There will be enormous and entirely justified scepticism about the UDA's announcement at the weekend that it intends to halt all paramilitary activity for the next 12 months.
The UDA's latest move confirms that, as everyone knew, the ceasefire which it was allegedly observing since 1994 was a complete sham.
UDA leaders also claimed they were endorsing the Good Friday Agreement in 1998, but instead cynically took the benefits on offer, in terms of prisoner releases, while refusing to accept their responsibilities over decommis-sioning.
The UDA's stock in trade, throughout its shadowy history, has been viciously sectarian attacks directed almost exclusively against Catholics living in vulnerable locations.
It has maintained this policy in recent years through sporadic assassinations and the intensive use of pipe bombs across Northern Ireland.
Figures obtained by the Irish News only last week confirmed that almost 500 of these deadly devices had been thrown over the last three years, with the vast majority linked to the UDA.
The organisation was also centrally involved in well-documented and lucrative drug dealing operations, which have had a devastating impact on the districts it controls.
Against this background, it was hardly surprising that the sincere efforts of some individuals to steer the UDA towards a political path ended in frustration.
The narrow failure by the UDA's former political wing, the Ulster Democratic Party, to secure a seat in the assembly five years ago, was something of a watershed.
Since then, the UDP was crudely ordered to disband by the UDA and the organisation largely ignored political considerations.
With the UDA having virtually disintegrated into rival and bitterly divided geographical units, its most notorious figure, Johnny Adair, launched what was effectively an attempt to seize personal control of the organisation.
After a relatively short but bloody feud over recent weeks, Adair found himself back behind bars and his supporters were driven out of Northern Ireland at gunpoint by their former colleagues.
However, the biggest challenge facing the UDA and other similar groups has been the dramatically improved performance of the police.
While more needs to be done, key UDA figures have been repeatedly arrested and the structures of the organisation placed under unprecedented strain.
In all the circumstances, the UDA was running out of options and its weekend initiative did not come as a particular surprise.
Suggestions that behind the scenes negotiations were under way surfaced when the UDA voluntarily abandoned a token number of pipe bombs in north Belfast last week.
It is possible that some form of deal with the authorities is being sought, although there can be no question of scaling down the efforts of the police in loyalist areas.
There will also be concern that the section of the UDA statement addressing the drugs issue, while apologising for some past events, was equivocal about the organisation's overall stance.
The best response to the weekend announcement is to reserve judgment and closely monitor the behaviour of UDA members over the next year.
It would be to the benefit of the entire community if the malign influence of all paramilitary groups, including those on the republican side, could finally be removed.
The IRA's curious definition of a ceasefire has allowed it to regularly carry out acts of violence against people living in Catholic neighbourhoods, and there are strong suspicions that it was behind the appalling assault on a teenager in west Belfast last Friday.
It must now be obvious that paramilitary organisations have nothing to offer, other than the failed and brutal tactics of the past, and should be prepared to accept that their day has come and gone.
