The murders of two soldiers and a policeman in Northern Ireland have put the peace process to the test, says David McKittrick in The Independent. But the signs are that it is “going to survive”. This “glimpse of the bad old days” has produced not acrimony, but a “new appreciation of the value of peace”. Thousands of people took part in silent vigils around Northern Ireland on Wednesday to express their revulsion, while the political response has been united. Gordon Brown was joined by Sinn Fein politicians Gerry Adams, Martin McGuinness and John O’Dowd in condemning the murders: McGuinness labelled the dissidents “traitors” of Ireland.
The only thing that could change the “emptiness” of these “heartless” acts is our reaction to them, says Jonathan Powell, Tony Blair’s former chief of staff, in The Guardian. It was the reaction of the British government that turned the Easter Rising of 1916 into a mass movement for independence in Ireland. Terrorists crave attention, and it is their repression that causes them to flourish. But ignoring them will not make them go away either, says Colonel Tim Collins in the Daily Mail. Before these attacks, there were worrying signs that republican terrorism was starting to revive. There have been 18 terrorist attacks since last year and the perpetrators have growing reason to believe they can escape justice. The Royal Ulster Constabulary (now the PSNI), “once the world’s most effective anti-terrorist force”, has been emasculated by the ‘reforms’ recommended by former Tory chairman Lord Patten.
A “heavy burden lies on the shoulders” of the chief constable, Sir Hugh Orde, says The Independent. He needs to be careful not to play into the terrorists hands by using the military, but he must bring the killers to justice. Adams and McGuinness aren’t helping, says John O’Sullivan in The Globe and Mail. They may have condemned the murders, but they have also objected to ‘shadowy’ troops brought in to solve them. Such “hedging” reinforces the omertá that Irishmen don’t inform to the Brits. But political murder is still murder, and until republicans accept that and reject the “sacred nationalist myth” that “violence on behalf of Irish unity is mandated by history”, a revival of the Troubles remains a possibility.