Hero, Villain Or Fool?

"Captain Nairac was a spy / Where is Captain Nairac now?" So ran a gleeful republican rhyme in the six counties in the late '70s. The subject, Captain Robert Nairac, was a member of the Grenadier Guards who worked undercover, liaising with the SAS in South Armagh.

Over a lengthy period of time, he had tried to blend into the local community, using the cover story that he was Danny McAlevey, a member of the Official IRA from Ardoyne. His confidence that he would not be found out was misplaced. On 14th May 1977 he went to the Three Steps Inn in a small village, Drumintee, not far from Crossmaglen. Nairac was abducted, beaten viciously, taken across the border and shot dead. His body has never been found.

Nairac's story is back in the public eye once again due to the recent publication of Death Of A Hero by British journalist John Parker.

Despite the title, the book does not shirk from drawing attention to Nairac's less heroic aspects (revealingly, Parker had intended the title to end with a question mark). The soldier comes across as possessing a strange mixture of bravado and naivety. For example, he was convinced that his mimicry of the Belfast accent and his repertoire of republican ballads would ensure that his true identity would be effectively concealed. Unbelievably, he regularly patrolled in uniform in Crossmaglen, about eight miles from where he worked undercover.

Nairac's passion for Ireland began in childhood. He travelled to Ireland often, staying with the family of Lord Michael Killanin in Dublin and, more often, in Spiddal. His friend, Martin Squires, recalls that "the place was clearly instilled in his psyche somehow. He developed a great knowledge of Ireland generally. He talked about it often with the kind of romantic intensity that went far deeper than the love of a country or town you might have visited and remembered from your schooldays or holidays."

Added to this was a solitary personality and an element of insecurity which manifested itself in a need to constantly prove himself. During a break from his army duties, he would brag to an English friend that he had infiltrated the IRA, a boast which was not remotely close to coming true. Many of the sources for Parker's book offer a similar view to that of Major Clive Fairweather: "In addition to having a slightly romantic view, he had a slightly morbid view of things as well . . . On the one hand he was quite an experienced officer, but there was a side to his nature which I could never put a finger on, that he was a law unto himself. That left me uneasy about him."

Nairac's first military involvement with the North came in early 1973 when he began his first tour of duty there. The period was unremarkable for the time, save for the fact that Nairac got heavily involved in the community relations or "hearts and minds" project initiated by his regiment. The chances of success for this can be judged by the admiring comments on Nairac's work made by Lieutenant Bob Woodfield, who, like many of Parker's sources, fails to display any understanding of the political motivations for the conflict:

"Robert was fantastic with Irish youth. He knew most of the 14 and 15 year-olds in our area, and how crime was in their blood. He used to give talks to their mums and dads on where their children were going wrong." Woodfield neglects to state how a British soldier lecturing parents in Ardoyne about the misdemeanours of their children was received . . .

It was only when Nairac returned to Northern Ireland the following year that he really became involved in the "dirty war". He was attached to what subsequently became known as 14th Intelligence and Security Company, or 14 Int for short. This group was and remains shrouded in secrecy. As John Parker points out, "They are buried in the deepest chasms of the Official Secrets Act. There are no documents, no formal regimental records and no governmental statistics in the public domain that relate to them."

Robert Nairac was not a fully-fledged member of the company, nor, as has often been claimed, was he a member of the SAS. In fact, his role was as a liaison officer—his local knowledge was often called upon by operatives new to the area.

14 Int was to some degree a product of the fierce rivalry that existed between the various branches of the security services. One of the reasons it was set up was that the British Army wanted to garner its own information about the IRA in order to reduce its dependency on RUC Special Branch. These internecine rivalries continued, however, throughout the period in which Nairac served in Northern Ireland and jeopardised the lives of many people engaged in similar work. For Nairac, though, the sense of danger and adventure held an attraction. Martin Squires believed that his plan of infiltrating the IRA "would have been a marvellous coup, but bloody suicidal, and I told him as much." Nairac, though, neglected to pay heed to such wise counsel. Back in Ireland, he disguised himself and began visiting the pubs of South Armagh "in character," where his spying on the local community apparently met with considerable, though low-level, success.

This seemed only to confirm Nairac's sense of his invincibility, which was coupled with an underestimation of the IRA's own intelligence capabilities. Major Clive Fairweather recalls receiving reports from the area that "the Cullyhanna IRA unit was going to get the curly-headed little SAS man called Danny [Nairac]." "I remember showing him the report and saying, 'Robert, there it is . . . that is the clearest warning. You want to be damned careful about what you are doing.' He just laughed."

On the night of his disappearance Nairac went alone and without backup to the Three Steps Inn. On arriving at the pub, he left the pistol which he normally carried in a holster, in his car. He apparently spent the evening drinking, chatting with locals, and singing rebel songs with the bar band. What happened at the end of the night is not entirely clear, but it seems that Nairac was challenged by a group of men who were dubious about his cover story. A fight in the car park of the Three Steps ensued, during which Nairac tried unsuccessfully to retrieve his weapon. He was then knocked out, bundled into a car, and driven into the Republic. There, he was beaten even more severely, but it is thought that the IRA unit who had abducted him did not succeed in getting him to admit that he was a British soldier. Furthermore, the unit, some of whom were drunk, failed to realise the importance of their captive. As a result, Liam Townson, a 24-year-old IRA man from Newry, shot Nairac in the head before there had been any prolonged attempt to interrogate him. In his first statement to detectives after his arrest Townson said, "I shot the British captain. He never told us anything. He was a great soldier." In 1978 Townson was sentenced to life by the Special Criminal Court in Dublin. Five others were also convicted for related offences. All of them have now been released, Townson being the last to walk free in 1990. Unsurprisingly, none have spoken of the events surrounding Nairac's death.

While Parker's book provides an excellent insight into the life and death of Robert Nairac, the nature of his work makes it highly unlikely that anyone will ever know the full story. There have long been rumours that Nairac was serving a higher power, such as MI5, that he was involved in the murder of local IRA commander John Francis Green, and even that he was present when the Miami Showband were massacred. The information currently available does not provide compelling evidence for any of these claims, and the truth is only known to the protagonists. John Parker does not even believe that Nairac's body will ever be discovered: "I don't think we shall see or hear any trace of him ever again. The SAS had a theory that he was buried somewhere near Belfast. No-one knows. Only the IRA can answer that question."

Nairac's story is ultimately a sad rather than heroic one—that of a brave but foolish man, whose admirable qualities were also responsible for his downfall. As Robert Nairac fatally discovered, the northern conflict extracts a high price for naivety.

Death of A Hero - Captain Robert Nairac, GC, and the Undercover War in Northern Ireland by John Parker is out now, published by Metro, stg£17.99