00:00

Sam Cushnahan
Belfast Businessman

'I remember this area well. I used to travel up and down it going to school. It's a tree lined avenue main arterial route going into Belfast. It was a lovely area.'

Sam in Vision
I'm a Catholic businessman but I'm middle of the road, no axes to grind with Protestant people or Catholics. So I moved into the area. I had nothing to hide, nothing to fear. I bought a number of properties, 14 and started to renovate them'.

Sam pulls up
Duncairn Gardens
03.46
But Sam made the mistake of buying his properties on the Protestant side of the road. It wasn't very long before he was the next Catholic victim in Belfast's dirty war.

Sam V/O pulls up and gets out of car
03.58
'These 3 properties were petrol bombed. I'd spent a lot of money on them. These three properties Durans, War on Want and Durans were petrol bombed, just because I was a Catholic.

Duncairn Gardens &
Wall & Bricked up
houses & people
04.16
Today Catholics walk on one side of Duncairn Gardens and Protestants on the other. They don't cross to the other side. After countless ethnic attacks forty foot walls have been built. It makes hit and run attacks more difficult and clearly marks the area as a war zone.


Sam Ext.
Interview
04.36
'I suppose you can use the term ethnic cleansing. People don't want to see Catholics encroaching on a Loyalist area and visa versa. Catholics don't like to see Protestants encroaching on their areas. It's a very sad situation.'

Army patrol in rain
on Falls Road
05.00
More and more the job of the 17 500 heavily armed British soldiers in Northern Ireland has been diverted from fighting the IRA, to keeping Protestants and Catholics apart.

Views & overviews of
Peace Line
05.23
There are many so called 'Peace Lines', or walls, across Belfast. They divide the Catholic and Protestant communities, and more are being built today.

Hand in manacle
mural on Falls Road
05.37
Once Catholics here had a case against their British colonisers, and the Protestant workers they imported. Catholics were treated as second class citizens, and restricted to menial jobs. Church

05.50
Rather than a religious war the Republican IRA's struggle here is more closely connected to other movements which fought against Britain's colonial legacy elsewhere.

Aged Industrial
Estates
06.02
One hundred years ago Belfast was an industrial power which produced huge revenue for the British Empire. Today the industry has gone and Northern Ireland now costs the British billions of pounds a year to keep.

Soldiers past 1916
mural Ballymurphy Estate
06.18
Ballymurphy is a Catholic working class estate with 70% with unemployment. It's a stronghold of the IRA and though the authorities have done much to ensure the Catholics are today treated equally, the resentment is as strong as ever.

Brendan Nolan
on bicycle
06.38
Twelve year old Brendan Nolan has never been to Protestant West Belfast. He's rarely been exposed to anything but the soldiers who patrol every day, and the simmering anger of his immediate community.



Brendan enters
house
06.51
Brendan lives in a small council house. His mother is the only one in his family of seven who is religious. The Nolan's lead a difficult life with all the men in the family out of work. His father's been unemployed for years.

Brendan and his friends
go to peace line
07.18
With little to do youngsters like Brendan spend their evenings on the streets. And like most youngsters in Ballymurphy Brendan has little understanding of the troubles, but like everyone he can't help being involved.

Kids look through
open gate to the
Protestant side
07.37
Protestant and Catholic young in these communities are as remote from each other as ever. As Brendan and his friends sneak through to the Protestant side of the wall an army spotlight switches on. They're suspicious that anyone should be crossing.

Brendan V/O
07.51
"I'd never go over to the Protestant side cos they'd know what religion you'd be and they'd try to kill you, especially if you came from the other side."

07.58
'I just stay in my own area. I feel more safe. Nobody is trying to kill me.'

Brendan Vision
08.02
'Do you have any Protestant friends?
'No'

08.07
'Would you like to live in a mixed community?'
'No not really, because they could find out what you are, and then they'll go and tell the other ones. And then they'll find your family and go and assassinate them.'

Throwing stones at Protestants
08.21
On this night, as with many other nights, Brendan and his friends come across a rock fight. They're only too happy to get involved. They're fighting with their Protestant counterparts from the other side of the wall.

