East German intelligence and Ireland, 1949–90

Espionage, terrorism and diplomacy

Jerome de Wiel, Jérôme aan de Wiel

• Publisher: Manchester University Press
• Year: 2015
• Print ISBN:
  9781526107411
  9780719090738
• eBook ISBN:
  9781847799708
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Intelligence & Espionage
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book is an in-depth examination of the relations between Ireland and the former East Germany between the end of the Second World War and the fall of the Berlin Wall. It explores political, diplomatic, economic, media and cultural issues. The long and tortuous process of establishing diplomatic relations is unique in the annals of diplomatic history.

Central in this study are the activities of the Stasi. They show how and where East German intelligence obtained information on Ireland and Northern Ireland and also what kind of information was gathered. A particularly interesting aspect of the book is the monitoring of the activities of the Irish Republican Army and the Irish National Liberation Army and their campaigns against the British army in West Germany. The Stasi had infiltrated West German security services and knew about Irish suspects and their contacts with West German terrorist groups.

East German Intelligence and Ireland, 1949–90 makes an original contribution to diplomatic, intelligence, terrorist and Cold War studies.

Part I

Relations between Ireland and East Germany

1

History of the relations between Ireland/Northern Ireland and the GDR

Ireland adopts the Hallstein doctrine

Before embarking upon this journey in the archives of the Stasi, it is necessary to give a picture on the relations between Ireland and the former German Democratic Republic (GDR, or East Germany) to set the scene. After the defeat of Nazi Germany in May 1945, the Soviet Union occupied the eastern area of the country. Serious disagreements between the Western Allies and the Soviets led to the division of Germany which would last until 1990: in May 1949, the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG, or West Germany) saw the light, followed in October by the GDR. The FRG became part of NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) in May 1955. A few days later, the GDR was among the founding member states of the opposing military alliance, the Warsaw Pact although the country still had to establish a formal army. That was done the following year in 1956 when the Nationale Volksarmee (NVA, national people’s army) saw the light and after Moscow denounced ‘the remilitarisation of the Federal Republic’.¹

Ireland had remained neutral during the Second World War although the large extent of its secret cooperation with the Western Allies led some to question if the country could really be described as having been neutral and redefined its wartime attitude as rather having been non-belligerent.² In the immediate post-war years, Ireland became officially a republic in 1949 and left the British Commonwealth. It also refused to join NATO as the then government deemed that joining the Atlantic Alliance would imply the recognition of Northern Ireland and the acceptance of partition.³ However, despite Ireland remaining officially neutral during the emerging Cold War, it was firmly anchored in the West. It did not take long for the Irish to cross swords with the Soviets as Moscow refused Irish membership of the United Nations (UN) in 1946. Andrei Gromyko, the Soviet Permanent Representative to the United Nations, was not impressed by the war record of certain countries against Nazi Germany, Ireland among them.⁴ He was clearly not aware of Ireland’s secret cooperation but in fairness to him he could not have known. It would appear that in fact the Soviets were thinking of the balance of power in the United Nations and therefore blocked the admission of certain countries. Ireland eventually joined in 1955.⁵

Once Ireland was in the United Nations, the attitude of the Irish delegation varied according to who was in power in Dublin although the country did not waver in its support for the West. When John A. Costello was Taoiseach (Prime Minister) between 1954 and 1957, the objective was to help the West to win the Cold War. Ireland was staunchly behind the United States. When Éamon de Valera took over from 1957 until 1959, the Irish delegation in the United Nations sought to lessen East–West tensions, adopted an independent role and supported African and Asian countries that struggled for independence. Yet, it was never neutralist. During the area of Seán Lemass, the Irish delegation tried to promote a stable international situation that would be in the country’s economic interests. Lemass himself was an Atlanticist who stood squarely behind President John F. Kennedy during the Cuban missile crisis in 1962. During an official visit to Bonn, he explained that although Ireland was not a member of NATO, it was firmly on the West’s side. During de Valera and Lemass’s terms in office, Frank Aiken was Minister for External Affairs. Aiken’s main aim was the reduction of tensions between the superpowers in which the United Nations should play a key role. He advocated a troop withdrawal scheme from Central Europe which was unsuccessful. Yet he was successful in his initiatives in nuclear non-proliferation. The Non-Proliferation Treaty was eventually signed in Moscow in 1968 and was his finest hour.⁶

Besides the mainstream politicians, the Catholic Church was the spearhead of the anti-Communist struggle in the country and Irish Communists were kept under surveillance. John Charles McQuaid, the Archbishop of Dublin, was pro-NATO and was kept regularly informed about Communist activities within his archdiocese while the Catholic Information Bureau, headed by two bishops, kept and upgraded lists of known Communists.⁷ The West German embassy in Dublin had noticed McQuaid’s very strong denunciations of ‘Godless Communism’ and his threats of excommunication against those Catholics who joined Communist organisations or who published and distributed Communist books, newspapers and pamphlets.⁸ On occasion, the police cooperated with the church. On 14 November 1967, the Special Detective Unit of the Garda Siochána (Irish police) wrote a report on Michael O’Riordan, the Irish Communist leader, who had participated in the 50th anniversary of the October Revolution of 1917 in Moscow. The detectives managed to get a copy of O’Riordan’s speech. Their subsequent report was then forwarded to McQuaid.⁹ There was clearly collusion between some in the Garda Siochána and the ecclesiastical authorities.¹⁰ Irish democracy took no chances with what it considered to be potential enemies of the far left.

