cease-fire represents a political turn. They believe that they hold a good bargaining position, precisely because they placed the military struggle against the British troops in the North and later the bombing campaign in Britain in the center of their analysis of how to develop a favorable relationship of forces in the struggle against imperialism. Now, they believe, the time has come for a turn to politics. The content of this turn throws light on many of the weaknesses of the program within which the Provisionals had conceived their struggle. Community politics, deals and maneuvers with imperialism, and an orientation toward the plebian elements of the Ulster Loyalist organizations are the main elements of this turn. In a recent interview with the Red Weekly, paper of the International Marxist Group, Brifish section of the Fourth International, Seamus Loughran, Provisional Sinn Fein organizer for the North, had this to say in response to a question about how to deal with the Loyalists: "You create a situation where you say to them, "Look, here we have got peace. We have given you this peace in an attempt to get you to listen to us." ... Then we produce on the table all of our Programme . . - and we say, 'There, what would you like to see changed in it?!" The main aim of the Loyalists, however, is to return as rapidly as possible to the total reconstruction of the sectarian Orange statelet with all its trappings, including the notorious B-Special police force. The January 6 issue of the Irish Times commented this way about the Loyalist organizations' responses to the latest Provisional cease-fire: "They are preparing for war. " The danger of the Provisionals' "turn, " reflected in their accommodation to the SDLP (in the modera-
fion of the demand for the withdrawal of British troops, for example) is that it may find a basis for support that goes well beyond that provided by the political weakness of their program. The press has been unanimous in pointing to the "Feeling for peace" now evident in the Catholic ghettoes of the North of Ireland. What the press has got hold of here is the crisis of perspectives in the North and the consequent feeling among the Catholics that the war alone is getting them nowhere. There are two central causes for this: the absolute powerlessness that the Catholic population felt in face of the reactionary Protestant general strike and the failure of the Provisionals to build an all-Ireland movement breaking the isolation of the Northern Republicans fight against Ulster reaction and imperialism. This crisis of perspectives is now beginning to have a real impact organizationally. A recent split from the Official Republican movement led by Costello and supported by Bernadette Devlin has resulted in the formation of the Irish Socialist Republican party. Initial reports would suggest a favorable evaluation of their program. They appear to have issued a call for an all-Ireland anti-imperialist united front calling for the immediate withdrawal of British troops and self-determination for the Irish people. While the importance of individual groups should not be overstressed, it seems that a general process of regroupment is now under way. Most important in this process is the beginning of the emergence of real forces breaking from a petty-bourgeois nationalist program. Joint action among the revolutionary groups is also on the agenda. The demand for such unity in action grows out of the real feeling of isolation and rejection of sectarian responses among Northern Irish Catholics who face possible attack from a reconstituted Orange statelet. In this situafion, the question of regroupment is a critical one offering a way out of the short- and medium-term deadlock on perspectives for the anti-imperialist population. The anniversary of Bloody Sunday (January 30, 1972, when thirteen people were shot dead by the British army during a civil rights demonstration) will refocus attention on the Irish question among the left outside Ireland. Even small-scale acts of solidarity will have an impact on the fighting spirit of the Northern Irish Catholic masses, and hopefully may well aid the regroupment process to take a Marxist direction.O
25
LIFE IMPRISONMENT
SRI LANKA WIJEWEERA By G. FONTAINE The verdict has come down. On December 20, 1974, the Sri