Gibraltar (B)
Far from the claim that “nothing happened” on Saturday 5 March in Gibraltar, one could say it was a day bursting with behind the scenes activity and expectation. With the blocking car in place and by that night the explosive unearthed in Valencia and on its way to Marbella, a necessary coupling for the success of the British scheme of things had been met. The shadow boxing was over. It was imperative that the bomb materiel be above ground and found after the shootings to justify the assassination of the three activists. The lie about a car bomb in Gibraltar would be ameliorated by the uncovering of an awaiting car bomb over the border in Spain. It would seem a close run thing.
It wasn’t.
The IRA game plan known. The British counter plan, surely well gone over in
committee, was now with the midnight security briefing entering the concluding
phase of Operation Flavius. The murder trap, once postponed, was about to be
sprung.
In the House of Commons, Sir Geoffrey Howe said that following the visit of the
"other known terrorist" the Gibraltar authorities went on "high
alert". Wasn't it prescient of them to go on high alert after this
visit when they didn't do so after previous visits? (In saying that one keeps
an open mind on what may have happened before MI5, hand unseen, aborted the
December 1987 phase of the IRA operation.)
Knowing the Gibraltar authorities went on “high alert” after
the visit of the "other known terrorist" and knowing the Gibraltar
authorities went on high alert at midnight Saturday, we again have confirmation
that Mary Parkin entered Gibraltar on Saturday 5 March. Knowing the IRA
mission was to bomb the guard changing parade on Tuesday morning, and knowing
the Gibraltar authorities didn't go on high alert before entry of Mary
Parkin but did so hours after entry, they were in fact rolling out a
plan for the expected entry of three members of the bombing team into the
colony the following day. You see, even without the benefit of immediate
surveillance the authorities knew IRA intentions.
But to return to the Saturday entry into Gibraltar of Mary Parkin and
the blocking car. For that to be done not less than two people and two cars
were required. The driver of the blocking car, a white Renault 5, was not going
to hitch a lift back to base in Spain on completion of task. Did the second car
use a parking arrangement outside the colony similar to that employed by the
assassinated trio on Sunday?
On parking the return car, did two team players, one
man and one woman, enter Gibraltar that afternoon: one part seeking (or
revisiting) a familiarity with the colony for the drive to and entry on foot
with two colleagues the following day?
Were any of these people party to another long drive later on, a return trip to
Valencia to collect explosive and other bomb parts, the same ordnance that
would be transferred to a white Ford Fiesta in an underground car park in
Marbella on Sunday morning? Whoever, they were under surveillance. Spanish
police would inform the car hire firm the red Ford Fiesta had been to Valencia
and back.
It was a day for all hands to the pumps. Was the return trip to base made in
the red Ford Fiesta or another undisclosed car? The authorities know which car
it was and who the occupants were. They long knew at least one IRA member who
entered Gibraltar on Saturday.
Phoenix – Policing the Shadows (Gibraltar inclusion)
Co-authored by Jack Holland and Susan Phoenix. Published by Hodder & Stoughton, London, 1996. This book, bought and read in February 1997, offers background disclosure, some indubitably inadvertent, on paramilitary matters to do with Northern Ireland. It likely received official scrutiny before publication. The vetting machine if alive to the proscribed, is at times blind to the peripherally related. One is thankful for small mercies.
It is also blind to that which it has no knowledge.
Page 135 states, without use of name or alias: "On March 5 1988 the second woman was observed in Gibraltar by an SAS unit, she was seen reconnoitring the area
around the governor's palace, where, it was thought, the Provisionals were
going to target a changing-of-the-guard ceremony. She was followed to a nearby
Catholic chapel, where she was observed lighting a candle before leaving. It is
unknown whether this was for the bombing team or for the hundreds of potential
innocent victims."
For an "SAS unit" to track this woman, they must have been informed
of her journey to and her entry into Gibraltar.
Two paragraphs on is this. "The woman who did the original recce was the
only member of the ASU to escape. Currently she is on the Ard Chomhairle, or
Central Committee, of Sinn Fein." This allusion is to a woman other than
Glenholmes: a claim that owes its life to a Sunday Times report of 4
September 1988. It is a piece of pernicious misdirection that will be dealt
with elsewhere.
