Irish Republican Army Essay

The IRA, PIRA and Britain In 1916, an unofficial military group was created to establish independence from British rule and to allow unity among the entirety of Ireland. This group came to be known as the Irish Republican Army. During their reign, the IRA had gone through growth spurts primarily consisting of younger Catholics committing to pushing the British out of Ireland and forcing a unified Ireland. In the late 1960’s, the IRA was split into two groups(the Irish Republican Army and the Provisional Irish Republican Army), because the PIRA believed itself to be the legitimate government of Ireland and believed violence to be a quicker solution to achieving their objective of a unified independent Ireland which in return led to a long,

Two weeks after a terrible meeting between the PIRA and William Whitelaw on July 21, 1972, 19 bombs exploded in a matter of an hour in Belfast. The PIRA gave no prior warning just that they were attempting to kill as many people as possible. The events of violence between Britain and the PIRA continued for many years. The violence of “The Troubles” finally came to a halt on July 19th, 1997 when the PIRA announced the renewal of their previous 1994 ceasefire. Although it took many years for Northern Ireland to finally get peace, it finally came in the form of the Good Friday Agreement. The Good Friday Agreement helped evolved Northern Ireland’s present day government and also decommissioned weapons, fixed civil rights issues and for the most part ended the violence between the IRA and Britain. The Good Friday Agreement or Belfast Agreement was a big part in piecing together peace in Ireland. Although the agreement went into effect in 1998, disagreements still continued over issues such as the Orange Order marches, policing and decommissioning paramilitary weapons. Also there were attacks from paramilitaries who opposed the peace process such as the incident in Omagh when the “Real” IRA (a splinter group of the IRA who opposed the IRA’s ceasefire), planted a bomb in a car which killed 29 people. In the end, Britain and Ireland worked out the issues between the two countries in a civilized