Chapter 2 explains how the British Army’s ‘honeymoon’ period in Northern Ireland came to an end by May 1970, and how these early months entrenched certain ideas about nationalist and unionist communities in British strategic thinking. The chapter argues the army succeeded in partially repairing trust between Catholics and the state, but that this proved highly destabilising. Strategists under-estimated lingering anger over the events in August 1969 and exaggerated their ability to control tensions. The decision to concentrate soldiers in predominantly Catholic areas and leave the police in Protestant areas gradually made the army appear biased. Tougher action, when it came, looked like it was happening only against one section of the community, whilst the army’s ability to understand Protestant militants was limited and strategists in any case wished to avoid any confrontation from that quarter. The Provisional IRA’s offensive began around Easter 1970, before the British Army adopted a more aggressive stance. By permitting provocative Protestant marches in Belfast the British began to lose the Catholic goodwill so carefully gained by army battalions in the preceding months. The British response to rising republican violence can only be understood in the context of the expectations about loyalist reactions.

On 23 March 1972 the British cabinet suspended the Northern Ireland parliament, scaled down military operations, and prepared to negotiate with nationalists and republicans. This chapter asks why it took Heath’s government so long to strategically adapt, and what the delay resulted in. A straight causal line is often drawn between internment, Bloody Sunday and direct rule from London being imposed. Bloody Sunday, when the Parachute Regiment shot dead thirteen unarmed protesters during an anti-internment march on 30 January, is considered to have happened in the context of a policy vacuum, or amidst frenetic efforts to secure peace. This chapter argues that the persistence of an offensive strategy intended to defeat the IRA and force nationalists to accept minor constitutional reforms contributed to Bloody Sunday. The direct-rule decision is frequently attributed to the fallout from Bloody Sunday. But the thinking and planning necessary for strategic adaptation had already taken place. The offensive strategy endured for weeks longer because ministers decided to delay direct rule. The massacre propelled large numbers to join the IRA, a recruitment glut essential for the expansion in violence seen during 1972. Those new recruits proved effective because IRA strategy and tactics had already changed before Bloody Sunday.