11:42am Wednesday 30th December 2009
BRITISH diplomats believed the bomb attack which killed Lord Mountbatten 30 years ago could have been prevented, it emerged today.
Lord Mountbatten, who lived at Broadlands in Romsey, was killed on August 27, 1979 when the IRA detonated a bomb on his boat at his Irish holiday home in Mullaghmore, County Sligo.
Three other people died in the explosion. Later the same day 18 British soldiers - including 16 members of the Parachute Regiment - were killed in an IRA ambush at Warrenpoint in Northern Ireland, marking one of the darkest days of the Troubles.
In a telegram to Foreign Secretary Lord Carrington - released by the National Archives at Kew today under the 30-year rule - the British ambassador in Dublin, Robin Haydon, said there was a widespread belief the attack on Lord Mountbatten could have been stopped.
He said that the concerns about the level of security provided by the Irish security forces were shared by local people who had "greatly liked and respected" the peer, a distinguished Second World War military leader and an uncle of the Duke of Edinburgh.
"For those men and women the horror of what happened was and still is very real and their shame is genuine. The more so because they must share the doubts which we in this embassy have that, had the Garda Siochana been more vigilant and conscientious, the murders might not have happened," he added.
Mr Haydon said he had been told by Lord Mountbatten's daughter, Lady Pamela Hicks, that it was the first year when the boat did not have a police guard on it during the day.
"In the absence of an official report, it would be unwise to go into detail, but I must say I find it extraordinary that the boat was apparently not searched by the Garda before it sailed," he said.
"It is even more extraordinary that, to my knowledge, no questions have been asked by the Irish media about the level and adequacy of Garda security for the Mountbatten family."
Mr Haydon also strongly criticised the "apathetic reaction" of Irish prime minister Jack Lynch, who refused to break off his holiday to Portugal to deal with the crisis.
"The Taoiseach's explanation, that he kept in close touch with the situation and issued instructions from Portugal about what was to be done, did not carry conviction and showed remarkable insensitivity to the need for a political leader in a crisis not only to take action but to be seen to be taking it," he said.
Mr Haydon added that the embassy had received many letters of sympathy and condolence from ordinary members of the Irish public, some written in "a highly emotional vein".
"There has not been one letter that in any way seeks to justify the crimes or to mitigate their horror," he noted.
"In any other country, that last sentence would probably be unnecessary: here, it has to be said because the Irish have a remarkable capacity for blaming others, especially the British, for their own failings and inadequacies."
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