Were the IRA defeated?

[Killerkai1]

A study by the Pat Finucane Centre has said that the British military achieved excellent sucess against the IRA but were they defeated or did Sinn Fein's political sucess eclipse the military struggle by the mid 1990's?

A couple of links;


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Provisional_IRA_campaign_1969-1997#Early_1990s

http://www.patfinucanecentre.org/misc/opbanner.pdf

[Loken]

Sinn Fein may have achieved success in the field of politics but at the same time the group has alienated the more militant Irish Nationalists. The British Military broke the Provos in the streets and fields(ex. May, 1987, Loughgall Ambush.) while British Intelligence infiltrated the Irish socialist and nationalist groups so throughly that trust is a rare thing and loyalty was very localized(ex.Rumors about McGuinness and Even Gerry Adams working for the British Government).

Wasn't it recently a high ranking member of the Irish National Liberation Army from Derry city admitted that he had been spying for two decades and passing information and such to the British Government?

[a_very_ex_STAB]

British intelligence even had the head of PIRA' s internal execution squad working for them. Very handy when you decide you want to off some of the opposition :)