Community hub
Recent from talks
Knowledge base stats:
Talk channels stats:
Members stats:
Irish National Liberation Army
The Irish National Liberation Army (INLA, Irish: Arm Saoirse Náisiúnta na hÉireann) is an Irish republican socialist paramilitary group formed on 8 December 1974, during the 30-year period of conflict known as "the Troubles". The group seeks to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and create a socialist republic encompassing all of Ireland. With membership estimated at 80–100 at their peak, it is the paramilitary wing of the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP).
The INLA was founded by former members of the Official Irish Republican Army who opposed that group's ceasefire. It was initially known as the People's Liberation Army. The INLA waged a paramilitary campaign against the British Army and Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) in Northern Ireland. It was also active to a lesser extent in the Republic of Ireland, Great Britain and mainland Europe. High-profile attacks carried out by the INLA include the Droppin Well bombing, the 1994 Shankill Road killings and the assassinations of Airey Neave in 1979 and Billy Wright in 1997. However, it was smaller and less active than the main republican paramilitary group, the Provisional IRA. It was also weakened by feuds and internal tensions. Members of the group used the cover names People's Liberation Army, People's Republican Army, and Catholic Reaction Force for attacks its volunteers carried out but the INLA did not want to claim responsibility for. The INLA became a proscribed group in the United Kingdom on 3 July 1979 under the 1974 Prevention of Terrorism Act.
After a 24-year armed campaign, the INLA declared a ceasefire on 22 August 1998. In August 1999, it stated that "There is no political or moral argument to justify a resumption of the campaign". In October 2009, the INLA formally vowed to pursue its aims through peaceful political means and began decommissioning its weapons.
The IRSP supports a "No First Strike" policy, that is allowing people to see the perceived failure of the peace process for themselves without military actions.
The INLA is a proscribed organisation in the United Kingdom under the Terrorism Act 2000 and an illegal organisation in the Republic of Ireland.
During the 1960s, the Irish Republican Army (led by chief-of-staff Cathal Goulding) and Sinn Féin radically re-assessed their ideology and tactics after the dismal failure of the IRA's Border Campaign in the years 1956–62. They were heavily influenced by popular-front ideology and drew close to communist thinking. A key intermediary body was the Communist Party of Great Britain's organisation for Irish exiles, the Connolly Association. Marxist analysis saw the conflict in Northern Ireland as a "bourgeois nationalist" one between the Ulster Protestant and Irish Catholic working classes, fomented and continued by the ruling class. The effect of this conflict was to depress wages, since worker could be set against worker. They[who?] concluded that the first step on the road to a 32-county socialist republic in Ireland was the "democratisation" of Northern Ireland (i.e., the removal of discrimination against Catholics) and radicalisation of the southern working-class. This would allow "class politics" to develop, eventually resulting in a challenge to the hegemony both of what they termed "British imperialism" and of the respective unionist and Irish nationalist establishments north and south of the Irish border.
In August 1969 a major outbreak of intercommunal violence occurred in Northern Ireland, with eight deaths, six of them Catholics. On 14–15 August loyalists burned out several Catholic streets in Belfast in the Northern Ireland riots of August 1969. IRA units offered resistance, however very few weapons were available for the defence of Catholic areas. These events and the dissatisfaction of more traditional and militant republicans with the political direction taken by the IRA leaders, particularly their moves to end Abstentionism, led to a split and the formation of the Provisional IRA.
The "Official" IRA units who remained loyal to Goulding occasionally fought the British Army and the RUC throughout 1970 (as well as the Provisional IRA during a 1970 feud). In August 1971, after the introduction of internment without trial, Official IRA (OIRA) units fought numerous gun-battles with British troops who were deployed to arrest suspected republicans. However, the OIRA declared a ceasefire in 1972. The ceasefire, announced on 30 May, followed a number of armed actions which had been politically damaging. The organisation bombed the headquarters of the Parachute Regiment (the main perpetrators of Bloody Sunday) in Aldershot, but killed only five female cleaners, a gardener and an army chaplain. After the killing of William Best, a Catholic British soldier home on leave in Derry, the OIRA declared a ceasefire. In addition, the death of several militant OIRA figures such as Joe McCann in confrontations with British soldiers, enabled the Goulding faction to call off their armed campaign, which it had never supported wholeheartedly.
