Guns led to great recovery
Haughey pulled off one of the greatest political comebacks in Irish history after weapons trial
By Connla Young
A leading player in politics for over three decades Charlie Haughey will always be remembered for pulling off one of the greatest political comebacks in Irish history.
For many the Arms Trial in 1970 is the enduring memory of a political career characterised by conflict. Haughey’s enemies within and without the Fianna Fáil party were many.
‘The Boss’, as he was known, dealt with opponents and those who showed less than total loyalty with an efficiency and ruthlessness that came to characterise his leadership.
Although an Irish cabinet minister since early 1960s, it was the outbreak of conflict in the North that gave Haughey an international profile.
Taoiseach Jack Lynch appointed a cabinet sub-committee to examine ways of providing emergency assistance and relief to beleaguered nationalists in the North.
No stranger to republican politics, Haughey’s father was an IRA commander in Co Derry before he joined the Free State army and his mother became a member of Cumann na mBan.
Both Haughey, who was minister for finance, and his cabinet colleague Neil Blaney, who was agriculture minister, were known to disapprove of Jack Lynch’s cautious approach to the emerging Northern conflict.
When allegations emerged that the hardline duo had allocated £100,000 worth of relief funds to purchase weapons for the fledgling Provisional IRA, Liam Cosgrove, who led the opposition Fine Gael party, demanded action from Taoiseach Lynch.
On May 6, 1970, Haughey and Blaney were sacked from government after they refused to resign.
Social welfare minister, Kevin Boland, subsequently resigned in protest at the sackings.
The alleged arms smuggling plot was said to have failed because the weapons haul could not be smuggled successfully past customs at Dublin Airport.
At the end of May, Haughey, Blaney, Irish army intelligence officer James Kelly, senior Belfast republican John Kelly and Belgian businessman Albert Luykx went on trial charged in connection with the alleged arms plot.
Blaney was found not guilty in July 1970 while the other accused were cleared in October of the same year.
John Kelly, who lives just a few miles from Mr Haughey’s ancestral home in south Derry and who stood trial with him in 1970, is saddened by his old friend’s death.
“I came to know him through an accident of history,” he said.
“I was part of a delegation that went to meet the Irish government in 1969 and Charlie was one of the people who were there and things rolled on from there.
“His parents were from south Derry and he had a greater understanding of any minister in the Irish government of the dilemma faced by nationalists and the trauma of partition and the disadvantage it brought politically and socially. You didn’t have to bridge any gaps in his understanding of the North.
“His father died a young man. Charlie was just 11 and the northern connection was very strong when he was growing up. He had the support of uncles and aunts in the North as his mother was left to raise six children.
“People will criticise him and they will highlight things for political reasons. But when we are weighed on the scale of life, we hope good will outweigh bad.
“He was a human being and the good does outweigh the bad. He was a good friend of the North and the first to say the North is a flawed political entity.”
