Thread 17888612

ITT, I'll tell you about the time that the Irish Republican Army (IRA) tricked North Korea into thinking they were on the verge of staging a successful marxist revolution in Ireland.

>"Ah, come on now Paddy. I'm looking for support from these people."
Seán Garland to Paddy Woodworth, criticising an article Paddy had written about the things Seán had seen in North Korea.

In 1983, two men walked into a building in Pyongyang.

There names were Sean Garland and Seán Ó Cionnaith; the former from Dublin, the latter from Galway. They met with Kim Young Nam, Secretary of the Central Committee of the Workers' Party of Korea. They travelled the country together, seeing many sights and sounds-and starting a relationship between North Korea and the IRA that was exactly as strange as it sounds.

Before we get there, though, some basics.
>The IRA? North Korea? Were the IRA communists?
In 1969, the IRA split into two organisations. There were 3 main areas of disagreement in the IRA;
1. Marxism
Many in the IRA's leadership believed that the time had come to finally move away from Irish Republicanism and into full blown far-left politics. Many in the rank and file disagreed, denouncing continental European communism as unsuitable for Irish people.
2. Armed Action
The pro-Marxist groups believed that the IRA would work better as a broad political activity group as opposed to some sort of army. Those opposed believed that IRA inaction was failing those in Northern Ireland who were under attack, and wanted to take the fight to Britain.
3. Abstention
Irish Republicans believe that both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland are illegitimate, so they reject both. The Marxists wanted to end this, to try make some political inroads for the future.

A group broke away to form the "Provisional IRA", which is the one you probably know of. What was left over was the "Official IRA", the military wing of "Official Sinn Féin" (as opposed to Provisional Sinn Féin). Later, Official SF became "The Workers' Party" and the OIRA went dark-operating in secret.

>"We had all these stories about North Korea - but we met them anyway."
-Seán Garland, IRA veteran and General Secretary of the Workers' Party. (picrel)

So in the 1980s, the "Official IRA" still existed-but had been officially "dormant" since their announcement of a ceasefire in 1972. Of course, they had been active ever since; mostly carrying out robberies for money, or feuding with rivals on the far left-or even with the Provisional IRA, who had by this point massively outgrown them.

As the Government struggled to crack down on both the Workers' Party and the OIRA, there existed an issue. See, the OIRA had people friendly to them all over the island-especially in the media. It was their view that the Provisional IRA (or, "the Provos") were traitors to their cause due to their rejection of full blown Marxist politics. Thus, they ran propaganda campaigns against the Provos and enjoyed relatively positive PR for themselves; the OIRA wasn't *officially* killing anyone, so the Irish media were happy to pin everything on the mean and scary Provos. Who cares about a bunch of communists LARPing?

Throughout the 1980s, the OIRA made contact with various Eurocommunist groups; French, Spanish, and Italian communist parties were contacted, whilst existing ties with the Soviet Union were strengthened.

When Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev died in 1982, the OIRA called him
>"an outstanding political leader and an ardent fighter for peace."

Des O'Hagan, a prominent member of the Workers' Party, was chairman of the Irish Committee for European Security and Cooperation-and thus had regular contact with the Soviets, leading to official relations between the Soviet Communist Party and the Workers' Party being established in 1983.

And it was through this connection that our boys met the Koreans.

>"We pointed out to them that putting full-page ads into the Irish Times of Kim Il-sung's thoughts was amaste of money, because nobody fucking read them."
-Seán Garland. You can see an example in picrel.

Séan Garland, Seán Ó Cionnaith, Des O'Hagan and Seamus Harrison were invited by the Soviet Communist Party to Moscow, and again to Estonia in 1983. They went-where they met the North Korean Ambassador to Denmark, who they had contacted years prior.

You see, there was already a strange North Korean presence in Ireland-newspaper articles. The Irish Times in the 1970s was paid by North Korea to show what were essentially adverts for his personal beliefs; Irish newspaper readers would be baffled to see news from Cork and Kilkenny be interrupted with a full page of what was essentially North Korean propaganda.

All the same, Garland and Ó Cionnaith travelled the country with Kim Young Nam in 1983. They reported that they were taken to schools, health centres, and various factories. While visiting the port of Namp, they reported that
>"The standard ofliving is quite high and the shops are well stocked. The people are well dressed and there were no indications of the sort of poverty that we witness daily in [Ireland]."

Or at least, that's what was reported by "Workers' Life", their magazine. The following year in 1984, the Workers' Party invited their NK connection from Denmark-he arrived in Ireland shortly afterwards to meet with business and state representatives.

The Workers' Party wer desperate to get people on board with their politics, and in particular wanted attitudes about the Soviet Union to improve. They placed over £12,000 worth of orders for Soviet books between 1982 and 1985, and would offer holiday packages to Yalta or other parts of the Soviet Union in their offices and publications.

>"Just as there is just one Korea and one Korean people, so there is just one Ireland and one Irish people."
Tómas Mac Giolla (picrel) to Kim Il-sung, first supreme leder of North Korea.

In Autumn of 1984, our Irish fellas found themselves back in North Korea-this time they were meeting the Supreme Leader himself, Kim-Il Sung. This was where things got a bit silly.

First, Kim appeared to be completely misinformed about the state of things in Ireland. This was the 1980s; the only guys waging any sort of sustained campaign against the British were the Provisional IRA. The OIRA still didn't officially operate; only a small group within the upper eschelons of the Workers' Party knew that it was still active.

Kim, however, appears to have been under the impression that the OIRA had much of Ireland in their grasp-and that they had everything from tanks to aircraft at their disposal.
>"Kim Il-sung praised the Workers' Party in their struggle to remove the British occupation forces from Ireland...he was pleased that they had struck deep roots among the masses."
Their meeting was published in the Pyongyang Times, and then likewise by the Sunday Tribune.

