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14 - 17 OCTOBER 2002
EVIDENCE HEARD
This week, the Tribunal heard the evidence of INQ2091, Brigadier Tickell and General Dalzell-Payne. The evidence of soldier 027 who began giving evidence on Wednesday and Thursday this week will be dealt with in Week 69.
The video footage of 027’s interview with Lena Ferguson for Channel 4 was shown on Tuesday to the legal teams, the families and wounded and the general public.
A full transcript of the proceedings is available at http://www.bloody-sunday-inquiry.org.uk.
1. INQ2091’s evidence
In 1972, INQ2091 was a Royal Signals Officer attached to 8 Infantry Brigade Headquarters (HQ) in Derry and was on duty as a junior watchkeeper in the Operations Room at HQ on Bloody Sunday.
1.1 questions on behalf of the tribunal
1.1.1 Army radio communications
In July 1999, INQ2091, together with his colleague INQ2090 (c.f. Week 67), gave a presentation to the Tribunal on army communications in 1972. Counsel for the Tribunal took him through the report written for the purpose of this presentation and other documents relating to army communications, asking for further detail where necessary. The main points raised are set out below.
1.1.2 Role on Bloody Sunday
INQ2091 explained that, as watchkeeper, his primary responsibility in the Operations Room was to make a log of all radio communications that were sent and received. He also provided situation reports to his superior officers as required and dealt with telephone enquiries received on the Brigade switchboard. On Bloody Sunday, there were two watchkeepers on duty and his specific role was to log all communications made on the Guardnet (c.f. Week 67, paragraph 5.1.1). He explained that, although the Guardnet was used as a backup system to the Ulsternet, there were a number of operatives using it on the day as their primary communications network, including those in helicopters.
He recalled a number of senior officers being at Brigade HQ much later than usual on the evening of Bloody Sunday, including Major INQ1901 who was in the Operations Room dealing with press enquiries. He could not recall what exact duties he performed that evening, but presumed that he and INQ2086 would have been preparing and sending the nightly situation report (a précis of all the events that had taken place in the Brigade area during any given day, focused primarily on the number of incidents that had arisen and the results of those incidents) to Army Headquarters Northern Ireland (HQNI) in Lisburn.
1.1.3 Secure net
INQ2091 told the Inquiry that it was well known within 8 Brigade at the time that insecure communications on the Guardnet and Ulsternet could be monitored by anyone able to tune into the system. However, he said that he doubted whether he had been aware that a secure link, using the BID 150 equipment, existed at HQ at the time of Bloody Sunday and that it had not been located in the Operations Room. He said that it was not general practice to maintain a log of communications made over a secure net, due to the sensitivity of the information transmitted. However, he said that, if a specific communication needed to be recorded, one of the Staff Officers would have relayed it to the watchkeepers to include on the general communications log for the day, as was general practice for other communications (e.g. those made over the telephone), to which watchkeepers would not have been privy. He explained that the rationale was to maintain a single log of all information communicated on the day.
INQ2091 was shown the transcript of a message sent to Brigade HQ by the Commanding Officer of the 3rd Battalion of the Royal Regiment of Fusiliers on Bloody Sunday, which described six men whom the army were tracking and finished with “we have detailed descriptions of them which will follow by other means”. He said that ‘other means’ was not a term of art to designate any particular means, such as a secure link, but merely meant that the officer had not yet decided how he was going to relay the information back to HQ. ‘Other means’ could therefore signify a different radio system or telephone.
1.2 questions on behalf of the families and wounded
1.2.1 Secure net
1.2.1.1 Functioning of the BID 150 equipment
INQ2091 explained that the BID 150 functioned as a normal communications device, as far as the user was concerned. It automatically encrypted and decrypted messages upon sending and receiving information, so that the message was sent and received as pure speech, but anyone trying to intercept the communication would not be able to hear it as pure speech.
