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“Army coup possible after FF failure?” February 16, 2011

Posted by irishelectionliterature in Uncategorized.
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From the front Page of this evenings Evening Echo in Cork

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1. LeftAtTheCross - February 16, 2011

“People thought I was mad…”

Yep.

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2. shane - February 16, 2011

This is parody, right? Or does Ned know something we don’t?

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3. Chet Carter - February 16, 2011

Waking Ned! And what has he been doing while the two Brian’s made a mess of the country?

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4. WorldbyStorm - February 16, 2011

Nostradamus Ned..? Mad Ned? Bah!

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5. Eoin O'Mahony - February 16, 2011

“extra nice” Stealing it.

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6. Earl Williams - February 16, 2011

I love the Evening Echo, largely because it’s a daily paper which never has anything except Cork news in it.

And who amongst would say no to the occasional extra nice shirt?

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Chet Carter - February 16, 2011

… or the occasional lovely girl?

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7. Terry McDermott - February 16, 2011

It is coming. Gilmore in power a week, addressing the nation when the whirr of helicopter blades is heard over Kildare Street and APCs are stationed along Nassau and Grafton Streets. Will the people respond? Tune in next week…….

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8. Terri - February 16, 2011

Sweety would have sorted it all out!

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9. DC - February 16, 2011

So FF have completed their transformation into Cumann na Gaedhal circa 1932…

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10. RepublicanSocialist1798 - February 16, 2011

Seriously this has to be a piss take.

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Starkadder - February 16, 2011

It sounds like one of those English gentlemen’s
clubs in the 70s where some old general would moan about trade unions and immigrants before
saying “We need a strong government, old boy!
Like the one in Santiago!”

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Tomboktu - February 16, 2011

“Seriously this has to be a piss take.”

Or just pissed.

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11. Tom Redmond - February 16, 2011

A Very British Coup. A great TV film …written by Chris Mullen labelled as “Looney Left” for supporting the Birmingham Six from an early stage. Superably acted by own own Ray MaAnnaly as Sheffield Harry.
It should be compulsary viewing for all young people so as they understand the nature of the capitalist state.

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WorldbyStorm - February 16, 2011

Fantastic film. Saw it a couple of years back, still powerful.

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EWI - February 16, 2011

There actually was a real coup being planned by Army types back in the early Thirties, when Fianna Fáil had won the election and were about to take office. It came to nothing, though, as CnG weren’t willing to go along with re-starting the Civil war.

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Earl Williams - February 16, 2011

This would have been separate from the Blueshirts’ March on Dublin, then?

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EWI - February 16, 2011

This would have been separate from the Blueshirts’ March on Dublin, then?

Yes, that was after Dev came into office, the plot I’m referring to was just before.

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John O'Farrell - February 17, 2011

I asked Paul Bew if it was true that most of the victorious Fianna Fail TDs were armed with handguns when they entered the Dail in 1932, seriously expecting a coup. Not only was it true, replied the historian (who regardless of what some think of his views, genuinely knows the period), but Dan Breen assebled a Thompson sub-machine gun in a phone box and carried the weapon into Leinster House under his coat.
The fact that there was no coup, despite the urgings from O’Duffy, marked Ireland out in the context of a decade in which few European democracies survived. Imperfect as Dev was, the fact that a fledgling Free State survived the most basic test, (ie, an election result being respected despite its outcome, cf Egypt, Palestine, Belarus) is something to be proud of.
Perhaps the reason is the difference in the class background of the leadership in the armed forces, certainly between the UK and RoI. The Irish military does not have the ‘tradition’ of military families in quite the same way as the Brits, replicated in the elite regiments such as the Coldstream Guards and the Tank Regiments (descendents of the cavalry). In fact, most Irish officers I have met are actually quite left-ish. And those who served on UN duties in Lebanon are fiercely anti-Israel, which feeds into a worldview not quite as reactionary as some on the left might like to think.

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12. shane - February 16, 2011

http://jrnl.ie/85744

“When contacted by TheJournal.ie this afternoon O’Keeffe was not immediately aware of the comments that he made but said he stood by them:

“I said what I said and that’s it. I said it because of the state of the economy.

The country is in crisis and the Fine Gael manifesto is totally going to destroy the country. ”

It’s not the first time O’Keeffe, a former junior agriculture minister, has been outspoken with his views. In 1995, he called for the film ‘Babe’ to be banned because it could harm Christmas ham sales.”

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13. WorldbyStorm - February 16, 2011

Funnily enough I was very recently talking to someone who works for a candidate who was saying that said candidate was desperate for PR at national level.

They should have tried this trick.

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14. EWI - February 16, 2011

The burning question here, of course, is whether the army coup will go with ‘p-p-p-pow’ or ‘dakkadakkadakka’ to simulate the sound of firing, the Defence Forces being rather under-resourced historically for warry things.

(Personally, I always had a fondness for dakkdakkadakka)

Batshit crazy. The officer corps of the Defence Forces is largely made up of the idiot sons of FF and FG types who weren’t fit for anything else.

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Pope Epopt - February 16, 2011

Talking of the scion of the civil war party aparatchiks – am I the only one to have heard the rumour that the Defence Forces have been concentrating their training on crowd control and counter-insurgency over the last couple of years?

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EWI - February 16, 2011

There was a spate of it back when the crisis started, as was reported in the papers.

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Earl Williams - February 17, 2011

I hadn’t heard that one, but hasn’t the army always really been about internal security anyway?

Circa 1970, for example, armoured units were discreetly moved closer to Dublin in case they had to deliver ‘the smack of firm government’ to street protestors (or so the state papers for that year asserted).

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Pope Epopt - February 17, 2011

Me and Dennehy were dakkdakkadakka boys. Hundreds of hedgerow bunkers were stormed or defended to the last man.

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15. shane - February 16, 2011

There was a planned coup against the CnG government back in 1924 by ex-Collins men but it was discovered by the authorities before it came to anything.

That said if the world economy goes down the toilet I wouldn’t be surprised to see coups in places like Latin America. I doubt it could/would happen in any European country.

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EWI - February 16, 2011

Yes, the (second) ‘Curragh Mutiny’.

The first being the British Army, egged on by the Tories (over Home Rule).

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16. Captain Rock - February 16, 2011

‘The officer corps of the Defence Forces is largely made up of the idiot sons of FF and FG types who weren’t fit for anything else.’

If that makes you feel happy then keep thinking it. Having known a few I’d suggest their a more complex bunch than that. Anti-war campaigner Ed Hourigan is of course an decorated former officer.

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EWI - February 16, 2011

If that makes you feel happy then keep thinking it. Having known a few I’d suggest their a more complex bunch than that.

I’ve known “a few” as well. Fairly representative of our middle class, but there are exceptions (hence the “largely”).

Yes, I know who Ed Horgan is, and who he used to be.

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17. Captain Rock - February 16, 2011
18. Joe - February 16, 2011

What’s not to like? Bring it on, Paddy O’Chavez.

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19. Was this what got poor Ned alarmed? « The Cedar Lounge Revolution - February 17, 2011

[…] was hardly this that got Ned O’Keefe alarmed and thinking of a […]

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20. Jim Monaghan - February 17, 2011

I was told ion the last recession by a person (currently a bigwig in SIPTU) that the army threatened one if the political class did not come together and make the neccessary cuts etc.hence the Tallaght strategy of FG amongst other things.
It would not be a Chavez, more Greek style

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