President Clinton has come and gone from Ireland, not just to claim his honours for the third and final time in his period of office, but to earn them. His message in Dublin, Dundalk and Belfast for the past two days has been simple but profound. The peace process has been for him "not a passing interest but a passion"; the difficulties of sharing power are nothing to the difficulties of having no power at all; and there has to be a commitment to effecting change only through peaceful means, through ballots, not bullets.
A third visit to Ireland by a serving President of the United States is unprecedented. In his final weeks in office, President Clinton has lent the authority gained from his bona fides in the Belfast Agreement and the influence of his high office, to an endeavour to tease out the current "implementation controversies" which could stall the whole political process early next year.
Some may be surprised that President Clinton, during his whirlwind final days in Ireland, could not wave a magic wand to lift the Unionist ban on Sinn Fein's participation in the North/South Ministerial Council; to end the stalemate on the nationalist parties signing up to the new Police Service of Northern Ireland; to reverse the refusal of the IRA to engage meaningfully on putting arms verifiably beyond use with the Independent International Body on Decommissioning. But a solution to these difficult obstacles to the full implementation of the Belfast Agreement could never be forced. The "implementation controversies", as he categorised them, have to be confronted and overcome by the participants themselves.
President Clinton has helped, once again, to focus minds on the nub of the current problems. And like the Taoiseach and the British Prime Minister, he is determined that all outstanding issues of implementation must be addressed together in a new sequencing package. He listed them, in order of priority, as putting arms fully and finally beyond use; getting the nationalist parties to sign up to the new police service; and demilitarisation.
The negotiation of the details of such a package will fall now to the two Governments and the pro-agreement parties in the coming days and weeks. It will be extremely difficult. The British Prime Minister is being asked to dismantle the watchtowers and to withdraw British troops from Crossmaglen. Mr Blair is showing understandable reluctance to take such a security risk with the threat of republican dissidents in the background. A new ingredient has been fed into this equation, however, with President Clinton's commitment to have a tripartite US, British and Irish drive to combat those paramilitaries opposed to the agreement. The Taoiseach is willing to share the risk by having a large Garda presence at the border. There is a growing acceptance that a major gesture on demilitarisation is the key to unlocking the decommissioning deadlock in a concrete, final and lasting way.
It remains to be seen whether President Clinton's exhortation to look at the bigger picture will serve as the spur to move forward. One thing is certain. The rapturous reception for the President and Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton at symbolic venues, North and South, is a testament to the fond esteem in which they are held in Ireland. President Clinton has earned his honours on the peace process. He has provided a major impetus to political leaders to deliver to him a Belfast Agreement in working order before he leaves office.