INQ2091 agreed that if an encrypted message were used to indicate that an arrest operation was to be launched, the security would only have existed as far as the tactical headquarters on the day, as no units further down the chain would be in possession of a BID 150. However, he said that, in addition to the option of communicating the order further down the chain orally or by insecure means, there could be a predetermined code word in use, relating specifically to the launch of the operation, which could be used on an insecure net without compromising the security of the message.
1.2.1.2 Log of secure communications
He reiterated that, due to the sensitivity of the information communicated via a BID 150, no log was kept of communications as this could have led to another potential weakness in the security of the system as a whole, but that a Staff Officer or an officer of a senior rank, such as Brigadier MacLellan, would have directed the watchkeepers to log the most important information communicated in the general log for the day. He said that, in such circumstances, the watchkeeper would have made a word for word manual record of the communication relayed to him by the Staff Officer, rather than a précis of any such communication, which would have been typed up and checked for accuracy by the officer who had requested that the information be recorded. He recalled occasions, other than Bloody Sunday, on which he had been chastised by Brigadier MacLellan for getting the record of such a communication wrong, and said that, in such circumstances, the log would have been immediately corrected.
He said that he could not recall Brigadier MacLellan entering the Operations Room on Bloody Sunday and giving him a specific instruction to record anything in the log, but said that it was his general practice, as Commander, to go in and out of the Operations Room throughout the course of any given day.
2. Brigadier tickell’s evidence
Brigadier Tickell (who now holds the rank of General) was the army Chief of Staff in Northern Ireland at the time of Bloody Sunday. He was responsible for the administrative side of running HQNI and for all matters which did not fall under the remit of the GOC and the CLF.
2.1 questions on behalf of the tribunal
2.1.1 Military Intelligence
Brigadier Tickell told the Tribunal that, in his capacity as Chief of Staff, he was not involved with Military Intelligence work, which was dealt with by the Director of Intelligence (known to the Inquiry as ‘David’). However, he said that he was vaguely familiar with intelligence matters as, prior to becoming Chief of Staff, he had been a member of a committee, chaired by David, which submitted a weekly intelligence assessment to the Ministry of Defence (MoD). He said that he was no longer a member of the committee (the name of which he could not recall) at the time of Bloody Sunday, but that he presumed it had still been in existence.
2.1.2 Intelligence relating to the Bloody Sunday march
Brigadier Tickell said that he recalled discussions at HQNI to the effect that information had been received which suggested that the IRA would hijack the march, leading to serious trouble. He said that he could no longer recall how he had learnt that the IRA would be involved in the march nor what hard information existed to support this suggestion, but was confident that intelligence had come from a number of sources.
2.1.3 Army plans for Bloody Sunday
The Brigadier said that, prior to 30th January, he had been aware that the 39 Brigade reserve had been moved to Derry to reinforce 8 Brigade and that the Commander of Land Forces (CLF), General Ford, and Colonel Tugwell would be present on the day. He said that he would have known of Colonel Tugwell’s intention to go to Derry at least a day or two before Bloody Sunday, and said that, as the head of Information Policy, it would have been wise for the Colonel to be present at an event that would raise issues relating to Information Policy.
2.1.4 Role and functions on Bloody Sunday
Brigadier Tickell spent most of Bloody Sunday in the Operations Room at HQNI. He said that General Tuzo had called him sometime after 4:00 pm to tell him that he had received a telephone call from a priest in Derry, indicating that there had been some shooting there. He had made further inquiries of staff in the Operations Room and had informed General Tuzo that there had been shooting on both sides. He also recalled being told that the injured were being tested for cordite dust to determine whether they had been handling firearms.
2.1.5 Royal Military Police (RMP) statements
It was Brigadier Tickell’s recollection that Colonel Dalzell-Payne at the MoD had given the statements taken from the soldiers by the RMP on the evening of Bloody Sunday to the Times for publication.
