For some time now Sinn Fein has been lazily portrayed as the wager of war, with a few voices attempting, against the grain, to portray it as making peace. But perhaps a more accurate way of describing the current position would be to say that Sinn Fein is engaged in making war through peace.
Interestingly, there was a time when it would have been accurate to say that republicans were making peace through war. This was the period from just before the 1994 ceasefire, through the resumption of the IRA campaign in 1996, up to the entry of the Ulster Unionist Party into the multi-party talks. From that moment on, a major shift occurred in the philosophical drift of republicanism. Although opponents of republicanism invariably sought to portray the "hard men" of the IRA as crouching in the background waiting for the process to falter - and then proceeding with their violence - the truth was that, a small number of dissenters apart, republicans had for some time come to realise that the armed struggle had run out of road.
From the declaration of the 1994 ceasefire, it was implicit in all republican statements and actions that the war was over so long as the various parties agreed to engage in talks in good faith.
There was never any question that the IRA would recommence a policy of armed struggle on the basis that it did not accept the outcome of talks which had been sincerely engaged in by the participants. Put another way, by going along with the talks process, David Trimble deprived republicanism of the option of armed struggle. Of course, notwithstanding the disingenuous interventions of various mischievous parties, everyone understood this position all along. Otherwise why, in the weeks since the Belfast Agreement, has not one voice been raised to wonder whether the IRA would reject this deal and resume its armed operations? Perhaps even if Mr Trimble hadn't taken the bait, the Provisionals had passed the point when they could usefully combine armalite and ballot box.
When one considers the success with which republicanism has used violence to keep its place at the races, this might seem like a risky strategy. But, in truth, once there is the possibility of any forward movement, republicanism stands to win far more than it can lose.
The relationship between unionism and nationalism is often perceived as a conflict between two factions in confrontation over a hotly-contested - but by implication unoccupied - territory, which either side stands to win or lose.
But the relationship is more accurately portrayed as similar to that between a man spreading himself out to occupy a two-seater settee and another man attempting to achieve the equal seating right which he believes is his.
In the very essence of the situation is the certainty that only the man who remains standing is capable of making progress. The man already in the settee can at best maintain what he has - any movement, negotiation or change can represent gain for challenger only.
In the same way, nationalism can only win, and unionism only lose, by any attempt to, as the mantra has it, "move the situation forward". This is why the word "no" comes so readily to unionists, for whom inertia represents the maximisation of self-interest. Negotiation, therefore, is high risk for unionists and - in a certain sense - low risk for nationalists. In pursuing this peace process, Sinn Fein has been drawing attention not just to unionist inertia but to the hypocrisy of those who said they wanted peace but were not prepared to pay a price for it. David Trimble, alone among unionist leaders, has confronted the republican tactic. As a result, he and the Sinn Fein leadership are currently engaged in an elaborate version of "call my bluff", in which both sides must continue in the process until there is an unassailable moral context for pulling out.
Thus, Mr Trimble must proceed until republicans break faith - for example, by rejecting the agreement or refusing to decommission. Sinn Fein must proceed until the Ulster Unionists renege on some aspect of the agreement or perhaps some other unionist faction succeeds in wrecking the institutions which will otherwise flow from it.
The first side to falter will lose the battle for the high ground, allowing the other to win on points. Sinn Fein, clearly, is well aware of the fragility of the tightrope. The agreement, it knows, is the means to an end rather than an end in itself. The agreement document needed to be carefully examined, Gerry Adams told the recent Sinn Fein Ardfheis, "in the context of strategy and struggle. And in preparing for the next phase we need also to examine the positions and strategies of our opponents and enemies." Speaking of which, it is interesting that Mr Trimble has attracted much praise from all sides for his allegedly visionary attitude, while in truth his position is somewhat safer than it appears. Although unionism seems deeply divided, this may be more cosmetic than real.
No matter what happens, there is the possibility for unionism to regroup and deal with whatever reality emerges. In other words, unionism as a whole remains firmly in the centre of the settee.
and so, while in one sense republicans are in a no-lose situation, the strategy is, paradoxically, extremely risky from the viewpoint of their core values. In the game which they themselves have initiated, republicans have had to stake their own deepest aspiration - the concept of Irish unity - which is probably postponed beyond the lifetime of anyone currently alive on the island.
Not only have they had to accept that the short-term solution can only involve a form of internal six-county rule, they have also had to implicitly acquiesce in moves to remove the legal underpinning of the national aspiration from the Republic's constitution. They have also agreed that armed force will no longer be used to pursue these objectives.
The most republicans can expect from this stage of the struggle is a corner of the extremely inhospitable and unattractive Northern Ireland settee, or at least the achievement of a more widespread understanding that the denial of this to Northern nationalists is incontrovertibly the consequence of unionist obduracy and bad faith. But this change of perception depends on a continuing guarantee that the use of armed force is no longer an option.
The change of republican tactics has ensured that, almost regardless of what happens in the settlement process, the IRA will not, henceforth, have the remotest justification for the resumption of armed struggle. This will place republicans in a difficult position if unionism wins the game of "call my bluff".