So it begins. According to the Daily Telegraph, the letter Theresa May signed invoking Article 50 went on its way to Europe under heavy security. It was, we were told, to be delivered by hand at a secret location “because of fears that Remainers might try to intercept it in a final act of defiance”.

If there was to be a respectable organ of Brexit you might think that the Telegraph – a publication that likes to think of itself as a quality newspaper – would be it.

That spectacularly crass sentence demonstrates that no such thing exists. The idea that a secret cadre of Remainers have hatched a dark plot to steal away the letter and keep us in the EU for, what, another day, is laughable. It is a classic case of projection, of thinking about what you might do were the reverse to be true, and putting it onto to your opponents.

Remainers are, as a rule, just too damn nice to even think of such a thing, much less actually to make plans to put something like it into action. That explains why the Telegraph had to do it for us. And it encapsulates our problem.

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The Telegraph’s willingness to conceive of such a notion is reflective of the long guerrilla campaign it was a part of, the dirty war the original Brexiteers started waging almost from the moment the UK joined the European Union.

That war stepped up a gear after the signing of the Maastricht Treaty in 1992, when, so devoted to their cause were its hardcore opponents that they, at times, paralysed the Conservative Government of John Major, which, remember, had a bigger majority than Theresa May has today.

Major was so frustrated by the three leading Eurosceptics in his cabinet that he unwisely swore on camera, referring to them as “bastards” and, unwittingly, handing them a badge of honour they wore with pride forever after.

The backbench rebels who had the whip withdrawn from them over their repeated rebellions during votes on the treaty’s implementation, were no doubt similarly delighted at being referred to as the “Maastrict Eight”.

Contrast that with the performance of most of the Remainers in Parliament now. Even the hardcore Tory remain rebels, the outriders, mounted only a token show of dissent over Theresa May’s profoundly undemocratic bill to involve Article 50, a shameful piece of legislation that serves more of an enabling act than a proper piece of law, before melting away.

It took only David Davis wagging his finger at them for them to pay their obeisance. Can you imagine Christopher Gill, once referred to as the “grey eminence” of the Maastrict rebels, and his colleagues giving way like that? They would view such a craven surrender with contempt.

They never gave up. Nor did their allies. Nor should we.

Unfortunately, however, that involves waking up to the harsh reality of the situation we are in.

Sadiq Khan calls for Theresa May to stand up for EU migrants during Brexit

Even calling upon the example set by a member of the hard right is an uncomfortable thing for a Remainer. But it’s going to require a lot more than that and the trouble is baulking at getting down and dirty is what lost Remain this fight in the first place

It’s understandable. Remainers are, as a rule, progressive in outlook regardless of the parties we support and vote for. We are idealistic and pluralistic. The behaviour engaged in by the leaders of Brexit, even now they have won we are still treated to childishness, tantrums, and the continued peddling of fantasy (like that Telegraph comment), it doesn’t come naturally to us.

There are still those who would argue that we should bow to the new reality rather than sully ourselves by stooping to it. Therein lies defeat.

I’m not arguing that we should go the whole hog and behave like children. I am saying we need to do what Paul Giamatti’s character, the primary antagonist in George Clooney’s political drama The Ides of March, states that Democrats are unwilling to do (resulting in their continued losses to Republicans). They, we, he said, have to “get in the mud with the f***ing elephants”.

That means accepting making some unpleasant compromises. Remainers tend to recoil from some of the big beasts on our side because of their past crimes and misdemeanours. Frankly, I do.

Unfortunately, the medicine necessary to cure a sickness doesn’t generally taste very nice. At the moment we are rudderless. With a few notable exceptions, and I include one of the tarnished big beasts, Nick Clegg, in their number, Parliament has been full of weaklings. It’s striking just how unwilling Remainers have been to engage in a slugfest in a place where fighting dirty is the name of the game.

That is what has led us from a referendum recommending that “Britain leave the EU” into a jingoistic, anti-immigration hard Brexit pulling us out of the single market and pulling up the drawbridge behind us.

If that doesn’t demonstrate that this fight is far too important an issue for dwelling on the past, nothing will. Frankly, we are in need of some leaders who have backbone. If the only ones available are compromised, then so be it.

Alastair Campbell might not win any popularity contests, but at least he gave it back to Farage on daytime TV this week. At least he showed some fire. Please show me someone like him, with the willingness to engage in a bare-knuckle brawl.

I am not saying we have to entirely abandon who we are. The lies and the fantasies peddled by the other side? We have no need for them. They are easily countered by facts. There is a vast weight of evidence on our side.

The reason our opponents get so cross about the lack of fiction on the Beeb about how great Brexit will allegedly be is because, for all the false equivalence it feels it has to indulge in under the badge of objectivity, they have nothing like that. And while its editors might very well be feeling considerable pressure, they are clear that the Beeb is emphatically still a news organisation. It hasn’t yet become a subsidiary of HarperCollins.

We can get down in the mud and fight with Brexiteers and still emerge cleaner because, while we should learn from their doggedness, steel ourselves to fight every bit as hard as they did, point blank refuse to give up, and be willing to take some blows if that’s what proves necessary, we don’t have to stoop as low as they have.