2.1.6 Report to the MoD
Shortly after Bloody Sunday, a report bearing the signature of Brigadier Tickell was sent to the MoD, outlining the army’s version of events on Bloody Sunday. It was the Brigadier’s evidence that, although he signed the document, he would have been merely the editor and not the author of the report. It was his belief that the report would have been written by either 8 Brigade staff or by UNK412, a lieutenant colonel in the Operations Department, on the basis of the RMP statements, reports from 8 Brigade, Information Policy information and information from 1 Para.
The report stated that “a reliable and detailed intelligence report received during the week preceding the march confirmed earlier reports by including the forecast that the IRA would be using the crowd and hooligan cover techniques… to provide opportunities for attacks on the security forces”. Although the Brigadier could no longer recall the contents or nature of any report suggesting that the IRA would use the march as cover, he was adamant that the existence of such a report and the knowledge of the likelihood of an IRA attack were both common knowledge prior to 30th January 1972, and had not been invented after the event.
The report also stated that, by 4:07, when “the Brigade Commander… gave verbal orders to 1 Para to launch the pre-planned arrest operation”, two gunmen had already opened fire on the soldiers and two army shots had been fired at a nail bomber. The Brigadier could no longer recall the source of this information, adding that he would not have made it up. However, to the best of his recollection, the annex appended to the report, detailing the number and nature of army shots on the day, had come from 8 Brigade. He confirmed that he had not verified whether the details provided in the annex corresponded to the evidence given by the soldiers to the RMP.
2.2 questions on behalf of the families and wounded
2.2.1 Report to the MoD
Brigadier Tickell said that, although he had not written the report himself, he had been satisfied with the reliability and authenticity of the information contained within it.
The only two contemporaneous reports assessing the possibility of IRA fire on Bloody Sunday which the Tribunal has received merely suggest it as a possibility rather than a definite prediction, whereas the Brigadier’s report to the MoD indicates that there was detailed information to suggest that it would occur. However, he said that he had never personally seen any report indicating that there was in fact detailed knowledge to this effect.
He agreed that, in planning any military operation, it would be essential for the Commanding Officer to factor into the operational tactical plans the possibility of attack, if the risk of ignoring such a possibility could have been extreme. However, he said that he would prefer not to express a military judgment on whether it was irresponsible for the CLF and those conducting the operation on Bloody Sunday not to plan for the possibility that the IRA might be present.
2.2.2 The Widgery Tribunal
Brigadier Tickell said that he did not think that the conclusion reached at the end of the MoD report that “at no time did the Army fire indiscriminately, least of all into a ‘peaceful crowd’” had in any way influenced the army’s approach to the Widgery Tribunal, but agreed that the alternative would have been that the army had in fact fired at unarmed civilians, a scenario for which the entire army, as well as individual soldiers, would have been taken to task. He said that the army’s concern at the Widgery Tribunal had been to present the truth as they saw it, and did not agree with Counsel’s suggestion that the real concern from the army’s point of view had been that, if people had been shot whilst running away, it could only have been due to a total failure of planning and command across the army hierarchical structures.
2.2.3 Attitude towards the situation in Derry
The Brigadier said that there had been no feeling at HQNI in the run up to Bloody Sunday that 8 Brigade, under the command of Brigadier MacLellan, had not been up to the job of dealing with the hooligan element in Derry. He also denied ever having known about Brigadier Ford’s suggestion that the time had come to shoot rioters in Derry, despite his name appearing on the distribution list of a document containing such a suggestion.
He was shown a document written by Colonel Dalzell-Payne (his counterpart at the MoD in London, with whom he was in regular contact) which stated, in relation to hooligan activity: “we must take stronger military measures which will inevitably lead to further accusations of ‘brutality and ill-treatment of non-violent demonstrators’”. He said that he did not know what ‘stronger measures’ his opposite number had in mind and that, although Colonel Dalzell-Payne regularly stayed with him during his visits to Northern Ireland, they would not have discussed operational matters.
