teven Prokesch, Special to The New York Times
1 February 1990
The New York Times
LONDON, Jan. 31 --
The British Government said this week that security forces might have engaged in a campaign to discredit the Irish Republican Army in the 1970's. It said it would reopen the case of a former British Army officer who says he was unfairly dismissed for seeking to end his part in the effort.
The British Government said this week that security forces might have engaged in a campaign to discredit the Irish Republican Army in the 1970's. It said it would reopen the case of a former British Army officer who says he was unfairly dismissed for seeking to end his part in the effort.
The Conservative Government said it had found evidence that an operation, code-named Clockwork Orange, had existed in the early and mid-1970's. But it said there was still nothing to prove that the campaign also included smearing Northern Ireland politicians and groups as well as British politicians deemed leaning toward appeasing the I.R.A., as some have charged.
In a written report submitted to Parliament on Tuesday night, Archie Hamilton, Minister of State for the Armed Services, also said there still was no evidence to suggest that the British Security Service had plotted in the 1970's to destabilize the Labor Government led by Harold Wilson.
But in light of the new evidence, Mr. Hamilton said, the Government will reopen the case and conduct a limited investigation into whether the former Army information officer, Colin Wallace, had been unfairly forced to resign.
The limited nature of the planned inquiry did not sit well with members of Parliament from both the opposition Labor Party and Northern Ireland's Protestant parties. They called for a broader investigation.
Merlyn Rees, who was Secretary of State for Northern Ireland in the mid-1970's in a Labor Government, called himself a victim of a dirty-tricks campaign. ''I have a document from America thanking me for donations to the Provisional I.R.A,'' he said in the House of Commons. ''There was a dirty tricks set-up outside what was in'' Mr. Hamilton's report.
Mr. Wallace was an information officer in the British Army in Northern Ireland from 1968 to 1975. He has long maintained that he was put in charge of a propaganda operation that worked closely with the British Secret Service to wage psychological warfare against the I.R.A. by spreading disinformation about the group.
The fullest account of Mr. Wallace's claims appears in ''Who Framed Colin Wallace?'' a book published last year that was written by Paul Foot, a British journalist. In the book, Mr. Foot wrote that major aims of the effort were to confuse or disorient the I.R.A. and to reduce its support in the United States and other countries.
But he then says the operation was extended to smear politicians by circulating gossip about their supposed financial dealings and sexual behavior or insinuating that they had Communist ties. They supposedly included not just Labor members but also the Rev. Ian Paisley, leader of one of Northern Ireland's Protestant parties, and Edward Heath, the Conservative leader.
The book says Mr. Wallace became disenchanted by the rising violence in Northern Ireland and decided that he wanted out of the operation. The book says his downfall was secured by that wish and by his effort to prevent the sexual abuse of boys at the Kincora Boys' Home in Belfast.
Mr. Wallace concluded that the police and army did not want to do anything about the boys' home because it was run by a Protestant extremist who headed a paramilitary group, TARA.
Mr. Wallace was forced to resign for disclosing a classified document to a journalist. He says he was later framed for the killing of a friend: he was convicted of manslaughter, went to jail and was released in late 1986.
In his report to Parliament, Mr. Hamilton said that ''the papers which now have come to light'' indicated that Mr. Wallace's job responsibilities had included ''providing unattributable covert briefings to the press'' and making ''on-the-spot decisions on matters of national security during such interviews.''
David Waddington, the Home Secretary, said after examining the arguments in Mr. Foot's book, that he was satisfied there was nothing that raised doubts about Mr. Wallace's manslaughter conviction.
Mr. Wallace said in an interview on BBC Television tonight that what had happened to him was ''disgraceful.''
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