SECURITY RESPONSE MUST NOT BE KNEE-JERK
Security response must not be knee-jerk
Brian Feeney ON WEDNESDAY
THE cabinet meets at 10.15 in Dublin this morning to endorse joint proposals from Irish and British security advisers for a crackdown on the so-called Real IRA. Let's hope that's not the only response or even the main response after Omagh.
For decades people argued for the primacy of politics and the superiority of the ballot over the bullet. The referendums north and south and the assembly elections have established this.
As a result, one of the developments people are looking forward to is the progressive dismantling of the military and security apparatus which has been constructed over the last 30 years. The British government had already begun to remove the oppressive legislation devised and maintained in the north since 1921.
Of course there has to be a security response to the savagery in Omagh. Now that the primacy of politics has been established it has to be defended. The democratic will of the Irish people must be protected from the sort of assault the Real IRA has unleashed.
But Ireland can't and shouldn't be turned into an undemocratic state because of the threat from a few dozen fanatics who have no electoral support and precious little of any other kind.
Any response has to be measured and not an obvious knee jerk.
The sort of badly-thought-out hasty legislation Roy Jenkins rushed through after the Birmingham bombs in 1974 caused untold misery and proved very difficult to remove from the statute book. Therefore it's important that it is the Irish government introducing new measures for at least four reasons:
First, Irish ministers and their advisers are aware of the sensitivities of these issues; secondly, the main activists responsible for the recent murders live in the Republic; third, there's general support for the security apparatus in the Republic; and fourth, rigorous action supported by republicans and nationalists throughout Ireland should provide some confidence for unionists.
All that said the primacy of the political process is what counts.
That means pressing on with the implementation of the agreement to show that political leaders are united in refusing to be thrown off course by a minority of nutters.
So far this week David Trimble has hit a series of jarring notes.
His statement attacking Sinn Fein in the immediate aftermath of Omagh was simply crass.
His ignoring Gerry Adams's condemnation of the murderous bomb is bad politics.
His refusal to discuss plans for progress in the assembly in September is ominous.
Trimble is asking the republican movement to put the cart before the horse. He refuses to admit that the process is an elaborate game of trade-offs. It's going to take two years, maybe longer.
The IRA won't hand over any weapons or material until the British have scaled down their military presence, withdrawn to barracks and demolished a significant number of strong points. They certainly won't issue an order to dump arms and formally call off the campaign until all prisoners have been released.
Sinn Fein and the IRA will watch carefully to see if the Good Friday agreement is being implemented in letter and spirit and at appropriate stages will utter soothing statements if they're satisfied with progress.
You can see a complex arrangement of bargaining counters, chips, cards, whatever metaphor you want to choose, being played out: prisoners, ministerial posts, statements, troop reductions, police reform, reforms to justice and the legal system and so on.
This process makes problems for Trimble within his own party and from snipers like McCartney and Paisley outside.
These lead him stupidly to demand Sinn Fein get to the end of the process immediately by handing over all their bargaining counters in one go and preferably at the outset.
He's asking the impossible and by doing so it means in his own unerring way he hands his opponents within unionism sticks with which to beat him.
His remarks are indistinguishable from those of the DUP and seem designed to prevent him ever sitting down with Sinn Fein as he must if the agreement is to work.
It's not only republicans who should be trying to build unionists' confidence: it's long past time when Trimble should have begun building up unionist confidence instead of fuelling suspicion and mistrust.
Most of his present difficulties are of his own making.
In his disastrous referendum and assembly election campaigns he repeatedly raised issues which were of help only to Paisley and McCartney.
Until Blair arrived like the cavalry Trimble's blundering looked set to lose the referendum on the unionist side.
Can nobody get to him and tell him that the peace process is a process which will continue for years and that his demand for a product before the machinery is built will yield something shapeless and half-baked?
Perhaps it's because the negotiations over the timing of exchanging bargaining counters are between Sinn Fein and the British and Irish governments.
Perhaps it should all be made more explicit so that poor old Trimble doesn't feel the need to keep explaining each move as a further concession to Sinn Fein, so that the DUP can rant about appeasement. Perhaps Trimble always looks so angry because he can't participate in the game the British and republicans are playing.
Whatever the reason, the functioning of the assembly is part of the rules of the game and Trimble's attempts to stall it damage the primacy of politics for which people here voted resoundingly.
The answer to the horrors of Omagh is to proceed with all deliberate speed towards politics and stop fighting the war against republicanism. They're on side.
