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Ulster Volunteer Force
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{{short description|Ulster loyalist paramilitary organisation formed in 1965}}{{For|the original Ulster Volunteer Force|Ulster Volunteers}}{{pp-semi-indef|small=yes}}{{Use Hiberno-English|date=June 2023}}{{Use dmy dates|date=October 2021}}- the content below is remote from Wikipedia
- it has been imported raw for GetWiki
| factoids | |
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{{flagdeco|United Kingdom}} United Kingdom
- {{Army|United Kingdom}}
- {{flagicon image|Force Standard of the RUC.png|size=22px}} Royal Ulster Constabulary
- Garda SÃochána| battles = The Troubles| status =
History
{{see also|Timeline of Ulster Volunteer Force actions}}Background
Since 1964 and the formation of the Campaign for Social Justice, there had been a growing civil rights campaign in Northern Ireland, seeking to highlight discrimination against Catholics by the unionist government of Northern Ireland.Chronology of Key Events in Irish History, 1800 to 1967 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110303105236weblink |date=3 March 2011 }}. Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN). Retrieved 11 June 2013. Some unionists feared Irish nationalism and launched an opposing response in Northern Ireland. In April 1966, Ulster loyalists led by Ian Paisley, a Protestant fundamentalist preacher, founded the Ulster Constitution Defence Committee (UCDC). It set up a paramilitary-style wing called the Ulster Protestant Volunteers (UPV). The 'Paisleyites' set out to stymie the civil rights movement and oust Terence O'Neill, Prime Minister of Northern Ireland. Although O'Neill was a unionist, they saw him as being too 'soft' on the civil rights movement and too friendly with the Republic of Ireland. There was to be much overlap in membership between the UCDC/UPV and the UVF.Jordan, Hugh. Milestones in Murder: Defining Moments in Ulster's Terror War. Random House, 2011. Chapter 3.(File:Shankillmural7r.jpg|thumb|right|An old UVF mural on the Shankill Road, where the group was formed)Beginnings
File:UVF flag in Glenarm.JPG|thumb|right|A UVF flag in GlenarmGlenarmOn 7 May 1966, loyalists petrol bombed a Catholic-owned pub in the loyalist Shankill area of Belfast. Fire engulfed the house next door, badly burning the elderly Protestant widow who lived there. She died of her injuries on 27 June. The group called itself the "Ulster Volunteer Force" (UVF), after the Ulster Volunteers of the early 20th century, although in the words of a member of the previous organisation "the present para-military organisation ... has no connection with the U.V.F. of which I have been speaking. Though, for its own purposes, it assumed the same name it has nothing else in common."BOOK, MacDermott, John, John MacDermott, Baron MacDermott, An Enriching Life, privately published, 1979, 42, It was led by Gusty Spence, a former Royal Ulster Rifles soldier from Northern Ireland. Spence claimed that he was approached in 1965 by two men, one of whom was an Ulster Unionist Party MP, who told him that the UVF was to be re-established and that he was to have responsibility for the Shankill.Hennessey, Thomas. Northern Ireland: The Origin of the Troubles. Gill & Macmillan, 2005. p. 55 On 21 May, the group issued a statement:From this day, we declare war against the Irish Republican Army and its splinter groups. Known IRA men will be executed mercilessly and without hesitation. Less extreme measures will be taken against anyone sheltering or helping them, but if they persist in giving them aid, then more extreme methods will be adopted. ... we solemnly warn the authorities to make no more speeches of appeasement. We are heavily armed Protestants dedicated to this cause.Nelson, Sarah. Ulster's Uncertain Defenders: Protestant Political Paramilitary and Community Groups and the Northern Ireland Conflict. Appletree Press, 1984. p. 61.On 27 May, Spence sent four UVF members to kill IRA volunteer Leo Martin, who lived in Belfast. Unable to find their target, the men drove around the Falls district in search of a Catholic. They shot John Scullion, a Catholic civilian, as he walked home.Dillon, Martin. The Shankill Butchers: The Real Story of Cold-Blooded Mass Murder. Routledge, 1999. pp. 20–23 He died of his wounds on 11 June. Spence later wrote "At the time, the attitude was that if you couldn't get an IRA man you should shoot a Taig, he's your last resort".On 26 June, the group shot dead a Catholic civilian and wounded two others as they left a pub on Malvern Street, Belfast. Two days later, the Government of Northern Ireland declared the UVF illegal. The shootings led to Spence's being sentenced to life imprisonment with a recommended minimum sentence of twenty years.BOOK, Taylor, Peter, Peter Taylor (Journalist), Loyalists: War and Peace in Northern Ireland, Bloomsbury Publishing, 1999, 44, 0-7475-4519-7, Spence appointed Samuel McClelland as UVF Chief of Staff in his stead.Jim Cusack & Henry McDonald. UVF. Poolbeg, 1997. p. 21Violence escalates
By 1969, the Catholic civil rights movement had escalated its protest campaign, and O'Neill had promised them some concessions. In March and April that year, UVF and UPV members bombed water and electricity installations in Northern Ireland, blaming them on the dormant IRA and elements of the civil rights movement. Some of them left much of Belfast without power and water.WEB,weblink Chronology of the Conflict: 1969, Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN), 1 September 2011, 6 December 2010,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20101206184139weblink">weblink live, The loyalists "intended to force a crisis which would so undermine confidence in O'Neill's ability to maintain law and order that he would be obliged to resign".Cusack & McDonald, p. 28 There were bombings on 30 March, 4 April, 20 April, 24 April and 26 April. All were widely blamed on the IRA, and British troops were sent to guard installations. Unionist support for O'Neill waned, and on 28 April he resigned as Prime Minister.On 12 August 1969, the "Battle of the Bogside" began in Derry. This was a large, three-day riot between Irish nationalists and the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC). In response to events in Derry, nationalists held protests throughout Northern Ireland, some of which became violent. In Belfast, loyalists responded by attacking nationalist districts. Eight people were shot dead and hundreds were injured. Scores of houses and businesses were burnt out, most of them owned by Catholics. In response, the British Army was deployed on the streets of Northern Ireland and Irish Army units set up field hospitals near the border. Thousands of families, mostly Catholics, were forced to flee their homes and refugee camps were set up in the Republic of Ireland.On 12 October, a loyalist protest in the Shankill became violent. During the riot, UVF members shot dead RUC officer Victor Arbuckle. He was the first RUC officer to be killed during the Troubles.McKittrick, David. Lost Lives: The Stories of the Men, Women and Children who Died as a Result of the Northern Ireland Troubles. Random House, 2001. p. 42The UVF had launched its first attack in the Republic of Ireland on 5 August 1969, when it bombed the RTÉ Television Centre in Dublin.NEWS, Bomb damages RTÉ studios,weblink RTÉ.ie, 2013-12-27, 1 December 2011, 15 October 2013,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20131015080931weblink">weblink live, "Dublin blast" {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210309040134weblink |date=9 March 2021 }}. The Lewiston Daily Sun, 29 December 1969 There were further attacks in the Republic between October and December 1969. In October, UVF and UPV member Thomas McDowell was killed by the bomb he was planting at Ballyshannon power station. The UVF stated that the attempted attack was a protest against the Irish Army units "still massed on the border in County Donegal".Cusack & McDonald, p. 74 In December, the UVF detonated a car bomb near the Garda central detective bureau and telephone exchange headquarters in Dublin."Irish tighten security after Dublin bombing" {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20201204224542weblink |date=4 December 2020 }}. The Lewiston Daily Sun, 29 December 1969Early to mid-1970s