2.2.4 Attitude towards NICRA
He was shown an MoD document dated 24th January 1972, written by Colonel Dalzell-Payne, referring to him and stating: “the COS subsequently gave it as his opinion, and the Director of Intelligence agreed, that the Protestants have got used to the Roman Catholic bomber / gunmen (whom they do not see) and are more likely to react increasingly violently to the sight of NICRA supporters defying the law”. He said that he would not have thought that NICRA had been perceived as an open manifestation of the IRA, adding that he believed that the reference to him was a misprint for Colonel Tugwell.
3. Colonel dalzell-payne’s evidence
Colonel Dalzell-Payne (who now holds the rank of General) worked for the Director of Military Operations within MO4, the branch of the Ministry of Defence dealing with affairs in Northern Ireland, acting as the channel for information between the MoD and HQNI. He was in London on Bloody Sunday.
3.1 questions on behalf of the tribunal
3.1.1 Guardian article of 25th January 1972 concerning the Paratroopers
In January 1972, Colonel Dalzell-Payne was tasked with dealing with the MoD and army response to an article written by Simon Hoggart, alleging that at least two army units in Northern Ireland had requested that the Paras be kept out of their areas, due to their rough and brutal manner. His contemporaneous memo relating to the article states that Colonel Tugwell “believes that we have not got enough concrete evidence to launch an attack on Winchester [Simon Winchester, Simon Hoggart’s boss] who has covered his tracks very carefully. However, Hoggart is professionally vulnerable as a result of his unethical conduct”. The Colonel, who said that he had never been made aware of any such requests made by senior officers in Northern Ireland, told the Inquiry that he had no recollection of the memo or of any action taken as a result of the Guardian article. He could not recall whether any investigations had been carried out to ascertain whether the allegations had any foundation and had no recollection of the fact that soldiers had been told to be more discreet with the press, as a direct result of the article.
3.1.2. Brigadier Tickell’s opinion of NICRA
Colonel Dalzell-Payne refuted Brigadier Tickell’s suggestion to the Inquiry that he had mistakenly attributed sentiments to the Brigadier in a memo written following his visit to Northern Ireland on 24th January 1972 (c.f. paragraph 2.2.4), stating that he would not have included the information in the memo had he not been sure it had been communicated to him by the Brigadier.
3.1.3 Role of the Joint Security Committee (JSC)
Contrary to the evidence given to the Tribunal by a number of former members of the JSC, it was Colonel Dalzell-Payne’s recollection that the JSC would have been responsible for determining the tactics to be used in dealing with the Bloody Sunday march, given that the Committee was responsible for all aspects relating to the control of marches.
3.1.4 Report on marches in Northern Ireland dated 27th January 1972
Three days before Bloody Sunday, Colonel Dalzell-Payne compiled a report on marches in Northern Ireland. He explained that the impetus for creating the report was three-pronged: to deal with the recent renewal of the ban on marches, to provide a summary paper on the topic for the MoD and to provide an overview of the issues concerned for rotating members of the MoD staff. He was asked by the Tribunal to provide further detail concerning a number of points raised in the report.
3.1.4.1 ‘Worst fears’ held by the MoD in relation to the planned NICRA march
The covering note accompanying the Colonel’s report reads: “the attached paper has been prepared as background to the current situation and to try to anticipate some of the problems we may face on Monday 31st January 1972, if events on Sunday prove our worst fears”. He told the Tribunal that the MoD’s ‘worst fears’ had been on two levels: firstly that the march would lead to a serious sectarian confrontation between nationalists and loyalists, and secondly that the march would get out of control, leading to serious rioting and destruction. Although there is no reference to any possibility of sectarian conflict in the body of his report or in the attached letter, Colonel Dalzell-Payne said that his addressees would have appreciated what he meant by ‘worst fears’.
3.1.4.2 ‘Stronger military measures’ envisaged for dealing with marchers
The report identifies the problem of seeking to uphold the ban on marches and proposes two possible courses of action, namely to ban all public meetings or to introduce additional measures for the physical control of crowds threatening to march. It continued “we must take stronger military measures which will inevitably lead to further accusations of ‘brutality and ill-treatment of non-violent demonstrators’”. The Colonel told the Tribunal that all he had envisaged by ‘stronger military measures’ was for hooligans to be arrested, and that he had not been advocating that soldiers use more physical force than that used in the past to effect arrests.
