organizations should come from honest, God-fearing, intensely religious
Catholics who are duped into thinking they are contributing to a worthy
cause instead of some tialmnable crew-who make Murder Incorporated look
like innocent children playing in a kindergarden. The money goes directly
to dedicated IRA operatives. Some of it is used to buy guns at
black-market sales in New York itself, auctions usually held in razed
areas or empty car parks, always by night, nearly always in the Bronx,
Queens or Brooklyn. Guns, gentlemen, are rather easily come by in the
fair city of New York.’In the depth of his bitterness, Riordan almost
spat the words out. ‘The rest of the money is used by other operatives
who openly travel to the southem and mid-western states where gun permits
do not exist. Wherever the guns come from, they all end up in the New
York area from where they are shipped out, almost always from New Jersey
or Brooklyn, with the warm encouragement and complicity of the stevedore
unions and the upright US customs,
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many of whom are first or second generation Irish and feel blood-brothers
to the murderous IRA. As the Customs Service is controlled by the US
Treasury Department, it is logical to suppose that those dealers in death
operate with the cognisance if not the connivance of the US Government.
The Irish influence in Congress is as well known as it is remarkably
powerful.’
‘A moment, Mr Riordan, if you would.’ The interruption came from Aaron
Wieringa, the Minister of Defence, a big, florid, blue-eyed and very calm
man, a man immensely respected throughout the country and one who would
very likely have become premier quite some years ago if he had not been
cursed with the unfortunate and crippling handicap, for a politician, of
total incorruptibility. ‘One appreciates – one can hardly fail to
appreciate – that you are a very angry man. We are not, I assure you,
nineteenth-century ostriches and I think it would be true to say that
there is not a man in this room who does not understand that your fury
is totally justifiable. I would not go so far as to concur in your
condemnation of Washington and Congress, but that, in the current and
particular circumstances, is by the by. Your opinion, as distinct from
your recital of verifiable facts, is not of immediate concern.
‘What is of immediate concern is why your wrath has seen fit to focus
itself on our unfortunate country in general and the city of Amsterdam
in particular. I cannot, at the moment, even begin to fathom the reason
for it, although I am certain we will not be left in ignorance for long.
But nothing you have said so far begins to justify your attempt to
blackmail us into acting as intermediary between you and the British
Government. I appreciate that you may have, and very probably do have,
very powerful reasons for wanting all British troops to withdraw from
Northern Ireland, but how you can possibly imagine that we have the
ability to persuade Britain to accede to your preposterous demands quite
passes my understanding. No conceivable reason exists why they should so
accede.’
‘A totally conceivable reason exists. Human tskrian motives. tarian motives
on your part and on theirs.’
~Our respective governments would be reluctant to see the
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Netherlands flooded and countless thousands – maybe hundreds of thousands
– drowned in those floods? Before even considering such matters, an answer
to my question, please. Why us? Is it that, because of our particular
geographical situation, we are peculiarly susceptible to threats of
genocide?’
‘You have been chosen because Amsterdam is the linchpin in the whole
lethal gun-running operation. It is the gun-running centre of Northern
Europe and has been for years, just as it has been the heroin centre of
Northern Europe. This knowledge is in the public domain, and the
continued existence of those two evil practices can only bespeak a deep
level of corruption in both government and law-enforcement levels.’ An
indignantlooking Mr Wieringa made to interrupt but Riordan imperiously
gestured him to silence. ‘There are, it is true, other towns engaged in
gun-running, notably Antwerp, but, compared to Amsterdam, Antwerp
operates in a minor league.’
This time Mr Wieringa, speaking in almost a shout which was unknown for
him, would not be gainsaid. ‘You mean you would find it impossible to
flood Belgium.’
Riordan carried on as if he had heard nothing. ‘Not all the guns passing
through Amsterdam go to Eire, of course. Some go to the RAF. Others go
to -‘
‘The RAFV It was, almost inevitably, Bernhard Dessens, the Jusice
Minister, who rarely if ever contributed anything of significance to any
discussion. ‘You suggest that the British Air Force is supplied -‘
‘Be quiet, you idiot.’ Riordan, it seemed, could descend below the
rhetorical level he usually set for himself. ‘I refer to the Red Army
Faction, the inheritors of the bloody mantle of the Baader-Meinhof
gangsters of the early seventies. Some go to the Sicilian-controlled
Mafia-type criminal organizations that are springing up all over Western
Germany. But the bulk goes to Eire.
‘Do you know what it’s like in Northern Ireland, Mr Minister?’ Nobody
bothered to follow his line of vision to know that he was addressing the
Minister of Defence and not the Minister of Justice. ‘Can you imagine the
hellish conditions that exist there, the hideous tortures practised by
both the IRA and UVF,
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the homicidal insanity that has ruled there for fourteen years? A country
ruled by fear that is tearing it to pieces. Northern Ireland will never
be governed by representatives of the.two communities, Protestant and
Catholic working together, because they are far too bitterly divided by
religion and, to a lesser extent, race. There are one and a half million
people living together in a small area, but in spite of their divisions
ninetynine point nine per cent on either side have never harmed anyone or
ever wished to. That ninety-nine point nine per cent on either side are
united in only one thing – in abhorring terrorism and in their desire to
live only in peace. It is a desire that, as matters stand, can never be
realized. Conventional politicians, with all the faults and frailties of
their kind, are still those who observe the conventions. In Ulster,
conventional politicians are an extinct breed. Moderation has ceased to
exist. Demagogues and gunmen rule. The country is ruled by a handful of
crazed murderers.’
Riordan paused for the first time, probably as much for breath as
anything else, but no one seemed inclined to take advantage of the
hiatus.
‘But murderers, even crazed murderers, must have their murder weapons,
must they not?’ Riordan said. ‘And so the murder weapons are shipped from
Amsterdam, usually, but not always, inside furniture. The weapons are
sealed in containers, of course, and if the Amsterdam customs are unaware
of this they must be the worst, the blindest, or the most corrupt and
avaricious in Europe. Nine times out of ten, the ships unload in Dublin.
How they – the containers, I mean – get past the Dublin customs I don’t
profess to know but I don’t think there’s any question of collusion – if
there were the customs wouldn’t have turned up a million dollars’ worth
of illegally imported arms destined for the IRA four years ago. But most
of the guns do get through. From Dublin the arms containers variously
labelled, but popularly as household goods, are trucked to a warehouse
in County Monaghan and from there to a horticultural nursery in County
Louth. Don’t ask me how I know but it would be rather difficult not to
know: the people thereabouts know but don’t talk. From there the weapons
are
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taken to Northern Ireland, not smuggled over the border in the middle of
the night by daredevil IRA members, but brought in during daylight hours
in cars driven by women, mostly young, surrounded by laughing kids. All
very innocuous.
‘It’s a long, long way from where a machine-pistol is purchased in a
mid-Western state until it’s in the hands of some maniacal killer
crouched in the shadows of some back street in Belfast or Londonderry.
A long way. But in a.11 that iong way the vital stage, the focal point,
the nodal point, the venturi in the funnel, is Amsterdam. And so we have
come to Amsterdam.’ Riordan sat down.
The breaking of the ensuing silence was far from immediate. There were,
altogether, eight men in Dessen’s luxurious lounae. Three men had
accompanied Riordan to the Minister of justice’s house – Samuelson, whom
de Graaf had described to van Effen, O’Brien, who had come to the
Trianon, and Agnelli, the man who George had forecast would be there.
Samuelson and O’Brien probably thought there was nothing they could
profitably add to what Riordan had said and Agnelli had probably yet to
recover his full powers of speech. When he had entered the room and seen