The World: The Master of the Tightrope Act

(2 of 2)

In addition to the extreme nationalists, Lynch must also contend with the reasoned criticism of such political opponents as Conor Cruise O'Brien, the scholar and diplomat who is now a Labor Party M.P. in Dublin. Last week O'Brien published in the Irish Times an eloquent open letter to New York Lawyer-Politician Paul O'Dwyer, urging him not to campaign for the I.R.A. in the U.S. Wrote O'Brien: "Don't believe the I.R.A. if they tell you the Irish people are behind them. I was elected with mainly a working-class vote. I have taken a clear anti-I.R.A. position, and people come up to me in the streets and tell me they agree. 1 have never heard anyone speak of the Belfast bombings with anything but horror and condemnation. The I.R.A. are not helping the cause of civil rights, nor have they any right to talk of civil rights since they have denied so many of their fellow citizens the elementary civil right of life itself."

Lynch's handling of the Joe Cahill case last week was an example of how shrewdly the Prime Minister maintains the balancing act. Cahill, the I.R.A. leader from Belfast, flew from Dublin to the U.S. to raise money "to kill British soldiers." But he was refused entry to the U.S. on a technicality, and was returned to Dublin. There he was detained by Irish authorities, held for eleven hours, and then released. The detention was presumed to be Jack Lynch's gesture to Britain, and also a way of warning the I.R.A. gunmen to watch their manners while traveling in the south. The eventual release of Cahill was Lynch's gesture to Ulster Catholics, a reassurance that the Dublin government is deeply concerned about their plight.