On January 18th, 1970, the backbench unionist MP, Norman Laird, fired off one of a series of angry personal letters to his Prime Minister, Maj James Chichester-Clark. After observing of Brian Faulkner, the Minister of Development, that he was guilty "of self deception of such a colossal degree as to raise grave doubts that he has the judgment necessary for the position he occupies", he continued: "If there is one thing obvious to all at the present time . . . it is the degree of alarm and doubt throughout the party at present government policy.
"The vast bulk of the loyalist people increasingly feel that present policy can only have one result, the destruction of Ulster. "Any person who refuses to recognise that if Ulster is in danger, this must inevitably lead to civil war, is living with his head in the clouds." The beleaguered Chichester-Clark was under steady pressure from London to expedite the reforms agreed in Downing Street after the troops had been sent in the previous August.
At the same time a growing number in his own party wanted tougher army action and loathed the disarming of the police, the dismantling of special powers, the disbandment of the B Specials and sweeping local government changes to be implemented under Faulkner's direction.
After four months deliberation the Attorney General, Basil Kelly, recommended that special powers legislation be scrapped almost entirely. Robert Porter, the Home Affairs minister, incorporated the recommendations in his Police Bill which after exhausting and bitter all-night debates became law on January 23rd.
Following some undignified attempts to get them to toe the line, five unionist MPs - including Laird - were expelled from the party on March 18th after they had failed to support a vote of confidence in the government. Next day the cabinet agreed that "ministers should not participate in political meetings attended by any of the five dissidents, except where . . . the presence of ministers was necessary to put the government point of view".
The cabinet was not prepared to do all that Harold Wilson's government asked. When on March 19th Robert Simpson, the Community Relations Minister, reminded his colleagues that nothing had been done about his draft Prevention of Incitement to Religious Hatred Bill - agreed at Downing Street - he got no support. "The government did not consider they were under any commitment to introduce legislation" even though Home Secretary Jim Callaghan had urged that the legislation be pursued despite the difficulties. Ministers' objections included fears that "the publicity likely to be afforded to a prosecution under such an Act might well have a bad effect on community relations by giving significance to utterances best ignored" and "the possibility of inadvertently extending the law to harmless evangelists".
The Ulster Defence Regiment became operational on April 1st and the B Specials were finally disbanded later in the month. The immediate problem was the disposal of surplus police and Special Constabulary arms listed for the cabinet as: "More than 15,000 rifles; 15,000 revolvers, pistols and shotguns; nearly 3,000 automatic weapons; and 117 mortars.
"Ammunition nearly 8 million rounds and 27,000 illuminating cartridges; 970 mortar bombs; 3,000 miscellaneous primers, detonators, flares etc, and 120 tear or gas grenades, 41 armoured vehicles."
"This vast armoury," the cabinet concluded, "is now a considerable security risk and its protection is absorbing manpower which could be better employed elsewhere".
That the five dissident MPs represented a deep unease within the Protestant community was dramatically revealed on April 16th. Unionist candidates were decisively beaten by the Protestant unionists, Ian Paisley and William Beattie, in the Bannside and South Antrim Stormont by-elections. It was more than an irritating reverse for Chichester-Clark - it was a seismic blow to the Ulster Unionist Party from which it could be said it never recovered.
The Westminster general election brought further humiliation: only eight unionists were returned. Also elected was Bernadette Devlin, returned for Mid-Ulster. That did not prevent her losing her appeal against a six-month prison sentence for riotous behaviour and incitement to riot during the Battle of the Bogside in August, 1969.
Letters and petitions poured in to ministerial offices including: a demand for an "immediate reprieve" from Watford Trades Council; a protest from Kinsale Urban District Council "as we believe that this action has resulted in the deaths of many people"; and a letter from Mrs A Redmond of Clontarf, "It's heart-breaking to think of a young girl at her age being confined like this. Plenty free that did more than she did."
"There is absolutely no merit" in these appeals for clemency, a civil servant pencilled on this correspondence.
So confident had the Labour government been that the problems would be resolved by the reform programme that three army units had been withdrawn from Northern Ireland in February. Now the new Conservative administration under Edward Heath had to face an alarming escalation of violence in the region. Previously the army had clashed most frequently with loyalists, notably in the Shankill in January. Catholics, however, increasingly regarded British troops as agents of a discredited Stormont regime and in April the first major confrontation erupted between Catholics and soldiers when Protestants were being driven out of the New Barnsley estate in northwest Belfast.
