THE Continuity Army Council, which claimed responsibility for the bombing of the Killyhevlin Hotel on July 13th, is an "emerging secret army" with the potential to create serious security problems, according to Dr J. Bowyer Bell.
The group told him it intended to carry out further attacks regardless of whether these provoked retaliatory violence by loyalist paramilitaries, including attacks in the Republic.
The group, which Garda sources say is close to Republican Sinn Fein (RSF), has a proven bomb making capacity and it told Dr Bowyer Bell that it had acquired firearms. He met the group, to be told of its intentions, at an isolated rural location which he says he would be unable to find again.
The group said it was separate from RSF, but supported identical policies and demands, including a British withdrawal from Northern Ireland the release of all "political" prisoners and the establishment of a united Ireland with a federal state based on four provincial governments.
The federal proposal is the same as that contained in RSF's policy document Eire Nua.
Dr Bowyer Bell says that the Continuity Army Council and its membership, which he refers to as the "Republican IRA", has built itself up since 1986, when the group which became RSF walked out of Sinn Fein during its annual ardfheis.
The new group had acquired arms, but had not taken any guns from the Provisional IRA.
Dr Bowyer Bell said. "With only a core of support, the years were spent in building an IRA from the ground up throughout the 32 counties, relying on the appeal of the faith.
"The lack of arms and money meant an inability to act and difficulty in attracting the militants. Progress was slow, but in time there was money there were arms of a sort and new volunteers and old veterans."
He said the group doubted the new political policies of the Provisionals "Mostly, the Provisionals were ignored increasingly irrelevant to the aspirations of the underground army, neither rivals nor allies."
The new group had also made a conscious decision to launch its campaign when it saw the IRA ceasefire breaking.
"The [Continuity] Army Council felt that the climate was promising the peace process had not worked, even the Provisionals' return to bombing could not hide the enormous damage done to the republican aspirations and assets since 1986."
The new group, he said, "reached the conclusion that the armed struggle was the only way forward and that their organisation had the means to pursue that struggle".
His own view was that, white the group would not reveal the extent of its membership, or of its arsenal, it posed a significant threat and could precipitate loyalist retaliation if it continued with attacks in Northern Ireland.
The bombing of the Killyhevlin Hotel, which the group described as an "economic target", came very close to causing loss of life. The hotel was cleared with only minutes to spare before it was wrecked by a bomb of about 200lb placed in the back of a four wheel drive vehicle which had been stolen weeks earlier in Dublin.
Loyalist sources have pointed out that they are already on the verge of ending their ceasefire and are likely to carry out attacks if there are any republican outrages.
The new group told him that there could be "no loyalist veto of the armed struggle any more than there can be a unionist veto to an all Ireland accommodation".
Dr Bowyer Bell said. "Ireland does not need one more secret army, more bombs, more provocation. It is in 1996 that the provocation seems most dangerous. The reaction of the loyalists to a renewed campaign would surely bring sectarian war, and not only to Northern Ireland.
"Sitting on a darkening summer day in a cold front room at the end of a long lane talking to those absolutely convinced that the vision of generations was valid, that they need not be troubled by the reasons of others, by counsels of moderation, not by the dangers to all and the distaste of most, can be a sobering experience.
"Such men are not easily moved, nor can they be easily discounted. If nothing more, this secret army, absolutely dedicated to the withdrawal of the British from Ireland, can greatly trouble an island already long troubled by the republican dream."