IN BOTH Britain and Irish Republic the 'thirty year rule' governs the revelation of secret documents.
So about this time every year we are fed carefully edited snippets about events in both countries 30 years ago. In Britain it's the Profumo affair, in Ireland, the visit of John F. Kennedy, who until fairly recently shared a place of honour on many an Irish mantelpiece with the Pope.
One of Kennedy's worries when he visited in 1963, according to the latest gleanings from Dublin, was the pressure he was being put under by the Fianna Fail Government to get the British to state publicly that "they were not opposed to the unity of Ireland'.
The Major/Reynolds Downing Street declaration barely goes beyond the position which Kennedy told Dublin that he could not deliver in 1963.
Island
True, the British now state they have no 'selfish strategic or economic interest in Ireland' and apparently concede for the first time that it is for 'the people of the island of Ireland' to decide on the future of the whole country.
But the declaration puts the right of the Unionists to self-determination above the rights of the majority on the island. The Unionist veto is the lockstop on Britain's continued rule in part ANALYSIS What is Paisley's deal 555 cravach ta maome coa of Ireland.
It is for this reason that Sinn Fein and, in a more muffled way, Dublin, have been trying to edge the British towards taking a more persuasive role in bringing about Irish unity.
There is absolutely no chance that the British will do so and this is the reason why Dublin has been offering some additional sweeteners to the republicans to get them to stop fighting, including talk of an amnesty and de-militarisation.
The repeal of the notorious Section 31 which banned Sinn Fein trom the media in the ПРИАДАЯ Sinn Fein 1989: the historic weakening of Irish nationalism now offers gains to British South is another enticement.
The Hume/Adams talks and the process leading to the Downing Street declaration undoubtedly sprang not so much from a war weariness on the part of republicans as the perception that it was impossible to force the British out militarily.
Weakest
The problem is that the republicans are politically at their weakest in 10 years and are relying on Dublin to negotiate with the British on their behalf.
This is only partly due to the fact that Hume/Adams Agreenent was hijacked by Dick Spring for Dublin's own pur poses.
In every decade since Partition in 1921 there has been a military uprising against what Charles Haughey called a "failed political entity' - the Six County statelet. Both the IRA and the British recognised early in the present phase that a decisive military victory by either side was impossible.
The IRA have traditionally been distrustful of politics and considered the military campaign as the 'cutting edge against the British. But their present predicament ruthlessly exposes this political weakness.
Whatever the bravery, resourcefulness and determination of the IRA fighters, they can't drive the British out through military means alone;
Sinn celL recognition of that is one of the reasons for the current talks.
A correct political strategy would have involved attempting to mobilise sufficient forces in Ireland (and Britain) which could achieve that. The military campaign too often clashed with the needs of politics, especially when civilians were killed or injured.
Sinn Fein has not developed a programme for the whole island, which would appeal to workers in the South as well as to loyalist workers in the North.
On social questions, such as divorce, contraception and abortion, the republicans allow themselves to be portrayed as conservative and backward nationalists and they didn't offer a rounded out solution to the crisis which would appeal to workers, the unemployed and emigrants.
Little support
Their share of the vote in recent general elections in the South never rose above two per cent.
The worst mistake was the failure to challenge Fianna Fail because they assumed that, in the end, Fianna Fail or, at least its base, was on their side. A leading Sinn Fein member spoke in London recently of the "nationalist family', embracing, presumably, everyone from the IRA to Fianna Fail and sections of the Catholic Church.
The implication of this kind of thinking is that family members look after each other and that betrayal by Albert Reynolds would be unthinkable.
The signs of Fianna Fail capitulation have been there for a long time. Former Fianna Fail leader Haughey's silence on the hunger strikes, his implementation of the Anglo-Irish agreement having opposed it in opposition, his changes in extradition law to placate the British, his inaction on the Birmingham Six, Guildford Four and other such cases were sufficient warning that, despite his republican reputation, he would not confront the British.
Distraction
Haughey was willing when necessary to make republican noises but that was only to distract attention from the economic crisis. Because they didn't address that issue, Sinn Fein were treated as being itrelevant to the concerns of the working class.
As a strategy it is a disaster for Sinn Fein to entrust the Dublin Government to negotiate with the British on its behalf.
The class interests of the Dublin Government are totally opposed to those of the working class people in the nationalist areas in the North.
The as yet unpublished Hume/Adams Agreement seems to contain Adam's agreement on some version of the Unionist veto, probably along the lines of John Hume's position that the most important division in Ireland is among its people and that therefore Irish unity and the ending of partition depends on the prior agreement of the Unionists.
The logic of this position leads Hume to argue that were it not for IRA violence, the British army would have no reason to remain.
Further, he claims that if the IRA laid down its arms, the British would dismantle their fortified border posts and the border would disappear. Partition itself is down to the republicans!
At best, this kind of thinking would be acceptable in a postBritish Ireland, when provision would obviously have to be made for the proper representation of the Unionists at
SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No. 55, January 15 1994, Page 7