Once Upon a Time in Northern Ireland

[Approaching footsteps] [Inhales] [Exhales sharply] Woman: No, no.

That's good.

[Breathes deeply] Man: OK?

Mm.

Grand.

Gonna show you a clip.

Hold on.

The space bar.

Oh, my God.

Ha ha ha!

Man, voice-over: 32 contestants were today being put through their paces as they rehearsed for tonight's contest.

The winner will represent Ireland in the Miss World competition in London later this year.

Ha ha ha!

Oh, my God.

Well, the striking thing, of course, is always the pretty face and the figure to go with it.

We like a girl to be ladylike, know how to carry herself, have poise and confidence.

Oh... [Laugh] Oh, my God.

Ha ha!

Man: Did you see yourself in there?

I bloody did.

Aye.

There is I, all the eighties hair.

Ha ha ha!

I look great.

I didn't know how you put on makeup.

I had zero idea.

Poise, elegance, and ladylike?

I was a ****ing tomboy.

Ha ha ha!

Woman, voice-over: I remember going on to Miss Ireland then was-- that was an eye-opener.

I was really greenhorn.

I'd never been outside of Derry at that point.

I've always done things where it's nearly a form of escapism.

To not think about what I was going through, I put on a character.

I wasn't me.

None of those people knew my experiences in the North.

Nobody knew that my brother was murdered, none of them.

[Children talking] Woman, voice-over: I just feel really angry that so many people in this part of Ireland had to suffer the **** that they did, should they be Catholic, Protestant, policemen, soldiers, everything in between.

[Woman screaming] [People shouting] Woman: I remember crying.

I remember thinking, "Right," and I can remember-- just remember me mommy.

Man: I remember people were joyful.

I can remember the excitement, the butterflies in the stomach.

Woman: I remember just being so happy and loved.

Man: I just remember the anger that I had.

Woman: My father always said this-- "Tell the truth.

Tell the truth and shame the devil."

[Birds chirping] In my memory I will always see The town that I have loved so well Morning, George.

Now you're in the heart of the Bogside, 99.9 Catholic nationalist area.

Great people, best people in the world.

[Vehicle passes] "IRA rules."

Ha ha ha!

Man, voice-over: I was born in the Bogside in Derry.

Born at home, 3-bedroomed house... but people think, "Oh, he's real lucky.

He had a 3-bedroomed house," but there was 3 families.

There was a family in each room.

I was too young.

I slept in a drawer because there was no room.

There was two siblings before me, so, I was the third.

Happy days looking back, you know.

There were some good times.

Some very sad times, but some good times.

Film narrator: Catholics call it Derry.

Protestants call it Londonderry.

Man: Here, a man is either a Protestant or a Catholic.

He is either with us or with them.

McVeigh, voice-over: You knew there was a separation.

When you looked across the river, it sort of just rang a bell in your head-- "They're all Protestants over there."

The divide was plainly seen because they all had good houses.

They also had better jobs.

If we had jobs at all, we were lucky.

The discrimination was gonna explode.

It was gonna come out.

Woman, voice-over: And I remember people saying, "Oh, we've no jobs, and we've outside toilets, we've no bathrooms," and I thought about it, and I said, "But that's me."

You know, that's exactly what we'd known-- nothing, either.

We were just working-class Protestants.

There's no difference.

And do you know what?

I was happy enough with the way my life was, to tell you the truth.

I had a house, had my kids and my husband.

We didn't want our life to change.

That was very selfish of me.

I just wanted to live in this lovely, happy city where everybody went out and got on-- Derry, Londonderry, whatever you want to call it.

[Laughter and talking] But there's too much underlying currents.

You kind of knew deep down that something was gonna happen.

Film narrator: Londonderry is a town where 2/3 of the population, who are Catholic, are ruled by the Protestant minority.

The rule is maintained, Catholics say, by a system which is totally undemocratic.

