Unleashing the "Third Force"

Amid rising tensions, Paisley's paramilitary makes its debut

Left, left, left, right, left." As the column of men approached, a hymn singing crowd of Protestants who had gathered in the main square of the community of Newtownards outside of Belfast grew silent. The militant Protestant leader, the Rev. Ian Paisley, had spoken of the "third force," his shadowy army of vigilantes, and now they appeared out of the night, marching three abreast, in ranks some 5,500 strong. A few strutted with the gait of trained infantrymen. Others stumbled to keep in step. But whether wearing face masks, field jackets or street clothes, all displayed orange armbands inscribed with the words FOR GOD AND ULSTER. Thundered Paisley from a makeshift reviewing stand: "My men are ready to be recruited under the crown to destroy the vermin of the I.R.A. But if the crown refuses to recruit them, then we will destroy the I.R.A. ourselves."

The ragtag militia review served as an ominous end to what Paisley billed as a "day of action" in protest against Britain's failure to move more forcefully against the Provisional Irish Republican Army. Less than a week after Paisley's supporters had gathered in mourning for the Rev. Robert Bradford, a Member of Parliament slain on Nov. 14 by I.R.A. gunmen, many of Northern Ireland's Protestants walked off their jobs in a day of demonstrations that disrupted the region. Paisley led a motorcade to the Parliament buildings in Stormont, which until the early 1970s were the seat of Protestant power. Labeling James Prior, Britain's Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, as "nothing better than a squatter," Paisley announced: "We are outside the gates of Stormont today. But very shortly we will be inside."

Prior, who was attacked two weeks ago by a mob of angry Protestants, warned that the government would not allow "private armies" to take over from the police and the army. But during the Newtownards rally, British troops were conspicuously absent and the police kept discreetly to side streets, leading to concern that the government would not be able to contain the "third force."

Some Unionists feared that Paisley's stridently anti-British stand might provoke a break with London. To preserve harmony in the Protestant cause--a doubtful prospect--Loyalist parties sent representatives to a hastily convened summit in Londonderry. But officials in both Belfast and London suspected that Paisley had other things than Protestant unity in mind. Said one Cabinet minister: "Ian Paisley sees himself as the first President of an independent Ulster."

In the uproar over the Paisley parade, a crucial call for an end to sectarian violence went largely ignored. Tomas Cardinal O'Fiaich, Primate of All Ireland, declared flatly that Catholics who cooperate with the I.R.A. are committing a mortal sin. Church officials are now worried that fear of indiscriminate violence by Paisley vigilantes might cast the I.R.A. as a defender of the beleaguered Catholic community.

The I.R.A. hoped that Paisley's "day of action" would help to split the Protestants and lead to a British withdrawal frum Ulster. Meanwhile, the I.R.A. continued to bomb in Britain. A toy gun left on the sidewalk in front of military barracks in London exploded, injuring two women. Said Social Democratic and Labor Party Deputy Leader Seamus Mallon, expressing the growing fears in Ulster and elsewhere with such continuing violence: "Paisley and the Provos are simply feeding on each other." qed

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