Even as I write, in England, Boys and Girls , educated at Oxbridge, are wrestling with a problem.

It is this.

Given that sooner or later the enormity of the participation of senior Sinn Fein/IRA personnel as state touts will emerge, how should the state  manage it? Also, how do we stop the Irish rabbiting on about the past?

Clearly, blanket denial is not an answer.

These clever Boys and Girls, schooled from childhood to take on the mantle of those who ran an Empire upon which the sun never set, will have to come up with an answer to bamboozle the Paddies.

We may be already seeing the first fruits of their labour.

“Well placed sources” and “veteran journalists” will start to mention the unmentionable. Books will be written. Reference has already been made in the last few days to Adams’ family.

I believe that I have already articulated the notion that the state knew years ago about the Adams Family Values and probably also about the Cahill family. They would have used this information for their own ends.

But I digress. The tactic is to reveal sufficient for the masses to be a little shocked, but not a lot. Slowly but surely they become used to it.

“Of course the Army Council were all informers” says the man in the pub/golf club/church/garden centre, “everybody knows that”

Then as the Boys and Girls point out , distracted by Britain’s Got Talent and other Circuses, if not bread, the masses  will move on.

Jimmy Savile has already been replaced by Sepp as the Bogey Man.

The aim is to numb, neutralise and normalise so that nobody asks the hard questions about the state’s involvement in murders that could have been avoided. “It’s all terribly sad and it was a cock up not a conspiracy so  let’s move on.”

Sadly , for the Boys and Girls and their Mandarin Masters, a few good people will continue to ask awkward questions.