Man, voice-over: I was 14, 15, maybe 15.

I was starting to become interested in politics.

The whole electoral system was unbalanced because you had to be a homeowner to have a vote.

Film narrator: In local elections, the 7 adults in this family have only two votes-- for the householder and his wife.

O'Rawe, voice-over: Very few Catholics owned their houses, hadn't got any money, paid rent.

So, a lot of Catholics didn't have votes at all, whereas the Protestants, quite a few of them did own their houses.

This is a crucial element in all of this.

The state of Northern Ireland was designed so that there would be a permanent Protestant majority.

Man: Ever since the partition of Ireland, power has been monopolized by one party-- the Unionist Party devoted to the British Crown and to the Protestant religion.

McVeigh, voice-over: So, there was something in the air.

You could tell.

The discrimination was gonna explode.

It was gonna come out.

Enough was enough.

[People shouting] McVeigh, voice-over: There's thousands of people, like.

We're getting together here.

One man, one vote!

One man, one vote!

One man, one vote!

McVeigh, voice-over: One of the main aims was one man, one vote.

One person, one vote.

Simple as that.

We were basically demanding equality, and we were being beat off the streets.

[People shouting] And don't forget, the police was predominantly Protestants, as well.

[People shouting] [Woman screams] McVeigh, voice-over: After the second or third march, you went prepared for a riot.

People armed themselves.

[Cheering] That was-- that was the beginning of it.

We shall not be moved... Man, voice-over: We were being told that the civil rights movement was dangerous, really dangerous people, and they're fighting our police, and they are our police.

[People shouting] Nazis, Nazis, Nazis, Nazis... Greer, voice-over: And I can remember Father saying, "You know, all the civil rights carrying on's just a front for the IRA, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah."

Your father was like the oracle, you know, in those days.

You didn't sort of-- whatever he said was the ****ing law, basically.

You know what I mean?

He used to wear two pairs of glasses, you know, one at the point of his nose and one up here, and he sort of alternated them for looking at whatever he was looking at and reading the paper, and he goes... [Mutters] and then he would go like this.

"Well, you gonna argue with that?

There it is in black and white."

[Drumming and shouting] Film narrator: The most violently anti-Catholic group is that led by the Reverend Ian Paisley, moderator of his own Free Presbyterian Church.

[Cheering] All our life and heritage is at stake.

[Cheering] Greer, voice-over: Paisley was preaching suspicion.

He was preaching hate.

He might have had a grain of truth and then a shovelful of **** along with.

Romanism has controlled in this land for many centuries, and Romanism has bred poverty and ignorance and priestcraft and superstition.

Greer, voice-over: Fear is a great motivator, you know.

Well, if you don't do something now, all was lost.

Protestant culture was gone.

Woman: We, as Protestants, have always been British, and we intend to remain and stay Brits.

Roman Catholics want to be under a united Ireland.

Greer: "Let me tell you that the whole thing is constructed by Rome against the Protestant people."

I thought he was great.

Like, I used to go to the rallies religiously.

It felt like you were part of something big.

No surrender.

[Cheering] Man: Up with Paisley.

[People shouting] [Glass shattering] [Gunshot] McVeigh, voice-over: And thinking back on it, Battle of Bogside was '69.

I was 17, only kids.

It was a 3-day riot, very violent, but we kept the police at bay.

Man, on megaphone: Come back up here, boys.

Come up.

Come up here.

Different man: Come on back.

Come on.

Come on.

Warke, voice-over: The police were there to protect us, really, weren't they?

I remember standing at the pram with me looking at them... [Gunshot] and it just got to you, you know-- "Why--why are they suffering like that?"

Man: What did you think was gonna happen?

Oh, I thought, "We're all gonna get shot, killed, blew up everything, the city was finished."

I did despair.

[Glass shatters] Film narrator: Inside the Catholic Bogside area, the second day of siege is underway, and barricades at every street keep visitors and the police outside.

