Word: conflicted
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...army's problem is that it is an army. In a non-military conflict such as exists in Ulster, a conflict of unseen gunmen and clandestine bombings, the instincts of an army are dangerous. By nature, an army feels uneasy without a clear enemy; and in Ulster, there are no clear enemies. The British army has, unfortunately, judged their enemy to be the Catholic community. Subject to the constant attacks of IRA, it has been obliged to concede that the entire Catholic population is in hostile sympathy with the paramilitaries. Indeed, given the secretive nature...
...division of sympathies is complicated because each group has reason to fear the other. In the foreign press and the propaganda of the Irish Republican Army (IRA), the conflict in Ulster is often portrayed only as a struggle of a Catholic minority against an oppressive Protestant majority backed by the British government. In reality the struggle is that of a "double minority." It is both the Catholic attempt to secure long-withheld civil rights; in Ulster, and the Protestant desire to insure British identity in the face of the Catholic majority to the south...
Many outside observers argue that the conflict now stems from "social" or "economic" factors, religion having lost its prior importance. In fact, the "troubles" remain religious. This is how it is perceived by the people of Ulster, who are deeply religious and who accord a certain preeminence to their beliefs. The conflict is still essentially the contention of two faiths, traditions that are inseparably intwined with racial origins and conflicting historical aspirations. Traditionally, the Catholic is an Irish Gael, a descendant of a people who predated British domination. The Protestant is a descendant of Scottish immigrants, whose succesful colonization...
Another fact seldom appreciated outside of Northern Ireland is the extent to which the conflict exclusively takes place in the working class. In the larger cities, particularly Belfast and Londonderry, where the violence predominates and where Protestants and Catholics live in tense proximity, the population is heavily working class. Virtually all the major violence occurs in working class neighborhoods. The main para-militaries--the IRA, and the Ulster Defense Association (UDA) and the Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF), both Protestant groups--are all manned by residents of these communities. Even the British army, manned by recruits from the back streets...
...parties differ in the extent of nationalization they say would best serve the nation, Moynod said. The Common Program does not specify the number of factories and industries to be nationalized to avoid conflict on this issue...