In January 1970, the UVF began bombing Catholic-owned businesses in Protestant areas of Belfast. It issued a statement vowing to "remove republican elements from loyalist areas" and stop them "reaping financial benefit therefrom". During 1970, 42 Catholic-owned licensed premises in Protestant areas were bombed.Cusack & McDonald, pp. 83–85 Catholic churches were also attacked. In February, it began to target critics of militant loyalism – the homes of MPs Austin Currie, Sheelagh Murnaghan, Richard Ferguson and Anne Dickson were attacked with improvised bombs. It also continued its attacks in the Republic of Ireland, bombing the Dublin-Belfast railway line, an electricity substation, a radio mast, and Irish nationalist monuments.Cusack & McDonald, pp. 77–78The IRA had split into the Provisional IRA and Official IRA in December 1969. In 1971, these ramped up their activity against the British Army and RUC. The first British soldier to be killed by the Provisional IRA died in February 1971. That year, a string of tit-for-tat pub bombings began in Belfast.Cusack & McDonald, p. 91 This came to a climax on 4 December, when the UVF bombed McGurk's Bar, a Catholic-owned pub in Belfast. Fifteen Catholic civilians were killed and seventeen wounded. It was the UVF's deadliest attack in Northern Ireland, and the deadliest attack in Belfast during the Troubles.Taylor, p. 88The following year, 1972, was the most violent of the Troubles. Along with the newly formed Ulster Defence Association (UDA), the UVF started an armed campaign against the Catholic population of Northern Ireland. It began carrying out gun attacks to kill random Catholic civilians and using car bombs to attack Catholic-owned pubs. It would continue these tactics for the rest of its campaign. On 23 October 1972, the UVF carried out an armed raid against King's Park camp, a UDR/Territorial Army depot in Lurgan. They managed to procure a large cache of weapons and ammunition including L1A1 Self-Loading Rifles, Browning pistols, and Sterling submachine guns. Twenty tons of ammonium nitrate was also stolen from the Belfast docks.The UVF launched further attacks in the Republic of Ireland during December 1972 and January 1973, when it detonated three car bombs in Dublin and one in Belturbet, County Cavan, killing a total of five civilians. It would attack the Republic again in May 1974, during the two-week Ulster Workers' Council strike. This was a general strike in protest against the Sunningdale Agreement, which meant sharing political power with Irish nationalists and the Republic having more involvement in Northern Ireland. Along with the UDA, it helped to enforce the strike by blocking roads, intimidating workers, and shutting any businesses that opened.Anderson, Don. 14 May Days. Chapter 3 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141007014857weblink |date=7 October 2014 }}. Reproduced on Conflict Archive on the Internet. On 17 May, two UVF units from the Belfast and Mid-Ulster brigades detonated four car bombs in Dublin and Monaghan. Thirty-three people were killed and almost 300 injured. It was the deadliest attack of the Troubles. There are various{{citation needed|date=September 2016}} allegations that elements of the British security forces colluded with the UVF in the bombings. The Irish parliament's Joint Committee on Justice called the bombings an act of "international terrorism" involving members of the British security forces."Call for probe of British link to 1974 bombs" {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121012084317weblink |date=12 October 2012 }}. RTÉ News. 19 May 2008. Retrieved 12 June 2013. Both the UVF and the British government have denied the claims.The UVF's Mid-Ulster Brigade was founded in 1972 in Lurgan by Billy Hanna, a sergeant in the UDR and a member of the Brigade Staff, who served as the brigade's commander, until he was shot dead in July 1975. From that time until the early 1990s the Mid-Ulster Brigade was led by Robin "the Jackal" Jackson, who then passed the leadership to Billy Wright. Hanna and Jackson have both been implicated by journalist Joe Tiernan and RUC Special Patrol Group (SPG) officer John Weir as having led one of the units that bombed Dublin.The Barron Report (2003). Jackson was allegedly the hitman who shot Hanna dead outside his home in Lurgan."UVF Rule Out Jackal Link To Murder", The People, 30 June 2002. weblink {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210923161303weblink|date=23 September 2021}}. Retrieved 17–12–10The brigade formed part of the Glenanne gang, a loose alliance of loyalists which the Pat Finucane Centre (PFC) has linked to 87 killings in the 1970s. The gang comprised, in addition to members the UVF, rogue elements of the UDR and RUC, all of which were allegedly acting under the direction of the Intelligence Corps and/or the RUC Special Branch according to the PFC.WEB,weblink Collusion in the South Armagh / Mid Ulster Area in the mid-1970's, 2011-04-18, dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110426121606weblink">weblink 26 April 2011, . Retrieved 17–12–10Mid- to late 1970s
File:UVF mural in Shankill Road, Belfast.jpg|thumb|right|UVF mural on the Shankill RoadShankill RoadIn 1974, hardliners staged a coup and took over the Brigade Staff. This resulted in a sharp increase in sectarian killings and internecine feuding, both with the UDA and within the UVF itself.Nelson, Sarah (1984). Ulster's Uncertain Defenders: Protestant Paramilitary, Political and Community Groups and the Northern Ireland Conflict. Belfast: Appletree Press. p. 175, pp. 187–190. Some of the new Brigade Staff members bore nicknames such as "Big Dog" and "Smudger".Nelson, p. 188 Beginning in 1975, recruitment to the UVF, which until then had been solely by invitation, was now left to the discretion of local units.Edwards, Aaron & Bloomer, Stephen, Conflict Transformation Papers Vol. 12, Democratising the Peace in Northern Ireland: Progressive Loyalists and the Politics of Conflict Transformation (2005), Regency Press, Belfast, p. 27The UVF's Mid-Ulster Brigade carried out further attacks during this same period. These included the Miami Showband killings of 31 July 1975 – when three members of the popular showband were killed, having been stopped at a fake British Army checkpoint outside Newry in County Down. Two members of the group survived the attack and later testified against those responsible. Two UVF members, Harris Boyle and Wesley Somerville, were accidentally killed by their own bomb while carrying out this attack. Two of those later convicted (James McDowell and Thomas Crozier) were also serving members of the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), a regular Army regiment consisting of Northern Irish reservists.From late 1975 to mid-1977, a unit of the UVF dubbed the Shankill Butchers (a group of UVF men based on Belfast's Shankill Road) carried out a series of sectarian murders of Catholic civilians. Six of the victims were abducted at random, then beaten and tortured before having their throats slashed. This gang was led by Lenny Murphy. He was shot dead by the IRA in November 1982, four months after his release from the Maze Prison.The group had been proscribed in July 1966, but this ban was lifted on 4 April 1974 by Merlyn Rees, Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, in an effort to bring the UVF into the democratic process.Taylor, Peter (1999). ''Loyalists: War and Peace in Northern Ireland'. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. p. 124 A political wing was formed in June 1974, the Volunteer Political Party led by UVF Chief of Staff Ken Gibson, which contested West Belfast in the October 1974 general election, polling 2,690 votes (6%). However, the UVF spurned the government efforts and continued killing. Colin Wallace, a member of the Intelligence Corps, asserted in an internal memo in 1975 that MI6 and RUC Special Branch formed a pseudo-gang within the UVF, designed to engage in violence and to subvert the tentative moves of some in the UVF towards the political process. Captain Robert Nairac of 14 Intelligence Company was alleged to have been involved in several UVF operations.Barron Report (2003) p, 172 The UVF was banned again on 3 October 1975 and two days later twenty-six suspected UVF members were arrested in a series of raids. The men were tried, and in March 1977 were sentenced to an average of twenty-five years each.BOOK, Boyce, George, Defenders of the Union: British and Irish Unionism, 1800–1999,weblink limited, Routledge, 2001, 269, 978-0-415-17421-3, NEWS, What is the UVF?,weblink BBC News, 3 May 2007, 11 February 2008, 18 May 2008,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20080518142406weblink">weblink live, In October 1975, after staging a counter-coup, the Brigade Staff acquired a new leadership of moderates with Tommy West serving as the Chief of Staff. These men had overthrown the "hawkish" officers, who had called for a "big push", which meant an increase in violent attacks, earlier in the same month.Taylor, pp. 152–156 The UVF was behind the deaths of seven civilians in a series of attacks on 2 October.Sutton Index of Deaths: 1975. CAIN. The hawks had been ousted by those in the UVF who were unhappy with their political and military strategy. The new Brigade Staff's aim was to carry out attacks against known republicans rather than Catholic civilians. This was endorsed by Gusty Spence, who issued a statement asking all UVF volunteers to support the new regime.Dillon, Martin (1989). The Shankill Butchers: The Real Story of Cold-Blooded Mass Murder. New York: Routledge. p. 53 The UVF's activities in the last years of the decade were increasingly being curtailed by the number of UVF members who were sent to prison. The number of killings in Northern Ireland had decreased from around 300 per year between 1973 and 1976 to just under 100 in the years 1977–1981.Taylor, p. 157 In 1976, Tommy West was replaced with "Mr. F" who is alleged to be John "Bunter" Graham, who remains the incumbent Chief of Staff to date. West died in 1980.On 17 February 1979, the UVF carried out its only major attack in Scotland, when its members bombed two pubs in Glasgow frequented by Irish-Scots Catholics. Both pubs were wrecked and a number of people were wounded. It claimed the pubs were used for republican fundraising. In June, nine UVF members were convicted of the attacks.Wood, Ian S. Crimes of Loyalty: A History of the UDA. Edinburgh University Press, 2006. p. 329Early to mid-1980s
In the 1980s, the UVF was greatly reduced by a series of police informers. The damage from security service informers started in 1983 with "supergrass" Joseph Bennett's information, which led to the arrest of fourteen senior figures. In 1984, the UVF attempted to kill the northern editor of the Sunday World, Jim Campbell after he had exposed the paramilitary activities of Mid-Ulster brigadier Robin Jackson. Another loyalist paramilitary organisation called Ulster Resistance was formed on 10 November 1986. The initial aim of Ulster Resistance was to bring an end to the Anglo-Irish Agreement. Loyalists were successful in importing arms into Northern Ireland. The weapons were Palestine Liberation Organisation arms captured by the Israelis and sold to Armscor, the South African state-owned company which, in defiance of a 1977 United Nations arms embargo, set about making South Africa self-sufficient in military hardware.{{citation needed|date=April 2008}} The arms were divided between the UVF, the UDA (the largest loyalist group) and Ulster Resistance.BOOK, Taylor, Peter, Peter Taylor (Journalist), Loyalists: War and Peace in Northern Ireland, Bloomsbury Publishing, 1999, 189–195, 0-7475-4519-7, (File:Sa 58-JH02.jpg|thumb|right|The UVF received large numbers of Czechoslovak Sa vz. 58 automatic rifles in the 1980s)The arms are thought to have consisted of:- 200 Czechoslovak Sa vz. 58 automatic rifles,
- 90 Browning pistols,
- 500 RGD-5 fragmentation grenades,
- 30,000 rounds of ammunition and
- 12 RPG-7 rocket launchers and 150 warheads.
Late 1980s and early 1990s
{{see also|Provisional IRA campaign 1969-1997#Loyalists and the IRA – killing and reprisals}}The UVF also attacked republican paramilitaries and political activists. These attacks were stepped up in the late 1980s and early 1990s, particularly in the east Tyrone and north Armagh areas. The largest death toll in a single attack was in the 3 March 1991 Cappagh killings, when the UVF killed IRA members John Quinn, Dwayne O'Donnell and Malcolm Nugent, and civilian Thomas Armstrong in the small village of Cappagh.WEB,weblink NI Conflict Archive on the Internet, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 29 July 2009, 8 June 2011,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110608072332weblink">weblink live, Republicans responded to the attacks by assassinating senior UVF members John Bingham, William "Frenchie" Marchant and Trevor KingWEB,weblink CAIN, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 29 July 2009, 8 June 2011,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110608065150weblink">weblink live, as well as Leslie Dallas, whose purported UVF membership was disputed both by his family and the UVF.Ed Moloney, Secret History of the IRA, p.321 The UVF also killed senior IRA paramilitary members Liam Ryan, John 'Skipper' Burns and Larry Marley.The Irish Echo According to Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN), the UVF killed 17 active and four former republican paramilitaries. CAIN also states that republicans killed 15 UVF members, some of whom are suspected to have been set up for assassination by their colleagues.WEB,weblink CAIN: Sutton Index of Deaths – crosstabulations, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 1 September 2011, 24 March 2016,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20160324044004weblink">weblink live, According to journalist and author Ed Moloney, the UVF campaign in Mid-Ulster in this period "indisputably shattered Republican morale", and put the leadership of the republican movement under intense pressure to "do something","Voices From the Grave:Two Men's War in Ireland" Ed Moloney, Faber & Faber, 2010 pp 417 although this has been disputed by others.{{who?|date=August 2022}}1994 ceasefire
(File:Glenbryne.jpg|thumb|A UVF mural referencing the ceasefire)In 1990, the UVF joined the Combined Loyalist Military Command (CLMC) and indicated its acceptance of moves towards peace. However, the year leading up to the loyalist ceasefire, which took place shortly after the Provisional IRA ceasefire, saw some of the worst sectarian killings carried out by loyalists during the Troubles. On 18 June 1994, UVF members machine-gunned a pub in the Loughinisland massacre in County Down, on the basis that its customers were watching the Republic of Ireland national football team playing in the World Cup on television and were therefore assumed to be Catholics. The gunmen shot dead six people and injured five.The UVF agreed to a ceasefire in October 1994.Post-ceasefire activities
1994–2005
More militant members of the UVF who disagreed with the ceasefire, broke away to form the Loyalist Volunteer Force (LVF), led by Billy Wright. This development came soon after the UVF's Brigade Staff in Belfast had stood down Wright and the Portadown unit of the Mid-Ulster Brigade, on 2 August 1996, for the killing of a Catholic taxi driver near Lurgan during Drumcree disturbances."UVF disbands unit linked to taxi murder" {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160303214334weblink |date=3 March 2016 }} The Independent, 3 August 1996; Retrieved 18 October 2009File:Carrickfergus.jpg|thumb|right|300px|A UVF mural in CarrickfergusCarrickfergusThere followed years of violence between the two organisations. In January 2000 UVF Mid-Ulster brigadier Richard Jameson was shot dead by a LVF gunman which led to an escalation of the UVF/LVF feud. The UVF was also clashing with the UDA in the summer of 2000. The feud with the UDA ended in December following seven deaths. Veteran anti-UVF campaigner Raymond McCord, whose son, Raymond Jr., a Protestant, was beaten to death by UVF men in 1997, estimates the UVF has killed more than thirty people since its 1994 ceasefire, most of them Protestants.{{citation needed|date=October 2009}} The feud between the UVF and the LVF erupted again in the summer of 2005. The UVF killed four men in Belfast and trouble ended only when the LVF announced that it was disbanding in October of that year.NEWS,weblink 31 October 2005, 29 July 2009, BBC News, 'Cautious welcome' for LVF move, 16 December 2005,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20051216130355weblink">weblink live, On 14 September 2005, following serious loyalist rioting during which dozens of shots were fired at riot police and the British Army, the Northern Ireland Secretary Peter Hain announced that the British government no longer recognised the UVF ceasefire.NEWS,weblink 14 September 2005, 29 July 2009, BBC News, Hain says UVF ceasefire is over, 12 June 2006,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20060612231400weblink">weblink live,2006–2010