[Explosion] [People shouting] [Crash] Never prayed as hard in me life.

I did.

I just felt everything was over for us.

I did, honestly, and then it just escalated, really, didn't it?

Film narrator: After Londonderry, the conflict spread, and Protestant and Catholic gangs fought savage battles in the streets of Belfast.

[People shouting] O'Rawe, voice-over: About 150 yards from our house, the sky was absolutely on fire, all red, houses blazing.

It was whole streets being burned out by Protestant extremists.

The world had turned chaotic.

[Explosion] John Hume, voice-over: If there is no solution, the alternative is too terrible for words.

The alternative is civil war, and what must be realized by everybody on all sides is that nobody gains from this.

On one side, what use is one man, one vote if you're not there to exercise it, and on the other side, what is the use of maintaining a situation of privilege and power over a desert?

[Flames crackling] The price of no solution is total destruction.

[People shouting] [Glass shatters] [Brass band playing] Man, voice-over: I arrived in British Honduras on the 25th of November, 1968, and became 18 on the 26th of November, the day after.

What a birthday present, eh?

Sun, sea, sand, palm trees, beautiful women, you name it.

Every day was new.

Every hour was new.

Every minute was new of what you did.

It was brilliant.

We were young lads.

We didn't read newspapers.

You know, if we found one lying around, you'd pick it up and look at the sports pages and then throw it down again.

We were million miles away from what was happening in the UK.

[Bat hits] Very well done.

[Applause] Wharton, voice-over: So, we then started getting briefings about the riots that had been going on and the killings in some places that'd been going on.

We said, "Where's all this happening?"

"Oh, it's happening in Northern Ireland."

This was the scene as a new batch of British troops arrived to take over security duties in Belfast, Bogside, and other strategic points.

Man: Left, right, left, right, left, right... [Cheering] [People shouting] Wharton, voice-over: We'd been brought in to stand in the middle of this to stop them killing each other.

[People shouting] O'Rawe, voice-over: At the start, it was a real, real tense situation because people didn't know what these guys were gonna do.

I mean, I never heard an English voice before the Troubles, and I didn't know what the **** they were saying, and then all of a sudden, I see these wee women come in with trays of tea and coffee, and the whole heat's taken out of the situation.

Man: Ta, my dear.

Different man: What about me?

Oh, it's wonderful.

[Indistinct conversation] Thanks, sweetie.

Drink your tea.

[Dog barking] Woman, voice-over: There was that sense of, well, "Thank God they're here now.

Maybe a bit of calm will descend."

And I remember bringing, like, biscuits.

Man: You did?

Aye.

I think it was rich tea.

Wharton, voice-over: You got both Catholics and Protestants competing with the tea.

So, they come from one side with a tray of tea and sandwiches, and you'd eat those, and then you turn round, and from the Protestant side, they'd come along with another, and you're thinking, "Oh, God, I'm full," you know, because you don't get much exercise when you're stood at the end of a street, you know, but you come in for breakfast... [Indistinct conversation] and the people on both sides were so pleasant, it was unbelievable.

You know, "What's all this about?

Why are you here?"

Ha ha!

There you are, luv.

That's for after your lunch or after your dinner.

Thank you very much.

I'm Pru.

Pru, thank you.

Woman, voice-over: There was smiling and laughing, and it was people talking to them just like they were decent, normal human beings, and so... that was the early days.

We didn't know what was round the corner, really, then, did we?

[Birds chirping] O'Rawe, voice-over: I remember my father saying, he says, "This is the start of something huge."

O'Rawe, voice-over: I had no clue what he was talking about, and he wouldn't elaborate, but he saw something that I didn't.

My father was a Republican, had been a Republican, had been a former commander of Belfast during the 1940s for a while, and so, he--the people who he classified as friends were always committed to armed struggle.

They were not civil rights people.

These people were out and out revolutionaries, and I would say that, even by that stage, they were rubbing their hands and plotting... and... probably talking about raising an army to fight.

