Talking to Terrorists: A Personal Journey from the IRA to Al Qaeda. Peter Taylor
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Major checked with MI5, who assured him that the message was genuine, and had been sent by Martin McGuinness. When it became public later that year, McGuinness was incandescent, since it gave the impression that the IRA was surrendering. Brendan, who had been working with ‘Robert’ for almost two years, building confidence as he had with Michael Oatley, is adamant that McGuinness did not in fact send the message, and that its publication, which was never intended, ‘practically wrecked the peace process’. He knows exactly what the provenance of the message was, and says it definitely wasn’t McGuinness who sent it, and it definitely wasn’t him. Any message to the British government had to be conveyed through ‘Robert’.
I finally managed to see the original draft of the note, which had been scribbled in pencil on a piece of paper when Brendan met ‘Robert’ in a hotel room in London. It was ‘Robert’ who wrote it, and then sent it, presumably neatly typed or rewritten in ink, via MI5 to John Major. ‘Robert’ may also have added a gloss to give the government added encouragement. He then gave the original historic piece of paper to Brendan. The words on it reflected what Brendan believed the IRA’s broad position to be – with the exception of the unfortunate phrase ‘we need your advice on how to bring it to an end’, which may have been ‘Robert’s’ own amendment, ‘pour encourager’.
Despite the embarrassment and confusion the message subsequently caused, it had the desired effect. The government took almost a month to consider it, and finally responded in a communication via ‘Robert’ dated 19 March 1993. It said the government was prepared to engage in dialogue, but only within the limits it had already made clear: that an end to the partition of Ireland would not be on the agenda, and the principle of the consent of the majority was taken as read. Crucially, given what was about to happen, the government emphasised that any such dialogue could only take place following ‘a halt to violent activity’.30
The following day, 20 March, the IRA exploded two bombs planted in waste bins in Warrington city centre, near Liverpool. It was a Saturday, and the town was packed with shoppers. Warnings were given, but they proved inadequate. Two young boys died in the blast. One of them, Jonathan Ball, was only three years old. The other, Tim Parry, was twelve. Brendan was horrified. ‘A disaster. A total disaster. Warrington actually spurred me on. This is crazy. This has to end. Warrington practically stopped the process. I just said to Martin, “This is absolutely not on,” and he said, “Yes, you’re right.”’
The reason Warrington almost brought the peace process to an end was that following the government’s response the previous day, arrangements were already in place for a meeting between ‘Robert’ and his boss, John Deverell, and Martin McGuinness and another senior Provisional, the former IRA gun-runner and Maze escapee Gerry Kelly. Both sides were keen for things to move as quickly as possible, and the meeting had been scheduled to take place at Brendan’s house in Derry the following Monday, 22 March. The government had made it clear in its response of 19 March that dialogue could only take place following ‘a halt to violent activity’. With two young boys dead in Warrington and the nation outraged by the IRA’s murderous activity, going ahead with any such meeting was utterly unthinkable. ‘Robert’ knew it, and John Deverell knew it. But Brendan was convinced that the meeting had to take place, despite Warrington. McGuinness and Kelly were all geared up, and to cancel it risked destroying the whole process. Inevitably, the IRA would accuse the British of bad faith, and McGuinness’s judgement in going along with the relationship with ‘Robert’ and Brendan, and perhaps even his leadership, would be called into question. McGuinness knew he was walking a tightrope.
‘Robert’ let Brendan know, probably by coded fax, that he couldn’t come to the meeting. But Brendan was desperate: ‘We’ve a situation where two senior Republicans are prepared to meet you – and there can be progress. If you don’t come, I’m finished.’ ‘Robert’ said that under the circumstances he couldn’t come, but he would make a call and then ring Brendan back. Ten minutes later, the phone rang. ‘Robert’ said he still couldn’t make it. Brendan laid the situation on the line: ‘I’m totally serious about this. These people [McGuinness and Kelly] are in Derry at the moment, and I’ve organised it.’ ‘Robert’ said he would call back in half an hour. ‘He rang back in four minutes and said, “I’ll come.”’ But he would be coming on his own, without John Deverell. ‘Robert’ was breaking the government’s cardinal rule, that it would only talk directly to the IRA once it had declared an end to violence. ‘That’s why I admire the guy so much,’ said Brendan. ‘The world is full of everybody who does the right thing, and then occasionally there’s people who cross the line. If he hadn’t done what he did, we’d still be hearing the bombs going off today – and there’d be no Good Friday Agreement. “Robert” is the kind of guy who in other days you would pin medals on.’ The government didn’t find out about the meeting until many months later, and was horrified that its emissary had broken its vital precondition.
True to his word, ‘Robert’ arrived in Derry for the crucial meeting. McGuinness and Kelly were waiting at McGuinness’s mother’s house in the Bogside. When they heard that ‘Robert’ was alone, and Deverell hadn’t turned up, they were furious, scenting British double dealing. The spectre of Michael Collins was probably in their minds.p A message was conveyed to Brendan that the Republican delegation wouldn’t come until Deverell arrived, and that they would wait until the following day. ‘Robert’, who was waiting at Brendan’s house, said he would go and explain the situation to McGuinness and Kelly. Brendan was worried at the prospect of his going into the Bogside on his own: ‘Robert’ had told him two years earlier that if he was captured the IRA would kill him, but that they would torture him first to get him to reveal the names of MI5’s agents within the IRA, which were stored in his head. It was therefore decided that a former Catholic priest, Denis Bradley, who played a peripheral role in the Link, would accompany him to Mrs McGuinness’s house. ‘Robert’ must have been persuasive, as they returned with McGuinness and Kelly.
Northern Ireland is a dangerous place, and not just for ‘spooks’. It can be dangerous for journalists too. In 1993, around the time ‘Robert’ was meeting Martin McGuinness and Gerry Kelly at Brendan’s house, I was in the province researching a documentary called Dead or Alive for my series States of Terror, which was transmitted in autumn that year. I had no idea about the secret contacts between MI5 and the IRA that were taking place in the shadows of Derry.
Ironically, given that ‘Robert’ from MI5 was in Derry on a very different mission, Dead or Alive investigated the ways in which MI5 and the RUC’s Special Branch recruited and ran informers from within the ranks of the IRA, and how the IRA hunted them down and ‘executed’ them. As part of the evidence for the documentary, I needed to get my hands on taped interviews that I’d heard the IRA had recorded with three alleged informers before they put bullets in the back of their heads and left their naked bodies in black bin liners in remote country lanes in South Armagh.
The bodies were found on 2 July 1992, and were those of three Republicans from Portadown in County Armagh: Aidan Starrs (twenty-nine), John Dignam (thirty-two) and Gregory Burns (thirty-three). I wanted to find out who these men were, what had happened, and whether they really were informers or ‘touts’. The tapes of their ‘confessions’ would obviously be vital evidence for the documentary I was making.
Getting access to the tapes was a long process that involved clandestine meetings with masked IRA men in council houses in Belfast and Dublin. These meetings invariably began with my being picked up in a pub and then being taken to the rendezvous, whose location I was told to forget. The IRA finally gave the go-ahead for me to hear the tapes. However, the plan wasn’t for me to listen in the comfort and relative safety of a council house, but at some remote location in the wilds of South Armagh, where the tapes were apparently being held.
I met my escorts in a pub on the Irish side of the border, and was driven to another meeting point, where I was directed to get into another car. It was late at night, and very dark. I was told to get in the back and to cover myself with a blanket that was lying there. I was then driven