On 12 February 2006, The Observer reported that the UVF was to disband by the end of 2006. The newspaper also reported that the group refused to decommission its weapons.NEWS,weblink The Observer, Observer.guardian.co.uk, 12 February 2006, 29 July 2009, London, Henry, McDonald, 13 March 2007,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20070313121852weblink">weblink live, On 2 September 2006, BBC News reported the UVF might be intending to re-enter dialogue with the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning, with a view to decommissioning of their weapons. This move came as the organisation held high-level discussions about its future.NEWS,weblink 2 September 2006, 29 July 2009, BBC News, Empey heralds possible UVF move, 23 September 2021,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20210923161229weblink">weblink live, On 3 May 2007, following recent negotiations between the Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) and Irish Taoiseach Bertie Ahern and with Police Service of Northern Ireland (PSNI) Chief Constable Sir Hugh Orde, the UVF made a statement that they would transform to a "non-military, civilianised" organisation.NEWS,weblink UVF Statement, BBC News, 3 May 2007, 29 July 2009, 17 September 2007,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20070917171448weblink">weblink live, This was to take effect from midnight. They also stated that they would retain their weaponry but put them beyond reach of normal volunteers. Their weapons stock-piles are to be retained under the watch of the UVF leadership.NEWS,weblink RTÉ News – Statement Imminent, RTÉ.ie, 3 May 2007, 29 July 2009, 2 June 2009,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20090602205850weblink">weblink live, NEWS,weblink Statement Imminent, BBC News, 3 May 2007, 29 July 2009, 18 August 2007,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20070818042245weblink">weblink live, NEWS,weblink Statement Released, BBC News, 3 May 2007, 29 July 2009, 9 October 2007,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20071009024135weblink">weblink live, In January 2008, the UVF was accused of involvement in vigilante action against alleged criminals in Belfast.Henry McDonald Law and order Belfast-style as two men are forced on a 'walk of shame' {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080116095312weblink |date=16 January 2008 }}, The Observer, 13 January 2008. Retrieved 13 January 2008.In 2008, a loyalist splinter group calling itself the "Real UVF" emerged briefly to make threats against Sinn Féin in County Fermanagh.NEWS,weblink SF condemns 'Real UVF' death threats, The Irish Times, 23 March 2019, 28 September 2020,weblink live, In the twentieth IMC report, the group was said to be continuing to put its weapons "beyond reach", (in the group's own words) to downsize, and reduce the criminality of the group. The report added that individuals, some current and some former members, in the group have, without the orders from above, continued to "localised recruitment", and although some continued to try and acquire weapons, including a senior member, most forms of crime had fallen, including shootings and assaults. The group concluded a general acceptance of the need to decommission, though there was no conclusive proof of moves towards this end.WEB,weblink 412882_HC 1112_Text, 29 July 2009, dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20081218015532weblink">weblink 18 December 2008, In June 2009 the UVF formally decommissioned their weapons in front of independent witnesses as a formal statement of decommissioning was read by Dawn Purvis and Billy Hutchinson.'Loyalist Weapons "put beyond use"' {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210923161239weblink |date=23 September 2021 }} – BBC News, 27 June 2009 The IICD confirmed that "substantial quantities of firearms, ammunition, explosives and explosive devices" had been decommissioned and that for the UVF and RHC, decommissioning had been completed.'Report of the Independent International Commission on Decommissioning' {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100218162439weblink |date=18 February 2010}} – IICD, 4 September 20092010–2019
The UVF was blamed for the shotgun killing of expelled RHC member Bobby Moffett on the Shankill Road on the afternoon of 28 May 2010, in front of passers-by including children.weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20101019203637weblink">Twenty-Fourth Report of the Independent Monitoring Commission The Independent Monitoring Commission stated Moffett was killed by UVF members acting with the sanction of the leadership. The Progressive Unionist Party's condemnation, and Dawn Purvis and other leaders' resignations as a response to the Moffett shooting, were also noted. Eleven months later, a man was arrested and charged with the attempted murder of the UVF's alleged second-in-command Harry Stockman, described by the Belfast Telegraph as a "senior Loyalist figure".NEWS,weblink Man critical after stabbing in Tesco, Belfasttelegraph, 12 July 2020, 12 July 2020,weblink live, NEWS,weblink David Madine admits trying to kill loyalist Harry Stockman, BBC News, 16 November 2012, 12 July 2020, 12 July 2020,weblink live, Fifty-year-old Stockman was stabbed more than 10 times in a supermarket in Belfast; the attack was believed to have been linked to the Moffett killing.On 25–26 October 2010, the UVF was involved in rioting and disturbances in the Rathcoole area of Newtownabbey with UVF gunmen seen on the streets at the time.NEWS,weblink BBC News, Police say UVF gunman seen in Rathcoole during trouble, 27 October 2010, 22 June 2018, 16 September 2018,weblink live, NEWS, 28 15 May:49:41 BST 2010,weblink UVF linked to brutal killing – Local, News Letter, 1 September 2011, 4 August 2010,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20100804004100weblink">weblink live, On the night of 20 June 2011, riots involving 500 people erupted in the Short Strand area of East Belfast. They were blamed by the PSNI on members of the UVF, who also said UVF guns had been used to try to kill police officers.Is UVF’s ‘Beast in the East’ behind new wave of riots? {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110626033646weblink |date=26 June 2011 }}, Belfast Telegraph, 23 June 2011 The UVF leader in East Belfast, who is popularly known as the "Beast of the East" and "Ugly Doris" also known as by real name Stephen Matthews, ordered the attack on Catholic homes and a church in the Catholic enclave of the Short Strand. This was in retaliation for attacks on Loyalist homes the previous weekend and after a young girl was hit in the face with a brick by Republicans.WEB,weblink Attack on girl blamed for trouble, Belfast Telegraph, 23 June 2011, 1 September 2011, 20 October 2012,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20121020121943weblink">weblink live, A dissident Republican was arrested for "the attempted murder of police officers in east Belfast" after shots were fired upon the police.NEWS,weblink BBC News – Man held over East Belfast police murder bid, BBC News, 23 June 2011, 1 September 2011, 28 August 2011,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110828071749weblink">weblink live, In July 2011, a UVF flag flying in Limavady was deemed legal by the PSNI after the police had received complaints about the flag from nationalist politicians.UVF flag is legal-Cops {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110707133716weblink |date=7 July 2011 }} Derry JournalDuring the Belfast City Hall flag protests of 2012–13, senior UVF members were confirmed to have actively been involved in orchestrating violence and rioting against the PSNI and the Alliance Party throughout Northern Ireland during the weeks of disorder.WEB,weblink UVF members 'behind flag trouble', u.tv, 20 November 2014, dead,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20141129151851weblink">weblink 29 November 2014, Much of the UVF's orchestration was carried out by its senior members in East Belfast, where many attacks on the PSNI and on residents of the Short Strand enclave took place.