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Originally Posted by setanta
(Post 3069997)
I don't see many to be honest with you: two individuals fighting in the name of their people by any means necessary. There's degrees of bloodletting, violence and death to you when fighting for an ideal? Not to me. Mandela has admitted to being involved with one bombing that killed many lives after you had said previously that he had no power over the organization after being imprisoned. That proves to me that he still had a huge influence on their strategies. He was their leader and founder for feck sake.
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Lets put things in perspective. Mandela sanctioned operations to take place against legitimate military targets, not the actual operation itself. The result of some operations by the South African Military against ANC targets outside of South Africa. On hearing of the outcome of the Church Street Bombing he did, as you put it "sign off" violence.
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The ANC's submission said that the bombing was in response to a South African cross-border raid into Lesotho in December 1982 which killed 42 ANC supporters and civilians, and the assassination of Ruth First, an ANC activist and wife of Joe Slovo, in Maputo, Mozambique. It claimed that 11 of the casualties were SAAF personnel and hence a military target. The legal representative of some of the victims argued that as administrative staff including telephonists and typists they could not accept that they were a legitimate military target.
Ten MK operatives including Aboobaker Ismail applied for amnesty for this and other bombings. The applications were opposed on various grounds, including that it was a terrorist attack disproportionate to the political motive. The TRC (truth And Reconciliation Commission) found that the number of civilians versus military personnel killed was unclear. South African Police statistics indicated that 7 members of the SAAF were killed. The commission found that at least 84 of the injured were SAAF members or employees. Amnesty was granted by the TRC
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Now lets look at McGuinness, he took part in operations in his early years with the IRA as a sniper,thats a bit different than agreeing to an operation. When promoted to command he sanctioned many operations where the targeting was indiscriminate at best.
In 1987 a bomb was targeted at a Remembrance Day parade. Eleven people were killed, sixty-three people were injured. Sinn Féin's publicity director Danny Morrison describing himself as "shattered" on hearing that the IRA was involved at all. However best was yet to come, one little incident failed to make much headlines,
the other bomb in this little operation. This bomb four times larger was placed at a similar but smaller parade 20 miles (32 km) away at Tullyhommon. That parade was conducted by members of the Boys' Brigade, Girls' Brigade and "three or four members of the security forces in uniform there to lay a wreath". That bomb failed to explode.
McGuinness was the head of the IRA's Northern Command which not only sanctioned the Enniskillen bombing which left 11 civilians dead, it was in overall command of the operation, liaising with the three units involved.
In the aftermath of the attack the IRA insisted that its leadership had not sanctioned the bombing, however its Fermanagh Brigade was stood down. Then In 1997 Sinn Féin leader Gerry Adams apologised for the bombing on behalf of the republican movement.
Do you see the difference?
One man sanctioned a strike back at what he believed were to be solely military targets, when he heard the results, he changed his belief in the application of violent methods.
One man not only shot people he was top sniper at one time, he liked to attend interrogations of his own people, which were very brutal. Black and decker drills, sandbags and death for the person being interrogated were a regular occurence of these interrogations.
This second man went on to sanction loads of operations involving civilian casualties, one which if one of the bombs of a dual strike operation had exploded, would have taken out a troop of girl's brigade and members of the Boys Brigade in order to possibly injure or kill up to 4 members of the UDR/RUC. The other bomb did explode and, to paraphase, "killed old-aged pensioners, their medals taken out and polished up for the day? Where's the glory in that?"
Boys brigade, Girl's Brigade and old age pensioners, legitimate military targets?
