Hundreds of heavily armed troops, armoured personnel carriers and helicopters fanned out across a large swathe of north Cork as the largest military operation undertaken in the country in recent years reached a climax.
Code-named Dark Nights, the operation aimed to rid the Munster area of terrorist elements linked to the local ethnic minority which has been agitating for autonomy in recent years.
Earlier this week, specialist surveillance teams entered forested, boggy upland terrain in Kilworth, where they have observed 50 members of the so-called Fantasian Liberation Army (FLA).
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The terrorist group has sought to create a no-go area for the Defence Forces, ahead of a likely push for full independence from Ireland – a course the Government has said it will resist with all means.
The presence of military attachés from the US, UK and Russia at the start of deployment on Tuesday indicated strong international support for the Government stance, said diplomatic sources.
Lone rebel
In a major escalation on Wednesday morning, a 27th Battalion company came under assault rifle fire from a lone rebel in Upper Glansheskin Wood. Following a short exchange, the rebel was killed.
Troops had been dispatched on Tuesday from the Curragh, Co Kildare. Second-in-command of an Istar (intelligence, surveillance, target-acquisition and reconnaissance) company Capt John Byrne told his troops the Fantasian minority in Wexford, Waterford, Cork and east Kerry had declared their aim of forming an independent state, giving allegiance not to Ireland but to the Fantasia (formerly Wales) from whence their predecessors had come in the 15th century.
“Economic depression has hit Europe hard, and the European Union is at risk of implosion subsequent to the collapse of a number of historically robust economic powers,” he told troops.
Fantasia was attempting to deflect attention from its own economic woes by fomenting unrest among the Fantasian minority in Ireland, with an eye to gaining control of the oil and gas reserves off the south coast.
However, the fact the main pipeline from the southern oil and gas fields of Kinsale passed through territory now occupied by the FLA could not be tolerated.
From Tuesday evening, the Istar company set up observation posts (OPs) on either side of the FLA-held territory, backed up by a convoy of 16 Mowag close reconnaissance vehicles.
Lieut Risteard Byrne – known as “Red” – and three corporals under his command, Gray, McMahon and Kelly, selected a spot behind a fallen pine tree on the edge of Glansheskin Wood. At 300m, it gave them a commanding view across a wide, shallow vale to Glenatlucky mountain (283m) about 1km away.
Greasepaint
Wearing brown and green greasepaint, the four placed pine branches – tops pointed down to appear as though they had fallen naturally, cut ends pointing up so fresh breaks would not to be seen – to disguise their hide.
A VHF comms system enabled contact with other OPs; a laptop allowed for sending photos back to Company HQ. A bascha, a 10x8 thin tarpaulin sheet slung between branches just above ground behind the aperture, was all the cover they got on Tuesday night.
“This is hard routine,” Red told embedded correspondents during the night. “That means there’s no getting out. The OP is set. Hard routine; no leaving, no lights.”
The conditions were not bad, all things considered, he said. “At least we’re not swimming in muck.”
At 11.45pm, FLA rebels fired four paralume flares hoping to reveal the hide but served only to illuminate two insurgents to Cpl Gray who had taken a forward position, while Cpl Kelly guarded the rear.
At 12.20am, the night scope picked out two moving lights in the valley over towards Midleton, the specks of yellow moving slowly through the ghostly milky-green of the scope.
The wind and occasional low cloud persisted through until dawn. Several movements of rebels were noted. It emerged later than one may have involved the summary execution of a civilian.
Ambush
While the four-man unit breakfasted on high-energy cold rations, company headquarters assessed the information gathered by them and the other OPs during the night.
Later, an ambush by a lone rebel took longer to subdue than commanding officers wanted, but he was eventually killed when privates Aidan Gillespie and Damian Reilly, firing and moving forward from tree to tree, stormed over a fallen trunk, firing as they went.
The commanding officer of Dark Nights, Lt-Col Mark Hearns, is set this morning to unleash some 250 infantry troops against the FLA hold-outs in the occupied area, backed up by Air Corps AW139 helicopters for rapid medical evacuation if necessary.
Operation Dark Nights was a major night-time training exercise carried out by the Defence Forces this week