It was tailor-made for them because they had an army right in front of them in a green uniform-- the British Army, the British Army.

It was tailor-made for a revolution, and these guys went for it.

They went for it like racing drivers.

Man: And, what they're plotting, is that what became-- The Provisional IRA... and that's what happened.

The IRA, totally dormant, nobody even talking about it.

Suddenly, the unsaid was being said, you know?

"We want a united Ireland."

[Click] [Explosion] [Playing "Jingle Bells"] Man, voice-over: Your whole day was preoccupied with the riots.

From the minute you got out of school, it's all about the riots-- where was the riots, who was rioting, what was on fire.

Every day, there was trouble somewhere.

My name's Richard Moore, and I'm delighted to be here today.

[Chuckles] I would've been probably 8 or 9 years of age then.

[Woman shouting] [Gunshot] [Gunshot] [Women shouting] Wharton, voice-over: We had dog **** thrown at us-- loads of it--and they'd get it on a stick and go tsh.

You would be ducking.

There's things flying all over the place, and the kids loved it, and what are you gonna do about it against kids?

[People shouting] Wharton, voice-over: My second tour, 1971, the whole atmosphere had changed.

[Shouts] Wharton, voice-over: Some Catholic communities hated the British by now.

Woman: All right.

There you go, fella.

Man, voice-over: It's quite inevitable that if you are going to pursue counterterrorist campaign, you have to go in amongst the population which harbors the guerrilla and gives him sustenance.

You cannot do this without causing a degree of bitterness.

[Explosion] [Indistinct conversation] Man: I hope you realize we have to come round, look at these houses from time to time.

Yeah.

We know.

Yes.

We know that.

I understand.

I mean, we just have to make absolutely certain there are no weapons or anything in this area.

I know.

Yes.

Thank you.

Woman, voice-over: We became known as a Republican family.

We were singled out for supporting a united Ireland and classing ourselves as Irish.

They were raiding our house to see if we were either hiding bombs or gunmen.

Man: Has anybody approached you at any time to join the IRA or take part in any activities whatsoever in this area?

No.

Not at all?

No.

You absolutely sure?

Positive.

It's always-- it's the feet, the feet.

That's one of the things that I remember.

It was like, bang, bang, bang, bang.

It's, the stairs has literally been pounded in.

"Come on!

Come on.

Get out of your ****ing beds," and it's just all young girls in the room.

These weren't the same people who were sitting on the wall that I was handing biscuits to.

They were angry, and they were shouting, and they were wrecking the place, and, you know, dragging us out of bed, and-- and when they eventually left, there was no "Sorry.

We didn't find anything."

There was nothing.

Man: The new army searches have brought a rash of complaints from Roman Catholic residents.

The Army, for their part, claimed they used minimum force to enter the house and suggest that perhaps local residents had done it in order to win sympathy for the Republican cause.

[Helicopter passes] Woman, voice-over: I've been over in England quite a few times, and I think to meself, "How would they feel if this was going on in their city?

"How would they feel?

"Would there be an uproar against it, or would people just comply?"

Cold out, and that's finished.

Warm in here.

Ha ha ha!

[Laughter] Man: You blokes are standing in the middle over here, and, strictly speaking, you can't take sides with either Protestants or Catholics.

Is it really possible to do that, Tom?

No.

I don't.

Wharton, voice-over: I get embarrassed when I see it.

For one thing, I'm sat there going, "Fwing fwing fwing," and for another thing-- I don't know-- it's just embarrassing.

God, and look at that.

I mean, look at the hair, for one thing.

So, you go to a Protestant area, they give you tea, give you cakes.

They're friendly.

You went in a Catholic area, they throw bottles, they throw stones, and they shoot at you, so, it's only natural you're gonna be biased.

I'm biased.

I am biased.

Man: How do you feel about Catholics now?

Heh.

