the van, they found its cargo and arrested two IRA men. This van was pulled off to the side of the road as Ó Brádaigh and the others drove by in the second van. They stopped, considered going back, but decided against it. Magan had told them to get home safely, even if it meant leaving their goods behind. Also, their own haul was significant and there was not a lot they could do to help the others. Ó Brádaigh drove on to London, dropping Skuse off on the way so he could return to Blandford. In London, they unloaded the van at the rented shop. The plan was to wait out what was likely to be a storm of publicity and high security and then quietly ship the guns and ammunition to Ireland.
According to newspaper accounts, Scotland Yard and MI5 organized a manhunt involving 50,000 people. Sea and air routes were watched and Irish neighborhoods in larger cities were combed. Building sites, where many Irish immigrants were employed, were watched. Two days later, soldiers at a base in Wales claimed they had foiled a raid there. It was a hoax, but it added to the tension as Ó Brádaigh and his colleagues made their way back to Ireland. The team split up to make themselves less conspicuous. Ó Brádaigh took with him another volunteer, who seemed more nervous than the others. On Sunday, while riding on a train, an elderly lady across from them was reading a paper, The News of the World, with the headline, “All Britain Man Hunt; Armed and Dangerous.” She set it down and began checking out the two young Irishmen. As she became more and more curious, his compatriot became more and more nervous. Ó Brádaigh, a polite and well-spoken young man, struck up a conversation with her about the weather, thunder, lighting, and anything else available. He presented himself as a “nice boy,” and it worked. They were in Dublin by the following Saturday. Ó Brádaigh tracked down the newspapers for Monday through Sunday and read the accounts. His own account of the event appeared in the November 1955 United Irishman as “The Arborfield Raid by One of the Volunteers Who Took Part in It.”
Bad luck led to the capture of the first van and the arrest of Dánal Murphy (Charlie’s brother) and Joe Doyle. Police searching the van found maps and receipts which led to the discovery of the arms in the rented shop and the arrest of James Murphy (no relation). Although the raid was not a success, it was not a complete failure either. The IRA had demonstrated daring and courage and had embarrassed the British Army in England. And Ruairí Ó Brádaigh had demonstrated his ability to organize the raid, carry it off, and return safely to base. He also became very aware of the risks he was taking. When the arrested volunteers went on trial in September, a soldier testified that “one man sounded very well spoken, like a university student.” The IRA then, as it is now, was primarily comprised of people with working-class and small-farmer backgrounds. Relatively few of them are university educated. This reference to Ó Brádaigh caught his attention. Fortunately for him, there were no repercussions.
That fall, Sein Cronin arrived back in Ireland. Originally from the Gaeltacht in County Kerry, Cronin was a veteran of the 1940s Irish Free State Army, not the IRA. He was married, in his early 30s, and he had been working in the United States as a journalist. He settled in Dublin, took a job with the Evening Press, and sought out the IRA. Cronin was special, a guerrilla leader in waiting. His recruiting officers found that he knew more about military affairs than they did. He was quickly moved on to the IRKS general headquarters staff and charged with developing a new training program. He also began working on what became Operation Harvest, a plan of attack on the Six Counties. Cronin was not interested in more arms raids; he wanted a campaign. Before long, he was IRA director of operations.
The IRA was becoming more professional and the Irish government was getting more nervous. John A. Costello, the Fine Gael Taoiseach, was caught in a dilemma. Like most people living in the south, he wanted a united Ireland. Yet as Taoiseach, he could not stand by and watch his authority be undermined by a guerrilla army that was launching arms raids on the territory of another government, even if the Irish Constitution claimed that territory. In November 1955, he addressed the Dhil, trying to forestall what seemed inevitable. He threatened the IRA: “We are bound to ensure that unlawful activities of a military character shall cease, and we are resolved to use, if necessary, all the powers and forces at our disposal to bring such activities effectively to an end.” Yet he was not willing to cooperate with the northern authorities or the British and stated there would be “no question of our handing over, either to the British or Six-County authorities, persons whom they may accuse of armed political activities in Britain or the Six Counties.” Costello, like most people in the south, believed that the only reason there was a Northern Ireland was because Britain was more powerful than Ireland, “This ancient nation, whose geographical extent is defined by nature as clearly and as unquestionably as that of any nation in the world, has, for many years, been divided in two by the act of a more powerful State, against the will, repeatedly expressed, of the overwhelming majority of the Irish people.” He also argued that times had changed, that “now we have an Irish Government and Parliament, free and democratic, to speak and to act in the name of Ireland.”
The Catholic Church supported Costello. In January, 1956, the Irish hierarchy issued a statement condemning the use of force that was read at all Masses in Ireland. The IRA leadership, through the pages of the United Irishman, replied that the people in Ireland who bore arms illegally were the British Army. Ó Brádaigh agreed with the leadership, but he was troubled enough that he discussed the condemnation with his mother. She placed the hierarchy’s condemnation in perspective, commenting, “De Valera and the whole Republican movement in 1922 were excommunicated with bell, book, and candle. And they are now at high masses and all this kind of thing.” She did not recall the excommunication being lifted. Her opinion was that the Irish people had clung to their religion “in spite of the bishops.” The conversation cemented a personal view he still holds, that “you cling to your religion in spite of the politics, the passing politics.” Most volunteers took the same perspective, and only one left the movement because of the statement; he was back within a year.
The Stormont government was not caught in a dilemma. Faced with opposition, they repressed it. In November 1955, the Northern Ireland minister for home affairs, G. B. Hanna, passed regulations allowing the arrest and detention, without warrant, of any person for up to twentyfour hours. In July 1956, his successor, Captain Terence O’Neill, banned processions associated with another County Fermanagh Feis in Newtownbutler. One hundred police officers, many in riot gear and steel helmets, invaded the village of perhaps 400 residents and enforced the ban. There were no processions, no baton charges, and no water hoses and the event passed peacefully. The only altercation of any kind was when the RUC ordered a band to stop playing. They were crossing a street and therefore engaging in a procession on a public road. The Stormont government forced the peace in Newtownbutler, but it was a short-lived peace.
The appeals of Costello and the Catholic Church and the repression from Stormont did not deter the IRA. The Westminster elections showed that it had support. Many in the leadership were influenced by Sein Cronin’s enthusiasm and his abilities. Cronin had produced a manual called Notes on Guerrilla Warfdre and a series of battle lectures, and was pushing for a campaign. The Army Council, a mix of senior and junior people, considered the possibility. Tony Magan, the chief of staff, was complemented by two veterans from the 1940s, Tomis Mac Curtiin and Paddy Doyle, and by Larry Grogan, a veteran from the 1920s. The younger people were Charlie Murphy, Robert Russell (a nephew of Sein Russell, chief of staff in the 1930s), and Ó Brádaigh, who was co-opted onto the council in July 1956. While the younger people tended to be enthusiastic, as was Ó Brádaigh, Mac Curtiin was not convinced that the IRA was ready. He believed that the political situation in the north was not quite ripe and argued that a passive resistance campaign by northern Nationalists should precede an IRA military campaign. He suggested that Stormont elections, which were scheduled for 1958, offered an opportunity to organize civil disobedience and noncooperation. The council voted in favor of a campaign but did not set a specific start date. They did set up a summer “battle school" under Cronin’s direction. Ó Brádaigh attended it.
The Army Council’s plans were interrupted by a split in the IRA. Joe Christle, who had been shot during the Omagh raid, was a maverick with an ego who thought the leadership was too conservative. He grated on Tony Magan, who insisted on complete loyalty and
