In the end the parties brought themselves - and, patently reluctantly, the two governments - to the only decision ever really possible. The Ulster Democratic Party could not remain in the talks process without irreparable damage to the principles on which the process itself is supposedly founded.
Sinn Fein told Dr Mo Mowlam long before Christmas of its certain belief that the UDA had been involved in a number of sectarian killings. That assumption was commonplace within the wider nationalist community before Dr Mowlam's now-highly-controversial visit to the Maze Prison to meet UDA and UFF prisoners, under threat of the end of their ceasefire.
At her press conference yesterday afternoon, the Northern Ireland Secretary conceded that the RUC Chief Constable had confirmed the breach of the UDA ceasefire to her on January 12th. She was rather less explicit about what actions she took during the intervening 10 days before Mr Flanagan ) upended the entire process with his public comments last Thursday.
Dr Mowlam indicated that she needed to consult with the Irish Government and with the other parties; that events had made that consultation process difficult; and that the talks process itself was the proper theatre in which to consider the issue of the UDP's continued participation.
Her answer, however, appeared only to fortify the suspicion of some talks participants that the two governments had been content to cling to the fig leaf that there was no ["]conclusive["] proof. Indeed there was speculation in nationalist circles last night that the Chief Constable may have felt forced to act to preserve the credibility of his force in face of apparent government inactivity. But that is speculation. What we do know is that a number of the parties to the process canvassed last night said they had not been consulted. When Mr David Trimble raised his suspicion that ["]a number of the parties["] in the talks were engaged in violence with Dr Mowlam last Tuesday, he says he was told that was not what the Chief Constable was saying. And on Thursday morning, barely hours before the Chief Constable went public, a senior Irish Government source said there was no ["]hard proof["] the ceasefire had been broken. Such were the obvious implications of Mr Flanagan's comments, that some seasoned commentators wondered why he had acted as he did - and whether he had advised the Secretary of State of his intentions. One well-placed British source on Friday insisted he had given Dr Mowlam notice, if not a great deal of it. And Irish sources said they were advised some hours before the words were spoken. But whatever about who said what to whom and when, it seems clear now that Dr Mowlam - and presumably her Irish counterpart, Mr Andrews - had been struggling with their problem of conflicting moralities for longer than the past long weekend.
There was some initial cover for the two governments as the mainstream parties in the North reacted slowly, with obvious reluctance, and in some apparent confusion, to ["]the moral dilemma" into which the Chief Constable's words - and the subsequent UFF statement - had thrown the process.
On Friday night members of the SDLP's negotiating team were insistent they did not want the UDP expelled, one explicitly telling The Irish Times that it would result in the collapse of the process. The Ulster Unionist leader, Mr Trimble, maintained he would not let the (British) government off the hook - that it alone had to decide if the Mitchell Principles any longer had meaning. And the initial prevarications - coupled with the UFF assertion that its ceasefire had been reinstated following a ["]measured military response["]
- encouraged an already sceptical media in the belief that no action would be taken. That position could not hold. The long fuse was slowly burning. As the parties consulted their own constituencies, the positions hardened. By Saturday Mr Seamus Mallon, the SDLP's deputy leader, was insisting the parties representing the para-militaries either ["]disavow["]
those responsible for the violence or leave the talks. By Sunday evening Mr John Hume had endorsed that position, by which time Mr Trimble was talking of ["]moral imperatives["]. Mr Gary McMichael and his UDP delegation knew the writing was on the wall as they walked into the arrivals hall at Heathrow on Sunday night. Yesterday morning in Lancaster House they faced a cross-party consensus - resisted only by the PUP, Labour and the Womens' Coalition - that they could not remain. Mr Mallon's invitation to ["]disavow["]
their colleagues was declined. And after several turns of the circle, and rather than face the ultimate humiliation of being asked to leave, they walked.
The impression from the two governments, however, was that they need not walk too far. Mr Andrews said he welcomed the prospect of their return ["]in due course["] given, as Dr Mowlam put it, confirmation of the ceasefire by events on the ground, supported by word and deed. Irish sources insisted that the two governments had been right to consult the parties, and that there had, in the end, been convergence on the UDP's fate. But for all Dr Mowlam's denials, it seemed clear that the hand of the two governments had been forced.
However if the SDLP/Alliance/Ulster Unionist coalition - augmented for entirely different reasons by Sinn Fein - had asserted itself, the question was: for how long?
SDLP sources insisted that the UDP's suspension could not be for less than the six-week period originally set to test the credibility of the second IRA ceasefire. But Mr Gerry Adams yesterday effectively warned against any cosy assumption about the UDP's early return. The UFF's assurance, he said, was not worth the paper on which it was written. Catholics were not a disposable commodity in what he characterised as a concerted unionist/loyalist effort to block progress. Even as he spoke, the UUP was giving notice of its intention to press for forensic evidence it believes will show that the IRA, too, has been in breach of its ceasefire. In such a climate Sinn Fein's hoped-for engagement with the UUP seemed as remote as ever.
Mr Adams yesterday had the opportunity to damn the governments whatever they did. He was able to point to the exit door because the talks process operated under rules resisted by Sinn Fein but set by London and Dublin. There could be no double standards, he insisted, observing the near-certainty that comparable evidence against the republicans would hardly have produced such a protracted bout of moral agonising.
And the ["]double standards["] argument clearly weighed with the Ulster Unionists, who realised that failure to act yesterday would have left them powerless to seek sanction against Sinn Fein should that situation present itself.
These are not calculations and manoeuvres which encourage confidence that agreement in this process will be found. Ironically, a glimmer of hope came from a dejected member of the UDP team as he trudged off into the dark night. He believed the exclusion was inevitable and could prove beneficial, in persuading the UFF to desist and to pressure the LVF to do likewise. The consequences if they didn't, he knew, were too horrible to contemplate. The hope is that his exiled colleagues will agree.