Expectations of a peace process breakthrough have been dramatically raised, writes Gerry Moriarty.
As US Air Force 1 flies into Northern Ireland this evening the sleepy little village of Hillsborough, Co Down, will be the focus for some very serious war war and jaw jaw.
Churchill famously said that the latter was preferable to the former but for this Bush-Blair summit, making war and peace co-exist on the same agenda. There will be talk of war in Iraq, peace in the Middle East and breakthrough in our little backwater.
President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair will hold detailed talks at Hillsborough Castle tonight and tomorrow morning on how the war is being prosecuted. They will also examine how to chart President Bush's road map to peace between Israel and Palestine.
Around noon tomorrow, when the Taoiseach joins the two leaders, discussions will turn to the dreary steeples. After lunch the pro-Belfast Agreement parties will be granted audience with Messrs Bush, Blair and Ahern.
President Bush is expected to exhort the parties to do the business when Mr Ahern and Mr Blair publish their particular road map to restoring devolution, again at Hillsborough, on Thursday.
Quite a degree of cynicism has been expressed about the war summit being held in Hillsborough, the view being that President Bush, in particular, wanted to take unto himself some of the positive gloss of being associated with Northern Ireland's peace process to deflect attention from the bloodshed in Iraq.
A senior British official countered: "In terms of the peace process this is the most critical week since the Good Friday agreement was signed five years ago. Having the President of the United States drop in is a good way of underlining that fact."
It also raises expectations that the parties will endorse the Ahern-Blair blueprint for restoring the Executive and Assembly. After all, why would President Bush come to Northern Ireland to be associated with failure?
The same official counselled against such analysis. Both London and Dublin insist that while "positive signals" are emanating from republicans, neither the Taoiseach nor Prime Minister knows precisely how the IRA will respond to the document. A senior Sinn Féin spokesman was also adamant that the two governments did not know what the IRA planned.
What is clear is that all the parties know what is required to reactivate devolution. It's hardly a secret that the package will involve commitments on demilitarisation, policing, devolving criminal justice and policing to the Executive, liberty for IRA fugitives, and pledges to try to find an alternative to plastic bullets, as well as a litany of other issues.
The IRA is expected to respond positively but whether that response will be sufficient to satisfy the governments and more especially Mr David Trimble and pro-agreement unionists that it is effectively standing down remains a moot point.
Irrespective of the presence of the American President, Mr Trimble has emphasised that he won't be bounced into accepting anything from the IRA that he believes falls short of requirements.
Certainly, Mr Blair, in evangelical mode, would not tolerate anyone questioning his bona fides in relation to the peace process. If George Bush in Hillsborough can bolster the chances of a deal then let's have George Bush in Hillsborough, appears to be his attitude.
Mr Blair's commitment to the Northern peace process is nothing short of extraordinary judging by what appeared to be a throwaway line from Mr Adams on BBC Radio Ulster's Seven Days programme yesterday. "I have met with Mr Blair consistently over the last week or so," he said.
A Sinn Féin spokesman said that Mr Adams probably meant "weeks" and as these were private meetings he could not comment on them. How many times had Mr Adams, with Mr Martin McGuinness, met Mr Blair in recent weeks, the Sinn Féin man was asked. "More than you'll ever know about," he responded.
The fact that in the middle of a war Mr Blair could commit such time to the peace process demonstrates how important an issue this is for him.
It again triggers an assumption that Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness, at the very least, have been providing the Prime Minister with very strong nods and winks that the IRA will demonstrate by word and deed that its war is over.