The woman who did the scouting for the eventual Gibraltar operation was consistently identified as Mary
Parkin, an alias widely assigned to Evelyn Glenholmes. Some claims put her
initial Gibraltar reconnaissance work to
late summer 1987. Reports I have read, place the Mary Parkin woman in
Spanish or Gibraltar locations in
August-September 1987; November 1987; December 1987; February-March 1988.
She appeared almost to have dual residency rights.
She could have been there also in the omitted months.
Given its extended gestation and the fact of it seemingly been compromised from
the outset, that it was an operation too far with too many loose ends, there
could have been nothing of worth related to the Gibraltar mission, and another, that the authorities did not
know. Were the British hoping the IRA would read the signs (the eleventh hour
aborting of two operations) and give up the ghost, but yet, within the scheme
of things, still attempting to protectively disinform?
Was one proxy message a spoof story on Evelyn Glenholmes published in the Star
newspaper? Were the authorities saying through this that the whereabouts and
association of Glenholmes was at the time unknown to them? If so, why?
The Star, Monday 11.01.88 – “World Exclusive: IRA's
PLOT TO BLAST TROOPS – Evil Evelyn will be terror boss (inset photograph
of Miss Glenholmes). The IRA are about to launch a missile attack on an army
helicopter in England. * The Star can exclusively reveal today that a
gang of terrorists, led by Angel of Death Evelyn Glenholmes, are planning an
outrage using SAM missiles. * They intend to smuggle in the deadly weapons in
gipsy caravans, then stage their attack on a copter packed with soldiers flying
out of Aldershot army base."
Quoting my old pal, Willie Minihane: “Rubbage!” Would a newspaper
accommodate a like (or other) request from you or I? No. But they do for the
security services; and not infrequently. In that difference are two polar
worlds. As they oblige by disinforming, certain editors will also observe a
judicious censorship – the lies of silence – on behalf of the same
interests. A game of serve and return?
Bizarre it is. Yet the Glenholmes story was fed to the newspaper by a security
source, likely MI5, an agency with a taste for the absurd. An agency familiar
with IRA plans for a political bombing in Brussels and the bombing of a guard
changing ceremony in Gibraltar. The same agency who creatively intruded to effect an interdiction of both operations.
The same agency who was historically familiar with the woman spearheading the
Gibraltar operation. The same agency who had cause in the past to disinform on
the IRA member. The method of proxy communication by the bizarre might seem,
well, bizarre. It is. It is also a hallmark of the intelligence services. To
act out a philosophy of non-existence, they manipulate. Communication at a
remove. Sometimes through the medium of the absurd. Almost always via the
media.
The ridiculous contained in some of their overt manipulations is more
for themselves than the public – the opt out clause (plausible denial
sometimes made possible by implausibility). But the intention, hidden within
the chaff, is real. The old story of what you don't know being worth more than
that given to you by anonymous puppeteers. In secret state matters you are as
wise as they want you to be. That is, unless you are motivated enough to ask
questions and determined and resourceful enough to search for answers. Having
connection to or knowledge of the purpose of the exercise is a head start.
Knowing how to interpret another.
For the conscientious outsider framing the jigsaw is difficult. A news media
playing the game to to an unwritten rule book is no use. Veritably they are the
messenger in an unholy alliance, transmitting on behalf of the unseen other.
Using a military expression to describe a security service technique: bullshit baffles brains. It does with
many biddable editors who publish dubious (and contradictory) material fed to
them by state security. Adding insult to injury, they often parade these
stories under an exclusive label, as
if derived from self enterprise instead of a bung at the end of a telephone or
an envelope through the letter box. Yet, theoretically, the respective forces
are mutually incompatible. One side supposedly living by the truth, the other
surviving by the lie. Maybe the answer is betwixt and in reality the fourth
estate is, in matters of assumed
privilege, a codified extension of shadow state. The once last resort of
the citizen is now the secret state’s first.
Mutatis mutandis – a change of
that which needs changing: usurpation without due process of rights and
freedoms by our servant-masters.