I am a Catholic, and I just don't like the Irish Catholics over here.

Hmm.

Not everyone out there is out there to kill you, but there are some.

[Rhythmic footsteps] Man: News of the murders has undoubtedly shocked people here, and there's a wave of sympathy for the Army.

Apparently, no one saw anything in the pub where the young soldiers had been drinking, and no one could explain how they were lured out to be shot at close range in the head and left dying, heaped on each other at the side of the ditch.

Greer, voice-over: The IRA killed a couple soldiers.

People feared then that the thing was escalating.

Who would be next, you know?

We would have seen ourselves as British, so, "Brits out," what, does that mean me?

You know, it wasn't that one night, there was, "Ahh."

It wasn't like that.

It sort of crept on and crept on and crept on.

It became "the big monster that sort of everybody feared was now on our doorstep" type thing.

Shortly after that, there was bombs and, you know, blah, blah, and, you know, it was sort of starting to move onto another level.

Film narrator: Bombings were now several a day in shops, pubs, and offices.

Victims were not restricted to the shooting war between IRA and British soldiers.

The savagery of urban terrorism was indiscriminate.

Warke, voice-over: We just couldn't understand why the city was getting blew up.

It was just horrific.

I mean, there wasn't a Saturday that passed that you weren't caught up in either CS gas or rioting or bombs or something.

[Children talking and squealing] Warke, voice-over: You more or less felt like a prisoner in your own home because you didn't know what you were gonna walk into.

The fear of God set in then, trust me.

Wharton, voice-over: Our whole tactics changed.

[Click click] The IRA weren't messing around.

They were killing people.

So, you've got to come up with something, and that's the only thing we had-- internment.

Film narrator: The British government may detain without trial anyone they suspect of terrorism.

O'Rawe, voice-over: On the 8th of August, the British swept in, and they arrested over 300 individuals.

They were not the right people.

The Provisional IRA was relatively brand-new, so, they didn't know who they were... but they knew all the old-timers from the fifties, and they knew who the civil rights people were, so, they arrested a lot of civil rights people, and they arrested a lot of old Republicans who weren't involved.

[People shouting] Film narrator: Ulster's Catholics felt that both house-to-house searching and the policy of internment were directed at them rather than at the Protestants.

[People shouting] Moore, voice-over: All those things were there to give you a sense of a community that was under siege at times, but, in all honesty, I have to say, I don't remember feeling terrified.

I genuinely don't.

You know, you would almost describe it as exciting.

It was mad.

It was like a movie.

[People shouting] [Explosion] [Native Americans whooping] Aah!

Moore, voice-over: A child anywhere else in the world, you'd play cowboys and Indians.

We used to play soldiers and IRA men.

Man: And in your games, who won?

Ha ha ha!

I don't know if we ever had a winner, but if there was gonna be a winner, it would've been IRA, wouldn't it?

Ha ha ha!

Ah... Film narrator: A volunteer of the IRA operates a checkpoint.

Sometimes cars are seized to strengthen the massive barricades which fortify the area known as Free Derry.

Many Provisionals seem to be well-respected by the community.

Let's go.

Man: Did you join the IRA?

Yeah.

Tell me about that.

What's to tell you?

I joined it.

Ha ha!

What made you want to join?

For our country, for Ireland, to get the Brits out.

I mean, see, when you mention the IRA, people think this is a team of people come out of space or somewhere.

The IRA was in your street.

They were in every street, so, the IRA were the people.

O'Rawe, voice-over: You'd be trained on guns, et cetera.

Then you're back in Belfast, you'd be on active service.

[Gunfire] Film narrator: The new IRA leadership was determined to get its hands on the latest and most deadly weapons.

The Provisionals looked across the Atlantic to Irish America, which had traditionally supplied the IRA with money and guns.

Film narrator: $18,000 was used to buy 150 ArmaLite rifles and 10,000 rounds of ammunition.