The participation of Irish citizens in activities behind the Iron Curtain was taken extremely seriously. In October 1951, when it became known that a handful of young Irish people might have participated in the World Festival of Youth in East Berlin, some deputies asked Aiken in the Dáil (Lower House in the Irish Parliament) ‘if he is aware that citizens of the Republic of Ireland of immature age attended the youth rally in Berlin held in August of this year and fraternised with the avowed enemies of Christianity’. Aiken replied that ‘no passports were granted for the express purpose of attending the youth rally in Berlin last August but, as far as I am aware, 18 holders of Irish passports issued over the past four years attended the Berlin rally’.¹¹ Clearly, the Department of External Affairs (DEA) kept a record on the movements of Irish citizens. Perhaps the Irish authorities were right to be concerned. This World Festival of Youth had been carefully rehearsed and mass parades on the very large-scale took place in various places in East Berlin. According to Anne Applebaum, the event marked ‘the zenith of High Stalinism … and put East Germany on display on an international stage for the first time’. Also massively present was the Stasi, eager to collect as much information as possible and scouting for possible new sources and agents, notably among the West German participants.¹²

Those who received East German literature were monitored by the Department of Defence. In March 1957, the Department informed the DEA that a bookshop called New Books Ltd located at 16a Pearse Street in Dublin and also members of the Irish Workers’ League (IWL, Communists) and the Irish–Soviet Friendship Society were in possession of the following ‘propaganda material’: Democratic German Report (Berlin), Democratic German Republic Magazine (Leipzig), German Democratic Republic (Dresden) and Women of the Whole World (Berlin).¹³ The same month, the Department of Justice replied to a query of the DEA that ‘we have no evidence that propaganda material is being sent to this country by the Government of the Soviet Zone of Germany but we are aware that certain individuals are in receipt of propaganda material from East German trade union sources and from various cultural groups in East Germany’.¹⁴ The Department of Justice took its mission to root out Communism most seriously as back in January 1953 the DEA had notified its relevant consulates that ‘in no circumstances … is a visa to be granted to an Eastern European without reference to the Department of Justice’.¹⁵

The West German government advocated non-recognition of the GDR and claimed to be the only valid and true representative of the whole of Germany. This became known as the so-called Hallstein doctrine and non-recognition became the norm in the West. Frank Aiken was strongly in favour of German reunification and the Irish government adopted Bonn’s doctrine. This was appreciated by the West Germans,¹⁶ although they criticised Ireland’s insular tendencies and neutrality as they believed Western Europe should be strongly united to face the Soviet Union.¹⁷ Consequently, Dublin kept relations with the GDR at a strict minimum and took great care not to stand in Bonn’s way in intra-German relations. The Irish government rejected the GDR’s application for membership of various international organisations which was a way for the East Germans to obtain some sort of recognition. In 1954, for instance, it objected to East Germany’s membership of the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).¹⁸

East Berlin made strenuous efforts to obtain de facto and de jure recognition in the West, including Ireland. One approach consisted in sending official letters, hoping to get an acknowledgement in return and then try to build relations. Generally, the East German authorities took the occasion of the anniversary of some historic event or a current political development to make an approach. On 31 May 1965, the East German Ministry of External Affairs sent the DEA a ‘Manifesto on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of the Liberation’; in other words, the end of the Second World War and the defeat of Nazism. In it, the Western powers were accused of having imperialist aims in Germany and of having partitioned the country and that ‘we in the German Democratic Republic, we in the East of Germany, have consistently walked the path of peace. We have done everything necessary for peace.’ By contrast, the FRG was ‘the continuation of the Hitler state’ and ‘the spirit of militarist servitude and imperial conquest is increasingly permeating all pores of West German life and threatens to re-contaminate broad masses with chauvinism’.¹⁹ The Irish government’s standard reply to letters from East Berlin was to give no reply.

In November 1956, Minister for External Affairs Liam Cosgrave directed the department to send a new circular entitled ‘Recognition of States’ to the Irish missions abroad. Regarding China, it was explained that Ireland only recognised the nationalist government based in Formosa and not Mao Zedong’s government, while it recognised de jure the Soviet Union without, however, recognising the incorporation of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. Regarding Poland, it was reiterated in the circular that only its pre-war g...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of figures
• List of tables
• Acknowledgements
• List of abbreviations
• Introduction
• Part I Relations between Ireland and East Germany
• Part II Intelligence
• Conclusion
• Bibliography
• Index