December – IRA Vols. Brian Campbell and Com McGirrr were shot dead by the SAS in Clonoe, Tyrone. [46] [47] April 1974: Captain Anthony Pollen was shot dead in Derry City while carrying out undercover surveillance on a Sinn Féin event. He was shot twice in front of a crowd of more than 150 people. No other UK Government or military agency is so comprehensively trained, armed and equipped to undertake individually, or in flexible teams, the wide variety of covert intelligence gathering tasks that are required by a democracy in pursuit of the terrorist." In the early 1900s intelligence gathering was becoming better understood, to the point where a counter-intelligence organisation ( MI5) was formed by the Directorate of Military Intelligence (DoMI) under Captain (later Major-General) Vernon Kell; overseas intelligence gathering began in 1912 by MI6 under Commander (later Captain) Mansfield Smith-Cumming. [2] 1914–1929 [ edit ]

February - A three-man IRA unit was ambushed and killed by the SAS in the County Tyrone town of Strabane. Those were killed were unit commander Charles Breslin, and brothers Michael and David Devine. At just 16 years old David Devine was the youngest IRA Volunteer to be killed by enemy forces. See: Strabane ambush. [53] [54] The Strategic Defence Review: A New Chapter (PDF). London: The Stationery Office. 18 July 2002. ISBN 0101556624 . Retrieved 3 March 2014. Stuart, Mark Muller, Storm in the Desert: Britain's Intervention in Libya and the Arab Spring, Birlinn Ltd, 2017, ISBN 1780274521, ISBN 978-1780274522 Neville, Leigh, Special Forces in the War on Terror (General Military), Osprey Publishing, 2015 ISBN 978-1472807908, p.239-241Reveals the illicit SAS deployment of fragmentation grenades to Northern Ireland and the capture of an IRA unit when an SAS team threatened to use them. In the 19th century, British intelligence work was undertaken by the Intelligence Department of the War Office. An important figure was Sir Charles Wilson, a Royal Engineer who successfully pushed for reform of the War Office's treatment of topographical work. [1] The following is a Timeline of British Army and Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) undercover operations during Operation Banner during the 1969 – 1998 Northern Irish conflict in Northern Ireland that resulted in death or injury. Including operations by the SAS, 14 Intelligence Company, the Military Reaction Force (MRF), RUC Special Patrol Group and Special Branch. Intelligence was accused of acting in collusion with loyalist paramilitaries by former intelligence personnel Fred Holroyd and Colin Wallace in regards to the death of senior Provisional Irish Republican Army member John Francis Green, the Miami Showband killings and the Dublin and Monaghan Bombings. [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] Casualties [ ]

April – IRA volunteer and Staff Officer in the Provisional IRA's South Armagh Brigade 1st Battalion, Peter Cleary was shot dead by the SAS in the south Armagh area near his sisters home in Forkhill. [13] [14] August 1974 – Provisional IRA Belfast Brigade IRA volunteer Martin Skillen was shot dead by soldiers manning a British Army undercover post in Clonard cinema along the Falls Road. [11] The initial role of the squadron is surveillance and intelligence gathering, usually by way of foot patrols and covert observation positions (OPs). As with the counter-terrorist role, A,B,D & G squadrons would subsequently rotate in and out of Northern Ireland deployment on a 4-6 month schedule.February - A gun battle broke out between an IRA unit and 14 Intelligence Company, in the battle IRA Vols Henry Hogan and Declan Martin were killed. One British undercover soldier, Sergeant Paul Oram, was killed in the gun battle and another soldier injured [48]