1981 Irish Hunger Strike - Consequences

Consequences

The British press hailed the hunger strike as a triumph for Thatcher, with The Guardian newspaper stating "The Government had overcome the hunger strikes by a show of resolute determination not to be bullied". However, the hunger strike was a Pyrrhic victory for Thatcher and the British government. Thatcher became a republican hate figure of Cromwellian proportions, with Danny Morrison describing her as "the biggest bastard we have ever known". There was extensive international condemnation of the British government's handling of the hunger strike, and the relationship between the British and Irish governments was strained. As with internment in 1971 and Bloody Sunday in 1972, IRA recruitment was boosted, resulting in a new surge of paramilitary activity. There was an upsurge of violence after the comparatively quiet years of the late 1970s, with widespread civil disorder in Northern Ireland and rioting outside the British Embassy in Dublin. Security forces fired 29,695 plastic bullets in 1981, causing seven deaths, compared to a total of around 16,000 bullets and four deaths in the eight years following the hunger strikes. The IRA continued its armed campaign during the seven months of the strike, killing thirteen policemen, eight soldiers, five members of the Ulster Defence Regiment and five civilians. The seven months were one of the bloodiest periods of the Troubles with a total of 61 people killed, 34 of them civilians. Three years later the IRA tried to take their revenge on Thatcher with the Brighton hotel bombing, an attack on the Conservative party conference that killed five people and in which Thatcher herself only narrowly escaped death.

The hunger strike prompted Sinn Féin to move towards electoral politics—Sands' election victory combined with that of pro-hunger strike candidates in the Northern Ireland local elections and Dáil elections in the Republic of Ireland gave birth to the armalite and ballot box strategy, with Gerry Adams remarking "His victory exposed the lie that the hunger strikers—and by extension the IRA and the whole republican movement—had no popular support". The election victories of Doherty and Agnew also had political impact in the Republic of Ireland, as they denied power to Charles Haughey's outgoing Fianna Fáil government. In 1982 Sinn Féin won five seats in the elections to the Northern Ireland Assembly, and in 1983 Gerry Adams won a seat in the UK general election. As a result of the political base built during the hunger strike, Sinn Féin continued to grow in the following two decades, and it is currently the largest nationalist party in Northern Ireland holding 29 out of 108 seats in the Northern Ireland Assembly.

In 2005, the role of Gerry Adams was questioned by former prisoner Richard O'Rawe, who was the public relations officer inside the prison during the strike. O'Rawe states in his book Blanketmen that Adams prolonged the strike as it was of great political benefit to Sinn Féin and allowed Owen Carron to win Sands' seat. This claim is denied by several hunger strikers and Brendan McFarlane, who was OC inside the prison during the hunger strike. McFarlane claims O'Rawe's version of events is confused and fragmentary, and states "We were desperate for a solution. Any deal that went some way to meeting the five demands would have been taken. If it was confirmed in writing, we'd have grabbed it . . . There was never a deal, there was never a "take it or leave it" option at all".