my republic for a horse

barr na maidine duit, le bheith cinnte

today (being the date of publication) is, more or less (provisionally, so to speak) the 38th anniversary of a presumed crime which continues to baffle. was it a crime actually done, and if so, to what end, and how did it fail so spectacularly. yes, oh yes. indeed, this is about, or concerns, Shergar, look you see, and the kidnapping of this horse. 

i very much doubt that anyone what does a google to learn of Shergar would get my simple blog returned as a result. but, on the off chance this is so, or you are randomly here and curious, i can give a brief history. well, first i would suggest you read a proper article, but since we are here now, fine. 

whilst appreciating that different people can (and do) apply different criteria and come to a very different answer, and also that i am no expert, there is general, if not profligate, consensus that Shergar was the greatest racecourse ever to grace the planet. erudite, fast, sleek, beautiful and a winner. a horse that made a substantial amount of money for everyone but turf accountants (bookies), and this was very much worth a lot of money. 

one can, then, at a very superficial level, understand why the idea of "kidnapping" Shergar and demanding an awful lot of money in ransom for safe return would seem like a good one. it patently isn't, of course, after one has taken a moment to consider the immediate complexities of doing so. but, so the reports and stories go, this did not stop persons who remain officially unknown from doing so. 

just what, exactly (more or less), happened? no one is entirely sure. if like me you read a lot then you are aware of the concept of an "unreliable narrator". this is what the story of Shergar has, in abundance. if we remove the one theory of it all being an elaborate insurance scam (the horse was worth more alive than dead, even across all thirty five owners), and further disregard the more fanciful,the  one compelling and generally accepted as what happened story is that the horse was kidnapped by the IRA. 

for what reason would the IRA do such a thing? well, pretty much has been laid out above, not really to rally people to their cause of Irish unification, or even to get people to hate the British, but rather it was all done in furtherance of seeking coins of money. 

how do i put this all so very sensitively and delicately, so as not to seek to upset the sensibilities or moral fibre of anyone all that fragile they get upset at the mention of virtually anything which deviates from their blinkered view? tricky. a common trend across independently armed, quasi military groups enthusiastic about attaining ideals not generally voted for (whether you see them as terrorists or freedom fighters is up to you) is that they do not think to add a financial management section to their merry gang of devout believers. which is to say that usually they are not too good with fiscal control.

around the time of the Shergar kidnapping, the IRA were running up costs of around £5 million a year. this was in the days before it became trendy for Americans to remember their Irish ancestry and throw money at them, so sources of income were tight. with very few legitimate means of bringing in money available, and only so much to be made off of smuggling dodgy fags, other avenues were explored. like kidnapping. some attempts at kidnapping actual people didn't go too well, which is presumably when they thought that nothing could go wrong with kidnapping a horse. a thoroughbred, strong, big, heavy, not easy to keep calm horse. 

being fair, it's not like the IRA just gave up because of a lack of funding. other organisations certainly did. the end of apartheid in South Africa, for instance, had less to do with Bono, Sting, Jim Kerr and whoever "demanding" it, more to do with the white minority government running out of money. on a bigger scale, the Soviet Union collapsed financially, and not via America "winning" the Cold War. also, the HR department of the IRA is to be credited with not allowing any cost cutting measures which would affect, for want of a better word, staff. groups such as al-qaeda and isis have, to a degree, clocked that you can keep the weekly wage bill very low down if you use suicide bombers rather than blowing up cars and churches and what have you. 

presumably it was meant to all go down along the lines of IRA snatch the horse, IRA call the owners, IRA demand money, owners immediately pay, horse back. except, it didn't. Shergar had (technically has) 35 different owners, all with a (relatively) equal share. there was no one person to speak to with a demand, not even a more senior one. by the way, that's 35 owners in 35 different parts of the world. all before the days of an internet, or mobile phone, or any such easy way to reach out and contact someone. what agreement was reached between some owners was that there was no f*****g way they were paying, for it was just opening up a business of kidnapping other horses if they did so. 

so, what happened? no one is sure. an IRA "supergrass" (who, it should be noted, was paid for any information handed over) claims that yes, it was the IRA what did it, the ones who did it "miscalculated" how easy (or not) it would be to look after a kidnapped thoroughbred racehorse, they lost control of the poor animal and eventually they shot it, placing the remains in places unknown. essentially, then, the world lost a great racehorse, the IRA ran up extra costs, and no one came off any better at all. the insurance money (eventually) paid out to Shergar's owners was substantial, but insignificant compared to potential earnings from future races and of course putting him out to stud. 

no, not sure what (if any) point there is to this post. which makes it more or less the same as all the others. i just noticed the anniversary on this date, and thought, well, why not. perhaps someone shall have found it interesting or, more likely, i may have added myself to yet another hitlist. 

a bheith ar fheabhas lena chéile !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!