O'Rawe: I felt 10 foot high.

As far as I was concerned, I was doing the right thing, absolute right thing, the patriotic thing to fight these foreigners who were on Irish soil.

[People screaming] Film narrator: Before internment, the IRA had killed 10 soldiers.

By the end of the year, they had killed 40.

[Helicopter approaching] Man, on radio: Whiskey One, take extreme caution in the area, over.

Wharton, voice-over: My unit in a period of 4 months had 5 killed and over a hundred wounded-- gunshot wounds, bricks, bottles in the face, nail bomb blasts... in a British city.

It got really serious.

I had the conversations with me wife about whether I wanted to stay in or not, and she just said, "It's up to you."

There was always the chance, always the chance that I wouldn't be coming back, and she took it pretty hard when I got blown up.

She really did.

[Whooph] Last thing I remember is a whooph, gone.

That's it--whooph, gone.

[Explosion] Down at the bottom of the brick wall here, they'd taken two bricks out.

Then they put PE behind that and then concrete behind the PE.

Man: What's PE?

Plastic explosive.

Then they had filled the front of that hole full of bolts and nails and everything else they could find and packed it in, so, they just triggered it, and that blew all the nails out into the alleyway.

I had about 140 stitches up my back and me left leg.

I had shrapnel in me right leg.

That was broken where one piece had gone right through, and, as you can see, that hand was absolutely shattered.

Those fingers were-- well, the hand was almost severed.

Apart from that, I was all right.

[Chuckles] It's the old saying, the old adage-- one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist... so, are they freedom fighters or terrorists?

Man: What did you think they were?

Terrorists, nothing more than terrorists.

Children: If you hate the British soldiers Clap your hands, clap your hands If you hate the British soldiers... Hi, Jimmy.

Moore, voice-over: I lived just a few streets down from where the march was starting... you know, the march protesting against internment.

In our house that morning, some of my brothers were getting ready to go because it was a thing to do and was where all their friends were and girls would have met fellas.

Fellas would have met girls at it, you know.

There would have been all of that.

[Crowd cheers] Man: It started on this hill in a Catholic area overlooking Londonderry.

Several thousand people-- men, women, and children-- gathered behind Civil Rights Association banners and marched down the hill toward the British troops in defiance of the ban against demonstrations.

[Helicopter approaching] McVeigh, voice-over: When we arrived at William Street, they were stopping us.

They said it was an illegal march... [People shouting] and us as being the great rioters that we were, we said, "We'll take these guys on today."

[Gunfire] [People shouting] We broke away from the crowd, and we were rioting.

Heavy stuff.

[Slamming] It didn't last that long, you know.

15, 20 minutes.

We retreated back to the Bogside.

[People shouting] Next thing, somebody come round the corner and said, "The paratroopers are coming on up"... Go over there.

Let's go.

and that's when shooting started.

[Children clamoring] [Gunshot] Moore, voice-over: And then we start to hear the stories... about hiding behind a wall, about having to go down the street on their hands and knees... about seeing somebody being shot, about the bullets ricocheting off walls and stuff.

[Distant gunfire] [People shouting] [Gunfire continues] It's fine if you want to go.

Hold it... Oh.

Come on.

[Gunfire continues] Over here.

Get out of the way!

Get away!

McVeigh, voice-over: I seen 3 or 4 dead, like, two right beside me.

Yes.

Medic.

McVeigh, voice-over: You just feel like screaming.

Man: Turn your men back.

If I'm making this sound easy, believe you me, it's not.

Heh.

Man: What do you mean?

Talking like this about this.

You know, if you witness somebody being shot dead right beside you-- not just one, but a few-- that's not an easy thing to just sort of-- you don't go to bed and forget about it, you know?

I mean, I get the same nightmare-- being shot in the back running away, and that's where most people were shot, in the back running away.

Man: Drop the mic out.

Down a bit.

OK. Fine.

Did you see men firing at you?

