Unionist voters have brought the Belfast Agreement to the point of crisis and possible collapse. However, this is a moment of critical choice and definition for unionism, too. In these two articles, Frank Millar, London Editor, examines the hard choices facing the DUP and UUP as a result of last week's decisions by the unionist electorate.
Can Robinson deliver Paisley for a deal?
Can the pragmatist within Peter Robinson prevail against the resurgent force which is Paisleyism? That is the question exercising the British and Irish governments as they contemplate a Review which the DUP insists will amount to a re-negotiation of the Belfast Agreement.
It implies no disrespect to the DUP deputy leader to suggest that they might just be focused on the wrong man and asking the wrong question. Moreover, it is possible that a misinterpretation of the respective positions of the two men could badly skew the governmental response to the changed political landscape in Northern Ireland.
The focus on Mr Peter Robinson is easy to understand. Dr Ian Paisley has hardly cultivated a reputation for compromising and deal-making. He is the original No man of unionist politics, down the years the periodic and last recourse of Protestants terrorised by the IRA and ever-fearful of British betrayal.
Look no further for explanation as to why even middle-class unionists - while professing themselves appalled by his anti-Catholicism and the image he projects to the wider world - have repeatedly put him top-of-the-poll in the European elections. "We need a strong voice out there" is how such voters rationalise their choice, where they admit having made it.
Repeatedly under-estimated, Dr Paisley's earlier successes also encouraged some to misunderstand the man and his mission. In the end a politician like any other, they reasoned, he would surely want to crown his career by taking high office and making the inevitable transition from opposition to government.
However to his supporters Dr Paisley is first and foremost, the leader of "the loyal" opposition and last line of defence against the perpetual push for a united Ireland. Hence now, as Malachi O'Doherty observed on Saturday in the Guardian, the Protestant community has retained him to counter what he termed Sinn Féin's mandate to "reject the police and continue supporting the IRA".
The surprise is that anyone should be surprised.
Unionist disaffection with the Belfast Agreement was apparent even before David Trimble's pro-Agreement majority was exhausted in the last Assembly over two years ago. The resulting difficulty for the DUP however - and the major worry for the two governments - is that many who voted for the Paisley party last week are rather more interested in bringing down the existing agreement than they are concerned with the detail of what, if anything, might replace it.
Dr Paisley and his colleagues might reasonably object to this. It is true that opposition to the Belfast Agreement does not necessarily equate with antipathy to a genuine peace process or a lack of desire for an alternative form of government in the North acceptable to a majority of unionists as well as nationalists. Yet it is equally valid to observe that the DUP did not present the detail of its alternative to the electorate. Moreover, Dr Paisley's public demeanour is hardly preparing his constituency for the messy compromises and hard choices which will be necessary to make it a reality.
Understandable, then, the hope is reposed in Mr Robinson, the public face of the alternative DUP personality.
Nor is this 'Robinson-as-moderniser' a media fiction.
The East Belfast MP's talents naturally attract the spotlight. To which, should be added, that he has courted the assessment in some official circles in Dublin, London and Washington that he is a man with whom serious business can ultimately be done. A good head on his shoulders, he also has street craft in abundance. Cold as well as cool, friends dismiss criticism of his public persona, observing that David Trimble is not exactly everyone's idea of an easy personality. They also confirm he is capable of being much more pragmatic than his hard-man image would suggest.
The doubt is about how much pragmatism Dr Paisley will allow. Here's the really important message from last week's election: whether or not his health is failing, Dr Paisley's mental powers are not in decline and he shows every intention of retaining control. If a deal is to be done any time soon, it will have to be with him. Whatever fond hopes were previously entertained by governments, it will certainly not be done behind his back.
Can Trimble lead the UUP into another election?
Mr David Trimble believes the DUP won the election on the basis of a lie and will be quickly found out. For the time being at least, his survival strategy appears to be to sit back and wait for it to happen.
The Ulster Unionist leader assumes London/Dublin fidelity equal to his own and that Sinn Féin, likewise, is serious when it asserts there can be no renegotiation of the Belfast Agreement.
The implication of his weekend remarks is that he expects the two governments to subject the DUP's "alternative" proposals to a speedy test; that they will be inevitably found wanting; and that the British Prime Minister will then call another election in an effort to break the deadlock. Mr Trimble has also made it clear he intends to lead his party into any such contest and considers his responsibility to unionism actually increased as a result of last week's outcome.
This is not delusional, as some might think - even if Mr Trimble shows extraordinary complacency in suggesting his party will be delighted to have retained its vote and gained an extra seat.
Dr Paisley dismisses the threat of another election, confident it would only replicate the original result.
He may well be right. However, that the option is seriously entertained in some British government circles appears to serve notice on the DUP that it cannot presume lengthy "process" without conclusion until after a general election (18 months away) in which it will hope to consolidate its position as the major unionist party.
Suppose Mr Trimble's assessment of the DUP is wrong? If Dr Paisley accommodates himself to "the fundamentals" of the existing agreement, this still means the principle of consent, power sharing, and formal North-South and East-West structures. In such circumstances, it is not clear why unionist voters would continue to punish the UUP. It is also possible that a thus "compromised" DUP might forfeit some of its traditional support.
If, on the other hand, Mr Trimble proves correct, might not a second majority for the DUP be depicted as one for stalemate and an enthusiastic resumption of direct rule augmented by an enhanced Anglo-Irish intergovernmental partnership? Mr Trimble is right to keep his party focused on the opinion poll evidence that a majority of unionist voters would like the agreement to work provided there are paramilitary "acts of completion".
The DUP ascendancy might also be expected to concentrate Ulster Unionist thoughts on the battle for hearts and minds outside Northern Ireland - most crucially in the rest of the United Kingdom. The DUP brand and image does not travel well and members of both parties must surely shudder at the realisation that the British government is less bothered by the triumph of Sinn Féin and the demise of the SDLP than by the choice of unionist champion. It is plainly not in unionism's interest to be permanently estranged from the senior partner in the Union.
If - as they gleefully and perhaps unwisely predict - the DUP is bound to fail, it would seem all the more crucial that the Ulster Unionists provide a leadership capable of commanding a sympathetic hearing in Britain.
Even his fiercest critics acknowledge Mr Trimble's skills and standing as a formidable unionist asset.
His biggest problem may be in presenting himself as the man to deliver unionism from a mess the majority of his own people think of his making. In addition, his survival strategy would seem to require Mr Blair to move with speed.
Would unionist voters think it reasonable or fair for the British government to seek to bypass the DUP after barely five months (to allow for a June election) after the false starts, suspensions and eventual failure of the past five years? Can Mr Blair decide on any future strategy until the UUP resolves the leadership issue once and for all?
The party might well decide that a Reg Empey/Jeffrey Donaldson "dream ticket" would represent the necessary combination to protect its existing support and win back deserters. However if Mr Trimble wants to retain his leadership, he should not wait for the long-predicted challenge but instead bring matters to a head himself. Whatever its choice, the UUP cannot continue as before.