08.53
For as long as Brendan can remember boys have come to the peace-line to throw rocks at the Protestants.


Brendan and friends
speak
09.03
'Well we come up here and we play around, playing football. And then you just see a couple of stones and bottles coming up over the wall and you know it's them throwing things at you. You see them all coming up over the wall and you start to throw stones at them. And the rioting has started. Then the police come.'

Bigger Boy
09.17
Question
'Who's your biggest enemy, the British, or the Protestant's?'
'The Protestants. If the Protestants left Ireland we'd be all right. We'd all have peace. That's the way I think about it.'

Brendan
09.33
Question
'If a boy is a peaceful boy can he stay away from it?'
'If he says he likes the Protestants people won't like him at all. They'd just push him to the side. He'd be like ... the homosexual boy.'

Burning car

09.47
Nearby someone has thrown a petrol bomb into a car and the troops have been called out. For these boys the issues are simple and the solutions extreme.

09.57
"It's like a civil war, throwing bricks at each other. The Protestants coming around and shooting innocent Catholics. Then the IRA trying to stop it by going and shooting the ones who are part of the UVF, UDA and all their death squads.'

Brendan enters Nolan family home.
10.19
The peace initiative hasn't brought Brendan's family dream of a united Ireland any closer, but the Nolans have lived their lives with the violence and these days they often argue over the options.

10.30
Brendan's Dad wants peace but he's also suspicious of the politicians negotiating his future.

PAN OFF MARY
10.36
KEVIN SN.
'We all want peace. But it's not going to be peace at any price. Not John Major's peace or Albert Reynolds'. Who the Hell is Albert Reynolds anyway? Albert Reynolds is living down in Dublin.


10.47
MARY
'He doesn't have to put drop bars on his door going to bed at night.'

10.49
KEVIN SN.
'He's completely out of touch with people.'

10.54
Brendan's mum has spent her life with the Catholic struggle. She finds it harder to forgive and forget.

PAN OFF KEVIN SN

11.00
MARY. . 'What about all those people who've died over the years to give us peace?'

11.06
KEVIN SN. 'Well at the end of the day they haven't died for nothing, have they.'

11.12
MARY
'As soon as those peace talks are accepted they will have died for nothing. All those fellows standing in jail rotting. That's it, they're sold out.'

11.23
KEVIN SN.
'Who's sold out? You're saying you're sold out and the Loyalist are saying they're sold out. Well who the hell is gaining out of it then?'

Kevin
11.29
Their older son Kevin is more pragmatic. He's about to have his first child and would like a better life for his new family. He'd rather forgive and forget.

11.40
KEVIN JR.
'Why would you not live with them.'

11.42
KELLY.
'After what they've done to the people would you live them?'.

11.48
KEVIN JR. 'You're going to have to live with them.'

11.51
KELLY - PAN FROM KEVIN TO KELLY
'Would you live with them if they moved in next door to you?

11.55
KEVIN
'It wouldn't annoy me.'

11.57
KELLY.
'Well it would annoy me.'

'Cat's Cradle'
Anti Terror
TV advertisement



12.02
The hatred and distrust has been passed down through the generations, back further than anyone can remember. British government advertisements emphasise how hard it is for the young to escape a brutal training.


Memorial
Sermon
12.39
'The people of this community are united in suffering, are united in bereavement, are united in grief. The people of this community are united in the hope for a lasting peace.'

13.06 A service for a fifteen year old boy shot dead on this spot the day before. There are few families in working class Belfast who have not been directly affected by the violence.

Man enters Pub through
strict security
13.32
Security to get into Belfast's bars is tight. Hundreds of shootings and bombings have caused nearly two thirds of the city's bars to close down, and killed hundreds of innocents. The bars are often owned by the shadowy organisations the paramilitaries hide behind.

Knee-capping still

A 'knee capping', or a bullet through the knees, is what Belfast people are most afraid of. It's one of the IRA's favourite punishments. Today more people die through non political paramilitary violence than through the IRA's struggle against the British.

