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Ulster Defence Regiment

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Ulster Defence Regiment
File:UDR.PNGCap badge of the Ulster Defence Regiment
Active1970 - 1992
CountryUnited Kingdom
BranchBritish Army
TypeLine Infantry
RoleInternal Security
SizeSeven battalions (11 total)
Military unit

The Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) was an infantry regiment of the British Army. It was a locally raised, part time and full time unit, intended to carry out security duties within Northern Ireland. It was amalgamated in 1992 with the Royal Irish Rangers, forming the Royal Irish Regiment (27th (Inniskilling) 83rd and 87th and Ulster Defence Regiment).

History

Formed in 1970, the UDR was designed to replace the Ulster Special Constabulary (The "B-Specials"). The regiment was reduced to nine battalions in 1984, then to seven in 1991 through amalgamations, before being amalgamated as a whole with the Royal Irish Rangers in 1992 to form the Royal Irish Regiment. The Ulster Defence Regiment was presented with it's Colours by Her Majesty the Queen in 1991 and on July 23, 1991 Tom King announced to the Commons that as part of the restructuring of the armed forces that plans had been agreed to merge The UDR with the Royal Irish Rangers. On the 1 July, 1992 the merger of the regiments was official complete and the new regiment was to become as the Royal Irish Regiment.

In 1990 British Secretary of State Peter Brooke described them as committed to "justice, decency and democracy".

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Two UDR men were killed by British soldiers, three by loyalist paramilitaries and the remaining 192 by republican paramilitaries (mainly the Provisional Irish Republican Army). During this time members of the UDR were responsible for the killing of six civilians and two members of the IRA. Many unionist politicians in Northern Ireland today are former members of the UDR, Tom Elliott and Jeffrey Donaldson for example.

This is the only unit in the history of the British Army to have been on operational deployment for its entire history, from the moment it was created until it was amalgamated with the Royal Irish Rangers in 1992.

Structure

Initially, seven battalions were raised, immediately making it the largest regiment in the British Army. Within two years, a further four battalions were added, taking the total to eleven. To begin with, the regiment consisted entirely of part-time volunteers, before a full time cadre was added in 1976.

By the time the UDR became operational on 1 April 1970, it had a strength of 2440; of which 946 were Catholics.
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The full-time element of the regiment eventually expanded to encompass half the total personnel. The UDR was also the first infantry regiment in the British Army to fully integrate women into its structure, when the so-called Greenfinches took over clerical and signals duties, which allowed male members of the regiment to return to patrol duties. One Greenfinch, Eva Martin, was killed during the Troubles.

Battalions

Collusion allegations

There were repeated allegations throughout the UDR's history that a few of the units's members were covertly aiding the loyalist paramilitary groups in Northern Ireland.

Original Anti-UDR political poster

On 3 May 2006 the British Government released documents that showed overlapping membership between British Army units like the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR) and loyalist paramilitary groups was a wider problem than a "few bad apples" as was often claimed. The documents include a report titled "Subversion in the UDR" which details the problem. In 1973;

  • an estimated 5-15% of UDR soldiers were directly linked to loyalist paramilitary groups,
  • it was believed that the "best single source of weapons, and the only significant source of modern weapons, for Protestant extremist groups was the UDR",
  • it was feared UDR troops were loyal to "Ulster" alone rather than to "Her Majesty's Government",
  • the British Government knew that UDR weapons were being used in the killing of Roman Catholic civilians by loyalist paramilitaries.

Despite knowing that the UDR had problems and that over 200 weapons had been passed from British Army hands to loyalist paramilitaries by 1973, the British Government went on to increase the role of the UDR in maintaining order in Northern Ireland. This was part of the wider "Normalisation, Ulsterisation, and Criminalisation" strategy to quell the violence of the PIRA.

Two UDR soldiers, who were also members of the Ulster Volunteer Force, were convicted of the 1975 killing of three members of the pop group the Miami Showband in an Ulster Volunteer Force attack.

In 1983, UDR soldiers, known as the UDR Four or Armagh Four, were arrested in the murder of Adrian Carroll. All were convicted but an appeal led to the release of three of the group in 1992.

In 1989, 28 UDR soldiers were arrested by the Royal Ulster Constabulary as part of the Stevens Inquiry into security force collusion with paramilitaries. Six of those arrested were later awarded damages over their arrests.

In 1999 David Jordan, a former UDR soldier, allegedly broke down in a bar and admitted to being part of a patrol that killed nationalist councillor Patsy Kelly in 1974. Jordan also implicated former Democratic Unionist Party Northern Ireland Assembly member Oliver Gibson in the murder

References

  1. May 2, 2006 edition of the Irish News available here.
  2. Paisley by Ed Moloney & Andy Pollak Poolbeg Press Ltd., 1986 P.363-402
  3. http://cain.ulst.ac.uk/othelem/media/parkinson/parkinson98.htm Author's chapter contribution from 'Ulster Loyalism and the British Media' by Alan F. Parkinson (1998)
  4. See reference here
  • The official regimental history of the UDR was written by Major John Furniss Potter, a former Royal Artillery officer who had served as Adjutant of the 3rd (Co. Down) battalion of the UDR immediately following its foundation : A Testimony to Courage - the Regimental History of the Ulster Defence Regiment 1969 - 1992 (pub. Leo Cooper, 2001).


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