Also, it not being operational would hardly make Meself's butchering more bearable.

Curator, with your familiar use of military terms and abbreviations, you seem to be saying, with a nod, a wink and a finger laid along the nose, that you have inside knowledge and therefor know that PIRA did not do the job.

However, even if that were true and you were not just a fantasist, we already have the denial. That denial is as hard to believe as the denial that your people were assisting the Columbian terrorists. That they were just there to study the bird life and it was just coincidence that they suddenly started using PIRA style bombs with electronic timers.(and using them very indiscriminately.)

Sure the robbery could have been done by MI5, The Boy Scouts, or the Easter Bunny, but PIRA does seem the more likely culprit. If not why not?