{{citation needed|date=June 2020}} There were also reports that UVF members fired shots at police lines during a protest.NEWS, McKittrick, David, 7 January 2013, Surge in Belfast violence blamed on resurgent UVF,weblink Belfast Telegraph, 31 July 2014, 8 August 2014,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20140808055659weblink">weblink live, The high levels of orchestration by the leadership of the East Belfast UVF, and the alleged ignored orders from the main leaders of the UVF to stop the violence has led to fears that the East Belfast UVF has now become a separate loyalist paramilitary grouping which doesn't abide by the UVF ceasefire or the Northern Ireland Peace Process.NEWS, McAleese, Deborah, 11 January 2013, The Beast from East Belfast could put an end to flags violence right now... but he won't,weblink Belfast Telegraph, 31 July 2014, 8 August 2014,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20140808052645weblink">weblink live, WEB,weblink East Belfast UVF: Mission Accomplished?, Slugger O'Toole, 20 November 2014, 29 November 2014,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20141129023640weblink">weblink live, In October 2013, the policing board announced that the UVF was still heavily involved in gangsterism despite its ceasefire. Assistant chief constable Drew Harris in a statement said "The UVF are subject to an organised crime investigation as an organised crime group. The UVF very clearly have involvement in drug dealing, all forms of gangsterism, serious assaults, intimidation of the community."In November 2013, after a series of shootings and acts of intimidation by the UVF, Police Federation Chairman Terry Spence declared that the UVF ceasefire was no longer active. Spence told Radio Ulster that the UVF had been "engaged in murder, attempted murder of civilians, attempted murder of police officers. They have been engaged in orchestrating violence on our streets, and it's very clear to me that they are engaged in an array of mafia-style activities. "They are holding local communities to ransom. On the basis of that, we as a federation have called for the respecification of the UVF [stating that its ceasefire is over]."WEB,weblink Ulster Volunteer Force is no longer on ceasefire, police warn, Henry McDonald, The Guardian, 18 November 2013, 20 November 2014, 29 November 2014,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20141129074149weblink">weblink live, In June 2017, Gary Haggarty, former UVF commander for north Belfast and south-east Antrim, pleaded guilty to 200 charges, including five murders.NEWS,weblink Gary Haggarty: Ex-senior loyalist pleads guilty to 200 terror charges, 23 June 2017, BBC News, 2017-06-23, 24 October 2018,weblink live, On 23 March 2019, eleven alleged UVF members were arrested during a total of 14 searches conducted in Belfast, Newtownards and Comber and the suspects, aged between 22 and 48, were taken into police custody for questioning. Officers from the PSNI's Paramilitary Crime Task Force also seized drugs, cash and expensive cars and jewellery in an operation carried out against the criminal activities of the UVF crime gang.NEWS,weblink Police seize drugs and arrest 11 during raids on east Belfast UVF, Belfast Telegraph, 2019-06-24, 25 June 2019,weblink live, NEWS,weblink Nine men charged after east Belfast UVF police raids, Belfast Telegraph, 2019-06-24, 25 June 2019,weblink live,2020s
On 4 March 2021, the UVF, Red Hand Commando and UDA renounced their current participation in the Good Friday Agreement.WEB, 2021-03-04, Brexit: loyalist paramilitary groups renounce Good Friday agreement,weblink 2021-04-11, The Guardian, en, 10 April 2021,weblink live, In April 2021, riots erupted across Loyalist communities in Northern Ireland.{{relevance?|date=June 2022}}NEWS, 2021-04-11, NI riots: What is behind the violence in Northern Ireland?, en-GB, BBC News,weblink 2021-04-11, 12 April 2021,weblink live, On 11 April, the UVF reportedly ordered the removal of Catholic families from a housing estate in Carrickfergus.NEWS, UVF orders removal of Catholic families from Carrickfergus housing estate in '21st century form of ethnic cleansing', en-GB, Belfast Telegraph,weblink 2021-04-11, 0307-1235, 12 April 2021,weblink live, On 25 March 2022, the UVF was blamed{{by whom?|date=June 2022}} for a proxy bomb attack targeting a "peace-building" event in Belfast where Irish Foreign Minister Simon Coveney was speaking. Armed men hijacked a van on the nearby Shankill Road and forced the driver to take a device to a church on the Crumlin Road. The community centre hosting the event and 25 nearby homes were evacuated and a funeral was disrupted. A controlled explosion was carried out and the bomb was later declared a hoax.{{cn|date=June 2022}}On 26 March 2022, the UVF was linked to a hoax bomb alert at a bar in Warrenpoint, County Down.{{cn|date=June 2022}}The group also continue to carry out racist and sectarian attacks against Black people and Eastern Europeans in Northern Ireland. The police stated the group had contributed to a 70% rise in hate crime: "It has a deeply unpleasant taste of a bit of ethnic cleansing."NEWS, 2014-04-03, UVF 'behind racist attacks in Belfast', en-GB, BBC News,weblink 2023-04-20, NEWS, More Polish homes targeted by racist thugs in fresh bout of 'ethnic cleansing' by UVF, en-GB, BelfastTelegraph.co.uk,weblink 2023-04-20, 0307-1235, NEWS, UVF 'behind racist attacks in south and east Belfast': Loyalist paramilitary group behind attacks says PSNI, en-GB, BelfastTelegraph.co.uk,weblink 2023-04-20,Leadership
Brigade Staff
(File:Ulster Volunteer force.jpg|thumb|left|Masked UVF Brigade Staff members at a press conference in October 1974. They are wearing part of the UVF uniform which earned them their nickname "Blacknecks")The UVF's leadership is based in Belfast and known as the Brigade Staff. It comprises high-ranking officers under a Chief of Staff or Brigadier-General. With a few exceptions, such as Mid-Ulster brigadier Billy Hanna (a native of Lurgan), the Brigade Staff members have been from the Shankill Road or the neighbouring Woodvale area to the west.Anderson, Malcolm & Bort, Eberhard (1999). The Irish Border: History, Politics, Culture. Liverpool University Press. p. 129 The Brigade Staff's former headquarters were situated in rooms above "The Eagle" chip shop located on the Shankill Road at its junction with Spier's Place. The chip shop has since been closed down.In 1972, the UVF's imprisoned leader Gusty Spence was at liberty for four months following a staged kidnapping by UVF volunteers. During this time he restructured the organisation into brigades, battalions, companies, platoons and sections.Taylor, Peter (1999). Loyalists. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. p.112 {{ISBN|0-7475-4519-7}} These were all subordinate to the Brigade Staff. The incumbent Chief of Staff, is alleged to be John "Bunter" Graham, referred to by Martin Dillon as "Mr. F".weblink" title="archive.today/20120720121259weblink">"The untouchable informers facing exposure at last". Belfast Telegraph. David Gordon. 18 January 2007. Retrieved 31 May 2012Dillon, p. 133 Graham has held the position since he assumed office in 1976.Moloney, Ed (2010). Voices From the Grave: Two Men's War in Ireland. Faber & Faber. p. 377The UVF's nickname is "Blacknecks", derived from their uniform of black polo neck jumper, black trousers, black leather jacket, black forage cap, along with the UVF badge and belt.BOOK, Gallaher, Carolyn, Carolyn Gallaher, 2007, After the Peace: Loyalist Paramilitaries in Post-accord Northern Ireland,weblink Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 9780801474262, 125403384, 31 July 2014, Kate Fearon. The Conflict's Fifth Business: a brief biography of Billy Mitchell. 2 February 2002. p. 27 This uniform, based on those of the original UVF, was introduced in the early 1970s.Nelson, Sarah (1984). Ulster's Uncertain Defenders: Protestant Political, Paramilitary and Community Groups and the Northern Ireland Conflict. Belfast: Appletree Press. p. 208Chiefs of Staff
- Gusty Spence (1966). Whilst remaining de jure UVF leader after he was jailed for murder, he no longer acted as Chief of Staff.
