(IRA), outlawed Irish nationalist military organization. Founded in 1919 to fight British rule in Ireland, it supported the nationalist aims of SINN FEIN (q.v.), but the two groups operated separately. The IRA, initially as an informal group of Irish insurgents, first engaged in guerrilla fighting in the war for independence (1916–21). Like Sinn Fein, however, it split over the postwar settlement that established the Irish Free State. The larger faction, then called the Irregulars, fought the Irish Free State government in the civil war of 1922–23. Although it surrendered in 1923, the IRA continued to recruit and train members and periodically engaged in violent acts. It was outlawed in 1931 and again in 1935. After Ireland withdrew from the Commonwealth in 1948, the IRA turned its attention to removing British rule from Northern Ireland and establishing a unified Irish republic. In the late 1960s Northern Ireland’s Roman Catholics began a forceful campaign for improved economic and political status. Support for the IRA then grew, and IRA attacks against Protestant activists and the British army escalated. Disagreement in 1969 over use of terrorist tactics led to a split into a radical group, the Provisional IRA, and the main group, the Official IRA. The former carried out assassinations and other terrorist activities during the next three decades.

In August 1994, with momentum building toward a negotiated settlement in Northern Ireland, the IRA declared an unconditional cease-fire; when peace talks stalled, however, the IRA returned to its bombing campaign in February 1996. A new cease-fire was declared in July 1997, and peace talks resumed in September. The IRA gave qualified approval to the resulting peace plan, which was endorsed by voters in Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic in May 1998; not until November 1999, however, did the organization agree to take part in talks on surrendering its weapons, as required by the accord. In June 2000, the IRA broke new ground by allowing an independent team of international inspectors to begin monitoring its weapons stockpiles. While the IRA maintained the cease-fire, several splinter organizations, including a group calling itself the Real IRA, continued to promote the nationalist cause by violent means. In October 2001 the IRA announced it would begin to disarm, which led British Prime Minister Tony Blair to announce that more than 13,000 British soldiers would be pulled out of Northern Ireland. See also IRELAND, REPUBLIC OF; NORTHERN IRELAND,; TERRORISM,.

For further information on this topic, see the Bibliography, sections 930. Irish history, 931. Northern Ireland.