Instead of laughing at the Star report, as some in the IRA surely did,
those in the know should have asked questions as to it having a possible
subliminal dimension. And not just that story. Other clues, maybe. Like the
eleventh hour cancellation of the changing-of-the-guard ceremony on a flimsy
pretext. The eleven week refurbishment of a sentry box that could have been
painted in a few days. For those eleven weeks there was no guard changing
ceremony. This must have made the troops happy. Only toy soldiers like parades
and the spit and polish and drill practise attendant upon making them
successful.
On Tuesday 8 December 1987 MI5
engineered the cancellation of the guard changing parade. One day on, at a
Trevi Group on Terrorism meeting in Denmark, Douglas Hurd M.P., Home Secretary,
warned that the IRA was believed to be planning attacks on British interests on the Continent. As Home
Secretary, Mr. Hurd was political head of the Security Service, they who
oversaw the Gibraltar operation on
behalf of the British state and who put into effect the decision to assassinate
the IRA trio. The forced postponement of the IRA's pre-Christmas 1987 plan to
bomb the guard changing ceremony, by cancelling the parades, proved no more
than a stay of execution. Because of complications to do with the Brussels and
Gibraltar operations, MI5 needed the highest political sanction in the land to
do what they have long done in Northern Ireland, without external resort, carry
out assassination at a remove. Home Secretary Douglas Hurd, as the early part
of this document is testament, was professionally familiar with Evelyn
Glenholmes. That she became a recurring political headache was down to the
actions of an agency in his own department – MI5 – and their deadly
and convoluted ways.
Much pain was inflicted and blood unnecessarily spilt as a consequence of those
mores of madness. MI5 didn’t save lives: they took them. They prolonged
and aggravated the agony. This judgement alludes to much more than the
Gibraltar operation and its aftermath.
The Daily Mirror, Monday 07.03.88 – “The
shootings came just 24 hours after the IRA promised Premier Margaret Thatcher
'something big'. The Provos warned: 'We
intend to leave something more than a calling card for Mrs. Thatcher's forces
shortly.'" One of those loose ends?
Returning to the book, Phoenix – Policing the Shadows. a) The
woman who entered Gibraltar on Saturday 5 March, 1988, was not the then Sinn
Fein Ard Chomhairle member. b) She was not the only IRA survivor from the
Gibraltar mission. c) A clue to the fact
that she was not the Ard Chomhairle member mischievously alluded to, was her
reported attendance at a "Catholic chapel" for prayer and the
lighting of a candle in Gibraltar on
Saturday 5 March. Further confirmation are her visitations to Catholic churches
in Spain, observed by Spanish security who described her as
"religious". d) There are a number of other reasons for concluding
that she was not the Ard Chomhairle member alluded to, not least that her real
name was well known to the authorities, Irish, British, Spanish and Gibraltar.
In the aftermath of the Gibraltar shootings, the British tried to cover up on
the sex and identity of the “other known terrorist" because of the
implications attached to her involvement and preservation. Initially they tried
to make a man out of the woman. It didn't work. The cat-flap had been let open
and the feline exited too often to be denied. The gender of the fourth bombing
team member was admitted to be female.
(Despite Sir Geoffrey Howe's House of Commons admission of a fourth person,
Spanish security said there were no IRA beyond the three shot members. In an
avalanche of reality to the existence of others, that lie soon died a death.
The Spanish climbed down and conceded to another person – a woman.)
The next stage was to admit a name – Mary Parkin (an alias). With
too many cooks involved in making the broth, the identity of Mary Parkin
leaked. The authorities were playing catch-up. After denial came dismissal and
then an attempt to rescript the person behind the alias.
Not only did the name of Evelyn Glenholmes crop up consistently, so did
functions she carried out, places where she stayed, and even her code name
– Miss F.
Could the genie be put back in the bottle?
Fatal Encounter and “Glenholmes – the true story”
(Page 255):
Putting the genie back in the bottle. In this regard an American intelligence
expert – a man from out of town – entered onto the scene to write a
book on the IRA Gibraltar operation. It involved lots of collation,
interpretation, and – in vital areas – rescription. A copy book
example of how to disclose much and uncover little. A bit like a weather vane
caught in cross winds: lots of air but no definitive forecast. While
postulating on the theme of concerned exposure, the indignant leftie touch, and
oft times making valid observations, it omitted crucial understanding and made
errors in basic evaluation to make points. Here we are only concerned with
attempts to dismiss the involvement of Evelyn Glenholmes.
