Northern Ireland: The Powder Keg

WATCHING Ulster's troubles is like watching a whole country slide down the drain before your eyes," said a despairing official of Northern Ireland's beleaguered government. "It's like sitting on a powder keg. Things are out of control and we're helpless to do anything." Last week a new man was perched atop the powder keg. Former Minister of Development Brian Faulkner, 50, was named to replace James Chichester-Clark as the sixth Prime Minister in Ulster's 50-year history--and the third in the past 23 stormy months. He could also be the last, unless he is able to cope with the growing violence between Ulster's Protestant majority (826,500), the Catholic minority (498,-750) and the 9,700 British troops sent to maintain order (see color pages). If he fails, there is a real chance that the British government will restore direct rule from Westminster for the first time since 1921.

The son of a shirt-factory owner, Faulkner at 28 became the youngest M.P. ever elected to the Unionist Party-dominated Parliament. In his younger days, he was a hard-liner and he has a record of being tough on extremists of the outlawed Irish Republican Army. But more recently he has cultivated a somewhat more middle-of-the-road reputation.

In his new job, Faulkner will need all the shrewdness and negotiating skill he is said to possess. Former Home Affairs Minister William Craig, whom Faulkner defeated in a 26-to-4 vote of the Unionist M.P.s, has already warned the new Prime Minister: "If he doesn't respond to the needs of our country, he'll be cut down ruthlessly."

To Craig, those needs are simple: sterner measures against rioting Catholics, rearming of the Protestant dominated Royal Ulster Constabulary, internment of suspected terrorists. To less intractable men, the needs are far different, and far more complex. Despite the reforms timidly introduced by Chichester-Clark in response to the 1969 disorders, the needs remain enormous.

The outrageous gerrymandering that foisted Protestant city government on Catholic Londonderry has been abolished. Property qualifications for local elections have been done away with. The police have been disarmed, and the hated Protestant police auxiliary --the notorious "B Specials"--has been disbanded. Yet Catholics claim they still have trouble getting available housing and jobs. Northern Ireland's unemployment rate is 71% of insured workers, -and most of those out of work are Catholic. The Belfast shipyards employ 10,000 workmen, and only 500 of them are Catholics.

Poisoned Atmosphere. It was such conditions that prompted Catholics to begin agitating in 1968 for civil rights reforms, better jobs and improved housing. As the civil rights movement grew, Protestant extremists bristled until finally, in August 1969, they responded by rampaging through Catholic areas, smashing windows and tossing petrol bombs. The Irish Republican Army proved unable to protect the Catholics; some sneeringly said the initials I.R.A. really stood for "I Ran Away." A more militant, revolution-bent branch broke off from the official I.R.A., began caching arms, and eventually launched a campaign of riot and terror. The goal of the "provisional," as they styled themselves, was to force an eventual unification of the six counties of Ulster with the 26 counties of the Republic of Ireland (see box).

Although there have been 53 known deaths, hundreds of injuries and countless bombings since mid-1969, most of the violence has so far been contained in the Catholic lower-class districts of Londonderry and Belfast. In the smaller towns and farmlands of Ulster, tucked among gentle green hills, it is hard to imagine that there has ever been anything but peace. Even in Belfast nearly 90% of the people have seen the rioting only on television as they sat before gas logs in their living rooms. Still, the atmosphere is poisoned, and physical reminders are everywhere.

Rolls of barbed wire are coiled against brick factory walls. Sandbagged troop emplacements disfigure apartment blocks and churches. Soldiers in battle gear walk slowly down streets with loaded submachine guns crooked in their arms, muzzles pointed skyward but fingers on the triggers. Smashed shopwindows are boarded up. Scaffolding surrounds bombed buildings.

The British troops, who were welcomed by the Catholics in 1969 as protectors, are increasingly hated, particularly for their arms searches. Required by their duties to invade the privacy of Catholic homes, they sometimes carelessly break inexpensive but cherished knickknacks. Only occasionally do they find weapons. While the troops search for illegal Catholic arms, there are 73,000 licensed weapons, including 600 automatic weapons, throughout Northern Ireland, most of them in the hands of Protestants. To get a gun one needs a permit from a police inspector--and he is usually Protestant.

Almost everything in Ulster eventually comes down to the Protestant-Catholic question. That has been the case since 1690, when William of Orange defeated the papist forces of James II at the Battle of the Boyne. The Protestant domination of the Catholics subsequently reached into every corner of life in Northern Ireland. In some respects, the antagonism is as much social and economic as it is religious. But almost always, things get back to the Protestant-v.-Catholic issue. A characteristic complaint comes from Walter Williams, Grand Secretary of the 95,000-member Loyal Orange Institution of Ireland: "Those people [the Catholics] are never satisfied. If they don't get something, they bleat that they're being discriminated against."

Explo '71. Despite this endemic hostility, few Ulster Catholics would readily give up the British welfare-state benefits available in Northern Ireland for life in the poorer Republic of Ireland. "Why don't I go down South?" asked a Belfast longshoreman. "That's just what the Prods want us to do. Well, it's our country too." But with distrust turning more and more into open hostility and with minor street incidents turning into major riots, the prospect of civil war is becoming ever more likely.

With the situation as volatile as it is, the Unionist government--incredibly --has gone right ahead with its plans for "Ulster '71," a summer-long festival to celebrate the 50th anniversary of Ulster's founding. Unless things cool considerably by May, the affair could well earn the nickname suggested recently by Belfast wits: "Explo '71."

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