Deception and Lies

In May of 1970, two government ministers were dismissed from Cabinet for allegedly purchasing guns for the IRA. The Taoiseach Jack Lynch disavowed any knowledge of the plot. Few believed him. Charles Haughey, Minister for Finance, a captain in Irish military intelligence along with two others were put on trial. All were acquitted. Haughey refused to talk about the crisis for the rest of his life. Fianna Fail endured decades of splits, turmoil and leadership heaves. Until now, no one has revealed the pivotal role of an IRA informer in the affair. The part he played became the best-kept State secret of the last half-century. The book also reveals a dirty tricks campaign by Britain's Foreign Office to conceal the ancillary role of a British agent called Capt. Markham-Randall in the murder of Garda Richard Fallon on the eve of the eruption of the Arms Crisis.

A practising barrister David is the son of Dick Burke, a FG TD in the 1970s. the sat on the Public Accounts Committee in 1971 that investigated how the money given to Charles Haughey in 1969 for the relief of distress in Northern Ireland had been spent, i.e. the source of the funds which was subsequently spent on arms in Hamburg. David has written about the Arms Crisis and related issues for Village Magazine.