Fatal Encounter – The Story of the Gibraltar Killings, by Nicholas
Eckert. Published by Poolbeg Press, Dublin, in 1999. One day the near full
truth on Gibraltar will come out. While we await that moment, let's borrow from
page 255 of Fatal Encounter:
“In the immediate wake of the killings, the tabloid
press named Evelyn Glenholmes, an alleged Provisional bomber, as 'Mary Parkin'.
News stories appeared with headlines like 'Evil Evelyn' and 'Find this Woman!'
in the columns of the Sun, Daily Mirror and similar publications. Yet when
asked by a member of the regular or 'broadsheet' press the reason why the
tabloids nominated Glenholmes as the fourth member of the bombing team, the
brutally frank response was: 'Because we have a nice photograph of her, and she
won't sue.’” (Footnote 12, David Miller –‘The Truth on
the Rocks’, Magill, February, 1989, pp 11-12.)
The reference to the tabloids having "nominated" Glenholmes is quoted
to Magill, a Dublin news cum-investigative magazine. The Magill
story was derived from an analytical exercise by The Media Research Group at
Glasgow University, who in turn took the Glenholmes won’t sue
story from an Irish Press report by John McEntee. I have the original
report and so will quote the pertinent section in full.
"John McEntee – A Cavanman in London", is a round-up of news
tid-bits, mostly having to do with attempts at being funny. However, the
headlines in strong print above an eclectic lot went: "Glenholmes –
the true story". In the middle of the article is the following: "I
can rightly claim to have been present last week at the creation of a little
bit of history. The invention of Evelyn Glenholmes as the missing fourth IRA
member in Gibraltar. It occurred in the hack packed bar of the colony's Holiday
Inn on Monday evening. I asked a colourful colleague from Fleet Street if he
believed the theory of a fourth man. 'Oh it's a woman and we are saying it's
Evelyn Glenholmes', this craggy veteran explained. Why on earth, I wondered
aloud, was he saying it was Glenholmes. 'Because,' he replied, 'we have a nice
picture of her and she won't sue.'" – The Irish Press,
Wednesday 16.03.88.
I have long said of the above snippet of nonsense. The brain power that went in
to making it up was only matched by the brain power that gave it credence. It
is poor story telling and was surely not intended to be taken seriously? That
said, it was lent a spurious credibility by some writers who borrowed it to
make points. If a ten year old penned the story it would be patted on the head
and told to go and play with its toys. However, if an adult who is an
accredited journalist writes it it can be propagated, not because of its
content, that is never other than juvenile, but because it carries the
imprimatur of a professional journalist and a named broadsheet
newspaper. By such means others can disinform.
Before going on to analyse the report, please take a closer look at it.
Read and re-read it. It is the writing of ham theatre. While much of the world
press and media were trying to fathom the truth behind the Gibraltar shootings,
Mr. McEntee in a comic-cut piece without pictures tells us he has "the
true story" on Evelyn Glenholmes and he got it in the "hack packed
bar of the (Gibraltar) colony's Holiday Inn (on Monday 7 March from a) colourful
Fleet Street colleague – a craggy veteran." Mr. McEntee, playing the
part of a suitably dumb questioner, in order to make for a story return, asked
the craggy veteran if he believed "the theory of a fourth
man." In the intervening nine days to the publication of the Glenholmes
– the true story article, the Spanish authorities confirmed that the
fourth bombing team member, as distinct from other active service unit members,
was a woman who used the alias Mary Parkin. British and Gibraltar
security sources also gave out her name, which was widely and repeatedly
carried in the media, including the Irish Press – Mr. McEntee's
newspaper. As it was something that Mr. McEntee couldn't have been ignorant of,
how could he justify submitting copy which posed a question on the theory of
a fourth man when he knew the person was a woman?
Also on Monday 7, no doubt before his night out at the bar of the Holiday Inn hotel, Mr. McEntee filed a report for the Irish Press, in which he related that the shot IRA trio were supported by “at least three other” active service unit members. If much else in the report, featured in the following day’s newspaper, was confused – as were other reports at the time, he was at least right in that. One wonders to whom in the gender free threesome was the the theory of a fourth man supposed to fit?
