The Fenians are back......

‘The Wedding’ moves closer, stirring up general apathy. On the last occasion, we took our little plane to Le Touquet for a splendid lunch at the Hotel Westminster. The skies were empty, there was nobody on the streets, and it was lovely flying weather. But we now have a more world-weary public than 30 years ago.

Overshadowing the event are the promises made by various groups of nutcases to cause mayhem. Muslim extremists are threatening to mob the big day and the English Defence League is threatening the Muslims. More serious is a potential threat from revived Irish Republican terrorism.

The Fenians are back.

A new campaign of violence started in 2009 which has been rather under-reported here. There have been murders of soldiers and policemen. There have been bombings, attempted assassinations, failed ambushes and daily grenade attacks. When the report of the inquiry into the ‘Bloody Sunday’ violence was reported, Sinn Fein celebrated it as a victory and the start of a new peaceful era. The Oglaigh na hEirann (Soldiers of Ireland) responded with a 300 lb bomb outside a police station. A police station was destroyed during the last Tory Party conference.

MI5 has raised the threat level to substantial. There is known to be at least 700 activists. And the OnH knows that after the defence cuts the British Army no longer has the capacity to deploy the large numbers of troops need to combat a sustained terrorist campaign. Nice one, Dave!

And we have the wedding close to Easter, a landmark each year for violent Republicans.

By a strange irony, the Royal Duties Regiment at the wedding will be the Irish Guards, newly returned from Afghanistan so skinny that they are having to be kitted out with new ceremonial uniforms.

I am certain of one thing; the police will confront troublemakers very robustly, and we will not take too much notice of claims of ‘police brutality’.