The Yank: The True Story of a Former US Marine in the Irish Republican Army is the story of a man who plighted his troth to the Irish Republic and has remained faithful to it through thick and thin.
In what was considered “The Armed Struggle” by those who pledged allegiance to that Republic and referred to as “The Troubles” by a simplistic media, many like Crawley, would also pledge heart and hand. Some would stay the course, and others would waver or even sell out, while others would find the peace of the grave.
For your reviewer, there are two aspects that attracted me to the story of John Crawley, the eponymous Yank of this autobiographical tale.
First, it is a history of the era from the view of a man intimately part of struggle.
Second, and for the shallow fellow that your reviewer is, we share some demographics, more or less.
John Crawley was born on Long Island on the 6th of May, 1957 about eight years after me, in probably a similar Irish-American Catholic milieu with a bit of a difference. My family was definitely American, and it was expected that I would go to college despite my mediocrity as a student.
What stands out about “The Yank” is that there was little mediocre about Crawley’s youth. Post-secondary education was not his destiny, but he would pursue a course of study, applying himself fervently.
His excellence was noted almost before he started basic training with the Marines.
There, he was called out of training and offered the opportunity to attend the 50-week Chinese language course at the Presidio in San Francisco. This is elite training and would have marked him as a star.
John would turn it down. He was not going to be deterred from his goal of being part of the IRA.
The Marines tried again, offering him the Russian course, and his reply was the same.
They made one more attempt, a place in a class at the United States Naval Academy in Annapolis, Maryland.
The United States Government recognized that Crawley was a highly intelligent young man, and had he taken the bait, and successfully completed what was on offer, he would have been on his way to a career either in the intelligence community or in the higher ranks of the navy.
No one called me out of my basic training to offer such plum courses, and I am under no illusions why. I am jealous of Crawley, but not without admiration for him.
John went through several levels of elite Marine training, but never wavered in his goal. On May 29, 1979, “I was discharged from the United States Marine Corps at 8 a.m that fine May morning. By 2 p.m. that same day, I was on a plane for New York to catch a connecting flight to Ireland. I had done my bit for the American Republic. Now, I would do what I could for the Irish Republic. “
His chapter, “Volunteering,” is a good explanation of his mindset and also a defense against those who had a sure rationale of his motives.
Crawley became an IRA volunteer and served in, one assumes, numerous operations. There cannot have been many with the training that he had received and that had to have been invaluable to himself and his comrades.
His book gives a good, bad and ugly assessment of IRA capabilities. The deficiencies are to be understood in a military that cannot tax the population to arm itself and must not be overly public, but some in the leadership had a cavalier attitude with sly comments such as “Even the Brits admit we’re the best trained guerrilla army in the world.”
Reading Crawley, it is apparent that sufficient training was lacking in places, but not all, especially South Armagh and East Tyrone.
The author pays tribute to the many high-caliber volunteers but notes despite that, “The fact remains that no army can rise above the limitations of its leadership. The Brits knew that too. A large part of their counterinsurgency effort would be devoted to shaping an IRA leadership fit for purpose–their purpose not ours but few of us could see that at the time.”
He would give an account of a “Lone Gunman” patrol he went on, and then in the next chapter he would relate what being on active service was like. The story is one of tenacity, and stoicism. It makes all the criticisms from politicians and writers look cheap and small.
Crawley would be tasked with other work, such as going to the U.S.to set up arms shipments as they needed someone knowledgeable about weaponry to get things on track.
Well, no.
His expertise was irrelevant. They needed someone without a brogue that made a purchaser vulnerable to identification. John demurred, but it was made known to him that it was an order not a request.
He got to know Martin McGuinness and would come away not overly impressed. His American accent was the important thing and his desire to bring over useful ordnance was not as important to McGuinness.
A reader could get the impression that there were those in the hierarchy who would be satisfied with a shipment of blunderbusses.
The Yank was given half of a torn five-dollar bill to match with one possessed by his contact in the States and start work.
John duly arrived and would meet with one of the most notorious underworld characters in one of the most notorious of underworld dives.
Whitey Bulger is someone I had the pleasure of never meeting. John would however meet him at the bar, TripleOs, that had a brutal reputation.
This would be the beginning of his work to gather weapons and sail across the Atlantic. It was a
long effort that would not end in triumph.
They took weaponry over the ocean that was transferred from a boat named the Valhalla to another one, the Marita Ann and were promptly nabbed before landing.
A senior southern IRA man was the informer.
John would serve his ten year stretch but did not waste the sentence. The schooling he passed up for Marine Training and IRA Service would happen for him as he had the time. The list of books Crawley read and absorbed would be a true education as opposed to the politically correct courses on offer at many universities currently.
Crawley would eventually be released and go back to the fight. On an operation in England, he would be apprehended, and it would be back to prison. Liberated as a result of the Good Friday Agreement, John would probably have returned to the struggle, but there wasn’t really a struggle to go back to.
The last chapter, Down The Republic, is an analysis of the politics of the Good Friday Agreement and where physical force republican politics stands currently, post-ceasefire. The chapter is a fair description as to what has happened since he left Portlaoise.
A Sinn Féin apparatchik would probably call it carping by someone asking for the impossible.
And it might sound like that. After all, he was released, and peace was restored.
That was not what he was fighting for, as he makes plain in the final chapter.
