The Garda had been preparing to move against the `Real IRA' group before the Omagh explosion. A force of Special Branch officers, including detectives, surveillance and armed officers, was being assembled at the Special Detective Unit (SDU) headquarters, in Harcourt Square, Dublin, to take counter measures against the group.
Garda intelligence had indicated that the group was rapidly increasing in strength and by the start of the summer the Government had been informed that it was posing a very serious threat to the peace. The threat was already deemed sufficient to withdraw Special Branch officers who had been transferred to "ordinary crime" areas back into anti-subversive operations.
The force, taking up a considerable part of the Branch's available strength, was being assembled when the bomb went off.
It appears there was no intelligence about the movement of the Omagh bomb, so one of the initial imperatives will be to find out what caused the break in the previous run of successes against the dissident republicans.
As the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue, pointed out yesterday, the Garda i have had thwarted nine bomb attacks by the group up to June 23rd, when a car bomb was stopped on a Border road as it was being driven into Northern Ireland.
In the aftermath of this successful operation, however, it seems the dissidents changed their tactics and bombs began exploding again in Northern Ireland, at Newtownhamilton and Banbridge in the past month.
The RUC, too, seemed to have little insight into the activities of the group which had also increased the scale of its mortar attacks in the past month, mounting a single mortar attack on Newry RUC Station with a missile containing 200lb of explosive. The van used in this attack was bought earlier in the North, as was the car used in the Newtownhamilton bombing.
It is not known if there was any breakdown in communication between the two forces or whether they had both, albeit momentarily, lost touch with the group's activities during the summer. The RUC was under intense pressure during the summer as a result of the loyalist campaign surrounding Drumcree.
It has been a feature - in the aftermath of such atrocities in the past - for both forces and governments to try to exempt themselves from blame. However, it would seem logical that in the face of such a run of Garda successes the dissidents would seek to move their bomb-making operations into a part of Northern Ireland - like south Armagh - where there is still very little security force infiltration or presence.
Both Garda and Government sources are not responding to claims that the Republic's security forces were to blame for letting the Omagh bomb through. But it is known that the suggestions have caused annoyance.
On Monday the Garda Commissioner, Mr Pat Byrne, travelled north with his Deputy Commissioner with responsibility for operations, Mr Noel Conroy, to meet the RUC Chief Constable, Mr Ronnie Flanagan. Their discussions involved a broad outline of co-operative operations which could be undertaken against the group.
On their return, Mr Byrne and Mr Conroy stopped in Dundalk and met the two regional commanders with responsibility for policing in the Border area, Assistant Commissioners Tony Hickey and Kevin Carty.
An incident room was set up in Carrickmacross, Co Monaghan, under the direction of Assistant Commissioner Carty and the main operations against the `Real IRA' are expected to emanate from this headquarters.
Mr Carty has had a long and successful career in anti-terrorist operations, having countered IRA activity along the Border for many years. As a senior officer in the Crime and Security Branch during the mid-1990s he led successful arms searches in the south-west area, known as Operation Silo.
He had a spell in anti-drugs trafficking, during which he was involved in the seizure of 13 tons of cannabis at Urlingford, Co Kilkenny, in 1996.
His fellow regional commander in the Border area, Mr Tony Hickey, led the investigation into the criminal organisation whose members were responsible for the murder of the journalist, Veronica Guerin. The investigation was the largest and most complex ever undertaken by the Garda Siochana and has resulted in the disruption of organised crime in Dublin.
Over the next few weeks the Special Branch contingents in the Border areas will be bolstered by additional detectives and specialist officers from Dublin. The specialist armed squad known as the Emergency Response Unit (ERU), with between 40 to 50 officers, has already been posted to the Border along with the National Surveillance Unit, which is attached to the Crime and Security Branch at Garda Headquarters.
Across the Border the RUC has established what is understood to be a similarly strong squad of officers at Omagh barracks. The task force announced by Mr Flanagan on Monday is being supplemented by forensic experts from the London Metropolitan Force.
The Met's Commander, Mr David Vaness, immediately agreed to a request from Mr Flanagan for expert help.
The forensic examination of the wreckage of the Vauxhall Cavalier car used by the bombers will be a vital part of the overall investigation and could provide crucial evidence in any trial. The Met has the latest scientific equipment and expertise at its disposal for forensic examination of bomb wreckage. As in the case of the IRA bomb at Canary Wharf in February 1992, it can recover fingerprints and other forensic evidence, even after the largest explosion.
Mr Flanagan has appointed the deputy head of the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in Northern Ireland to head the task force in Omagh. Supt Eric Anderson, who is an acting Assistant Chief Constable with responsibility for crime, has considerable experience in anti-terrorist activity and was once responsible for Special Branch operations in Mid-Ulster area, which would cover the Omagh area.
In addition to the police forces there is military back-up in both jurisdictions. The Defence Forces are understood to have doubled their patrols in the Border area and there are now military patrols on permanent duty in the Cavan-Monaghan area.