IRA
14.26
With few resources the IRA has caused Britain huge expense. The Irish Republican Army began as a force determined to bomb the British out of Ireland, and to reunite the North and South. But their primitive devices will never bring about a military defeat. And with the British themselves now anxious to leave, and South Ireland less and less interested in taking on the quagmire in the North, the IRA's war for a United Ireland has become politically unsound.

Zoom through peace
line Loyalist East Belfast
15.03
On the other side of the peace line lies working class Shankill. It's the heartland of Loyalist militancy and only 500 meters from the Falls road.


UPSOUND RELIGIOUS SONG

Loyalist Graffiti
15.16
The Ulster Freedom Fighters and the Ulster Volunteer Force are now crucial to any peace treaty on Northern Ireland. The Loyalists were originally British workers imported to work on the industrial estates. Their greatest fear is that Britain now will pull out.

Protestant Church
Service Pastor
15.47
Pastor Jack McKee runs a youth centre in the Shankill road, at the heart of Loyalist militancy. Though not as religious as the Catholics Protestants have maintained closer touch with religion than their ancestors in England here.

McKee watches
football
16.14
Jack McKee is one of the Shankill Road's leading youth workers. He is also an arch Loyalist. He says the Loyalist young he works with each day are now flocking to join the gunmen and that if the current peace deal results in a United Ireland there will be a new civil war.

McKee V/O
16.32
'The main group of terrorists are the Republicans, the IRA. That situation will be reversed. The Loyalists will become the terrorists in a United Ireland. Dublin will be getting the bombs. 22.58 Catholic people in the South of Ireland will be getting murdered.'

McKee Interview
16.51
'My concern is that young people who we've been working with to try and steer them away from this, to encourage them not to get involved with the paramilitaries, my concern now is that the paramilitaries are able to say to these people look Britain is selling you out - you need to fight for your future, you need to fight for your cause. And the young people will listen to that message.'

Shankill Road:
Band
UPSOUND OF BAND PLAYING
17.16
On the Shankill Road Loyalist bands march to celebrate an ancient military victory over the Catholics. Protestants beat their drums to assert their own traditions. Loyalists bands are often the target of Republican attack. That's why they get substantial police protection.

McKee Interview
in V/O
and in vision:
17.35
'We know that if Ireland was to unite, the South of Ireland could not, in any way, assist the future of people of the North. Our identity as Protestants would also be threatened.'

17.45
'We would not have the freedom we've got now. We genuinely believe that. Religious freedom exists in Northern Ireland today. We genuinely believe that it would not exist in a United Ireland.'

22.22
UFF Stills
18.05
Loyalist violence is today more extreme than IRA violence, and they kill more people. In recent years they've stepped up their attacks and regularly target Catholics who've never had anything to do with politics.

Pool Room
18.22
To the young the Loyalist paramilitaries are heroes and freedom fighters, fighting against the disaster they see coming if the IRA eventually has it's way and the British leave.

Military on Shankill
18.34
Because of the emerging Loyalist threat the army now find themselves forced to also patrol Protestant areas.

Loyalist Youth march to peace line.
18.40
They're spending more and more time just keeping the two sides apart. At night young Loyalists walk to the peace line - as the Catholics on the other side do.

Loyalists at the
peace line
18.56
Tonight there are no gates open, and they can only shout through at the Catholics on the other side.

SHOUT
19.06
Riots caused by youngsters like these have chopped Belfast into a patchwork of districts behind high fences. The young grow up with a siege mentality, and exaggerated fears of the dangers on the other side.

Interview with
younger Loyalist
at peace line

19.18 'Do you come to the peace line very often?'
'Yes.'
19.21 'What do you do here?'
BOY 'Throw bricks'
19.24 'Do they throw bricks back?'
BOY 'They run down the road after us. And we run back after them.'

Bigger Loyalist lad
19.31
'They're putting the finger up to the Loyalist people. They're forcing their culture down our throats. They're forcing it. If they'll sit down with us certainly we'll allow them to have their Gaelic sayings up in the Falls or Ballymurphy but they'll not put them on the Loyalist Shankill because we're different cultures.'

