Senior security figures on both sides of the Border have had nagging doubts about the latest IRA ceasefire but, until recent weeks, have outwardly accepted that this ceasefire was appreciably more solid than the previous one.
Since July 14th, the Garda and RUC could detect no IRA arms movements, no weapons training, targeting of security force targets in the North and no punishment shootings or beatings. These activities had continued during the previous 17-month ceasefire from September 1994.
During that period, the IRA, under the Direct Action Against Drugs alias, shot dead eight people, more than it killed during the period from February 1996 to July this year when it resumed its "armed struggle".
In the Republic, the Government responded with the early release of prisoners from Portlaoise. The British government embarked on a series of measures including the removal of internment from the statute books, the ending of orders excluding people from Britain and a promise to reduce the military presence in the North by 35 per cent.
Last Wednesday, it began again. Tone Donnelly (21), from west Belfast, who has minor convictions for larceny, was abducted and shot in the back of each knee by an IRA punishment squad. He may be permanently crippled. People in the area say word has been spreading that the punishment shootings were returning and that there would also be a return of the DAAD shootings.
It also emerged that both political and military republicans were quitting the organisation in the south Armagh-north Louth area. According to local people, a number of key IRA figures in Crossmaglen, Migh, Silverbridge and Jonesboro have left.
Local sources say there had been growing disillusionment in the area, not just from ideological differences over things like the Mitchell Principles, but also over more mundane matters like the fact that both the RUC and British army have been moving freely around the area since the ceasefire was re-established.
It has been particularly galling for local IRA figures to be stopped by the RUC on roads where the police had not previously been able to operate during daylight, and have their cars checked for faults and tax, locals say.
The extent of the resignations in the south Armagh IRA is not clear yet. It is also not clear yet if IRA members in other key areas like east Tyrone will follow suit. According to sources in the North, there is concern that there will be resignations right along the Border and into republican strong holds in the mid-Ulster area.
There is no obvious sign of the dissent spreading to the urban areas, however, where there is still said to be strong support for the ceasefire. Belfast and Derry are said to be solidly behind the political leadership of Mr Gerry Adams and Mr Martin McGuinness.
Donegal is also said to be stron gly behind the ceasefire and political leadership of the local Sinn Fein figure, Mr Pat Doherty.
In an attempt to gauge which way the divisions are developing in the IRA, the gardai are keeping watch on a number of key figures.
One is said to be the IRA's director of operations. Like at least two of the other senior figures rep orted to have resigned positions in the leadership in the last month, he is formerly from Northern Ireland and has been living in the Republic since going on the run from the security forces there more than a decade ago. He is a Tyrone man living in Co Cavan.
He is known to be close to the Belfast man living in the Dundalk area who reputedly held the position of IRA quartermaster until he resigned last month. If both the quartermaster and director of operations of the IRA were to be seen to leave, it can be assumed a serious rift in the organisation could be on the way.
By the end of last week no source was prepared to put a figure on the number of resignations. The groups involved are among the most secretive and traditionally most immune to intelligence penetration. It may even be that the republicans themselves do not know the level of the dissent.
The dissidents are leaking out small amounts of information to journalists. There was an expectation at the weekend they would put forward the sister of one of the Maze hunger strikers as their spokeswoman. She was scheduled to give an interview to a New York radio station, but this was cancelled. Reports say it has been re-scheduled for next weekend.
If the dissidents promote their cause in New York, this would, at least, be highly embarrassing to the Sinn Fein leadership, which is increasingly relying on legitimate US fund-raising to finance its operations. If they go public, it is expected they will say their concerns lie primarily with the Mitchell Principles.
The dissidents apparently see these and the Strand One talks about setting up an assembly in Northern Ireland with cross-Border institutions as completely contrary to the "green book" rules, which preclude participation in any process not designed to bring about a 32-county socialist republic.
To this extent the IRA dissidents share the same ideas as Mr Ruairi O Bradaigh's Republican Sinn Fein splinter group and its military wing, the Continuity IRA. However, both republican and security sources say there is no immediate likelihood of the dissidents moving towards the Continuity IRA camp. Even the most hardline of the dissident republicans are said to regard the RSF/CIRA group as dangerous amateurs.
The dissent among the disaffected is also directed at the leadership of Mr Adams, who is accused of having developed a personality cult and of leading the organisation towards accepting an internal settlement.
He has faced previous challenges to his authority. In 1986, he consolidated his political leadership of the republican movement when he saw off the element led by former SF president, Mr O Bradaigh, who left and set up RSF.
At about the same time, IRA supporters of Mr Adams in Belfast gathered around him to see off a challenge from the then IRA brigade commander in Belfast. He was literally surrounded by gunmen loyal to Mr Adams, disarmed and forced out of the organisation.
Since then, his leadership has been largely unchallenged, even as he led the IRA into the peace process and two ceasefires. Usually reliable security sources say reports of the latest divisions emerged after the organisation held a snap meeting of its military leadership in a south Donegal town last month, at which figures close to the Sinn Fein leadership were voted onto the ruling Provisional Army Council.
A number of purely military figures, who have been known to be opposed to Mr Adams's leadership, were displeased.
It appears to be accepted that a number of important figures, including the quartermaster, resigned their positions but did not leave the organisation. It cannot be ascertained if this constitutes a move against the leadership - and the possibility of a resumed military campaign - or if they are just walking away from a process which they believe will lead to an internal settlement in the North of which they want no part. If it is serious, it could precipitate the leadership into the same position in which it found itself at the end of the last ceasefire - having to revert to war to stop the organisation from splitting.
Until the position becomes clear, the security forces in the North have been put on alert about the possibility of a renewal of IRA attacks.