- Sam "Bo" McClelland (1966–1973) Described as a "tough disciplinarian", he was personally appointed by Spence to succeed him as Chief of Staff, due to his having served in the Korean War with Spence's former regiment, the Royal Ulster Rifles. He was interned in late 1973, although by that stage the de facto Chief of Staff was his successor, Jim Hanna.
- Jim Hanna (1973 – April 1974)"The Dublin and Monaghan bombings: Cover-up and incompetence". page 1. Politico. Joe Tiernan 3 May 2007 {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150829231415weblink |date=29 August 2015 }} Retrieved 17 November 2011 Hanna was allegedly shot dead by the UVF as a suspected informer.
- Ken Gibson (1974)Coogan, Tim Pat (1995). The Troubles: Ireland's Ordeal, 1966–1996, and the Search for Peace. Hutchinson. p. 177 Gibson was the Chief of Staff during the Ulster Workers' Council Strike in May 1974.
- Unnamed Chief of Staff (1974 – October 1975). Leader of the Young Citizen Volunteers (YCV), the youth wing of the UVF. Assumed command after a coup by hardliners in 1974. He, along with the other hawkish Brigade Staff members, was overthrown by Tommy West and a new Brigade Staff of "moderates" in a counter-coup supported by Gusty Spence. He left Northern Ireland after his removal from power.Moloney, Ed (2010). Voices From the Grave: Two Men's War in Ireland. Faber & Faber. p. 376
- Tommy West (October 1975 – 1976)BOOK, Gallaher, Carolyn, Carolyn Gallaher, 2007, After the Peace: Loyalist Paramilitaries in Post-accord Northern Ireland,weblink Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, 9780801474262, 125403384, 31 July 2014, A former British Army soldier, West was already the Chief of Staff at the time UVF volunteer Noel "Nogi" Shaw was killed by Lenny Murphy in November 1975 as part of an internal feud.
- John "Bunter" Graham, also referred to as "Mr. F" (1976–present)
Aim and strategy
(File:UVFVolunteers.jpeg|thumb|250px|A UVF publicity photo showing masked and armed UVF members on patrol in Belfast)The UVF's stated goal was to combat Irish republicanism – particularly the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA) – and maintain Northern Ireland's status as part of the United Kingdom.Country Reports on Terrorism: 2004. State Department, Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism. p. 128 The vast majority of its victims were Irish Catholic civilians, who were often killed at random.NEWS, Will loyalists seek bloody revenge?, David McKittrick,weblink The Independent, 12 March 2009, 21 June 2011, London, 14 March 2009,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20090314053127weblink">weblink live, Whenever it claimed responsibility for its attacks, the UVF usually claimed that those targeted were IRA members or were giving help to the IRA.Kentucky New Era, 14 April 1992 At other times, attacks on Catholic civilians were claimed as "retaliation" for IRA actions, since the IRA drew almost all of its support from the Catholic community. Such retaliation was seen as both collective punishment and an attempt to weaken the IRA's support; it was thought that terrorising the Catholic community and inflicting such a death toll on it would force the IRA to end its campaign.BOOK, Native vs. Settler, Mitchell, Thomas G, 2000, Greenwood Press, 154–165, Chapter 7 subsection: The Loyalist terrorists of Ulster, 1969–94, Many retaliatory attacks on Catholics were claimed using the covername "Protestant Action Force" (PAF), which first appeared in autumn 1974.Steve Bruce, The Red Hand, Oxford University Press, 1992, p. 119 They always signed their statements with the fictitious name "Captain William Johnston".Taylor, Peter (1999). Loyalists: War and Peace in Northern Ireland. London: Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. pp. 40–41Like the Ulster Defence Association (UDA), the UVF's modus operandi involved assassinations, mass shootings, bombings and kidnappings. It used submachine guns, assault rifles, shotguns, pistols, grenades (including homemade grenades), incendiary bombs, booby trap bombs and car bombs. Referring to its activity in the early and mid-1970s, journalist Ed Moloney described no-warning pub bombings as the UVF's "forte".Moloney, Ed (2010). Voices From the Grave: Two Men's War in Ireland. Faber & Faber. p. 350 Members were trained in bomb-making, and the organisation developed home-made explosives.Jim Cusack & Henry McDonald, UVF, Poolbeg, 1997, p. 105 In the late summer and autumn of 1973, the UVF detonated more bombs than the UDA and IRA combined,Steve Bruce, The Red Hand, Oxford University Press, 1992, p. 115 and by the time of the group's temporary ceasefire in late November it had been responsible for over 200 explosions that year.Jim Cusack & Henry McDonald, UVF, Poolbeg, 1997, p. 129 However, from 1977 bombs largely disappeared from the UVF's arsenal owing to a lack of explosives and bomb-makers, plus a conscious decision to abandon their use in favour of more contained methods.Jim Cusack & Henry McDonald, UVF, Poolbeg, 1997, p. 194Steve Bruce, The Red Hand, Oxford University Press, 1992, p.144–145 The UVF did not return to regular bombings until the early 1990s when it obtained a quantity of the mining explosive Powergel.Jim Cusack & Henry McDonald, UVF, Poolbeg, 1997, pp. 311–312, 313, 316, 317NEWS, Bruce, Steve, Angry men at an Ulster crossroads,weblink The Independent, London, 5 August 1996, 14 December 2017, 8 March 2021,weblink live,Strength
The strength of the UVF is uncertain. The first Independent Monitoring Commission report in April 2004 described the UVF/RHC as "relatively small" with "a few hundred" active members "based mainly in the Belfast and immediately adjacent areas". Historically, the number of active UVF members in July 1971 was stated by one source to be no more than 20.Boulton, p. 144, Later, in September 1972, Gusty Spence said in an interview that the organisation had a strength of 1,500.Cusack & McDonald, p. 102 A British Army report released in 2006 estimated a peak membership of 1,000.WEB,weblink AC 71842 Operation BANNER, Vilaweb.cat, 2017-06-23, 3 March 2016,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20160303215447weblink">weblink live, Information regarding the role of women in the UVF is limited. One study focusing in part on female members of the UVF and Red Hand Commando noted that it "seem[ed] to have been reasonably unusual" for women to be officially asked to join the UVF.Alison, Miranda, Women and Political Violence: Female Combatants in Ethno-National Conflict, Routledge, 2009, p. 160, {{ISBN|978-0415592420}} Another estimates that over a 30-year period women accounted for, at most, just 2% of UVF membership.McEvoy, Sandra, Gender and International Security: Feminist Perspectives, Routledge, 2009, p. 134, {{ISBN|978-0415475792}},Finance