Interview younger lad
19.51
'At first we were going to trust them and we had a football match. Then we got sick of just talking so then we started fighting again. A couple of them went home with their heads busted.'

Memorial for John
McMichael
20.09
Every year members of the militant Ulster Defence Volunteers meet to commemorate the founder of the Loyalist Paramilitaries, John McMichael. Six years ago he was killed by the IRA. Many of the men attending his memorial today have been involved in attacks against the Catholics. These loyalists are furious that the government has been speaking to the IRA.

Speech at
Grave-side
20.31
'Now we have a new declaration from two governments. At this time we need people like John McMichael. You cannot compromise on principals. Compromise on principals and you're beaten. We think now of those who've sacrificed their lives. Who're in the jails. Who believed in what they were doing. 'We do not like anything but straight talking. We do not like to be lied to. We do not like the language in the document which has been issued. We like to say what we mean, and mean what we say. Not to be bluffed or conned by English politicians, or Irish politicians, which is a foreign country remember, and by our own politicians.'

Memorial
21.43
The Ulster paramilitaries suspect that despite Britain's denials the British government has already decided to pull out of Northern Ireland.

Ray Smallwood
21.53
Ray Smallwood is a militant loyalist politician and is an ex-paramilitary who has gunned down Catholics.

Ray with Tom and Geoff
22.00
Geoff Graham and his father Tom are deeply committed. Tom has also spent years in prison for his part in the Loyalist violence.

Ray in pub
22.10
After the memorial Ray Smallwood and friends return to the Belfast political haunt - the bar. This one is a popular meeting place for the Loyalist paramilitaries.

Tom and Geoff
Graham playing
snooker
22.21
Geoff and his father Tom will go to great lengths to keep the British in Northern Ireland and the Catholics at bay. Tom was convicted with Ray of shooting a Catholic woman. He spent 11 years in jail, and was only recently released. His son feels proud of what his father did.

Geoff Interview
22.40
'I think what my father did was right because he was out defending the people of Ulster. If the British government were doing their job against Republicans kicking out British citizens, and slaughtering Ulster people, my father, and other people wouldn't have to go out and do it.'

Tom Interview
22.59
'I believed in what I did. I thought about it beforehand. My conscience dictated that at that particular time I must do something about the political situation. I attempted to assassinate a high profile Republican. I have no regrets about it. None at all.'

Pub
23.22
Ray and Tom insist that their violence is justified.

Ray at Tildarg Protestant
Estate, Suffolk
23.29
Ray took us to see a Protestant suburb under siege from the Catholics surrounding it.

Boarded up houses
Tildarg Estate
23.36
Fourteen hundred Protestants used to live in Tildarg Estate. Now over 300 of them have left. They say it's because of Catholic intimidation from the Republican areas which surround it. Huge fences have been built to protect the Protestants from attack but a resident told us what he and others on the estate live through anyway.

Tildarg Resident interview
23.55
'We had stones thrown, petrol bombs, bricks. We had crowds of youths gathering, basic things which I'm sure you wouldn't like to live under I'm quite sure, where it wasn't safe to go out the front door. This is why these people have moved out. It's happening all over the place. It's not just this terrace. This whole area here to our right, going back 300 yards people are moving away.'

Ray goes to house
24.29
Every resident in Tildarg has a tale to tell. Ray takes us to a house which has been attacked twice. As with many residents in this area they've had to invest in elaborate security systems.

Inside Lesley
Dougan's house
24.43
Protestant Lesley Dougan has lived in Tildarg Estate for ten years. Two months ago Catholic paramilitaries burst into her home. While her children watched the men fired two shot gun blasts.

Lesley shows us shotgun blast
25.01
'That's where they shot with the shotgun, through the curtains, and also the TV.'

Ray Smallwood
Interview at Lesley's door
25.09
'This is quite typical in Loyalist areas. Virtually everybody I know has one of these. Quite apart from the safety chain, the other locks, the substantial locks top and bottom, the camera outside, the peep hole, this is the way people have got to live.'

Estates and Murals
25.26
The working class estates of Belfast are at the centre of the war zone. The children are the innocent victims whose lives are made by the violence around them.