The report went on to set out that “the only additional measure left for physical control is the use of firearms, i.e., ‘disperse or we fire’. Inevitably it would not be the gunmen who would be killed but ‘innocent members of the crowd’”. Colonel Dalzell-Payne explained that he had not meant that innocent members of the crowd would in fact be killed but that would have been how it would have been portrayed by nationalist propaganda. He also said that he could not recall anyone having discussed the possibility of using firearms in a crowd control situation prior to Bloody Sunday, and that it had not been raised as a possibility for dealing with the planned NICRA march.
The Colonel said that he had envisaged that firmer measures would be used on 30th January and that the passage in his report stating “we must await the outcome of the events planned for this weekend… to see what effect our firmer measures have” referred to the implementation of a more aggressive arrest policy towards hooligans. He acknowledged that the report recipients could not have known that ‘firmer measures’ or ‘stronger military measures’ meant merely that hooligans would be arrested, given that he neither discussed hooligans nor a firmer arrest policy in the body of his report.
3.1.5 Intelligence concerning IRA activities planned for Bloody Sunday
He told the Tribunal that he had no recollection of receiving any intelligence concerning the IRA’s plans for the march prior to Bloody Sunday nor of discussing the possibility of a hostile IRA presence on the day.
3.1.6 Press briefing given on 31st January 1972
Colonel Dalzell-Payne gave a press briefing on 31st January 1972, based on information contained in a report compiled by Brigadier Tickell, amongst other sources. He said that he had not had the time to check the reliability of his sources prior to giving his press briefing. He was adamant that he had not been the source for Colonel Tugwell’s allegation in an interview with the BBC in the early hours of 31st January that four of the dead were on the wanted list. He also denied Brigadier Tickell’s suggestion that he had made the soldiers’ RMP statements available to the Times for publication in the run up to the Widgery Inquiry.
3.2 questions on behalf of the soldiers
3.2.1 Use of 1 Para as arrest force on Bloody Sunday
General Dalzell-Payne denied Counsel’s suggestion that the ‘stronger military measures’ or the more aggressive approach to arrests envisaged in his report related to the use of 1 Para to conduct a more aggressive arrest operation, involving larger numbers of arrestees on Bloody Sunday than attempted previously. It was his evidence that he had been unaware at the time of writing his report that 1 Para would be sent to Derry on Bloody Sunday.
3.3 questions on behalf of the families and wounded
3.3.1 Report on marches in Northern Ireland dated 27th January 1972
3.3.1.1 Motivation behind the ban on marches
Referring to various official documents from the time of the imposition of the ban on marches, Arthur Harvey QC told the General that the ban had been a political quid pro quo for the introduction of internment and had been opposed by the GOC. One such document, underscoring the political nature of the ban, was a report written by Anthony Stephens, which read: “the line which he have asked the GOC not to take is that the marchers are doing no harm until they leave their communal area… This would in fact be true militarily but would of course defeat the whole point—politically speaking—of the ban on marches”.
Counsel contended that, as the channel for all information between HQNI and the MoD, General Dalzell-Payne would have known that it was essentially a political issue. He responded that he had only been concerned with military issues.
3.3.1.2 Marchers versus hooligans
Although the report by General Dalzell-Payne sets out the background to the ban on marches and the problems for dealing with “mass civil disobedience in the defiance of the ban on marches”, it was his evidence to the Tribunal that much of the suggestions contained within it pertained to hooligans rather than marchers, despite there being no reference to hooligans within the body of the report.
