Paras faced 'cocktail of pressure' on Bloody Sunday

Lack of restraint by some soldiers on Bloody Sunday “could have contributed” to the tragedy, a former British government minister said today.

But Geoffrey Johnson-Smith, who was the junior army minister in January 1972, felt it would be unfair to blame the paratroopers because of the unpredictable “cocktail of different pressures” they faced when on the front line.