The IRA had stepped up their campaign against British military targets outside of Northern Ireland in the late 1980s . In May 1988 they killed members of the RAF in attacks in the Netherlands . On 13 July 1988 nine British soldiers were injured when the IRA detonated two bombs at a British military barracks in Duisburg , Germany . On 1 August 1988 the first Provisional IRA bomb on the UK mainland in four years was set off by a timer device at the British Army base at the Inglis Barracks in Mill Hill , North London . The two storey building containing the single men 's quarters was completely destroyed . One soldier , Lance Corporal Michael Robbins , was killed . Nine others were injured . In September 1989 eleven Royal Marines were killed and 22 others injured when the IRA bombed their barracks in Deal , Kent , England . On 18 November 1989 two British soldiers were wounded when an IRA car bomb exploded at a British Army barracks in Colchester , England . On 20 February 1990 the IRA bombed a British military recruitment office in Leicester , England . Two people were injured in this attack . Five days later on 25 February 1990 , another recruitment office was bombed , this time in Halifax , West Yorkshire . Less than three weeks before the Lichfield attack 16 May 1990 the IRA detonated another bomb under a military minibus in London , killing Sergeant Charles Chapman , and injuring four other soldiers . After this attack the IRA released a statement which read " While the British government persists in its continued occupation of the north of Ireland the IRA will persist in attacking the British government and its forces in England " '' . '' On 1 June 1990 three off duty British soldiers were sitting on a bench on a platform at Lichfield City railway station . Suddenly two paramilitary volunteers from the Provisional IRA appeared on the platform , pulled out handguns and fired shots at the soldiers , then jumped onto the tracks , ran across the line and through a builder 's yard opposite the station . The attack killed 18 year old private , William Robert Davies of Pontarddulais , south Wales and injured two other soldiers , Robert Parkin , 20 , and Neil Evans , 19 . A British Rail employee who witnessed the shooting said he jumped across the tracks to try to help the soldiers
bombed their barracks
Deal barracks bombing
Lichfield gun attack