Over the years practitioners in litigation have become used to a particular dilemma, namely whether a breach of contract by the defendant justifies the exercise of the remedy of termination by the claimant. The dilemma arises because, if the remedy is exercised, but it is later successfully challenged, the claimant’s own wrongful failure to perform1 will amount to a breach. The dilemma therefore is over whether to terminate. More recently, a further dilemma appears to have arisen, or been given prominence,2 by a number of decisions; namely how to terminate. It arises because termination may be invoked either on the basis of the general law for a “repudiatory breach” or pursuant to an express contractual power. Some decisions appear to have established that, if it is the contractual power that is invoked, it may not be possible at a later stage to argue for termination on the basis of repudiatory breach in order to obtain the additional benefits which may flow therefrom. The explanation appears to be derived from the law relating to affirmation. In enforcing the contractual power to terminate (at least in some circumstances), the contract is affirmed, albeit by way of its termination, and it is too late to accept the repudiatory breach. This is the paradox referred to in the title to this paper, which seeks to analyse the