Brian Feeney ON WEDNESDAY
THE cabinet meets at 10.15 in Dublin this morning to endorse joint proposals from Irish and British security advisers for a crackdown on the so-called Real IRA. Let's hope that's not the only response or even the main response after Omagh.
For decades people argued for the primacy of politics and the superiority of the ballot over the bullet. The referendums north and south and the assembly elections have established this.
As a result, one of the developments people are looking forward to is the progressive dismantling of the military and security apparatus which has been constructed over the last 30 years. The British government had already begun to remove the oppressive legislation devised and maintained in the north since 1921.
Of course there has to be a security response to the savagery in Omagh. Now that the primacy of politics has been established it has to be defended. The democratic will of the Irish people must be protected from the sort of assault the Real IRA has unleashed.
But Ireland can't and shouldn't be turned into an undemocratic state because of the threat from a few dozen fanatics who have no electoral support and precious little of any other kind.
Any response has to be measured and not an obvious knee jerk.
The sort of badly-thought-out hasty legislation Roy Jenkins rushed through after the Birmingham bombs in 1974 caused untold misery and proved very difficult to remove from the statute book. Therefore it's important that it is the Irish government introducing new measures for at least four reasons:
First, Irish ministers and their advisers are aware of the sensitivities of these issues; secondly, the main activists responsible for the recent murders live in the Republic; third, there's general support for the security apparatus in the Republic; and fourth, rigorous action supported by republicans and nationalists throughout Ireland should provide some confidence for unionists.
All that said the primacy of the political process is what counts.
That means pressing on with the implementation of the agreement to show that political leaders are united in refusing to be thrown off course by a minority of nutters.
So far this week David Trimble has hit a series of jarring notes.
His statement attacking Sinn Fein in the immediate aftermath of Omagh was simply crass.
His ignoring Gerry Adams's condemnation of the murderous bomb is bad politics.
His refusal to discuss plans for progress in the assembly in September is ominous.
Trimble is asking the republican movement to put the cart before the horse. He refuses to admit that the process is an elaborate game of trade-offs. It's going to take two years, maybe longer.
The IRA won't hand over any weapons or material until the British have scaled down their military presence, withdrawn to barracks and demolished a significant number of strong points. They certainly won't issue an order to dump arms and formally call off the campaign until all prisoners have been released.
Sinn Fein and the IRA will watch carefully to see if the Good Friday agreement is being implemented in letter and spirit and at appropriate stages will utter soothing statements if they're satisfied with progress.
You can see a complex arrangement of bargaining counters, chips, cards, whatever metaphor you want to choose, being played out: prisoners, ministerial posts, statements, troop reductions, police reform, reforms to justice and the legal system and so on.
This process makes problems for Trimble within his own party and from snipers like McCartney and Paisley outside.
These lead him stupidly to demand Sinn Fein get to the end of the process immediately by handing over all their bargaining counters in one go and preferably at the outset.
He's asking the impossible and by doing so it means in his own unerring way he hands his opponents within unionism sticks with which to beat him.
His remarks are indistinguishable from those of the DUP and seem designed to prevent him ever sitting down with Sinn Fein as he must if the agreement is to work.
It's not only republicans who should be trying to build unionists' confidence: it's long past time when Trimble should have begun building up unionist confidence instead of fuelling suspicion and mistrust.
Most of his present difficulties are of his own making.
In his disastrous referendum and assembly election campaigns he repeatedly raised issues which were of help only to Paisley and McCartney.
Until Blair arrived like the cavalry Trimble's blundering looked set to lose the referendum on the unionist side.
Can nobody get to him and tell him that the peace process is a process which will continue for years and that his demand for a product before the machinery is built will yield something shapeless and half-baked?
Perhaps it's because the negotiations over the timing of exchanging bargaining counters are between Sinn Fein and the British and Irish governments.
Perhaps it should all be made more explicit so that poor old Trimble doesn't feel the need to keep explaining each move as a further concession to Sinn Fein, so that the DUP can rant about appeasement. Perhaps Trimble always looks so angry because he can't participate in the game the British and republicans are playing.
Whatever the reason, the functioning of the assembly is part of the rules of the game and Trimble's attempts to stall it damage the primacy of politics for which people here voted resoundingly.
The answer to the horrors of Omagh is to proceed with all deliberate speed towards politics and stop fighting the war against republicanism. They're on side.
Further Information
Publisher: THE IRISH NEWS
Ref: IN/0093
Published Date: 19-Aug-98
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