{{Further information|Paramilitary finances in the Troubles}}Prior to and after the onset of the Troubles the UVF carried out armed robberies.Bruce, p. 191Cusack & McDonald, p. 86 This activity has been described as its preferred source of funds in the early 1970s,Wood, Ian S., Crimes of Loyalty, Edinburgh University Press, 2006, p.20 {{ISBN|978-0748624270}} and it continued into the 2000s, with the UVF in County Londonderry being active. Members were disciplined after they carried out an unsanctioned theft of £8 million of paintings from an estate in Co Wicklow in April 1974.Taylor, p. 125 Like the IRA, the UVF also operated black taxi services,Cusack & McDonald, p. 85Boulton, p. 174Adams, James, The Financing of Terror, New English Library, 1988, p. 167, {{ISBN|978-0450413476}} a scheme believed to have generated £100,000 annually for the organisation. The UVF has also been involved in the extortion of legitimate businesses, although to a lesser extent than the UDA,Bruce, p. 198 and was described in the fifth IMC report as being involved in organised crime.WEB,weblink FIFTH REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT MONITORING COMMISSION, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 2017-06-23, 4 March 2016,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20160304200553weblink">weblink live, In 2002 the Northern Ireland Affairs Committee estimated the UVF's annual running costs at £1–2 million per year, against an annual fundraising capability of £1.5 million.REPORT,weblink Select Committee on Northern Ireland Affairs - Part One: The continuing threat from paramilitary organisations, 26 June 2002, UK Parliament, House of Commons: Northern Ireland Affairs Committee, The Financing of Terrorism in Northern Ireland: Report and Proceedings of the Committee volume 1, Stationery Office Books, 2002, {{ISBN|978-0215004000}}A Canadian branch of the UDA also existed and sent $30,000 to the UDA's headquarters in Belfast by 1975. The Northern Ireland Affairs Select Committee noted in its report that "in 1992 it was estimated that Scottish support for the UDA and UVF might amount to £100,000 a year."Drug dealing
The UVF have been implicated in drug dealing in areas from where they draw their support. Recently it has emerged from the Police Ombudsman that senior North Belfast UVF member and Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) Special Branch informant Mark Haddock has been involved in drug dealing. According to the Belfast Telegraph, "70 separate police intelligence reports implicating the north Belfast UVF man in dealing cannabis, Ecstasy, amphetamines and cocaine."The Belfast TelegraphAccording to Alan McQuillan, the assistant director of the Assets Recovery Agency in 2005, "In the loyalist community, drug dealing is run by the paramilitaries and it is generally run for personal gain by a large number of people." When the Assets Recovery Agency won a High Court order to seize luxury homes belonging to ex-policeman Colin Robert Armstrong and his partner Geraldine Mallon in 2005, Alan McQuillan said "We have further alleged Armstrong has had links with the UVF and then the LVF following the split between those organisations." It was alleged that Colin Armstrong had links to both drugs and loyalist terrorists.NEWS, McQuillan, Alan, 'Drugs link' man is ex-policeman,weblink 16 June 2012, BBC News, 24 March 2005, 23 September 2021,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20210923161227weblink">weblink live, Billy Wright, the commander of the UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade, is believed to have started dealing drugs in 1991NEWS,weblink BBC News, Who was Billy Wright?, 14 September 2010, 22 June 2018, 16 September 2018,weblink live, as a lucrative sideline to paramilitary murder. Wright is believed to have dealt mainly in Ecstasy tablets in the early 90s.NEWS,weblink BBC News, Billy Wright timeline, 14 September 2010, 22 June 2018, 16 September 2018,weblink live, It was around this time that Sunday World journalists Martin O'Hagan and Jim Campbell coined the term "rat pack" for the UVF's murderous mid-Ulster unit and, unable to identify Wright by name for legal reasons, they christened him "King Rat." An article published by the newspaper fingered Wright as a drug lord and sectarian murderer. Wright was apparently enraged by the nickname and made numerous threats to O'Hagan and Campbell. The Sunday World's offices were also firebombed. Mark Davenport from the BBC has stated that he spoke to a drug dealer who told him that he paid Billy Wright protection money.WEB,weblink BBC - The Devenport Diaries: Remembering Billy Wright, 20 November 2014, 24 September 2015,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20150924161551weblink">weblink live, Loyalists in Portadown such as Bobby Jameson have stated that the LVF (the Mid-Ulster Brigade that broke away from the main UVF - and led by Billy Wright) was not a 'loyalist organisation but a drugs organisation causing misery in Portadown.'The Lost Lives, David McKittrick, Page 1475The UVF's satellite organisation, the Red Hand Commando, was described by the IMC in 2004 as "heavily involved" in drug dealing.WEB,weblink Report_Cover, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 2017-06-23, 23 April 2018,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20180423062640weblink">weblink live,Arms importation
In contrast to the IRA, overseas support for loyalist paramilitaries including the UVF has been limited.Bruce, p. 149–150, p. 171–172 Its main benefactors have been in central Scotland,Cusack & McDonald, p.198–199 Liverpool,Bruce, p. 165 Preston and the Toronto area of Canada.Cusack & McDonald, p. 209Scotland was a source of funding and aid, supplying explosives and guns.Boulton, p. 134Cusack & McDonald, p.34–35, 105, 199, 205 Former MI5 agent Willie Carlin said: “There were safe houses in Glasgow and Stirling. The ferry [between Scotland and Northern Ireland] was pivotal in getting arms into the north – and anything like checkpoints, or armed police and Army in Scotland would have b**d that all up.