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The fighting covered a wider section of Belfast than ever before. But still, much of Ulster's middle class remained physically untouched by the turmoil. Odd patches of tranquillity survived in the very midst of danger. As he dodged stones and petrol bombs, Correspondent Shaw looked inside a window to see three middle-aged women placidly watching a television documentary about East Africa.
In Londonderry, as Protestants were hanging out their anniversary Union Jacks and repainting their murals of "King Billy" (William of Orange), 400 Catholic women and girls marched up from the raw new apartments of the Bogside to the ancient city walls. They chanted, "Oh we hate the British soldiers, yes we do, yes we do," lifting the hats of British sentries as they marched past. The demonstration was organized by Bernadette Devlin, who as a representative from Mid-Ulster is the youngest Member of Parliament at Westminster. Bernadette, 23, was too pregnant (by a man she has refused to name) to march, so she rode in a loudspeaker car. Her political stock has clearly been lifted by the crisis and by her return to the barricades. As one priest joked, "If she were the hoor of Babylon, we'd elect her now."
Tantamount to Heresy. By the time a chill rain ended the fighting on the fourth day, I.R.A. leaders were claiming that their cause had been strengthened. Their strategy is to force Faulkner into a spiral of violence leading to suspension of the Ulster government and a return to direct rule by London for the first time in 50 years; finally, they hope, it would lead to a political settlement between London and Dublin.
In Dublin, the Irish Republic's Prime Minister John Lynch condemned the Ulster government for resorting to internment, even though he had threatened to invoke it himself last year against Eire's own I.R.A. activists. He also sent his External Affairs Minister, Dr. Patrick Hillery, to London to seek joint talks with London and Ulster over the crisis. Ulster's Protestant politicians angrily shouted "interference!" To them the idea of a discussion with Dublin is tantamount to heresy.
Even so, many politicians in London were beginning to face the fact that a new solution must be found for Northern Ireland. British Labor Party leaders are leaning toward some sort of Ulster-Eire relationship, perhaps an all-Ireland Council as proposed by former Home
Minister James Callaghan. Labor's former Foreign Secretary Michael Stewart went so far as to say that "there can be no solution of this problem except in the context of a united Ireland." The Conservative government, however, is in no mood to tinker with the existing setup. Ulster's Unionists, after all, have provided the Tories with at least nine or ten seats in the British Parliament (out of twelve for Northern Ireland) ever since 1921, and the Tories do not want to antagonize them.
Shaky Survival. For the time being, Ulster's crisis has passed. As Correspondent Prendergast notes: "In Ulster crises come like spasms, and they always subside. Newly burned-out cars rust away beside the hulks of old ones; in a few weeks it is hard to tell whether a particular building was wrecked in this year's troubles or last year's. Shoppers hardly glance at the signs, BOMB DAMAGE SALE— BIG REDUCTIONS."