Yes.

You see, the Catholics say that the British troops, particularly the paratroops, fired indiscriminately into the crowd.

Yeah.

When my platoon fired, they located gunmen or bombers, and they fired at gunners or bombers.

They did not fire indiscriminately into the crowd at any time.

Man: They're on about the Bloody Sunday.

And they're on about our discipline and our unit.

If our unit hadn't been so well-disciplined and so well-trained troops... Man: There'd have been 500 dead.

there would have been a lot more than 13 lying out there in the morgue, an awful lot more, but because they're so bloody professional in this unit, there is only 13, and every one of the 13 was a rebel.

We in the Protestant community swallowed that hook, line, and sinker, and we believed that every one of those people that were shot on Bloody Sunday deserved to be shot.

We used to sing songs, you know-- "We shot one.

We shot two.

We shot 13 more than you"... not nice.

Man: Do you feel guilty for those years?

Of course I do.

Oh, there's part of me inside that feels bad to this day.

Like, how could you not, you looking back and saying, "Oh, Jesus Christ, was I that person?

Was I ever that person?"

Clearly, I once was that person, you know, and to this day, you know-- and you've been in Derry-- in loyalist areas, what do you see flying from lampposts?

Paratroop flags, 2nd Battalion.

I can't get my ****ing head round that, and I grew up a loyalist, and I cannot get my head round that.

Prepare His mighty altar And dance forevermore Oh, saveth, our Lord Jesus We humbly ask, O Lord Moore, voice-over: The thing that stands out in my mind almost most of all was seeing 13 coffins on the altar... and it sort of brought it home, the enormity of what happened that day... and you did sort of think, there's no turning back now.

You're like... "You can't undo this"... um... and when I think of it as young boy, I think that, something changed, as well, because it wasn't funny anymore... or it wasn't exciting anymore... wasn't like a movie anymore.

Life had got very serious.

David Cameron: The conclusions of this report are absolutely clear.

What happened on Bloody Sunday was both unjustified and unjustifiable.

It was wrong.

[Woman crying] Cameron: The first shot was fired by the British army.

Ohh, I miss you, and I love you.

Cameron: There was some firing by Republican paramilitaries, but none of this firing provided any justification for the shooting of civilians.

What's more, some of those killed or injured were clearly fleeing or going to the assistance of others who were dying.

One person was shot while crawling away from the soldiers.

[Woman wailing] Woman, voice-over: Bloody Sunday, I feel, just sealed my brother Jim's fate.

He was so incensed by it, he thought, "Right.

That's it.

I'm signing up."

Man: And when you say signing up-- He signed up to the IRA.

So many people done it, and then you had boys lying about their age just to sign up, and--do you know what?-- that alone was the biggest recruitment drive for the IRA ever.

So, he was 16 years old and he signed up... and, sure, when you're that age, you think you're going to save the world.

4 years later, he was dead... killed by a British soldier.

I've had people actually saying to me, "Well, you deserve what you get."

Sure, we were the thugs, and we were the terrorists.

Well, I think that everybody has their own terrorist, and the British Army are mine.

They always were, and they always will be.

That's just the way I view it.

They-- you know, they inflicted terror on me.

They traumatized me.

So, you know... that's what they are to me.

O'Rawe, voice-over: It was snowing, and there's 4 or 5 of us in the house... and we heard about Bloody Sunday... and we'll leave it at that.

Man: What do you mean?

Why?

Why?

Because just, I don't really want to talk about it.

We were very, very angry that 14 innocent people had been mowed down by the paras... but I've very vivid memories of it.

It wasn't too hard to say to yourself, "You know what?

"I'm ready, boys.

Come on.

Let's have it."

My analogy at the time was that we were like the French Resistance to the Nazis.

[Glass shatters] My name is Ricky O'Rawe.

I was involved in the struggle for Irish freedom.

Far as I was concerned, this is war.

[Gunshot]