â€NEWS,weblink Inside story: Why the IRA never attacked Scotland, Neil Mackay, 12 October 2019, The Herald (Glasgow), The Herald, An Irish government memo written by David Donoghue stated: "The commonest contribution of Scots UDA and UVF is to send gelignite. Explosives for the north were mostly shipped in small boats which set out at night from the Scottish coast and made contact at sea with vessels from Ulster ports." Donoghue noted the links between Orange Lodges in Scotland and loyalist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland and that membership of the Orange Order in Scotland at the time was 80,000, and was concentrated in Glasgow, Lanarkshire and Inverness.WEB,weblink Revealed: how Scots loyalists sent gelignite to paramilitaries. Secret memo says explosives were shipped in small boats, 30 December 2005, The Herald (Glasgow), The Herald, It is estimated that the UVF nevertheless received hundreds of thousands of pounds in donations to its Loyalist Prisoners Welfare Association.Cusack & McDonald, p. 199 Protestants in Canada also supported the loyalist paramilitaries in the conflict. Sociologist Steven Bruce described the support networks in Canada as "the main source of support for loyalism outside the United Kingdom . . . Ontario is to Ulster Protestants what Boston is to Irish Catholics." After the Troubles began, an Orange-Canadian loyalist organization known as the Canadian Ulster Loyalist Association (CULA) sprang to life to provide the 'besieged' Protestants with the resources to arm themselves.McDonald, Henry & Cusack, Jim UVF - The Endgame In 1972, five Toronto businessmen shipped weapons in grain container ships out of Halifax, bound for ports in Scotland, Wales, and Northern Ireland which were destined for loyalist militants.JOURNAL,weblink The Canadian Dimension to the Northern Ireland Conflict, Andrew Sanders and F. Stuart Ross, 2020, 195, The Canadian Journal of Irish Studies, 43, 27041321, Between 1979 and 1986, Canadian supporters supplied the UVF/UDA with 100 machine guns and thousands of rifles, grenade launchers, magnum revolvers, and hundreds of thousands of rounds of ammunition. These shipments were considered enough for the UVF/UDA to wage its campaign, most of which were used to kill its victims. On 10 February 1976, following the sudden uptick of violence against Catholic civilians by loyalist militants, Irish cardinal William Conway and nine other Catholic bishops met with British Prime Minister Harold Wilson and his cabinet, asking them as to where the loyalist militants had acquired guns, to which Secretary of State for Northern Ireland Merlyn Rees replied "Canada".BOOK, The Catholic Church and the Northern Ireland Troubles, 1968-1998, Margaret M. Scull, 72, 2019, Oxford University Press, 978-0-1925-8118-1,Affiliated groups
- The Red Hand Commando (RHC) is an organisation that was established in 1972 and is closely linked with the UVF.
- The Young Citizen Volunteers (YCV) is the youth section of the UVF. It was initially a youth group akin to the Scouts, but became the youth wing of the UVF during the Home Rule crisis.
- The Progressive Unionist Party (PUP) is the political wing of the UVF.NEWS,weblink Northern Ireland &124; What is the UVF?, BBC News, 14 September 2005, 29 July 2009, 22 December 2006,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20061222150309weblink">weblink live, In June 2010, its sole member in the Northern Ireland Assembly, party leader Dawn Purvis, resigned from the PUP over the UVF being accused of involvement in the Moffett murder.
- The Protestant Action Force and, much less commonly, the Protestant Action Group were cover names used by the UVF to avoid directly claiming responsibility for killings and other acts of violence. The names were first used during the early 1970s.WEB,weblink CAIN: Abstracts of Organisations, Cain.ulst.ac.uk, 29 July 2009, 17 February 2011,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20110217154305weblink">weblink live,
Deaths as a result of activity
The UVF has killed more people than any other loyalist paramilitary group. Malcolm Sutton's Index of Deaths from the Conflict in Ireland, part of the Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN), states that the UVF and RHC was responsible for at least 485 killings during the Troubles, and lists a further 256 loyalist killings that have not yet been attributed to a particular group. According to the book Lost Lives (2006 edition), it was responsible for 569 killings.David McKittrick et al. Lost Lives: The Stories of the Men, Women and Children who Died as a Result of the Northern Ireland Troubles. Random House, 2006. pp. 1551–54Of those killed by the UVF and RHC:WEB,weblink Sutton Index of Deaths: Crosstabulations (two-way tables), Conflict Archive on the Internet (CAIN), 1 September 2014, 24 March 2016,weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20160324044004weblink">weblink live, (choose "organization" and "status"/"status summary" as the variables)- 414 (~85%) were civilians, 11 of whom were civilian political activists
- 21 (~4%) were members or former members of republican paramilitary groups
- 44 (~9%) were members or former members of loyalist paramilitary groups
- 6 (~1%) were members of the British security forces
See also
- Independent International Commission on Decommissioning (IICD) – Organisation overseeing Decommissioning
- Independent Monitoring Commission (IMC) – Organisation monitoring activity by paramilitary groups
- Irish issue in British politics
- Larne Gun Running
- UVF Mid-Ulster Brigade
- Young Citizen Volunteers
Footnotes
{{reflist}}Further reading
- Birgen, Julia. "Overstating and Misjudging the Prospects of Civil War: The Ulster Volunteer Force and the Irish Volunteers in the Home Rule Crisis, 1912–1914." (Thesis 2017). online {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180623193911weblink |date=23 June 2018 }}
- BOOK, David, Boulton, UVF 1966–1973: An Anatomy of Loyalist Rebellion, Torc Books, 1973, 978-0-7171-0666-0,
- Bowman, Timothy. Carson's Army: The Ulster Volunteer Force, 1910–22 (2012), a standard scholarly history
- BOOK, Steve, Bruce, The Red Hand: The Protestant Paramilitaries in Ulster, Oxford University Press, 1992, 0-19-215961-5,
- BOOK, Jim, Cusack, Henry, McDonald, UVF, 2000, Poolbeg, 1-85371-687-1,
- BOOK, Martin, Dillon, The Dirty War, Arrow Books, 1991, 0-09-984520-2,
- BOOK, Aaron, Edwards, UVF: Behind the Mask, Merrion Press, 2017, 978-1-78537-087-8,
- BOOK, Tony, Geraghty, The Irish War, Harper Collins, 2000, 0-00-638674-1,
- Grob-Fitzgibbon, Benjamin. (2006) "Neglected Intelligence: How the British Government Failed to Quell the Ulster Volunteer Force, 1912–1914." Journal of Intelligence History 6.1 (2006): 1-23.
- BOOK, Brendan, O'Brien, The Long War – the IRA and Sinn Féin, The O'Brien Press, 1995, 0-86278-606-1,
- Orr, David R. (2016) Ulster will Fight. Volume 1: Home Rule and the Ulster Volunteer Force 1886-1922 (2016) excerpt {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210324023108weblink |date=24 March 2021 }}; a standard scholarly history
- BOOK, Peter, Taylor, Loyalists: War and Peace in Northern Ireland, TV Books Ltd, 1999, 1-57500-047-4, registration,weblink
External links
- weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20050328085847weblink">History of the 1912 UVF
- weblink" title="web.archive.org/web/20051123001001weblink">History of the YCV
- CAIN – University of Ulster Conflict Archive
- content above as imported from Wikipedia
- "Ulster Volunteer Force" does not exist on GetWiki (yet)
- time: 3:49pm EDT - Wed, May 15 2024
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