A day after the US State Department warned the IRA about links with a Colombian terrorist group, reaction in the US was muted as questions mounted about what the effect of any US action against the IRA would mean.
On Thursday the State Department spokesman, Mr Philip Reecker, warned that the IRA could face penalties if links between it and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia group (FARC) were proven.
"We would be concerned if it were established that the Irish Republican Army were assisting, sharing information or in any way collaborating with a violent terrorist organisation such as the FARC," Mr Reecker said.
Three men closely linked to the IRA were arrested this week in Colombia and were accused by Colombian authorities of aiding FARC.
Colombian officials have said they will wait several days before deciding whether to officially charge the men with any crimes.
The primary question in the US is whether the administration plans to put the IRA back on its list of designated "foreign terrorist organisations".
The IRA was on that list until 1997, when it was removed because of its commitment to a ceasefire. Today, FARC and nearly 30 other groups are on the list.
The practical effect of being on the list is that it makes it a crime to provide funds or material support to the named groups.
It denies visas to "aliens abroad who are members or representatives" of the groups and it also requires American banks to block funds under control of the groups.
The question, of course, is whether a return of the IRA to the list would prohibit American funds being sent to Sinn Fein.
Funds raised by Irish-Americans are a considerable source of revenue to Sinn Fein.
Numerous calls to the State Department to clarify the precise meaning of the statement were not returned.
But the stinging editorial in Thursday's Washington Post, which criticised Mr Gerry Adams and Sinn Fein for failing to deliver on decommissioning, concluded that Mr Adams used to have friends in Washington, but the band was dwindling now.