When Police Ombudsman Nuala O'Loan's report on the Omagh bombing excoriated RUC handling of the atrocity and its aftermath, it was to be expected the Chief Constable would have strong feelings about it. It was also to be expected the media would be interested in those feelings. In short, Ronnie Flanagan wasn't going to have to do much to attract attention to the issue.
So it was a surprise when he announced he would commit suicide in public if the O'Loan report stood. This melodrama ensured the world knew Flanagan didn't accept O'Loan's criticisms, but created little clarity on why those criticisms should be rejected. Having attracted the attention, he then failed to provide the specific rebuttal evidence to disprove the O'Loan thesis. Instead of making a cogent case for the exceptional methods a Special Branch may employ to combat terrorism, he merely drew attention to his own feelings in a way calculated to make the most disinterested bystander take a long, hard look at his character and stability.
He did have the wit to backtrack fairly promptly, saying he might have been a tad emotional when he threatened to do himself in. No kidding. I suppose it's good to know it's only when he's really ratty, he'll threaten suicide-as-public-spectacle. If he was less annoyed he would probably menace us with no more than a little self-mutilation.
The initial threat, nonetheless, undermined the man, the new Police Service of Northern Ireland, and the countering of the Ombudsman's report. When you're in command of men and women whose lives may depend on your judgment, you get no free pass for the day you're tired and emotional. The test of command is how a man comports himself under extreme pressure, not how he performs when things are motoring smoothly. Not since Alexander Haig claimed to be completely in control of America (when he demonstrably wasn't) has someone in such a prestigious and pivotal position so spectacularly lost his marbles.
He did not, however, find himself without friends. Peter Mandelson, a latter-day marine, came to Flanagan's support, giving new life to the old saying that with friends like him, you don't need enemies. "If the Chief Constable was human, he would be at the end of his tether. But I know he is stronger and tougher than that," Mandelson said.
This incoherent support suggested:
a) the Chief Constable was something other than human, and
b) wasn't at the end of his tether.
Now, whatever about the humanity, threatening to end your life publicly is as near to the end of a tether as most of us ever get. By way of assisting Ronnie Flanagan to retreat from the end of his personal tether, the former Northern Secretary then weighed in with classic Mandy slithery non-specific spin. The report may have damaged O'Loan's credibility, he opined, since it came over as "slightly vindictive". He quoted no quotes, provided no evidence. Just delivered broad-brush, impressionistic smear. Mo Mowlam would recognise the style.
If O'Loan's report fails to understand the nature of Special Branch policing, contains inaccuracies or is made up of "sweeping generalisations", as has been suggested, Flanagan was perfectly placed to list and scotch each inaccuracy or generalisation. He had the time to do that, since O'Loan gave him a copy of the report in advance of presenting it to the relatives of the Omagh dead, the group she believed should know what was in it before it was released to the media. The advance provision of the document would have allowed him to prepare a considered response, explain the apparent decision not to respond to a tip-off about the bombing before it happened, and justify actions taken, or not taken, by the RUC in the aftermath of the worst atrocity experienced in Northern Ireland. Such a considered, evidence-based response would have been the dignified option and might have protected the reputation of the Chief Constable and his force at a difficult time.
Instead, Ronnie Flanagan did a Grand Old Duke of York, marching up to the possibility of public hara-kiri and then talking his way back down from it.
In the process, he did neither the police nor his own reputation any favours. Of course the report, whether flawed or flawless, is an painful blow in the final months of his incumbency. What is sad is that this man responded with such counter-productive intemperance, a man who has, with commitment and courage, brought the police through years of horror to the once unimaginable point where a new combined insignia could be incorporated in the force's livery.
At first reading, it must have been clear the Ombudsman's report would give succour to those who wanted a stick to beat the police, and, at the other end of the continuum, would further confirm, for an embattled unionist community, that the sacrifice of life and limb throughout the years by members of the force was neither valued nor validated. But there was always going to be a second reading. And a third. This was a report which would be perused, parsed, challenged.
What was needed, to inform that process, was a calm, reasoned - and not instant - response. Flanagan should have known that, of all the options open to him, histrionics was not the way to go.
Terry Prone works for Carr Communications in Dublin. John Waters is on leave