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'The Men Behind The Wire' is a song written about internment introduced in Northern Ireland in 1971.'Internment refers to the arrest and detention without trial of people suspected of being members of illegal paramilitary groups. The policy of internment had been used a number of times during Northern Ireland's history. It was reintroduced on Monday 9 August 1971 and continued in use until Friday 5 December 1975. During this period a total of 1,981 people were detained; 1,874 were Catholic / Republican, while 107 were Protestant / Loyalist. The Unionist controlled Stormont Government convinced the British Government of the need, and the advantages, of introducing internment as a means of countering rising levels of paramilitary violence. The policy proved however to be a disastrous mistake. The measure was only used against the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the Catholic community. Although Loyalist paramilitaries had been responsible for some of the violence no Protestants were arrested (the first Protestant internees were detained on 2 February 1973). The crucial intelligence on which the success of the operation depended was flawed and many of those arrested had to be subsequently released because THEY WERE NOT INVOLVED IN ANY PARAMILTARY ACTIVITY.'http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/events/intern/sum.htm - a University of Ulster based resource on political and social conflict in Northern Ireland.read the history and make up your own minds

Mon 08 Dec, 2008

Gregory Campbell as minister for Arts!Creative and Visionary thinking is not something one would associate with the men of the DUP.

Mon 08 Dec, 2008

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