Anglo-Irish relations during the early to mid-1980s in an effort to bring about peace, as noted above, his ability to win from Thatcher recognition on behalf of the British government that Dublin should have a ‘consultative’ role in Northern Ireland was a major breakthrough. However, this was only one strand in finding peace in Northern Ireland.
Indeed, it was Haughey and not FitzGerald who took the bold political gamble to open up secret talks with the Republican movement in 1986. This decision by Haughey was all the more brave considering that at this time the PIRA were committing acts of brutality and murder on a daily basis. It is, therefore, equally disingenuous of some writers (including key political actors and prominent journalists) to attempt to erase Haughey’s role in the birth of the Northern Ireland peace process. In his autobiography, Albert Reynolds made the ludicrous claim that Haughey ‘had been reluctant to make advances on the North …’.66 Such arguments, although false, remain common among political commentators and politicians. As this study reveals, the reality is altogether different. Haughey, with the encouragement of Redemptorist priest Fr Alec Reid, took great personal risk in opening up a clandestine channel of communication between Fianna Fáil and Gerry Adams’s Sinn Féin during the late 1980s.
Haughey’s relationship with John Major is where the story of the former’s contribution to the Irish government’s Northern Ireland policy was brought to an abrupt end. During the last years of his premiership, the basis of Haughey’s Northern Ireland policy focused on convincing the British government to agree to convene all-party constitutional talks among the Northern Ireland political parties (including Sinn Féin) under the auspices of a joint British–Irish government initiative to consider the constitutional future of Northern Ireland. Following intense behind the scenes lobbying on behalf of the Irish government, Major eventually agreed to kick-start a new Northern Ireland peace initiative. In late 1991, following three years of discussions between Gerry Adams and the SDLP leader, John Hume, Haughey presented Major with a blueprint document to help bring the conflict in Northern Ireland to an end (the so-called ‘Draft 2’).67
To his disappointment, Haughey never had the opportunity to discuss his proposal face-to-face with Major. The events of Haughey’s past finally caught up with him when Seán Doherty, minister for justice during Fianna Fáil’s brief spell in office in 1982, claimed that Haughey had been fully aware of the 1982 telephone tapings of journalists Bruce Arnold and Geraldine Kennedy. Despite Haughey’s denials, Fianna Fáil’s coalition partner in government, the Progressive Democrats (PDs), indicated that they could no longer support his position as taoiseach. As a result, on 30 January 1992, Haughey announced his retirement as Fianna Fáil leader. He formally resigned as taoiseach several days later on 11 February.
It therefore fell to Albert Reynolds, Haughey’s successor as Fianna Fáil leader and taoiseach, to move forward with the early stages of the Northern Ireland peace process. Reynolds’s contribution to this process was first acknowledged with the signing on behalf of the British and Irish governments of the Joint Declaration on Peace (colloquially referred to as the ‘Downing Street Declaration’) in December 1993. The culmination of Reynolds’s involvement with the Northern Ireland peace process arrived two years later with the signing of the Framework Document in February 1995. The climax to the peace process occurred with the signing of the Good Friday Agreement on 10 April 1998, following gruelling multi-party talks. With the support of the political parties of Northern Ireland (with the exception of the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP)) the British and Irish governments signed up to the Agreement.
Although Haughey had long endorsed the path towards finding a peaceful settlement to the Northern Ireland conflict, which ultimately witnessed the Republican and Loyalist paramilitaries decommission their weapons, he was disgusted by the political settlement that was reached following the signing of the Good Friday Agreement. In retirement, he purportedly denounced taoiseach and Fianna Fáil leader, Bertie Ahern’s, greatest political achievement as ‘inherently unstable, an unstable settlement in which the Provisional IRA demonstrates its willingness only to protect the nationalists within a failed state’.68
Readers should note that this book is not solely a biography of Haughey in relation to his stance on the Northern Ireland question. To write a book of that nature would be to greatly undervalue the subject under investigation. Rather its intention is to provide a more rounded and nuanced analysis of the Irish government’s Northern Ireland policy during the second half of the twentieth century, always of course, within the prism of Haughey’s political career.
It is for this reason that the study also introduces readers to prominent events and personalities related to Northern Ireland and more generally Anglo-Irish relations. For instance, the genesis and development of Thatcher’s Northern Ireland policy is examined and her relationship with the Irish government. Thatcher remains a divisive figure in Irish political discourse. Within Republican circles she is particularly despised. Many will never forgive the ‘Iron Lady’ for her ‘no surrender’ attitude to the Republican hunger strikers during the early 1980s. Yet, Thatcher deserves far greater credit for her role in nurturing what became the early stages of the Northern Ireland peace process. For instance, her willingness to put pen to paper and support the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985, albeit reluctantly, helped to set a process in motion whereby the British and Irish governments, working in conjunction with the major political parties of Northern Ireland, came together to find a lasting settlement to the conflict in Northern Ireland.
This study also seeks to untangle the often neglected role played by civil servants in policymaking. It is the nature of civil servants, be it in Britain or Ireland, to shy away from publicity, to underplay their role in policy development. Unlike their political masters, diplomats usually refrain from writing memoirs or recording their contribution to the life of a nation. This form of self-inflicted censorship generally distorts historical truths and, on occasions, can airbrush out altogether the integral role played by prominent mandarins. This work seeks to address this historical imbalance. Somewhat forgotten figures, for example, Dermot Nally of the Department of the Taoiseach, and Robert Armstrong, secretary to the British cabinet, are restored to their rightful place within the history of Anglo-Irish relations during the 1980s.
Furthermore, readers should note that this book does not merely dip in and out of Haughey’s Northern Ireland policy during the 1980s, depending when he was in or out of government. On the contrary, the aim is to analyse how the Irish government’s Northern Ireland’s policy developed even when Haughey found himself on the Opposition benches. It is for this reason that several sub-sections of the book examine Fine Gael leader, Garret FitzGerald’s, construction of Northern Ireland policy during his periods as taoiseach in the early to mid-1980s. It is only by analysing FitzGerald’s support for the Anglo-Irish Agreement of 1985 that one can adequately explain Haughey’s reasons for rejecting the Agreement.
The historiography: Covert republican or political opportunist?
Haughey’s public and private attitude to Northern Ireland is greatly neglected within the relevant historiography. In fact, those examining his approach to Northern Ireland have tended to cover this topic on a piecemeal and often ad hoc basis. Haughey’s finest biographies, notably Bruce Arnold’s Haughey and Justin O’Brien, The modern prince, respectively, attempted to delve into this subject.69 Yet, neither work was entirely successful, particularly given the unavailability of hitherto classified archival governmental and personal files related to the 1980s from several archival institutions in Britain and Ireland.70
More specialised studies related to Fianna Fáil and Northern Ireland have explored, to varying success, Haughey’s actions in relation to this topic. However, they generally offer an all-encompassing examination of Fianna Fáil’s Northern Ireland policy within a limited timeframe, rather than specifically focusing on the development or evolution of Haughey’s attitude to Northern Ireland.71 For instance, in her study, Fianna Fáil, Irish republicanism and the Northern Ireland troubles, 1968–2005, Catherine O’Donnell felt it necessary to only allocate several pages to Haughey’s contribution to Northern Ireland during the 1980s. The focus of her analysis was on the Fianna Fáil–Sinn Féin relationship, with Haughey’s involvement with the forces of Ulster unionism and the British government given only a passing footnote.72
General works relating to Fianna Fáil have, likewise,