Passing the Hat for the Provos

No practical way to curb the cash flow

The burly bartender at a neighborhood saloon in the Queens section of New York City offers a shot of John Jameson Irish whisky to a Gaelic-looking stranger. As the visitor tosses it down, the bartender mutters a curse about "the bloody Brits"--and carefully observes the drinker's reaction. At the slightest sign of agreement, he moves in. Bluntly, and loudly enough so his other Irish-American patrons can hear, he asks the stranger for a contribution to the terrorist Provisional wing of the Irish Republican Army.

Few customers can resist the pressure: most contribute. Each week the bartender collects about $100, which he turns over to unnamed friends who deliver it "where it will do the most good." The bartender, who has never even seen Ireland but whose father was born there, also collects weapons for the Provisional I.R.A. He led a recent visitor to a nearby cellar, where he had hidden half a dozen M-16 rifles and a footlocker full of land mines. The cache was being held for a confederate ("I'm not sure of his name, but I think it's Casey"), who would smuggle the arms to Northern Ireland.

The bartender is one of countless Irish Americans across the country who, out of a romantic sense of patriotism for the land of their forefathers, gather money and guns for the Proves. Gunrunning is illegal: although the bulk of the arms buying is done in the Middle East, since 1973, 22 Americans have been convicted of purchasing and exporting weapons to Northern Ireland. But fund raising, even for terrorists, is not unlawful. Furthermore, any individual can carry up to $5,000 in cash out of the country without reporting it. When suspicious customs inspectors searched some passengers on a charter flight to Ireland from New York City last March, they found that no one was carrying more than $4,900. According to a British intelligence report, Americans contribute more money (an estimated $145,000 a year) to the Provisional I.R.A. than do people in any other country. The largest single U.S. source of cash, according to the report, is the New York-based Irish Northern Aid Committee (Noraid), which is headed by a former I.R.A. fighter, Michael Flannery, 77, who operates out of a small, cluttered Bronx office.

Two weeks ago, the Justice Department tried to compel Noraid to designate the Provisional wing of the I.R.A. as its "foreign principal." Noraid refused, and its attorney, former New York City Council President Paul O'Dwyer, insisted, "We won't be falsely labeled."

Noraid's leaders contend that the organization does not supply money or weapons for the Provos gunmen. They insist that the group's sole purpose is to help support the families of fighters killed or imprisoned by the British. Yet the line is a fine one, as even Flannery concedes: "Our support for their families enables them [the Provos] to make other uses of their money, so in that respect, yes, we're financing the I.R.A." Because Noraid has long been registered in the U.S. as an agent for the Irish Northern Aid Committee of Belfast, Flannery makes an accounting to the Justice Department of his organization's receipts twice a year. He says that Noraid raises about $200,000 annually and that the books he keeps account for every penny.

Because the Justice Department cannot put Noraid out of business, the Government's primary aim is to discourage contributions from Americans by forcing Flannery to acknowledge that some of the money is used for terrorism in Northern Ireland. Says a federal investigator: "Flannery would be better off standing on a soapbox shouting for money to buy guns and bricks and bombs to blow the Brits out of Northern Ireland. That would be the end of it as far as we are concerned. We would leave him alone." In fact, while donations might slow if the collectors were that candid, Noraid could not then be sued by the Justice Department for failure to disclose the real purpose of its money.

Ireland's Prime Minister, Jack Lynch, readily agrees with the Justice Department's strategy. Says he: "If those who contribute believe that their money goes to support widows and orphans, let me make it clear that it goes to make widows and orphans." While touring the U.S. last week, Lynch estimated that "something like 2%" of Ireland's population supports Provo objectives. He pleaded with Irish Americans in Chicago to "desist from giving support to these people." Said Lynch: "If Americans imagine that they are helping Ireland, they are wrong. They are doing just the opposite."

But that kind of talk does not at all dissuade the Provisional I.R.A. sympathizers who pass the hat in bars, social clubs and churches in Irish neighborhoods in the U.S. Acknowledges Alice Mulkern, a mother of three who eagerly solicits contributions in New York City: "It's not for widows and orphans. The British welfare system takes care of them. It's for the I.R.A."

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