And did he really not hear of the involvement of Evelyn Glenholmes in the Gibraltar IRA operation? Just about everybody else in the media appear to have got whiff of it on the same day as Mr. McEntee credits his exchange with a Fleet Street colleague in the Holiday Inn bar.
Spanish security knew the identity of the woman using
the Mary Parkin alias for more than six months prior to the 6 March shootings,
as did the Irish, British and some Gibraltar police, but now all parties
– following from initial post shooting releases that it was Evelyn
Glenholmes – were rowing back on the disclosure. The fanciful Irish
Press piece was used as a component in that endeavour.
Mr. McEntee's article didn't so much report "the creation of a little
piece of history" as lend opportunity for the dissemination of
disinformation. The carrying of his story by others was a text book
illustration of how to make case by use of a borrowed quote. A demonstration of
a classic intelligence technique for dubious validation. A more familiar
example of attribution transfer is that which uses statements from disgruntled
ex-intelligence operatives
and equally disgruntled former military personnel who in retirement come
to see the error of past ways. People who attach themselves to peace
movements or dress themselves up as whistleblowers and are uncommonly
blessed with an easy access to the media. One party piece is to act out games
in courts of law. Middle class theatre for the proletariat.
Nine Bob Notes to the cognoscente.
Why did the craggy veteran from Fleet Street say that Mary Parkin
was in fact Evelyn Glenholmes? "Because," he is reported to have
replied, "we have a nice picture of her and she won't sue." (Laugh).
Mr. McEntee's craggy veteran colleague from Fleet Street must have been
a hack of considerable influence. He not only persuaded the London tabloids
that Mary Parkin and Evelyn Glenholmes were one and same person, he also
convinced the BBC, ITN and the (Belfast) News Letter that it was so
– that is some achievement. Even Mr. Eckert wouldn't call them tabloids.
But then, of course, the truth may be something different. Mr. McEntee could
have been looking into the bar mirror or an empty beer glass when the Evelyn
Glenholmes invention took on a life of its own?
NB:
1) The tabloids didn't nominate Glenholmes. Nor did Mr. McEntee say they
did, as implied by Mr. Eckert. Her name was leaked by British and Gibraltar security
sources.
2) Mr. Eckert used the word nominate. John McEntee, author of the
original article, plumped for invention; and the Magill report
taken from the Glasgow University Media Research Group analysis correctly
quotes him. It is easy enough to see why Mr. Eckert chose to alter the word
– connotation is most important in presentation.
3) Can you see the tabloids, ever out to out-do one another, coming together to
nominate a person? That is what Mr. Eckert said they did.
4) Mr. McEntee claims he got this gen from a craggy veteran in a hack
packed bar in Gibraltar's Holiday Inn. It was the very same hotel that Mary
Parkin/Evelyn Glenholmes was widely reported to have stayed in on at least
one of her numerous visits to the area. One wonders aloud if Mr. McEntee had
the professional savvy to ask the hotel management if he could look at the
register or booking cards for the time or times when Mary Parkin is
reported to have stayed there. A copy of her signature or other hand writing,
if available, might have been informative. And why not cross the frontier into
Spain and do the same there with named hotels and the police?
Note: A copy of the John McEntee, A
Cavanman in London report will be among the list of corroborative and
supporting items at the end of this document.
Fatal Encounter and Siobhan O’Hanlon (Pages 255-256):
"It was the somewhat more respectable Sunday
Times which came up with a more serious (Mary) Parkin 'candidate', Siobhan O'Hanlon.
From a staunchly Republican North Belfast family...." As the original
article is in my possession, I will respond to the claims of Mr. Eckert.
1) How many news reports after the Sunday 06.03.88 Gibraltar shootings named or
alluded to Evelyn Glenholmes being the person behind the alias Mary Parkin?
One dozen? Two dozen? Three dozen? More?
2) How many news reports prior to the Sunday Times of 04.09.88, named
Siobhan O'Hanlon as the person behind the alias Mary Parkin? One? Two?
Three? Four? None? Yes, that's it. None!
