Ronnie Bunting

Background Bunting came from an Ulster Protestant family in East Belfast. His father, Ronald Bunting, had been a major in the British Army and Ronnie grew up in various military barracks around the world. Ronnie's father became a supporter and associate of Ian Paisley and ran for election under the Protestant Unionist Party banner.

Having completed his education and graduating from Queen's University Belfast, Ronnie Bunting briefly became a history teacher in Belfast, but later become involved in the Northern Ireland Civil Rights Association and then with Irish republican organisations.

Unlike most Protestants in Northern Ireland, Bunting became a militant republican. His father, by contrast, was a committed Ulster loyalist, who organised armed stewards for counter-demonstrations (against civil rights marches) called by Ian Paisley, most infamously at the Burntollet Bridge incident, when his followers attacked a People's Democracy civil rights march on 4 January 1969. before joining Official Sinn Féin (which used the name Republican Clubs in Northern Ireland).

Bunting married his wife Suzanne in 1969 while still a student.

Membership of the Official IRA Some time around 1970, as a result of his left wing, secular interpretation of Irish republicanism, as well as a belief in the necessity of armed revolution, Bunting joined the Official Irish Republican Army (OIRA). (The other wing of the IRA—the Provisional Irish Republican Army—was more nationalist and Catholic in its outlook.) At the time, the communal conflict known as the Troubles was beginning and the Official IRA was involved in shootings and bombings. Along with many others, Bunting was interned in November 1971, and held in Long Kesh until the following April (see also Operation Demetrius).

Membership of the INLA In 1974, Bunting followed Seamus Costello and other militants who disagreed with the OIRA's ceasefire of 1972, into a new grouping called the Irish National Liberation Army (INLA). Immediately, a violent feud broke out between the OIRA and the INLA. Initially claimed by the Provisional IRA, it was later attributed to the INLA when Bunting called the BBC, using the "Captain Green" code name, and gave technical details of the killing.