Fears possible loyalists bombings would be ‘like civil war’, Irish records show

John Bruton warned a bombing campaign would mean the complete unravelling of the Northern Ireland peace process.

Office buildings in London’s Docklands, damaged in an IRA bomb blast in 1996 (PA) (PA Archive)

Fears of loyalists bombing in the Republic of Ireland were raised by the Irish Government after the IRA ceasefire ended in 1996, newly released Irish State papers shows.

The then-Irish premier John Bruton warned a loyalist bombing campaign in the Republic would be “like a civil war” and would mean the complete unravelling of the Northern Ireland peace process.

The danger of a possible loyalist backlash was discussed during an Irish Government meeting within hours of the IRA ending its cessation of violence and the subsequent bombing attack in the London Docklands on February 9, 1996.

The blast killed two people and injured more than 100 others.

The “secret” document detailing a meeting of the cabinet sub-committee on Northern Ireland stated there had been “no advance warning of the IRA announcement”.

“The implications of what had happened for the Mitchell Report and for further contacts with Sinn Fein were discussed briefly,” the note continued.

“The danger of a possible loyalist backlash was also averted to.”

The report was written by US senator George Mitchell, who was one of the architects of the Good Friday Agreement.

The then-taoiseach, justice minister, Garda commissioner and attorney general were among those at the 15-minute meeting.

A loyalist bombing campaign in the Republic would be like civil war and would mean the complete unravelling of the peace process

John Bruton

Five days later a meeting between the then-shadow Northern Ireland secretary Mo Mowlam and Mr Bruton suggested “another possible means of moving forward” with the peace process would be “a role for Mitchell as mediator”.

“Mitchell might be able to talk to Sinn Fein in a way that would be impossible for the two governments,” Mr Bruton told Ms Mowlam.

But he said the difficulty was that Sinn Fein wanted a date for all-party talks, believing the British government could “deliver the unionists to those talks”.

The taoiseach believed that “no matter how the talks are packaged there will always be a question mark over the attendance of unionists”.

“It would be possible to argue that a package of proximity talks, elections and all-party talks might satisfy the IRA,” he said.

“The problem would be to persuade (John) Hume to accept elections and if all-party talks alone were proposed the unionists would not attend.

“The loyalists might then start bombing in this State.

“A loyalist bombing campaign in the Republic would be like civil war and would mean the complete unravelling of the peace process.”

Ms Mowlam stressed that it was crucial that the Irish and British governments work together, adding in order for credibility with the nationalist community to be maintained there could not be a “fag of paper between you”.

During the meeting between the Taoiseach and the British Labour Party delegation on February 14, Ms Mowlam asked Mr Bruton his opinion of 500 extra British troops being posted to Northern Ireland following the ending of the IRA ceasefire.

“The Taoiseach felt that he should make no public comment on it, that he should not get involved in grievance politics,” the notes said.

Mr Bruton did not know if it was a “political gesture or a genuine security necessity”, the document continued.

“If it was the former he didn’t believe that reassurance of that kind was necessarily required.

“He added that commenting on every matter of this nature was not helpful.”

Mr Bruton also raised his concerns that the expectations over the summit he was due to have with then-British prime minister John Major were “overblown”.

He said the proposed summit with Mr Major had been agreed under a different set of circumstances and that the resumption of violence had made it “more difficult”.

The material can be viewed in the National Archives in file 2022/81/24.