Conspiracy
theories have never been strangers to Republican
circles. The most notable since the 1998 Belfast
Agreement, is that so-called 'securocrats' are
involved in a conspiracy to discredit the leadership
of the Provisional movement and undermine the
peace process. (1) Securocrats
can be defined as "disgruntled members of
the security forces who want to force Sinn Fein
out of government." (2)
The securocrats allegedly pull the secret strings
of Northern Ireland. "These men, skulking
in corners of the army, MI5, Special Branch and
the Northern Ireland Office, form… a 'shadow
government', bent on forcing its own, reactionary
agenda on the province. In this view, their driving
purpose is the defeat, discrediting and humiliation
of Sinn Féin and the IRA - regardless of
the policy pursued by Tony Blair and his 'official'
government in Downing Street." (3)
For example, last December the late Denis Donaldson
was exposed as a British agent. He had been one
of three officials charged with spying on other
political parties at Stormont; the alleged 'Stormontgate'
plot discovered in October 2002. The Provisional
leadership insisted that this was proof that the
spy ring had never existed and that the whole
Stormontgate affair had been set up by the securocrats.
"It was a British spy ring controlled by
securocrats, by people within the establishment
who are hostile to the peace process" declared
Martin McGuinness. (4) This
is questionable. Far from launching the Stormontgate
affair to give the then Ulster Unionist leader
David Trimble an excuse to walk away from power-sharing
with the Provisional movement, the securocrats
took the view that Mr Trimble should ignore the
spying scandal and stay in government.
As
Ed Moloney puts it, "The Sinn Féin
conspiracy theory - that the spooks are out to
destroy the peace process - suffers from a fundamental
flaw. Not only is it rubbish, but the exact opposite
is the truth. The peace process represents the
wildest fantasies of the security establishment
come true and the last thing the spooks want is
to see it destroyed. The peace process has enabled
MI5 and the Police Service of Northern Ireland
special branch to achieve something that very
few if any security forces have ever accomplished:
to see their enemy defanged by its own leadership
and led out of violent revolutionary ways into
constitutional politics and a world where the
principle of consent overrides the Armalite. MI5
and the PSNI know they could never have done this
themselves, that they needed people like Gerry
Adams and Martin McGuinness to do it for them.
So why on earth would the spooks want to undermine
them, to frustrate them and place obstacles in
their way, as the Provo leadership claim they
have consistently done - most recently with Stormontgate?
To have done so would have been to act fundamentally
against their own interests. It just wouldn't
make sense." (5) Professor
Paul Bew noted that "those whom Sinn Féin
named as securocrats gave every sign of being
inconvenienced by the Stormontgate affair. It
was their job, after all, to deliver the institutions
of the Good Friday agreement and to keep Mr Adams
locked into the peace process. In that sense,
there has been, for many years now, a profound
commonality of interest between the British security
establishment and Mr Adams." (6)
This
is not to say that the securocrats are nothing
but "a conspiracy theory that belonged in
an airport thriller rather than the real world"
as some think. (7) Such
elements of the British security forces exist,
"but they are not in the driving seat of
British security policy. Those running the show
know that there is more than one way to skin a
cat. They are the type of people whom the Provisional
leadership was meeting behind the backs of its
membership and whose overriding objective was
to ensure that Provisional objectives were never
secured." (8) For example,
when Chief Constable Hugh Orde alleged in December
2004 that the Provisional movement carried out
the Northern Bank robbery, Martin McGuinness told
a press conference that there was a political
agenda by the government and "securocrats"
to try to "criminalise and marginalise"
his party and stop the peace process. (9)
But it is not the agenda he would have us believe.
