Such has been the success of the semantic propaganda of those whose gamesmanship may yet plunge this country back into war that it is sometimes difficult to see beyond the language they use to the lack of logic beyond. A typical example was last week's summary of the post-Hillsborough Declaration situation by the Northern Secretary, Dr Mo Mowlam.
On the face of it, her remarks appeared even-handed enough. She was "concerned and angry" that the Belfast Agreement was being vandalised by "two of the parties". She went on: "It's a matter of the Ulster Unionists and Sinn Fein deciding whether they want to hold on to the political pro cess or whether they want to hold on to their pre condition on the one hand or adherence to non-decommissioning on the other . . . Sooner or later, the rest of the political parties and the two governments have got either to move them from those positions or face up to the fact that, because of this issue, these two parties will have been allowed to bring this agreement to an end".
On closer examination, cracks begin to appear in this ostensibly balanced summary. For one thing, it is not necessary that both Sinn Fein and the UUP be moved from their respective positions: the logjam could be dispersed by either party giving in. The question then arises as to which is best placed to do this; whether the UUP can more readily dispense with its "precondition" or Sinn Fein abandon its "adherence to non-decommissioning".
The trouble is that Sinn Fein does not have any "adherence to non-decommissioning". It is the IRA which appears to have, at least under present circumstances, such an adherence, and since the IRA has not signed up to the Belfast Agreement, it logically follows that of the two parties mentioned by Dr Mowlam, only the UUP has the capacity for immediate compromise on the decommissioning issue.
Common-sense observation of the events of recent years tells us that there is only one way to get the IRA to decommission its weaponry: stop asking it to do so. All but the most dishonest observers have come to admit that something profound has been occurring within republicanism and that there has been no reason to expect that such changes would not continue.
Two lengthy ceasefires, amounting to nearly five years of qualified peace, as well as a central involvement in constructing a political process intended to take over from armed struggle, must surely amount to more than a tactical manoeuvre. What paramilitary organisation would give up its most effective instrument for such an extended period without a sincere desire for a new way forward?
Even the most backward dog in the street now knows that the IRA wants peace, but everyone knows too that the IRA will not sue for peace. It is not a question simply of paramilitary pride, but of the IRA's capacity to detach from the conflict in a manner which will neither detract from the "legitimacy" of the organisation's activities over the past three decades nor in some way discount the moral claims of those who will continue to make the nationalist/republican case at the talks table.
It should by now be obvious that the decommissioning issue has been pursued in order to prevent decommissioning taking place, so as to, by extension, prevent republicanism moving forward into the constitutional arena.
Contrary to the propaganda, volunteers do not embark on involvements with paramilitary organisations with a view to making careers out of killing and maiming their fellow human beings. The role of violence, from their perspective, is to create political momentum which they believe cannot otherwise be achieved. Once alternatives are created, it follows that violence becomes obsolete. The IRA, clearly, had already reached that point in August 1994.
Once such violent conflicts are concluded in practice, it is a relatively minor detail to remove permanently the paraphernalia of war. This tends to happen by osmosis, since once the need for such equipment, materials etc has been removed, there is diminishing context for acquiring or maintaining them.
Thus, it is obvious, the IRA would already have started to decommission its weaponry were it not for the fact that its opponents were constantly demanding it to do so, in much the same way as growing boys tend to decommission short trousers. This reality was recognised in the complex mechanism if the Belfast Agreement which left potentially contentious matters on the middle finger while making space for political progress in the meantime.
The concept of decommissioning has been employed to great effect by the enemies of Irish republicanism wishing to frustrate the dynamic of the Belfast Agreement, in particular its capacity to create the correct conditions to allow an organic process of decommissioning to occur.
The purpose is to appropriate moral ownership of the process, to put pressure on paramilitaries to decommission while simultaneously denying them the freedom to do this in their own way. Thus the dynamic of the agreement is frustrated and the impression generated that this is because paramilitaries are reluctant to dispose of weaponry for which they should no longer have any purpose.
What is remarkable is the success of those seeking to frustrate decommissioning in presenting themselves as vainly seeking to achieve it. The two sovereign governments which put their names to the Belfast Agreement, in addition to the vast majority of media voices, plus of course unionists of every hue, have managed to present themselves as being on the side of peace when one logical consequence of their attitudes might be a return to war.
It is pointless to talk about bringing together the two sides in this apparent stalemate. Both, in a sense, want the opposite of what they say. The IRA wants the freedom to dispose of its weaponry and move on to the next stage; the Ulster Unionists, in truth, want to prevent this and move on without any republican involvement.
The Northern Secretary, therefore, utterly misses the point in calling on Sinn Fein and the UUP to compromise in the interests of peace. It should be obvious that there is little space for "compromise" between such perversely constructed positions.
There is a way for republicans to remove themselves from their present double bind: by stealing the moral high ground back from their opponents by the declaration of a commitment to an unambivalent policy of non-violent resistance.
This would not amount to a surrender or even to decommissioning in the sense at present proposed. The IRA could simply state that, having considered its position, it now believes that a line has been crossed in the conflict beyond which armed struggle can no longer have any productive value. This would provide the republican movement with a face-saving means of scuppering the pseudo-moral climate so successfully created by its opponents.