UNIONISTS are right. The conciliation of Sinn Fein and the IRA is not the only route towards the establishment of peace in Northern Ireland. There are three other options:
. An agreement between constitutional nationalists and unionists.
. The military defeat of the IRA.
. The political defeat of Sinn Fein and the IRA.
Unionists may also be right about any future IRA ceasefire being merely a tactic in the ongoing "armed struggle".
The most plausible of the alternative options in doing a deal with Sinn Fein is the defeat of the republican movement politically. This strategy is founded on the belief that violence can persist only in circumstances of continuing uncertainty over the constitutional future of Northern Ireland.
This thesis is almost certainly true. It is inconceivable that people would continue to take such risks with their lives and their liberties in the pursuit of a case that was seen to be hopeless.
Therefore, if the British government was now to abandon the Anglo Irish Agreement, remove from the Government all influence over Northern Ireland policy and integrate Northern Ireland fully into the United Kingdom after a relatively short time four or five years at most the IRA campaign would fizzle out.
It would also be possible to defeat the IRA militarily. This could be done through the introduction of internment North and South and the pursuit of the policies enacted by the last Labour Northern Secretary, Mr Roy Mason.
These latter policies included the infliction of physical and psychological pressure on suspects under interrogation to "persuade" them to reveal information about the plans, structures and membership of the IRA. They also included the military saturation of nationalist areas and a general exertion of military pressure on those nationalist communities believed to be most tolerant of IRA activities.
Such policies very nearly destroyed the IRA in the late 1970s. What rescued the IRA then was the mishandling of the 1981 hunger strike by the British government.
It may also be possible for the unionists to do a deal with the SDLP on the reform of the Northern Ireland state, involving institutional links with the Republic. Catholics are now prepared, for the first time, to accept the Northern state if they see it is reformed. Sinn Fein's involvement in such a deal is not essential to its viability. But
The IRA demoralisation strategy, while in theory possibly the most effective, in reality is not "on". This is because of its essence it requires the enthusiastic support of the people in England, Scotland and Wales, along with their political representatives, and this is lacking.
Quite simply, there are no unionists left, or almost no unionists. Essentially, unionism entails a denial of any right of secession. Finchley, for instance, has no right to secede from Britain. Northern Ireland has, and almost nobody disputes that, including the "unionists" of Northern Ireland. Therefore there is an uncertainty about the constitutional position of Northern Ireland from the outset.
BUT apart from that, there is no will on the part of the British people or political establishment to integrate Northern Ireland into the United Kingdom, as some sections of the Ulster Unionist Party would wish. The removal of the constitutional uncertainty that the IRA demoralisation strategy entails is not possible politically.
The military options would be very expensive and probably not "on" politically.
It would be hugely expensive in terms of the damage that would be caused by an intensified IRA campaign which the military options would initially provoke.
A majority Fianna Fail government could get away politically with joining in the internment of suspected IRA members, if that was all the military option entailed. However, that is not all it would entail and, unavoidably, the British army and the RUC would become embroiled in politically unacceptable operations, such as the brutalisation of "suspects", and make further engagement by the Government in this strategy unlikely.
This leaves the option of attempting to conclude a deal between the unionists and the SDLP, mainly along the lines of the Framework Document and not much different from what Sinn Fein (or its leadership) would agree to if it were involved in the talks.
This would have the advantage of denying the IRA any appearance of reward for the resumption of military activity and rendering the all party negotiations easier in the absence of the "provocative" presence of Sinn Fein.
The difficulty with this option is that if Sinn Fein is excluded, the IRA campaign is likely to resume to its levels of 1993. This will provoke a military response from the security forces and from the loyalist paramilitaries, with the likelihood of atrocities on all sides.
All party talks in such circumstances are unlikely to get anywhere. This is all the more true in the crucial area of policing. Effectively, the IRA has been able in the past to frustrate any agreement being arrived at by the "moderates", and this is likely to happen again. So back to the option of involving Sinn Fein in the talks.
The downsides are (1) the involvement of Sinn Fein in the all party talks after the Adare murder and the Manchester bomb will suggest to the IRA that it can act with impunity without the risk of any negative political fall out and (2) Sinn Fein's involvement in the talks in the absence of decommissioning will introduce an intimidatory element to the negotiations, which will bias any outcome unfairly and in a manner likely to cause future resentment and instability.
These are substantial considerations, but they must be weighed against the advantage of Sinn Fein's involvement in the talks.
THAT advantage is that any agreement reached by the main parties, whether assented to by Sinn Fein or not, is more likely to frustrate any future republican campaign of violence than an agreement reached through any other means.
Furthermore, the traditional republican justifications for violence would be blunted by the ratification of the outcome of such talks by referendums throughout the island. Such ratification, in the absence of Sinn Fein's participation in the process that brought about the agreement, would have far less persuasive effect with this disaffected minority.
This strategy is not without its risks and difficulties, but it is the best of the available options.
Sinn Fein's participation in the talks must, therefore, remain the prime objective of the two governments in spite of the recent outrages.