The young man suspected of killing and injuring students at an Oregon college yesterday idolised the IRA, social media posts suggest.

Chris Harper-Mercer, 26, was killed by police during a shootout at one of the classrooms at the Umpqua Community College in Roseburg.

He had begun his killing spree at 10.30am local time.

Police have confirmed that ten people are dead – including the gunman – although Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum has said that 13 people were fatally wounded.

More than a dozen remain injured – some seriously.

A MySpace page belonging to Harper-Mercer contains pictures of masked gunmen and several references to the IRA.

Complete with the headline “British army could not defeat IRA,” another image shows the front page of a 2007 edition of An Phoblacht.

Meanwhile, one photograph of a group of Irishmen dressed in camouflage, wearing balaclavas and holding rifles was captioned “looking cool defending their country”.

He also wrote in a post about that he greatly admired Vester Flanagan, the gunman who killed a cameraman and presenter live on television in August.

The young man furthermore showed an interest in the Virginia Tech and Sandy Hook school shootings, having recently shared documentaries about the massacres online.

“He appears to be an angry young man who was very filled with hate,” a law enforcement official told The New York Times.

It is thought that he was a student at Umpqua at some stage: his name was listed as a production assistant for an forthcoming production of the Noel Coward play, Blithe Spirit.

Harper-Mercer was born in England but moved to the US as a youngster. He had been living with his mother just a few kilometres from the campus.

His father, Ian Mercer, said he was "shocked" and "devastated" by the news.