Analyis: Tony Blair's speech has upped the ante very sharply in his dialogue with republicans, writes Gerry Moriarty, Northern Editor
As if adapting the title of an old Adam Ant pop hit, Tony Blair's central message yesterday was Disband and Deliver: if the IRA eased into retirement the British government would deliver all outstanding elements of the Belfast Agreement, including demilitarisation.
This was a go for broke speech from the British Prime Minister. No more pussy-footing around stately buildings such as Hillsborough, Lancaster House or Weston Park in "inch by inch" frustrating negotiations - the time for protracted talking is over, the time for acting is upon the key protagonists, chiefly Gerry Adams and Martin McGuinness and P. O'Neill.
Mr Blair has certainly upped the ante. The game has moved beyond decommissioning, visible or not, or some form of mildly positive words from the IRA: the British government, with the acquiescence of Dublin, says this is "crunch" time.
"The fork in the road has finally come," said Mr Blair. Which immediately prompted the old American gag about what you must do when you come to a fork in the road: you take it.
And that, in effect, has been the holding response from Sinn Féin. Republicans are not saying yea or nay to the Prime Minister's arguments. Mr Adams and Mr McGuinness delivered the inevitable shopping list of demands but overall the initial republican response was restrained. Mr Blair and the Taoiseach, Mr Ahern, will see value in that reaction.
Dublin's response was interesting too. One might have expected that the serious endgame intent of Mr Blair's speech would have been at variance with the normally cautious, gradualist approach of the Taoiseach.
And Mr Ahern won't have been enamoured by Mr Blair's dig at the Irish Government refusing to sit with Sinn Féin in government in the absence of IRA disbandment while expecting unionists to sit with Sinn Féin in government in Northern Ireland.
"To this blunt question," said Mr Blair, "there are many sophisticated answers, but no answer as simple, telling and direct as the question." It was an acid aphorism that could have been penned by Mr David Trimble or one of his senior advisers.
One Dublin source said that Mr Ahern and his colleagues might have preferred if Mr Blair had given unionists "more of a lash" for failing to work the agreement but generally speaking the two governments were at one.
Mr Blair aimed for balance by addressing a range of current and historic issues but this was centrally about the IRA.
Said one Dublin insider, "It was a good speech. He was saying it's about deeds, not words anymore. And he was right: there has to be movement now, and it has to be substantial. It's not good enough to fiddle around at the margins." Dublin also pointed out that while the kernel of Mr Blair's speech was obvious, he never used the word "disband", and that he was careful in his language not to be prescriptive. This, because of the accepted wisdom that issuing ultimatums doesn't bring the required response from the IRA.
Mr Blair, while indeed avoiding bald diktats, nonetheless was fairly clear in his approach. He spoke of this being a "time for acts of completion". He said republicans must make "the commitment to exclusively peaceful means, real, total and permanent".
One can't avoid suspecting some tick-tacking between London and Sinn Féin directly ahead of yesterday's speech. On Wednesday evening Sinn Féin rushed out a précis of a Gerry Adams speech in Lurgan that night where he called for the lifting of the suspension of the Belfast Agreement institutions, the convening of round-table talks and bilateral discussions.
Yesterday morning, Mr McGuinness issued a list of Sinn Féin demands. He wanted movementon policing, demilitarisation, safeguarding the institutions, equality, human rights, on-the- runs, justice, prisoners, victims and, perhaps significantly, on arms.
There was a certain sense of Mr Blair and Mr McGuinness and Mr Adams talking to each other from different forums. Both sides spelt out what they want, and both indicated that the other could be facilitated in the context of full reciprocal delivery.
At face value both republicans and the British government appear to be seeking action that is mutually deliverable. But only the politically naïve would expect formal disbandment of the IRA. For instance, as long as loyalists continue to threaten nationalist interface areas there will be a republican defence system in place.
But there are ways in which the IRA could gently fade into the mist and allow Sinn Fein reap the electoral rewards. In particular it could avoid alleged adventures such as in Colombia, Castlereagh and Castle Buildings, Stormont.
At such "crunch" times as this the natural inclination of Provisional republicans is to stall and to cloud what initially appears clear. That may be the game plan again in the weeks ahead. What Tony Blair was about yesterday in what undoubtedly was a milestone speech was telling the IRA and Sinn Féin that the time for unnecessary stonewalling is over.