Perhaps it is this endless rioting that made some members of the army based in Northern Ireland fired up and ready to kill, also the sheer number of Nationalist protestors could have been intimidating enough to evoke a reaction from some of the younger, less experienced soldiers. When the opportunity came for them to release some of their pent up aggravations they were only too willing to. The Bloody Sunday documentary film portrayed the army as being aggravated, one soldier admitted to firing 22 rounds but he remained resolute that the marchers had fired on them first, and that nail and acid bombs had been thrown in their direction. Source A, an extract from the Daily mail features one soldier who says, “If we were firing indiscriminately why were there no women and children killed?” This shows how they believed that the shots they fired were justified, that those shot at had been seen with firearms.
The Widgery inquiry backed up the paratroopers’ interpretation of events, ruling that, “they had been shot at before responding.” The inquiry also ruled that, “Mr Wray had been handling guns or explosives.” However, although the Widgery report backed up the British armies view on the event, it also acknowledged that “Some soldiers showed a high degree or responsibility; at the other end of the scale, firing bordered on recklessness.” In spite of this no soldiers were charged or disciplined. It is this side that the Catholic nationalists saw, the Londonderry coroner for the case, Major Hubert O’Neill said, ”the army ran amok “ and the event was “sheer unadulterated murder.” His views would have been similar to those of the Catholics, because he was from Derry.
When the Widgery inquiry had stated its findings, it sparked off a number of following events. There was increased funding from the USA for the IRA as the outside world condemned the British Armies actions, also the number of new recruits increased greatly. 20,000 protesters burnt down the British Embassy; also Bernadette Devlin slapped a British MP, Reginald Maudling, and called him a “murdering hypocrite.” These subsequent events meant that “Bloody Sunday” stayed at the forefront of the news, and kept the British government in the “bad books” of the rest of the world, increasing the IRA propaganda. Although events such as these died down, recently “Bloody Sunday” came to the front of the news once more as a new inquiry into the events of “Bloody Sunday” began, the Saville inquiry was the new inquiry the families of the victims had waited 27 years for, and what the paras had hoped would never happen.
The families of the dead welcomed the new inquiry as it brought to light new evidence, such as new forensics that Dick Shepherd and Kevin O’Callaghan had found, saying that McGuigan had been shot in the back of the head with a ‘dum-dum’ bullet. Not only is it impossible for him to have been firing at the troops then because he can’t have been facing them, but the Geneva Convention deems ‘dum-dum’ bullets illegal. New testing also allowed the original Northern Irish forensics scientist, Dr Martin to retract his initial findings stating that there was a “Strong suspicion” that some of the victims had handled weapons, what he then thought could have been explosives could now be put down to emissions from car exhausts.
These new findings enraged many of the paratroopers involved in the “Bloody Sunday” and even drove some to change their opinions to say that they Catholics were fired on first. One ex-Para, known only as soldier 027 told the daily telegraph that, “there was no justification for any of the shots he saw fired”, also he said that some soldiers were “firing without pause or hesitation” if this statement is true, it means that those soldiers could not have had time to find a target with firearms and shoot at them.
Despite all this new evidence in the Saville inquiry, no one can make a judgement as to who is to blame for the events on “Bloody Sunday” as different newspapers depict the events in different lights. Source A, from The Daily Mail mainly reports from a paratroopers view. Whereas, Source B from, the Guardian, reports on a predominantly republican interpretation. However, Some facts are the same in both sources, such as the fact that Dr. Martin changed his opinion. Perhaps there are so many different interpretations on “Bloody Sunday” because of the way that the media portrays each side and their views.