John defends the position that Sinn Féin wholesale abandoned Irish Republicanism. The chapter goes into great detail, but all one needs to know about contemporary Sinn Féin and how they have given over is at their website.
True, they have an Irish Unity page, but it should not inspire confidence.
In the South, they seem to be in line with the main parties, supporting the recent family and care referenda that went down in flames. Simultaneously, this SF is running away from the hate speech legislation they previously expressed support for. The party seems about as revolutionary as a bowl of mush.
They are quickly devolving to the level of the main parties, whose people in government appear to be a crew of woke rent-seekers looking to curry favor in the EU.
Nothing really stands out about the politicians running the show in Dublin. They are run of the mill. De Tocqueville made the point that superior men do not seek office in America. It does not appear different in Ireland.
A Sinn Féin aspirant fits in well.
It’s a pity that people who have shown themselves truly outstanding do not run in Ireland, as they rarely do in the US.
Maybe folks interested in better people in government in Ireland might want to reach out to Monaghan and contact a certain former volunteer who was steadfast for the Republic.
Breaths should not be held.
The Yank: The True Story of a Former US Marine in the Irish Republican Army By John Crawley, Melville House, 288 Pages.
Crawley went to prison because of an I R A plan to cut power supplies across the south of England . Imagine the mayhem it would of caused to hospitals , nursing homes & those battling illness while living @ home . If he was so smart , how come he went to prison ?
Like all lap dog irish Americans & the Shinners ( various versions ) , he has nothing negative to say about America’s genocide against the good people of Vietnam & American imperialism in the Middle East that is causing Europe’s permanent immigration shambles .
Intelligent people don’t join the American military , the bulk of those who went to Vietnam & more recent theatres of war were low I Q ( $ 1 an hour ) burger flippers ( living with mom ) . No Vietnam vet has or will occupy the highest office in the land . By contrast three draft dodgers have done so .
What the Yanks sowed , they reaped on 9 / 11 . Get over it soldier boy . Maybe there is more deserved retribution to come . Crawley will come out of retirement & save his beloved uncle Sam !
☘
In terms of scrutiny, there’ll be no stones unturned.
As this fine article points out, Sinn Fein is not that of 1919,which achieved a majority all Ireland vote to form an Irish government that sat at the Mansion House Dublin.
In Michael Collins era, pre 1916 there was no FF or FG to contend with.
The IRB was the group of Irishmen that formed together to end 800yrs
of British Colonisation,and almost succeeded before being broken up into
Treaty and Anti-Treaty supporters,thus creating the civil war, war of
Independence, and the formation of FF/FG.
What we have to contend with today in 2024 is that all of these parties
mentioned have no genuine connection to the men of 1916,no genuine
connection to the Proclamation,no genuine connection to the future of
Ethnic Irish Generations, other than their token gestures to our brave
Ancestors while selling out the Nation to their foreign puppet masters .
In the last Century of their governance and control we’ve lost not just
control of our own economy,our culture and our future heritage,our own
People have been downgraded to second class status by a rogue govt.
Whilst in the North,
sectarianism was allowed out of control by the British, an equally planned situation to purposely divide the community.
Collins had it right,
Intelligence is the key,and scrutiny will achieve all the knowledge that’s needed.
Why are they all so smug in government, it’s because their never scrutinised,never put under the spotlight,never challenged enough.
So turn on the heat,turn on the spotlight,the scrutiny and intelligence can be shared both sides of the border,no need for violence or intimidation.
The whole of Ireland,
North and South,could be and should be one of the greatest countries on earth to live,regardless of creed…provided it’s Ethnic Population comes first and foremost.
So leave no stone unturned,ask yourself what happened in the last 100yrs
What’s happening now
What will happen if we let it happen again,…or we make things happen.
This is Plastic Paddery at its very worst. Someone who is not Irish, but who, because he is in a multiracial society that offers brownie points for ethnic identitarianism, chooses to pretend he is Irish–and goes one further by becoming a terrorist. Why couldn’t the security services have dispatched this goon to hell? Why were the UK security services only responsible for 365 of the 3,532 people killed in the Troubles (just 10%)? Don’t they know how their guns work or something?
Not one sentence you have written there is correct. It reads like you wrote it at 5am, not 5pm.
☘
A thick O sickO,
Most people go to the bother of reading an article or book before making their comments, not this stupid clown though…argues with the mirrors.
We get it,
an Irish/American of first generation, nothing plastic about it.
U.K. security services, how nice, despatched from the Republic USA.
365/10% deaths only linked to UK security services…rather upsetting chaps eh…butchers apron responsible for millions of deaths,you idiot.
Quote “the Troubles”
Really! .?? and where’s that come from…ah yes you’re sources
The same sources that gave you Big Hunger…Potato!
Your a very sick sickening puppy…back in the box now Jack
[…] READ MORE […]
Ivaus, my source is Wikipedia. Enjoy! Bain taithneamh as!
I purchased the last copy of the book in ‘Books Upstairs’, D’olier Street. It was an eye-opener to this kid who grew up totally insulated from ‘the Troubles’ and was 7 y/o when the GFA came to be. Even if you have no links with Ireland, it’s a fascinating read. If you are Irish, it is a poignant and introspective read. Well written too, the cover is a bit ‘tabloid-y’ which doesn’t fit the content! (Don’t judge by its cover).