"Teribus:
As you sidestepped offering an opinion on whether Ard Mhacha was a bomber"

Now you tell me Mr Carroll - exactly what part of this do you not understand:

"Jim, in no way have I stated any opinion as to whether Armagh planted bombs or not, I have no way of knowing that, perhaps you should direct that particular question to him."

But I do realise that you have a little trouble with simple comprehension - Armagh said that his little run in had happened "returning from my newsagent during the `troubles`," - You Mr. Carroll translate that to:

"For that matter, where were you when Teribus was justifying the thuggish behaviour of armed and uniformed thugs towards a member of this forum (repeated thousandsfold over the last forty years - this week) in the name of law and order?"

At least he walked away from it Jim, his fate would have been a damn sight less certain if it had been the un-uniformed thugs of PIRA that had reason to pull him up - classic example Mrs Jean McConville - in your diatribes about thuggery tell us about her Jim, what happened to her amounted to rather more than being spread-eagled against a wall, being shouted at and given a dig in the ribs - oh and of course she never walked home ever again did she, Jim??

Now let's see what would have happened had the Security Forces not been present in their role of aiding the civil power:

In the field of explosive ordnance disposal in the period 1972-1978, over 400 Wheelbarrows (remotely operated vehicles used to counter-mine bombs) were destroyed while dealing with terrorist devices. That's 400 bombs that did not go off, did not kill or maim anyone. I'll give you, Jim Carroll and your pal Armagh a little challenge - I've offered it before on this forum and up to date no republican sympathiser has ever been able to respond to it. Give me one example where a member of ANY paramilitary group, that operated during "The Troubles", sacrificed his own life to save a member of the public, a "civilian", in Northern Ireland. By the bye, bombers who died assembling or transporting their own bombs do not qualify.

Now I on the other hand can give you many, many, instances of members of the Security Forces, Police Force and emergency services who did just that. I can also give you many, many, instances where those you appear to support acted deliberately in such a way as to cause as much death and dismemberment of innocent civilians amongst the general population that they were telling the world they were trying to "protect". Both you and Armagh seem to have a very weird idea of what behaviour deserves condemnation - because I have never heard either of you condemn the excesses of the paramilitaries - and I mean all of them, republican as well as loyalist.