Ira May Have Planned Army Bombings For Months

The Irish Republican Army may have planned an attack on the British army’s headquarters here four months ago - before the latest negotiations on Northern Ireland’s future, police said Wednesday.

The IRA bought one of the cars used in the attack on June 4, said Detective Chief Superintendent Derek Martindale, who is leading a team of 40 detectives in investigating Monday’s car bombings inside Thiepval Barracks.

Six days after the IRA bought the car, negotiations among nine parties and the British and Irish governments began in east Belfast.

The IRA-allied Sinn Fein party had demanded entry to the talks, but was barred because the IRA resumed its campaign of violence against British rule in February with a London truck bomb.

Wednesday’s disclosure provides another indication that the IRA had no intention of resuming its truce as the British, Irish and U.S. governments expected.

In Dublin, Irish Prime Minister John Bruton condemned the IRA and Sinn Fein as fascists who would stop their violence only if they got what they wanted. He accused them of “a cynical betrayal” of peacemaking efforts.

“This betrayal came from an organization that told democratic politicians that their original cease-fire would hold ‘in all circumstances,”’ he said.

Police investigating hours of surveillance videotapes from Thiepval Barracks, southwest of Belfast in Lisburn, identified all three cars used by the IRA in the bombing.

But they said it remained a mystery how the bombers acquired the army identity passes that allowed them to drive through the single, heavily guarded gate of the province’s most important military installation without arousing suspicion.

“Of course it’s alarming that two bombs got into a military establishment like that,” Martindale said. “The time it took to plan this mission, the amount of money spent, all indicate these were dedicated terrorists.”

Eight of the 31 people injured remained hospitalized Wednesday. Two victims in west Belfast’s Royal Victoria Hospital were listed in critical condition, including a soldier with a fractured skull and burns over more than half of his body. No one was killed in the bombings.

Martindale said two Volvo sedans - the first purchased in Lisburn on June 4, the other bought in east Belfast in July - each were used to carry more than 600 pounds of homemade explosives.

The getaway vehicle, a Volkswagen Passat purchased two weeks ago at an auction south of Belfast, passed out of the Thiepval Barracks gates as the first car bomb exploded, Martindale said.

Police released a composite of the Volkswagen buyer that portrayed him as a bearded man wearing thick glasses and a hooded jacket.

In claiming responsibility Tuesday for the attack, the IRA said it intended to deal a blow to “the headquarters of the British occupying forces in Ireland.”

The outlawed group said it didn’t want to provoke the province’s two main pro-British paramilitary groups, which have held to their own two-year cease-fire.