In response to Alan Polain: The Irish border question: A primer,
Don Benson wrote:
The reality is that the ‘peace’ in that divided island has always been a phoney peace based on never pursuing IRA criminals for their past atrocities. It was a golden opportunity, made possible by joint membership of the EU on both sides, for Irish republicans to continue a new, more political, campaign for a united Ireland with the blessing of Westminster. And decontrolling the border was an essential part of the deal because of its tacit implication that reunification would eventually happen. A practical consequence has been the gradual economic (trading) integration of North and South. And that can only have helped the reunification cause.
Today’s issue is not really about the border at all (no one really believes border controls will be re-established). It is that, whatever happens to the border, Brexit might cause the gradual economic integration of North and South to go into reverse. And so the reunification goal could take longer to achieve. But it might actually speed things up: it will always depend simply on majority opinion North of the border.
So the whole thing is an exploitation of perception rather than practical reality. In essence it’s just another cynical EU ploy to prevent Brexit. Implied threats of resumption of violence are disgraceful, particularly in view of how many men of violence escaped their just deserts on the back of the ‘peace process’.
Andy wrote:
The whole Irish border ‘problem’ is absurd. The value of goods crossing into the Republic from NI in relation to the whole single market is something like 0.01 per cent. It is not even a statistical adjustment. So we have all this nonsense for that. It’s pathetic.
