Historical Dictionary of Terrorism Third Edition

580 • RED HAND COMMANDOSCity, although one occurred in Washington, D.C., on 20 April 1984,when a bomb exploded at the Washington Navy Officers’ Club. On 5April 1984 the RGR bombed the Israeli Aircraft Industries plant. On26 September 1984 the group bombed the South African consulate. On23 February 1985 it bombed the New York City Police Benevolent Associationoffices. None of these bombings caused harm to life or limb,and after the last bombing in 1985 no further attacks were claimed inthe name of the RGR. Some analysts believe that the Red Guerrilla Resistancewas a nom de guerre of the May 19 Communist Coalition.RED HAND COMMANDOS. The Red Hand Commandos were an UlsterProtestant terrorist militia established in 1972 by John McKeagueafter his expulsion from the Ulster Defence Association. This groupand the Ulster Volunteer Force, with which it worked in tandem,functioned as anti-Catholic death squads in the Belfast area and werebanned by the British government in 1973. In April 1975 the Commandosbombed a pub in a Catholic district, killing six. The Red HandCommandos were also suspected in the 17 May 1974 bombings ofdowntown Dublin and Monaghan, which killed 30 and injured 151.McKeague was unsuccessfully prosecuted under the StormontParliament’s Incitement to Religious Hatred Law. Shortly after hisacquittal in January 1982, McKeague was killed by militants of theIrish National Liberation Army. The group is known to have killedsix people in the period 1992–1995 and is believed to have been associatedwith another group, the Loyalist Retaliation and DefenceGroup, which terrorized shopkeepers who sold the official newspaperof Sinn Fein, An Phoblacht (The Republic), killing two of them in1991. In total, the Red Hand Commandos killed 12 civilians and oneof their own members.On 3 May 2007 the Red Hand Commandos announced, along withthe Ulster Volunteer Force, that they would renounce violence anddisband as a military organization. Rather than disarming, the grouppromised to put its arms under the control of the leadership of theUlster Volunteer Force, which the Independent International Commissionon Decommissioning rejected as insufficient compliance.RED HAND DEFENDERS (RHD). The RHD is a small Ulster ProtestantLoyalist group that came into existence in 1998 and is believedto consist of members of the Loyalist Volunteer Force, the UlsterDefence Association, and the Ulster Freedom Fighters who op-