For example, it was the General’s evidence that the section of the report which stated “apart from the physical difficulties of imposing the ban, there are considerable difficulties in prosecuting those who are identified defying the ban. The RUC are obliged to submit all such cases for prosecution to the Attorney General (AG) of Northern Ireland. This inevitably causes lengthy delays…”, related not to marchers, but to hooligans. However, Mr Harvey pointed out that, as a standalone document, designed to give an overview of the situation to MoD personnel unfamiliar with the issue of marches, it could only have been understood on the basis of what it said, namely that the ‘firmer measures’ envisaged were directed at marchers not hooligans. Furthermore, both Mr Harvey and Lord Saville said that the issue of legal delays could only relate to the prosecution of marchers, given that hooligans could have been dealt with by summary proceedings, without the need for the involvement of the AG.
It was also Counsel’s contention that the only possible reading of the section dealing with the introduction of ‘stronger military measures which will inevitably lead to further accusations of ‘brutality and ill-treatment of non-violent demonstrators’” was that physical control measures were to be introduced against those merely involved in civil disobedience by defying the ban, given complete absence of reference to hooligans or to rigorous arrest procedures. However, the General maintained that this was an incorrect reading of the document and that ‘hooliganism was definitely in [his] mind’ when writing the report.
3.3.1.3 Suggestion of ‘disperse or we fire’ tactics
Despite the section in his report stating that “the only additional measure left for physical control [of those threatening to march] is the use of firearms, i.e., ‘disperse or we fire’”, it was the General’s evidence that they had not been contemplating using such a tactic at any stage. Although the report does state that the tactic should not be used except for “in extremis”, it adds that “it cannot, however, be ruled out”. Counsel contended that there would have been nothing to prevent the General from spelling out in the report exactly what he envisaged by ‘firmer measures’, if indeed all he had envisaged was a more efficient and effective arrest plan, suggesting that the ‘firmer measures’ contemplated in the report had not been spelt out due to their inappropriate nature. He rejected this suggestion.
He said that the army had never envisaged using the ‘disperse or we fire’ tactic that was used by the British Army ‘overseas’, and said that there had been no feeling in the army at the time that Northern Ireland was in fact ‘overseas’ to all intents and purposes. He told the Tribunal that he had never become aware of General Fords’ suggestion, expressed in a memo of 7th January 1972, that the time had come to shoot Derry riot ringleaders dead, adding that he would have considered it unacceptable. He said that there was no correlation between his own mention of ‘disperse or we fire’ and General Ford’s own suggestion.
3.3.2 Responsibility of the MoD for the events of Bloody Sunday
General Dalzell-Payne said that, although he had been responsible for suggesting ‘firmer measures’ to be adopted against rioters, it had been up to the army on the ground to decide how to carry them out. It was his evidence that he would not have enquired as to how the policy was to be implemented on the ground, believing that it related simply to more numerous arrests than usual. He said that the MoD would not have suggested any particular precautions for protecting citizens of the Bogside or the Creggan in the event of a gun battle with the IRA, but could not confirm or deny whether the view of the MoD corresponded with that of General Tuzo, recorded in General Dalzell-Payne’s own memo that NICRA was “active ally of the IRA”.
He denied Counsel’s suggestion that the MoD was in some way responsible for the events of Bloody Sunday, given that they had specifically advocated the use of firmer military measures against marchers. He also strenuously denied Lord Gifford’s allegation that he knew in advance that the military operation planned for Bloody Sunday would gravely endanger life and might result in innocent deaths.
3.3.3 Use of 1 Para
General Dalzell-Payne said that he would not have been aware of the decision to use 1 Para as the arrest force on Bloody Sunday at the time of writing his report, despite the fact that his deputy, INQ2105, has told the Tribunal that this was the key reason for which he attended the march as observer (a suggestion the General dismisses as untrue). He also said that the reputation of the Paras to the effect that they struck fear into the hearts of local citizens in Belfast was unknown to him at the time.
He rejected Counsel’s contention that the army saw itself as responsible for law and order in Northern Ireland, applying rules of military law as opposed to civil law in dealing with civil disobedience.
SUMMARY OF
PROCEEDINGS
Monday 14th: Paragraphs 1 and 2
Tuesday 15th: Paragraph 3
Wednesday 16th and Thursday 17th: See Week 69
For Peace Justice & Human Rights
