IS IT futile to tell the truth? Is it the mark of a fool to have read and remembered what was actually said by the protagonists before we went over the edge last Friday night? Or are we content to parrot half truths, the half remembered, the half understood? On balance, we are probably content with seminess. It is better and easier than going to the trouble of remembering what was said, and what was intended.
How many people over the last weekend said John Major had rejected the Mitchell report? How many people said he had made it inevitable for the poor, misunderstood IRA to take its war to London, adding, of course, though, God knows, my heart goes out to those poor people in London, and their families, but the IRA was given no choice, sure John Major's the man to blame.
What did John Major say when the Mitchell report was presented? Did he reject it? He did not, though, heaven knows, one would never have guessed it to judge from the comments flowing so freely around Dublin in the past few days. In fact John Major actually welcomed and endorsed the six principles enunciated in the Mitchell report - which is, by the way, a jewel of lucidity and brevity. worth examining for its English alone.
People have already forgotten, or half remembered, the six principles, which in themselves demand no more than the British and ourselves had been demanding for months. It recommended that all parties to talks affirm their absolute commitment to democratic and peaceful means of resolving political issues; to the total and verifiable disarmament of all paramilitary groups; to renounce for themselves and to oppose any effort by others, to use force, or to threaten to use force, to influence the course or the outcome of all party negotiations; to agree to abide by the terms of any agreement reached in all party negotiations and to resort to democratically and exclusively peaceful methods in trying to alter any aspect of that outcome with which they may disagree; and to urge that punishment beatings cease.
Good faith
As a token of good faith, it might have been a nice idea that punishment beatings cease immediately. They didn't. And bit by bit, the six principles have been peeled apart by the very people they were intended to bring to the peace table, Sinn Fein IRA.
But what of John Major? Did he not insist that the paramilitaries disarm before talks began? No, he did not. This is what he said. The government also welcomes the body's broad recommendations of the modalities of the decommissioning process. We are ready to implement them. It is now for those in possession of illegal arms to say whether they will accept and act on them."
And this is rejection? He then proposed the convention, the device which got Dublin in uproar; though that very day, a certain tax disc was being stolen in Armagh in order to bomb London. The IRA operation, responsibility for which is now being laid at John Major's door for his response to the Mitchell report, was already under way.
But what of this convention? Wherefore its origins? How did this slippery piece of Brit cant come to be uttered by John Major, that ruthless exponent of realpolitik? Simple. It is in the Downing Street Declaration of December 15th, 1993, whose every colon was pored over by the bright lads and lasses in Foreign Affairs.
Here runs the crucial paragraph. The British and Irish governments reiterate that the achievement of peace must involve a permanent end to the use of, or support for, paramilitary violence. They confirm that, in these circumstances, democratically mandated pad ties which establish a commitment to exclusively peaceful methods and which have shown that they abide by the democratic process, are free to participate fully in democratic politics and to join in dialogue in due course between the governments and the political parties on the way ahead." (my itals).
You see that word mandated? It is a key word. It is what entitles Martin McGuinness to say, "John Major's refusal to recognise our right to represent those who vote for us goes to the heart of the conflict... This is not a concession but a fundamental principle."
Mandates
Have you twigged yet? Nobody has been mandated as yet to participate in round table talks. If mandates are to be consulted, are we to assemble our cast at the round table from the local councillors of Northern Ireland? Hardly, splendid those doughty characters undoubtedly be. Then are we to choose from the elected Members of Parliament?
No doubt a fine idea - but there are no Sinn Feiners there. John Major might not have met Gerry Adams - and to my mind that was certainly a gamble he should have taken - but Gerry Adams is not alone in his exclusion. John Major doesn't meet hundreds and hundreds of defeated parliamentary candidates, such as Gerry Adams, or, come to that, Martin McGuinness, who got 4,000 fewer votes than the DUP man in his constituency.
The Downing Street Declaration insisted on democratically mandated parties being responsible for us getting out of the impasse which existed then. The 17 elected MPs for the North contain not a single Sinn Feiner; yet Sinn Feiners must be present at talks, and those who join in dialogue on the way ahead must be democratically mandated to be there. So insisted the carefully assembled document read by the two prime ministers the fortnight before Christmas, 1993.
Elections before talks - this was a reasonable expectation, or was, until terrible events of last Friday ended the peace process altogether. For what kind of ceasefire will placate the unionists now? We know what a "complete" ceasefire means; what other varieties are there on offer? None. In fact, the IRA will probably not insult us by calling any more ceasefires. We know where we are now; we are where I said we were the other week. Square One. Get used to it.