Friday, July 29, 2005
IRA Announcement Day 2
Ed Moloney's take on the latest IRA announcement to "dump arms"-Don't count your chickens...
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Evidence that ambiguity lives on and that this is probably deliberate comes in the apparent fact that there has been no IRA Convention, no attempt by the leadership to refashion republicanism for a new order. No Convention means no changes to the IRA constitution. The IRA’s legally binding commitment to “wage revolutionary armed struggle” when possible thus survives and sits uneasily besides P O’Neill’s new, non-binding public pledge to use only political methods in the future.
The fact that there has been no Convention also means that legally speaking the IRA has not ended its war, no matter what yesterday's statement said. Only a Convention can end the war with Britain and that has not happened. Ending the armed campaign - #150; notice the statement did not say "armed struggle" - #150; means this move is similar to the ending of the 1956-62 campaign. An important event for sure, even historic but the option of returning to armed struggle survives, as it did in 1962.
