More than 10 years after the first IRA ceasefire, the advantages of having an "undefeated" standing army must be a decidedly mixed blessing for the republican political leadership.
The acceptance of military defeat by republicans in 1923, which ended the Civil War, blocked off certain paths and made for greater political clarity among its leaders.
The year 1924 was one in which Sinn Féin and the IRA, like today, were different faces of the one movement.
Fr J. Anthony Gaughan's Austin Stack: Portrait of a Separatist, published in 1977, prints in an addendum minutes kept by Mary MacSwiney of a meeting of Comhairle na dTeachtaí on August 7th to 8th and presided over by Eamon de Valera.
It was made up of republican deputies of the second Dáil as well as those elected in the pact election of June 1922 and in the general election of August 1923.
At that time "faithful" members of the second Dáil claimed to be an emergency government de jure, not in a position to exercise its functions de facto.
Interesting from today's viewpoint is their discussion on what was legitimate and permissible.
Seán McEntee raised the issue as to whether they should have the wide powers of a validly established and constituted government over the life and property of every citizen.
If so, he could not assent to that, as a government using such powers must be freely chosen by the people under no duress whatever and govern with the assent of the majority.
De Valera agreed that they had no power of life and death, and that "we can have no sanction of force". Outside a war situation, he could not be a member of a government arrogating to itself such powers, unless it was both the de jure and the de facto government of the country.
"The criminal side is a matter we will not be able to deal with except by public opinion and expulsion from the body of citizenry," de Valera said. The following day he repeated: "We will not permit or sanction any executions."
Countess Markievicz stated: "If we attempt to execute a man for common murder we should be acting as a junta."
De Valera went on to say that if the army disobeyed or any attempt was made to take life, they would immediately disclaim all responsibility and regard those responsible as traitors. It would never be that simple.
Today we all believe that we have peace, even though the republican movement has never formally declared, as de Valera did in May 1923, that "the war, so far as we are concerned, is finished".
Even in terms of republican ideology, leaving aside Sinn Féin's signed-up commitment to the Mitchell Principles, how can a peacetime IRA usurp powers of justice that belong only to legitimately constituted government, clearly defined and ratified by the people in the Good Friday agreement, which includes the present fallback position of direct rule with British-Irish consultation?
How can shootings, robberies and intimidation be legitimised by their alleged political purpose or be other than criminal?
It would help enormously in the present fraught situation if there was clarity about this. There will never be agreement about the IRA campaign, which most people abhorred. Making its cessation complete in all its manifestations is the sine qua non of democratic progress in Ireland and of a viable and sustainable political dynamic.
A good deal of sense and nonsense is spoken at ardfheiseanna, Sinn Féin's included. At one level it would be hard to fault the content of the passionate statements by Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness on bringing to justice those involved in slaughtering Robert McCartney, even if republican reaction to popular feeling was distinctly tardy. Results are needed.
Denis Bradley, vice-chairman of the Northern Ireland Policing Board, put his finger on it when on RTÉ Radio's Morning Ireland last Wednesday, he partly attributed the current contortions of the republican movement to its determination to try and avoid giving any support or credibility to new policing, an issue still being ruthlessly exploited as an electoral battering-ram against the SDLP.
Yet it is Sinn Féin that is outside the nationalist consensus on this. The McCartney family wants justice in the courts, not a compounding of the original offence by the IRA.
The IRA's Green Book, with its cringe-making ideology of an anonymous and wholly unaccountable paramilitary "government of the Irish Republic", belongs to the era of Ruairí Ó Brádaigh and its obsolete doctrines. How far Adams's apparent recognition last weekend of the legitimacy of this republic has been internalised by the movement is unclear.
Nonsense includes the demonisation of Eoin MacNeill's grandson, Minister for Justice Michael McDowell, who articulates in no understated fashion the impatience of people who feel the process has been dragged out for far too long and who now demand clarity. Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, for his part, is more concerned to win the peace rather than win the argument.
The claim by Mitchel McLaughlin that all that survives of the peace process is the IRA ceasefire, as if they were somehow the heroes of the hour, is nonsensical.
Did no one with an ounce of political savvy have advance sight of the IRA statement? The chasm in mentality and in values to be bridged represents an awesome challenge.
No one in the governments or other political parties has the stomach for a further painstaking attempt to put the institutions back, if it is only to see them collapse again within a few weeks or months because of a further breach of trust, lukewarm IRA commitment and a refusal to carry out what is required to restore confidence.
A self-styled revolutionary party may not attach much importance to stability, preferring to demand a Green Paper on a united Ireland rather than knuckle down to making the Good Friday agreement work.
Political leadership and realism of a very high order are needed.