A series of Irish Republican Army bombings has highlighted the group's ability to get around security in England, where fear of terrorism is balanced against a determination to live normally. Police believe the bomb that killed Conservative Party lawmaker Ian Gow Monday was planted by the IRA, which has recently struck against the British army, the Stock Exchange and a London club favored by Conservatives. No group, however, immediately claimed responsibility for the slaying of Gow outside his home in Southeastern Hankham. Metal detectors at the House of Commons and a barrier guarding the prime minister's home testify to the threat, but most of London remains a relaxed and open city. Politicians and experts on terrorism argue that intensive security and fear would indicate a victory for the IRA, which has waged a terrorist campaign against British rule in Northern Ireland for two decades. Gow, killed by a bomb stuck beneath his car, had been warned he was on an IRA hit list. But his telephone number was listed and neighbors said his gate was often open. ``Mr. Gow was determined not to live in a castle and be protected,'' said Jonathan Graves, parish priest in Gow's village. ``He lived an open life.'' Peter Bottomley, another Conservative lawmaker, expressed the feeling of many politicians on increased security: ``We need to take obvious and sensible precautions. ... But the idea that each of us can have four bodyguards around us would mean that the IRA had won.'' The recent attacks, however, have prompted appeals for a return of the tight security following the death of six people in an IRA bombing at Harrod's department store in 1983. For a time, bags and parcels were searched at shop entrances. Scotland Yard recently distributed 13,000 posters advertising a toll-free hotline for reporting suspicious activities. A spokeswoman for Scotland Yard said a surge in notifications of suspicious parcels indicated heightened public concern. Late last year, a gate and a retractable concrete barrier were installed at Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher's official residence, No. 10 Downing Street. But terrorism expert Ian Geldard said increasing security for all politicians _ who now rely on mundane precautions such as checking beneath cars _ would not necessarily be the best solution. ``You can never have total security,'' Geldard said. ``The terrorists always have the advantage because they can choose the time and the place.'' Geldard, editor of Terror Update, a privately circulated newsletter, said the IRA clearly has targeted specific establishments and individuals. ``It would not be particularly sensible to increase security for everyone. The amount of disruption would be a victory for the IRA,'' he said. An unidentified IRA leader discussed the group's strategy in an interview published in the June 28 edition of Republican News, the weekly newspaper of the IRA and its Sinn Fein political wing. The IRA intends to ``surprise the enemy, give them no rest, continually pressurize them and of course to hit them where it hurts, preferably at the central nervous system,'' the leader said. He gave as an example the attack on the Carlton Club, a facility frequented primarily by members of the Conservative Party. There was no warning before that bombing or before Gow was killed. But eight warnings preceded the explosion in the visitor's gallery at the Stock Exchange on July 20. Mrs. Thatcher on Monday urged lawmakers to take warnings seriously. ``Many members of Parliament, indeed all of them, will have been given advice to have special regard for safety,'' she said. ``I make one plea, that they take that advice very seriously indeed, for themselves and their families and their staffs.'' Government security advisers refuse to detail arrangements, but it is widely believed lawmakers are advised to vary their daily routine. Mrs. Thatcher Monday told lawmakers to check under their cars and examine all parcels arriving by mail.