"It is an agenda of bringing Sinn Fein more
closely into the structure of the state. Had there
have been any chance of a deal being stuck, Orde
would have been under tremendous pressure to go
no further than his under reported statement that
a republican group was responsible for the Northern
Bank heist, without specifying which." (10)
Similarly, the Provisional movement accused senior
NIO official permanent secretary Pilling of running
a nest of securocrats. Pilling had in fact ensured
during the 1998 Belfast Agreement negotiations
that prisoners would not be released in exchange
for decommissioning as a means to facilitate the
peace process and the Provisional's transition
into British institutions. Far from the British
establishment "considering the process to
be a threat to its rule in the North" or
the securocrats "attempting to engineer political
isolation and demonisation" of the Provisional
leadership (11), we find
British diplomat David Goodall claiming that everything
was going almost according to plan and former
MI6 director Michael Oatley expressing public
admiration for the Provisional leadership. (12)
The
Provisional movement also frequently allege that
there is a conspiracy between the media and the
securocrats, with journalists becoming a willing
participant in the so-called 'dirty war' by spreading
"misinformation" to attack Sinn Fein
and the Peace Process. When the so-called 'Stake
Knife' affair broke out in May 2003, the Provisional
leadership denied everything and blamed the collusion
of securocrats and 'journocrats'. "All of
these stories are coming from nameless and faceless
securocrats in British intelligence" said
Martin McGuinness. (13)
The peace process has indeed corrupted journalism,
but not in the manner alleged by McGuinness. Quite
the opposite in fact. The media has been accused
by award-winning journalist Ed Moloney of covering
up truth to protect the peace process and being
reluctant to report events unhelpful to the peace
process. (14) For example,
when in October 2000 the Provisional shot dead
Joe O Connor in Ballymurphy, their involvement
in the murder was mostly brushed under the carpet
by the media. Reporters and editors sympathetic
to Sinn Fein's strategy branded journalists who
asked awkward questions (such as Ed Moloney or
Suzanne Breen) "JAPPS - Journalists Against
the Peace Process". It would be more accurate
to say that the peace process has in fact produced
Journalists Against Journalism.
The
securocrat conspiracy theory may be flawed, but
it brings two political benefits for the Provisional
movement. First it allows to present itself nationally
and internationally as a perpetual victim; which
is electorally advantageous. Secondly, it allows
to shift the blame for deadlocks in the peace
process away from itself to 'securocrats', 'malevolent
blanketeers', 'japps' and other 'enemies of the
peace process'. But the cost has been that crying
securocrat wolf too often has ultimately undermined
the credibility of the Provisional movement. Every
time the Provisional leadership cries out 'securocrat',
only the faithful believe.
NOTES
(1) Roy Greenslade, The securocrats' revenge,
The Guardian, 9 October 2002. One of the
only mainstream articles taking the 'securocrat'
conspiracy theory seriously.
(2) Nicholas Watt and Rosie Cowan, Special branch
blamed for leaks that damage Sinn Fein, The
Guardian 23 April 2002
(3) Jonathan Freedland, The strange collusion
between Downing Street and Sinn Fein, The Guardian,
21 December 2005
(4) Henry McDonald, 20 Years of treachery, The
Observer, 18 December 2006
(5) Ed Moloney, Was there a Stormontgate? The
Belfast Telegraph, 21 December 2005
(6) Paul Bew, Shadowy alliance haunts Stormontgate,
The Yorkshire Post, 22 December 2005
(7) Jonathan Freedland, op.cit.
(8) Anthony McIntyre, SF - Securocrat Fantasists,
http://www.phoblacht.net/am1201057g.html
(9) Mathew Tempest, IRA blamed for £22m
Belfast bank raid, The Guardian 7 January
2005
(10) Anthony McIntyre, op.cit.
(11) Adam O'Toole, 'Stakeknife' turns out to have
blunt British blade, An Phoblacht/Republican
News, 22 May 2003
(12) David Goodall, Actually it's all working
out almost exactly to plan, Parliamentary Brief,
May/June 1998, and Michael Oatley, Forget the
weapons and learn to trust Sinn Fein, Sunday
Times, 31 October 1999
(13) Tom Happold and agencies, Adams: Scappaticci
innocent until proven guilty, The Guardian,
16 May 2003
(14) Henry McDonald, Reporters 'covered up truth'
about IRA to help peace, The Observer,
17 September 2006