Hub AI
Irish National Liberation Army AI simulator
(@Irish National Liberation Army_simulator)
Irish National Liberation Army
The Irish National Liberation Army (INLA, Irish: Arm Saoirse Náisiúnta na hÉireann) is an Irish republican socialist paramilitary group formed on 8 December 1974, during the 30-year period of conflict known as "the Troubles". The group seeks to remove Northern Ireland from the United Kingdom and create a socialist republic encompassing all of Ireland. With membership estimated at 80–100 at their peak, it is the paramilitary wing of the Irish Republican Socialist Party (IRSP).
The INLA was founded by former members of the Official Irish Republican Army who opposed that group's ceasefire. It was initially known as the People's Liberation Army. The INLA waged a paramilitary campaign against the British Army and Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) in Northern Ireland. It was also active to a lesser extent in the Republic of Ireland, Great Britain and mainland Europe. High-profile attacks carried out by the INLA include the Droppin Well bombing, the 1994 Shankill Road killings and the assassinations of Airey Neave in 1979 and Billy Wright in 1997. However, it was smaller and less active than the main republican paramilitary group, the Provisional IRA. It was also weakened by feuds and internal tensions. Members of the group used the cover names People's Liberation Army, People's Republican Army, and Catholic Reaction Force for attacks its volunteers carried out but the INLA did not want to claim responsibility for. The INLA became a proscribed group in the United Kingdom on 3 July 1979 under the 1974 Prevention of Terrorism Act.
After a 24-year armed campaign, the INLA declared a ceasefire on 22 August 1998. In August 1999, it stated that "There is no political or moral argument to justify a resumption of the campaign". In October 2009, the INLA formally vowed to pursue its aims through peaceful political means and began decommissioning its weapons.
The IRSP supports a "No First Strike" policy, that is allowing people to see the perceived failure of the peace process for themselves without military actions.
The INLA is a proscribed organisation in the United Kingdom under the Terrorism Act 2000 and an illegal organisation in the Republic of Ireland.
During the 1960s, the Irish Republican Army (led by chief-of-staff Cathal Goulding) and Sinn Féin radically re-assessed their ideology and tactics after the dismal failure of the IRA's Border Campaign in the years 1956–62. They were heavily influenced by popular-front ideology and drew close to communist thinking. A key intermediary body was the Communist Party of Great Britain's organisation for Irish exiles, the Connolly Association. Marxist analysis saw the conflict in Northern Ireland as a "bourgeois nationalist" one between the Ulster Protestant and Irish Catholic working classes, fomented and continued by the ruling class. The effect of this conflict was to depress wages, since worker could be set against worker. They[who?] concluded that the first step on the road to a 32-county socialist republic in Ireland was the "democratisation" of Northern Ireland (i.e., the removal of discrimination against Catholics) and radicalisation of the southern working-class. This would allow "class politics" to develop, eventually resulting in a challenge to the hegemony both of what they termed "British imperialism" and of the respective unionist and Irish nationalist establishments north and south of the Irish border.
In August 1969 a major outbreak of intercommunal violence occurred in Northern Ireland, with eight deaths, six of them Catholics. On 14–15 August loyalists burned out several Catholic streets in Belfast in the Northern Ireland riots of August 1969. IRA units offered resistance, however very few weapons were available for the defence of Catholic areas. These events and the dissatisfaction of more traditional and militant republicans with the political direction taken by the IRA leaders, particularly their moves to end Abstentionism, led to a split and the formation of the Provisional IRA.
The "Official" IRA units who remained loyal to Goulding occasionally fought the British Army and the RUC throughout 1970 (as well as the Provisional IRA during a 1970 feud). In August 1971, after the introduction of internment without trial, Official IRA (OIRA) units fought numerous gun-battles with British troops who were deployed to arrest suspected republicans. However, the OIRA declared a ceasefire in 1972. The ceasefire, announced on 30 May, followed a number of armed actions which had been politically damaging. The organisation bombed the headquarters of the Parachute Regiment (the main perpetrators of Bloody Sunday) in Aldershot, but killed only five female cleaners, a gardener and an army chaplain. After the killing of William Best, a Catholic British soldier home on leave in Derry, the OIRA declared a ceasefire. In addition, the death of several militant OIRA figures such as Joe McCann in confrontations with British soldiers, enabled the Goulding faction to call off their armed campaign, which it had never supported wholeheartedly.