O'connor's at table
25.42
One day Loyalist gunmen arrived at Michelle O'connor's house. Her father was shot dead in front of her and the other four children. He was killed just for being a Catholic. Everyone is vulnerable to the paramilitaries cruel reign.

Michelle Interview
25.58
'I heard my big sister screaming. I just saw my daddy falling back after he was shot. My sister put us all in the bathroom and locked us in because she thought the gunmen were going to get her. And she was afraid of them coming into the house, so she locked us all into the bathroom. Then the neighbour had to kick the door down to get us out because my sister wouldn't let anybody into the bathroom.'

O'Connor's at table
26.29
But Michelle's family has also been the victim of the IRA. Following her father's death Catholic gunmen held the family at gunpoint for ten hours while the family's car was used to ferry weapons around Belfast. Michelle's mother Patricia sees little hope for peace while the paramilitaries have free reign.

Patricia O'connor interview
26.50
'There's too much hatred on both sides. And too much money to be made as well I suppose. They're gangsters on both sides. There's money to be made out of the troubles in Northern Ireland as well.'

Advertisement
27.10
Gangland killings and extortion have come to dominate the paramilitaries activities. The power of the Godfathers in charge of Belfast's battle grounds has reached such proportions it's doubtful many would want to end the war even if the politicians came to a political settlement.
Army

27.41
More and more the British army find themselves unwilling participants in a war where the violence rarely happens through the sights of their guns. It's like trying to fight the Mafia with a conventional army.

Nolan Household
27.57
Mary Nolan began campaigning for Catholic rights 30 years ago when there was mass discrimination against her people. Now the conflict is no longer that simple.

Mary Nolan inside newspaper office.
28.18
Today Mary, along with IRA prisoners wives, is campaigning for publicity at her local newspaper. It's for seven Republican prisoners from Ballymurphy, her area. She's asking the newspaper to print letters from the seven prisoners.

28.35
Though institutional discrimination against the Catholics is far from what it was for Mary Nolan the struggle is still no laughing matter. She comes from a generation which could more easily justify the IRA paramilitaries. Mary has had four relatives killed and many more imprisoned.

Mary V/O
28.56
'My hate for the Protestant's, I confess every time I go to confession but I tell you it just keeps on.'

Mary Interview
at home
29.04
'Men don't understand what a mother comes to. I can only give the mother's point of view. The fear that I have, and why I'd never trust them. You're sitting in the house and if it's not the Protestants you're worried about getting your children, it's the police, and the British. It goes in that order.'

Kevin Interview.
29.24
'It's understandable she's a bigot. Or we call her a bigot. She's bitter towards the Protestant people, all of them. She doesn't understand that not every Protestant is the same as a Loyalist.'

Kevin Nolan (jnr)
in pigeon house
29.44
Mary's son Kevin has only had a few weeks employment in his life. That was in a Protestant company. He left when a Catholic work mate was killed. But in contrast to his mum Kevin says the cycle of hate has to stop.

Kevin Interview
30.01 'I don't want another 25 years of hatred the same as they've had. I want to be able to see my kid growing up able to go into the town, do what he wants, go out at night, without my mother worrying the way she worried about us going out, over the Loyalist death squads or the police. I would always see it that way. That's the way my father thinks and the way I think. But the rest of them think of them as Orangies because of what they've done over the years. At the same time look what the IRA has done over the years.'

IRA track around
aimed gun
The gunmen have become a part of life, the attitudes inbred over generations. They are in reality little more than gangsters and criminals with outdated politics and no justification for the suffering they incur.

UPSOUND SHOOTING
IRA shoot at helicopter
30.33
The IRA has a reputation as a fearless guerilla force but their struggle more and more and more appears to have been hijacked by gunmen intoxicated with the power of their weapons.

O'Connor's at
grave side
Patricia O'connor and her family still miss the loss of husband and father. Michelle and the others only vaguely remember what it's like to have a father. For them, like many others, the gunmen have turned their lives into a nightmare.

Troops in graveyard

But while the O'Connor's still grieve for their loss, the continuing threat of more violence in Northern Ireland is still very real.

END