3) The Sunday Times report naming Siobhan O'Hanlon as the woman who
styled herself Mary Parkin is dated 4 September 1988, six months after
the Gibraltar shootings and 48 hours before the start of the delayed inquest
into those shootings. Surely this blatant piece of news manipulation impacted
immediately with its cynicism? The book, Fatal Encounter, is a veritable
testament to how easily the Sunday Times lent itself to the interests of
the British security services. Yet here was Mr. Eckert accepting uncritically
from the uncritical. It strained belief.
4) The first paragraph of the Sunday Times report: "British
intelligence officials say they know the identity of the fourth member and sole
survivor of the IRA team that planned to bomb the band of the Royal Anglian
Regiment in Gibraltar in March." Forty eight hours before the start of the
Gibraltar inquest MI5 discover who the fourth IRA team member is. It is so
absurd it is laughable. For more than six months prior to the Gibraltar
shootings, the Irish, British and Spanish security services knew the identity
of the woman who employed the Mary Parkin alias. Now, 48 hours before
the start of the Gibraltar inquest into those shootings, here was the great
servant of the security services, the Sunday Times, muddying the waters
on behalf of its friends.
A questioning newspaper editor would have asked: "Why the lie at this
time?" (The article carries the byline of Barrie Penrose. However, one
wonders if the O’Hanlon inclusion was his or imposed from on high? It has
been reported that Mr. Penrose disputed some of his own paper’s carrying
of the Gibraltar story.)
5) The publishing of the detail, at the time it did, was a contemptible piece
of journalism. It was as unprofessional as some of the earlier offerings of the
Sunday Times on the Gibraltar shootings, to which Mr. Eckert devoted
paragraph after paragraph of his book in ripping to shreds. In propriety and
intellectual terms Mr. Eckert kicked the Sunday Times from pillar post
to pillar post. He savaged their journalistic performance. In boxing parlance,
flowing from a sustained two-fisted onslaught, the Sunday Times would
have been counted out on its feet. Yet here he was, on pages 255-256, standing
his own judgement on its head – doing, in effect, a Sunday Times
– by lending credence to a disgraceful attempt to mislead at a critical
juncture.
"It was the somewhat more respectable Sunday Times which came up
with a more serious Parkin 'candidate', Siobhan O'Hanlon." By
saluting the newspaper whose coverage he mocked, so too is Mr. Eckert by his
own words mocked.
6) Not only did the Sunday Times come up with the supposed discovery of
the fourth IRA bombing team member – which was wrong – they also
claimed that she was "the sole survivor" of the Gibraltar operation.
Wrong again. A number of other active service unit personnel were involved.
Their names and aliases were known to the Irish, British and Spanish security
services. Indeed, the names of at least two surviving members were likely made
known to the British Prime Minister, Mrs. Margaret Thatcher, by MI5.
7) Reading the Sunday Times report again, I am reinforced in the belief
of the gullibility and unprofessionalism of how any newspaper, less still one
styled as a quality broadsheet, could accept so readily a self-evident plant.
The information was given to the Sunday Times by the security services
for the purpose of benefiting state interests at cost to the exposure of truth
at a crucial moment.
If some nobody stood up at the time to put the record straight with the truth,
that person would more likely have been mocked than listened to. The
authorities and their many obliging servants would point to the Sunday Times
report and say: "There – you are wrong". The spoiler, a lie,
because it carried the imprimatur of a respected quality newspaper,
would be given credence. It was a fallback – just in case. For all that,
the lie remains what it is: a lie. Which goes to show, quality and
integrity are not necessarily synonymous. For all the gems she might wear, a
harlot is a harlot. On Gibraltar the Sunday Times more than prostituted
itself, it further diminished the tarnished image of the fourth estate.
8) In Fatal Encounter, in order to support his thesis that Ms O'Hanlon
and Mary Parkin are the same person, Mr. Eckert refers to the fact of
her being known to and having an active service connection with Daniel McCann
and Seán Savage (the two shot men). That is supposition of a questionable order
and is no basis for deduction. It smacks of an attempt to make case through
historic connection. Once again, any port in a storm?
On that basis Glenholmes has an equal if not greater connection to all three
slain IRA members, not least through years of active republican involvement but
also because she, like Savage, McCann and Farrell, came from west Belfast.
Siobhan O'Hanlon was from north Belfast. I give that more as a statement than a
counter claim. For in truth, where they came from is irrelevant.
