Rascal
El Presidente
Hamann Pineapple said:Did Maggie actually defeat the IRA or is the fact that Martin McGuiness and Gerry Adams are now political figures an example of her failure ?
I doubt very much Sinn Fein or the IRA would have ever made peace with Thatcher because she withdrew the special category status that made IRA prisoners political rather than criminal. Bobby Sands and others went on hunger strike and died for there cause."Crime is crime is crime. It is not political," she said, as the republican prisoners, one by one, starved themselves to death. It provoked a lot of outrage around the world as i recall and probably made it easier for the IRA to recruit. The SAS was also used against the IRA and she denied Sinn Fein any airtime in the media.
She also upset Unionists by signing the Anglo-Irish agreement.
Months after she left office Major signed the Good Friday agreement which started the peace process.