A major weakness many of us have in our assessments on the situation in NI is that we tend to view it from our individual perspectives and goals as opposed to trying to understand it from the viewpoints of the players. In this sense, I try to assess and evaluate the postures of participants in relation to whatever goal they are trying to achieve. In the case of Trimble and his hard-core constituency, I believe their goal is to fight what a militarist might call a retrograde movement, i.e.; to do anything to slow down or stop what they see as unwanted change. In my view, NI is a statelet based on apartheid, and the ruling caste doesn't want that to change. Thus, any tactic that supports that strategy is available in their eyes. I believe that the common goal on the other side is parity and and end to apartheid. There is great variation as to the preferred tactics with which to pursue the anti-apartheide strategy. I would characterize what I perceive as the three principle tactical categories as 1) political, 2) accomodation, and 3) force. From an historical perspective, each of those categories has had its time or times in the ascendancy, but all of them have always been present, and there has always been heated debate between adherents of competing camps. I believe it is accurate to say that we have been in a time windo in which political measures have been seen as having the most promise. How long that view might yet prevail is a question for which there is no clear answer. However, I believe that a strong element in the ardent Orange strategy is to push the balance back toward force, because they believe their cause would benefit from renewed violence by the other side. I hasten to add that while the anti-apartheide side has pursued a policy on non-violence for five plus years now, the pro-apartheide forces have continued their violence on a nearly daily basis.