Mr. Eckert sought to make case too on the basis that "O'Hanlon closely
resembles the various witnesses description of 'Mary Parkin'". I don't
know where he got that one from! No full description (or photograph, though
many will have been available) of Mary Parkin was made known, because it
was not policy to publicly identify her. Descriptive references to the woman
extended from the intentionally limited to non-existent. If that which was
alluded to closely tallied with anybody it was to Mairéad Farrell, whom we know
it is not, and another lady of similar build and appearance – “the
attractive brunette known as Miss F." In size, build, age and general
appearance, Farrell and Glenholmes approximated closely to one another. Age
apart, Ms O'Hanlon was of different physical proportions and appearance. For
example, she is not "slight"; and is "extremely short"
– to quote Mr. Eckert.
One way or another, labouring on that point is akin to ploughing sand. The
authorities long and well knew the identity of the woman who was codenamed Miss
F and used the alias Mary Parkin. It was not Siobhan O'Hanlon. The
purpose of the British Security Service leaking false information at that time
was to deceive. I suspect they only deceived those who asked no questions and
those who had no care for the truth.
9) The Sunday Times further erroneously stated that "O'Hanlon was
already on her way back to Belfast" when her three comrades were killed in
Gibraltar. One touches on several points in answer to that. Firstly, Siobhan
O'Hanlon and Mary Parkin are not the one and same person. Secondly, Mary
Parkin – to use the alias, was still on station in Spain at the time
of the shootings; and so too were other members of the active service unit.
Thirdly, the three IRA members were on a familiarisation trip in Gibraltar when
shot. It was known they possessed no ordnance. The bomb car was intended to be
brought in the following day (Monday) by the full bombing team, which will have
included the fourth bombing team member. Entry to the colony will likely
have been made in two units of two: two in the bomb car and two on foot (to
remove the blocking car). Hence the use of the term the fourth (bombing)
team member; a consideration that seems to have been lost on the Sunday
Times.
10) The Sunday Times implied that O'Hanlon's name (and, by implication,
others) was "likely to feature later this week" in the Gibraltar
inquest. Wrong again.
At the inquest the British barred questions on intelligence and surveillance
prior to the 6 March shootings by the use of Public Interest Immunity certificates
(and pre-inquest by another gaggng order?).
They did not wish their lies to be challenged or the truth to out.
11) In the second column of the Sunday Times report is this sentence:
"On the day the IRA trio were shot dead by SAS soldiers in Gibraltar,
O'Hanlon was already on her way back to Belfast, her part in the operation
completed."
Column six of the report has the following: "She (O'Hanlon) was watched by
intelligence officers as she made her final journey to Gibraltar to finalise
arrangements before the bomb was to have been planted. Farrell, Savage and
McCann were also tailed as they made their separate ways to the border. But
somehow O'Hanlon lost her pursuers early on Sunday March 7 (sic), the day the
three IRA were shot.”
(Sunday was 6 March.)
Without dwelling on the confusion inherent in the two sections, one observes
that column two is contradicted by column six.
12) Column six of the report also contains this statement: "Back in
Belfast, O'Hanlon has since had a baby..."
Removing all conjecture from the November-December 1987 phase of the Gibraltar
operation, and ignoring other anomalies in the Sunday Times report, we
learn that O'Hanlon was released from prison in February 1987 and sometime
before end August 1988 she gave birth.
Where I come from a full human gestation is 9 months, and possibly a bit more.
Taking it that Ms O’Hanlon didn't embark on starting a family directly
after her prison release, we can reasonably assume a time lapse of a few months
for a romance to blossom before conception took place. That would place a birth
in 1988 – say, after January and before end of August. Do correct me if I
am wrong in that deduction. You see, I am not necessarily giving credence to
the Sunday Times claims but merely analysing them. I do so because a
professional intelligence officer, an expert from out of town, used them to
make a questionable point.
By the Sunday Times' arithmetic, Ms O'Hanlon was well into a pregnancy,
even heavily pregnant, when she is supposed to have been on active service
duties on the Iberian peninsula in February-March 1988. Is further comment
necessary?