Ties with eastern (and far eastern) communist/socialist groups continued to grow through the 80s. In 1987, the Workers' Party welcomed a delegration from the Chinese Communist Party, and likewise welcomed Syriuan and Japanese Communists to the 1988 Ard Fheis (annual meeting). Zadim Zagladim, head of the CPSU International Department, stated that any Irish person in the Workers' Party who needed medical treatment unavilablein Ireland could now come recieve it in the USSR instead.

Kim Yong Sun, Vice Chairman of the Committee for the Peaceful Reunification of the Fatherland (NK) likewise arrived in Dublin by invitation of the Workers' Party-and this is where things get even sillier.

>"The food was crap. They gave us dog soup once.There was a scrap of meat and it had dog fur on it."
-OIRA Volunteer about his time in North Korea.

Kim Yong Sun's arrival in Dublin was something that he hoped would further strengthen the Ireland-Korea link. Later in 1988, Garland, O'Hagan, and Harrisson once again travelled to North Korea.

There, they met again with President Kim Il-Sung, as well as his heir, Kim Jong-il. But whilst these lads rubbed shoulders with big whigs, 6 other Irish fellas were elsewhere-taken out to the jungle from Pyongyang. 6 members of the OIRA thus travelled to North Korea and were taken aside to a secluded training camp in massive limouisines given to them by the Ministry of Interior. At a military base around 30 miles north of the capital, they travelled under false identities.

And which false identities did these 6 overweight pale men from Ireland choose? Why, identities as members of the Maltese Communist Party, of course! They dressed in Korean People's Army uniforms when they arrived, and were taught how to salute and pay tribute to the "Great Leader", Kim Il Sung. In between lectures about how brilliant North Korea was, they were taught;
>hand to hand combat
>use of poison in assassinations
>knife fighting
They were taken to a fake town, where they sort of just ran around aimlessly firing different weapons and detonating random bombs.

When the 6 OIRA geezers tired of their training, the North Koreans feared they were suffering morale problems-so they were taken to a circus and *made* to go on a merry-go-round. They left shortly afterwards, with one man saying;
>"It was the worst place I ever went to. The poor bastards thought they were living in utopia."
>"They were virtually slaves. It was so servile, the bowing and scraping, I said to myself, do we really want this for Ireland?"

In the end, the trip to North Korea was a disaster.

The Provisional IRA likewise tried to make contact with the North Koreans-but were rejected, as it seems NK leadership fully believed that the more Marxist rivals of the Provos were the winning horse.

While the Workers' Party continued to work with them, the OIRA members who travelled there were left extremely disillusioned. Despite this, the Koreans continued to send them support-gun shipments here, hosting Workers' Party members, etc. For a few days, 6 daft Irish fellas were driven around North Korea to live like kings-with citizens and staff alike not even daring to meet them in the eye.

All for some star jumps in the jungle.

More like IRGAY

>>17888755
FUCK YOU

SEAMUS GET THE FERTILSER
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

Anyway fun dact; the IRA's Green Book (used as a training manual for the Provisional IRA) mentions homosexuality 4 times. All of them are referring to Prison Staff; they told IRA volunteers that those who were imprisoned should prepare to face abuse and humiliation from a Prison Staff that they believed were all a bunch of gays.
>Volunteers should attempt to understand the mentality (of Prison Guards).
>Just as they removed the volunteer's clothes, which symbolised a defence mechanism or natural barrier, so too by passing derogatory remarks about the volunteer's sexual organs they attempt to humiliate the volunteer and by so doing to weaken his will to resist.
> The mere act of doing this has deeper undertones than one would guess. Volunteers should understand that from a psychological point of view this act is called a penis complex. This complex is inherent in the homosexual and although the interrogators themselves may be married men with a family it indicates suppressed homosexual tendencies.
>He should look upon them as homosexuals with the immunity of the establishment, as people who become sadistic from the homosexual tendencies, which underlie them.

>>17888763
You're 14

>>17888768
If I was 14 I'd probably be idolising the stickies as opposed to making a thread making fun of how retarded so much of what they did was.

but a bump is a bump! thanks anon

Another weird North Korean article from Irish newspapers.

destroyed by based ulster bvlls

>>17888950
Destroyed? I don't know that I'd say that. All the Loyalist Paramilitaries combined only managed to get about 40 Republican paramilitary men, and that's counting the ones the Security Forces helped them with.

Its always quite interesting to read examples of western Marxists going to actually existing Marxist states and realizing how fucking terrible they were.

>>17888980
What's very interesting to me is the divide between the leadership and the rank and file.

While the 6 members of Group B that went fucking hated it, the leadership insisted all was well. For example, Mac Giolla said in his final address;

>"We are regularly told that we have freedoms here which they haven't got in the Soviet Union."
He then went on to do this whole bit about no matter how shitty the Soviet Union seemed, the people there were better off. He said things like;
>freedom of the press? only if you OWN a newspaper...
>soviets have free medical care! we have it only if you're rich
>also our education is only for the rich, unlike in the soviet union
>whatever individual freedoms are restricted are also closer to being restored because of glorious leader Mikhail Gorbachev

His actual words were
>"Mikhail Gorbachev leads an unstoppable surge towards freedom of expression, criticism, and movement."

>>17888997
Well, yeah, its hardly like the leadership of some dedicated Marxoid group is going to suddenly change their tune on things just because the guys they actually sent to train in North Korea recognized that North Korea is a shithole.

Marxists are masters of cognitive dissonance.