Republican killings and the politics of denial

AT every crucial stage of the peace process, the Provisional IRA decided to test the resolve of the British and Irish governments by dispatching to eternity some unfortunate individual who was, from their lofty standpoint, surplus to requirements. That that person’s summary execution should also prove an embarrassment to the Sinn Féin leadership was sometimes seen as the macabre icing on the cake.

That much I allege.

Now consider this: Frank Kerr (the Newry postman) is dead. So, too, Det Garda Jerry McCabe in Adare, Joseph Rafferty in Dublin and Eamon Collins, who exposed the brutal heart of the Provisionals in Killing Rage, bludgeoned to death in Co Down.