PS. Re. above Sunday Times report on Ms O'Hanlon. Two days after the
story broke a statement was issued by a Belfast solicitor on behalf of Ms
O'Hanlon. I quote a newspaper carrying of it: "Woman denies bomb unit role
– Siobhan O'Hanlon, the 27 year old woman named in the Sunday Times
and Daily Mail as the fourth member of the IRA unit in Gibraltar yesterday
categorically denied the allegation and said she was taking legal advice.
"She said through her Belfast solicitors: 'The supposed details of my
involvement in any illegal activity in Gibraltar are totally without
foundation. I am not a member of the IRA and did not at any time carry out
so-called reconnaissance missions to Gibraltar. I have had no involvement in
any alleged bomb plot in Gibraltar.' Miss O'Hanlon said the Sunday Times
referred to her as blonde and said she recently had a baby. But she was not
blonde and had no children. On Sunday March 6, the day of the shootings, she
was visiting her mother in Belfast.
"'I understand I am now the third person to have been named by the media
as being the fourth member of the IRA unit in Gibraltar. Although I have been
living openly in Belfast since February 1987 my life has been put in danger by
the Sunday Times article.'" – The Guardian, Wednesday
07.09.88.
In Fatal Encounter, Mr. Eckert did further attempt to connect, through a
memoriam notice for the three Gibraltar slain in An Phoblacht – a
weekly republican newspaper, Ms O'Hanlon and the woman who used the Mary
Parkin alias. It is too tenuous and whimsical a nexus to devote serious
time to. It is more literary tripe.
Could it be that the intelligence officer's day job sent Mr. Eckert, a man from
out of town, on an overseas assignment to write a book?
(Whether by jurist or journalist, or elevated law officer, free minds should
treat carefully the investigative process….)
Note: The Sunday Times Siobhan O'Hanlon
report of 04.09.88 will be added to the list of corroborative and
supporting items following the completion of this document.
The Guardian, Monday 05.09.88 – “....as for the fourth (IRA)
member, it appears that Mary Parkin was declared flown without any attempt at
rigorous search or extended border closure." Should we be surprised at
that?
There will have been dozens of opportunities to arrest Mary Parkin,
extending from as far back as August-September 1987 to 6 March 1988, the day of
the Gibraltar shootings, and afterwards. Months before the SAS killings this
woman could have been arrested for possession of semtex explosive and other
bomb making components. She was not. She could have been charged with
conspiracy to bomb in Spain or Gibraltar (assuming such laws are on the statute
book). She was not. To interdict the planned bombing operation, without
disclosing their knowledge of intent or the whereabouts of explosive, etc., the
authorities could have arrested one or more of the IRA team for having false
documents. While not necessarily giving the whole game away, it would have
stopped the planned operation in its tracks. It was not done.
There was "no search or extended border closure" because there was no
plan to arrest Mary Parkin or other surviving IRA team members. Their
identities and whereabouts known, they were left to await re-location in the
bloody aftermath of Sunday 6 March. This under the watchful eye of the
authorities.
It would seem the survivors, at least two men and a woman, did not take
immediate flight. That may have been for tactical reasons or because the names
on the dud passports that hitherto facilitated their journies to and from the
Iberian peninsula were now in the public domain, through car hire and hotel
bookings. Aliases used were widely publicised and known to be compromised.
If they didn’t have fall-backs, wouldn't replacement passports be needed
– more forgeries – to facilitate passage of the stranded survivors
to elsewhere? Did the supply of alternative documents take time? Were there administrative
difficulties to be overcome?
In the meantime the maintenance of those isolated in Spain will have
necessitated extra funding. Spanish police found two thousand and four hundred
pounds sterling in the red Ford Fiesta parked just outside Gibraltar only hours
after the shootings; this in addition to maybe as much again found on Seán
Savage and the other two shot IRA members. Whether belonging to one part of the
active service unit or jointly owned, it was lost. Given this forfeit and the
fact that Sunday 6 March was only relative hours from the culmination of the
Gibraltar bombing project and dispersal, the coffers may not have been over
flush. Couriers – runners – to and from Spain may have been
needed to finance the unplanned extension. Traffic that will have been
compromised all along the line.
Alternatively they may have had access to a bank manager locally resident at the
time?
Was the supply of a replacement false passport for the surviving female team
member by courtesy of a woman courier? Someone she will have known and been
comfortable with? A travelling companion to effect extrication to another
location?