Finding that they were being accepted more and more as defenders of Catholic enclaves, the Provisional IRA were encouraged to engage the British army in sustained gun battles in east and north Belfast towards the end of June. Four Protestants and one volunteer were killed. Reginald Maudling was appalled by the deteriorating security situation on his first visit as Home Secretary on July. During his return flight he was heard to remark: "Bring me a large Scotch. What a bloody awful country." Responding to the unionist government's appeals for tougher action against the IRA, the army imposed a 35hour curfew - lifted for two hours for shopping - on some fifty streets in the Lower Falls in Belfast between July 3rd to 5th. Floorboards were ripped up and doors kicked in as around 5,000 homes were searched for arms, and five civilians were killed. There is no indication in the cabinet records that the Chichester-Clark government thought this was a heavy-handed operation.
At a cabinet meeting on 7 July 7th, the Minister of Home Affairs reported with satisfaction that "in addition to the very substantial haul of arms and ammunition, information had been discovered which would be of great value to Special Branch". Aware of widespread condemnation in the media, "ministers regretted the tendency of certain important sections of the press to play up the alleged depredations of the troops and to ignore the main issue of a very substantial arms cache which was desperately defended by the residents".
In fact, for such a major operation, the arms haul had been small and many of the weapons were antiquated, as was admitted later on in the meeting: "The age and variety of weapons captured suggested to the Minister of Education [Long] that there had been no recent organised supply of weapons to the Lower Falls area at least."
Ministers even regarded the Lower Falls curfew as a propaganda coup and "the Minister of Commerce [Roy Bradford] regretted that over the events of last weekend, which had clearly demonstrated that there was a continuing and serious threat to the state, had failed to alter the tone of much of the comment". He called for a publicity campaign in the US and finally it "was agreed that ministers should take advantage of recent events to emphasise in their speeches where the real danger lay".
Maudling caused the unionist government some embarrassment by asking the Orange Order to call off the Twelfth parades. The cabinet "discussed at some length" how they should respond. Chichester-Clark "stated that apart from the possibility of walking a token distance with his private lodge at the beginning of the day he would either be at Stormont or army headquarters".
Bradford felt that "ministers should not embarrass the Westminster government by taking part" but his colleagues did not agree. They concluded "that deliberate mass abstention from the celebrations at this time would only serve to weaken further the government's standing in the country and that it would be preferable for ministers to honour their normal commitments by walking with their Lodges".
The Minister of Community Relations, so often slapped down by his colleagues, got no support when he suggested a ban on bonfires on the Eleventh Night. "It was generally agreed that as most of the material had been collected prohibition would be unenforceable. Removal of the material by the army or its premature burning by the authorities would only serve to exacerbate feelings."
The parades passed off peacefully enough and, once they were safely over, a six-month ban on marches was imposed on July 21st. This provoked charges of partisan treatment, especially as Apprentice Boys were allowed a "celebration" in August provided they agreed to checks and were "identifiable by their collarettes".
Meanwhile, the Provisionals' bombing campaign was escalating and two constables were murdered by a booby-trap bomb in Crossmaglen on August 12th.
Increased violence inevitably led the cabinet to consider the adoption of more draconian measures. Chichester-Clark in London suggested that it "might be necessary to consider in certain cases trial by High Court judges". This alternative to jury trial - eventually recommended in the 1972 Diplock Report - did not appeal to Maudling who said "his first reaction was that this would represent a very extreme course". When the possibility of internment was raised on July 20th Porter took the view "that the adverse repercussions would outweigh any likely benefit". Other ministers were attracted to this option but refrained from calling for a cabinet vote.
The burden was becoming too much for Porter who resigned on August 26th. John Taylor had been appointed Minister of State and was the obvious replacement as Minister of Home Affairs.
Chichester-Clark shrank from appointing a man too clearly identified with the right wing of the party and took over the portfolio himself - clearly a bad decision as he was soon overburdened with work. As his critics gathered strength he fell ill. When the journalist T.E. Utley sent the Prime Minister a note of sympathy, Chichester-Clark replied on October 20th that "it seems unfortunate that the only way one can get out of the office now is to be ill".
Sir Patrick Macrory had delivered his report on local government on May 31st. His sweeping proposals recommended stripping powers from local authorities and handing them to largely appointed area boards and the creation of twenty-six district councils, elected by PR, with much-reduced functions. Control of housing had already been taken away from local government and much of the government's time was taken up with determining the composition of the Housing Executive.
Moderates from both sides of the sectarian divide had formed the Alliance Party on April 21st and constitutional nationalists had coalesced to create the Social Democratic and Labour party on August 21st.
Dr Jonathan Bardon is the author of A History of Ulster published by Blackstaff Press.