The Government official advised that this be considered in any plans for engagements in a review of the Good Friday Agreement, as well as the timing for any planned visits to Washington DC
Irish officials believed the September 11 attacks would impact how US politicians viewed the Northern Ireland peace process, according to a newly released Government file.
One day after the terror attacks which killed more than 2,900 people and injured thousands more, a Government official put together a briefing document on its potential impacts on the peace process.
While noting it was “very early days” to assess the consequences on the foreign policy of the George W Bush administration, the official predicted that the US could not enter a prolonged period of introspection where matters of internal security and dealing with terrorism would “dominate the agenda for a long time to come”.
Several US legislators had taken a keen interest and been involved in work towards the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, as well as subsequent efforts to maintain the peace deal.
The official predicted that the peace process would have to compete for space on the US foreign policy agenda, while noting that the war on terrorism may cause US legislators to take a more “exacting approach” with republicans in Northern Ireland due to the “whiff of cordite”.
The Government official advised that this be considered in any plans for engagements in a review of the Good Friday Agreement, as well as the timing for any planned visits to Washington DC.
The briefing document, published as part of the annual release of Government documents from the National Archives of Ireland, notes former US president Mr Bush’s comments that his government would “make no distinction between the terrorists who committed these acts and those who harbour them” as a potential “precursor of this zero-tolerance approach to terrorism which may now drive US foreign and defence policy”.
The official said it was likely that US foreign policy would now be “largely driven by the imperative of the war against international terrorism”, and would see an environment where security-focused policy advice coming from the FBI, the US Department of Justice and the intelligence agencies would “completely out-trump any more sophisticated or nuanced analysis of conflict resolution situations” from the State Department or National Security Council.
“It is likely, therefore, that defeating terrorism will become a central organising principle for US policy for some time to come.
“In this regard, US policy makers may not be inclined to make fine distinctions between different varieties of ‘terrorist’ organisation; between their various stages of transition from paramilitaries to politicians; or between the political and military wings of insurrectionary movements.”
The document states that while the perpetrators of the September 11 attacks were associated with the “Middle East/Islamic elements”, this will “not insulate the republican movement from much more rigorous and critical scrutiny in an environment which increasingly lumps together, as the enemy, all shades of ‘terrorism’.”
The document predicted republicans may experience a “very chilly” and “more hostile environment” in the US if it did not take quicker action on disarmament – which began shortly thereafter – and clarify its position on the Colombian guerilla group FARC.
It states: “The republican movement’s attempts to prevent itself from being so branded will be seriously undermined by (a) its perceived failure to meet its commitments on illegal arms and (b) more especially, its recent associations with the FARC.
“Since the beginning of the peace process, the Irish-American caucus in Congress has, with minor exceptions, been supportive of the republican movement’s progressive engagement with democratic politics, notwithstanding its militant past.
“With both sides of Congress now apparently sharing the administration’s view that the US is at war with terrorism, Irish-American Congressmen may now feel the need to adopt a more exacting approach in their dealings with the republican movement.
“The ‘whiff of cordite’ dimension (albeit at a respectable distance from its militant past) has contributed to the celebrity status of the Sinn Fein leadership in the US and to their appeal among Irish-America.
“In the very different ‘Attack on America’ environment which now pertains in the US, that same dimension may now become a drag on Sinn Fein’s respectability and access.”
On the same day, former taoiseach Bertie Ahern wrote to Mr Bush to express Ireland’s “deep and heartfelt condolences” to the American people.
“I am deeply shocked and enormously saddened by the terrible and evil events that have occurred in the United States,” he wrote.
“I utterly condemn these horrendous and unprecedented attacks.
“It is difficult to come to terms with the scale of this dreadful outrage but our hearts go out to the American people as they try to come to grips with it.”
The file also shows that Irish officials were monitoring comments by US figures in the weeks after the attacks, with former White House press secretary Ari Fleischer referring to the IRA while responding to a question on which organisations would be targeted in the war on terrorism – but later clarified the US would be limiting action to groups that threatened the US.
– This article is based on documents contained in the file labelled 2023/50/525 in the National Archives of Ireland.
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