toxic prism of Northern Ireland politics, you begin to understand how Soldiers A and C ended up in this predicament which shames not just Belfast, but Down-
It’s a sickening injustice. Here we talk to the two Paras facing trial for shooting a Provo godfather 44 years ago — while on the right we identify the victims of IRA killers NOT being investigated
ing Street too. Both Soldiers A and C served for 23 years in the British Army. Soldier A, who lives in the Midlands, retired as a warrant officer in the late Eighties after a number of tours of duty in Northern Ireland. He has also been stationed in Saudi Arabia and was assigned to UN peacekeeping forces in Cyprus.
Soldier C, from Hampshire, was seconded to the Special Forces where he also rose to the rank of warrant officer and was awarded the British Empire medal. In 1993, he retired from the Army to work in security.
The Parachute Regiment’s motto is Utrinque Paratus (Ready for Anything). But neither of the men at the centre of this story could have been prepared for the ordeal which began seven months ago when they were first told that the case of Joe McCann had been reopened. Then, last week, their worst fears were confirmed.
Soldier A kept news that he might be prosecuted from his cancerstricken wife of 44 years. She died without ever knowing her husband would be put on trial for murder. He says simply: ‘She had enough to deal with before she died.’
But, now news of his pending prosecution is official, he felt compelled to tell his children. ‘I broke it to them on Sunday,’ he said. ‘I handed them a newspaper cutting about the incident and told them I was going to be prosecuted. They were devastated.
‘What plans I had for my old age are on hold now.
‘I try to keep busy. I have a parttime job. But you find yourself thinking about the future when you go to bed and when you wake up. It’s distressing and depressing.’
The prospect of being stripped of his anonymity has placed an added layer of stress on what is an already intolerable situation.
‘I wouldn’t feel safe probably if I was identified in court.
‘I wouldn’t say we’re being thrown to the wolves — I prefer the expression, being thrown to the hyenas. Appeasing the bloody Republicans in Northern Ireland is what this boils down to.’
Soldier C is equally convinced they have been sacrificed to preserve what some have called the ‘false peace’ in Northern Ireland.
‘I feel very bitter about the whole scenario,’ he said. ‘Myself and many others like me who were also doing their duty are now being hounded by a cabal residing in Belfast who say they are seeking “justice”.
‘But my own opinion is that they are seeking revenge.
‘Ordinary people in the street — not just soldiers — cannot understand the Government’s position. I believe the Prime Minister has stated that justice has to be seen to run its course. If that’s the case, then why isn’t this a level playing field? Why are they only going after soldiers?
BACk in Belfast in 1972, ‘Staff Captain’ Joe McCann was given a full militarystyle funeral. More than 2,000 marched behind his coffin, led by a lone piper and McCann’s Irish wolfhound. McCann was eulogised for his good looks, charisma, wisdom and ironic sense of humour.
But, aside from his Republican comrades, few saw the funny side of Joe McCann.
Certainly not Anna-Marie Bankier, from Ipswich, who grew up without a father. Robert Bankier, a corporal in the Royal Green Jackets, is believed to have been shot dead by McCann when she was still a baby.
And not Unionist MP John Taylor, now Baron kilclooney, who survived despite being shot five times in the head when a group of IRA men,believed to have included McCann, opened fire on his car.
‘No one was ever prosecuted for the attempt on my life,’ he said.
‘It seems ridiculous that after 44 years they are prosecuting these veterans.’
Soldiers A and C could not put it better themselves.