Bayardo Bar attack

Bayardo Bar attack
Part of The Troubles
Memorial to the victims of the attack on the site of the Bayardo Bar
Location	Bayardo Bar Aberdeen Street, Belfast, Northern Ireland
Coordinates	54°36′14″N 5°56′53″W / 54.604008°N 5.948119°W / 54.604008; -5.948119Coordinates: 54°36′14″N 5°56′53″W / 54.604008°N 5.948119°W / 54.604008; -5.948119
Date	13 August 1975
Target	Ulster Protestants, Irish Unionists
Attack type	shooting, bombing
Deaths	5 (4 Protestant civilians, 1 Ulster Volunteer Force member)
Non-fatal injuries	50+
Perpetrator	3rd Battalion, "A" Company, Provisional IRA Belfast Brigade

The Bayardo Bar attack was a bomb and shooting attack against a Protestant owned pub in Belfast, Northern Ireland, which was carried out by the republican paramilitary group the Provisional Irish Republican Army which took place on 13 August 1975. A unit of the Provisional IRA Belfast Brigade, led by Brendan McFarlane, launched a bombing and shooting attack on the pub on Aberdeen Street (off the loyalist Shankill Road), which was frequented by Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF) members as well as civilians. Four Protestant civilians and one UVF volunteer were killed.

According to journalists Alan Murray and Peter Taylor, it was retaliation for the Miami Showband massacre almost a fortnight earlier, when the popular Dublin-based band were ambushed by the UVF at a bogus military checkpoint. Three band members were shot dead by the UVF gunmen after their minibus was blown up in a premature explosion.

McFarlane and two other IRA volunteers, Peter "Skeet" Hamilton and Seamus Clarke, were sentenced to life imprisonment for perpetrating the Bayardo attack.

By the year 1975, the religious-political conflict in Northern Ireland known as "the Troubles"— was more than six years old. On 10 February 1975, the Provisional IRA and British government entered into a truce and restarted negotiations. The IRA agreed to halt attacks on the British security forces, and the security forces mostly ended its raids and searches. However, there were dissenters on both sides. Some Provisionals wanted no part of the truce, while British commanders resented being told to stop their operations against the IRA just when—they claimed—they had the Provisionals on the run. The security forces boosted their intelligence offensive during the truce and thoroughly infiltrated the IRA.

There was a rise in sectarian killings during the truce, which 'officially' lasted until early 1976. Ulster loyalists, fearing they were about to be forsaken by the British government and forced into a united Ireland, increased their attacks on the Irish Catholic and nationalist community. They hoped to force the IRA to retaliate and thus hasten an end to the truce. Under orders not to engage the security forces, some IRA units concentrated on tackling the loyalists. The fall-off of regular operations had caused serious problems of internal discipline and some IRA members, with or without permission from higher up, engaged in tit-for-tat killings.