Bloody Sunday’s Architects | The Nation

Peter Pringle:

Saville’s report is now accepted with relief by the families as the official truth—but only regarding who shot whom. The darker side of Bloody Sunday—and of the forty years of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, during which more than 3,500 civilians and soldiers died—was the role of Britain’s secret service, MI5. Here Saville failed.

The example attracting most publicity is an allegation by MI5 officers that Martin McGuinness, then second in command of the Derry Provisional IRA and now Northern Ireland’s deputy first minister, told an MI5 undercover agent that he had probably initiated the paratroopers’ lethal response by firing a submachine gun in the Bogside. McGuinness vigorously denied the charge. MI5 refused to produce its agent for examination, on the grounds that exposure would endanger his life. Saville was forced to conclude that it would be “unwise (and, indeed, unfair) to place much weight” on this hearsay evidence. And he didn’t. But the truth remains locked up. The suspicion will linger with those who choose to give credence to the story—and that, of course, was the intention.

In dumping all the blame on Colonel Wilford and clearing army commander Maj. Gen. Robert Ford, Saville concluded that Ford “neither knew nor should have known at any stage that his decision would or was likely to result in soldiers firing unjustifiably.” But paratroopers, famous for going into battle “hard and ready,” are not obvious units of choice for urban security or civil rights marches.

(via Instapaper)