ireland, irish, ulster, ireland, irish, ulster, Sinn Féin, Irish America

(Anthony McIntyre, Daily Mirror)

This morning's (Friday) headlines should read 'excitable hacks go orgasmic over IRA statement.' But such headlines are 'not helpful to the peace process' and therefore long suffering readerships will have to endure the guff about seismic shifts, historic developments and whatever else takes the fancy of the scribbling class.

Yesterday's statement by the IRA on its future merely formalised what we have known for quite some time – that the organisation's armed campaign against Britain ended in failure. The British are still here, the consent principle is safely enshrined and partition entrenched. Commentators can openly speculate on current IRA volunteers eventually becoming British bobbies. Hardly the heady stuff of revolutionary success.

The IRA's war has ended and the organisation shall not disband. This is exactly the same position we were at this time last week, last month, last year.  Given that the statement tells us what we already know and therefore contains only rhetoric about future IRA intent, journalists and government officials have set themselves the task of wild spinning and hyping the statement.

The strategic purpose of the statement is to flush out idiots in both the London and Dublin governments who will wave the IRA's A4 paper, Chamberlain-like, and declare 'peace in our time.'

There would be some justification for this if the IRA were to follow through on its statement with facts on the ground. But the organisation has consistently lied about its involvement in numerous activities and there is no reason for believing it will not do so in the future. A promise to quit lying might have greater potential than yesterday's verbiage.

Like the Official IRA before it, and in whose shoes it now so comfortably strides, the current IRA, by the mere fact of its existence, will continue to function; not militarily against the British state, but as a militia to give muscle to Sinn Féin and as an organ of intimidation.

This article appeared in the July 29, 2005 edition of the Daily Mirror.

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