I don’t get this article. Is our current spending not commensurate with the level of threat of an invasion which is surely very low? Why fund the defence forces to the gills to ship them off for peacekeeping, it doesn’t make sense.
In other news water is wet
> As one senior official puts it: “Please explain to me why Ireland is celebrating a centenary of its independence from the UK, yet, to defend that sovereignty, relies almost entirely on the UK?”
Every small nation relies on its neighbours behaving reasonably in order to maintain sovereignty. That’s why humanity – including Finland – was carved into empires for most of recorded history. Up to the present day, Finland relies on Russia not attacking it in order to remain free; up to the ’90’s Finland was isolated internationally due to the USSR. It is now joining NATO on the realisation that its neighbour is not to be relied upon to respect their independence.
It’s a bit rich for a nation that has spent countless fortunes on war over the past century and a half *and still lost* to be telling us we need to tool up. The geopolitical landscape where Ireland needs to fear invasion just does not exist.
We should at least be able to patrol our territory. Look at the state of our radar, it’s embarrassing.
If Ireland were to be invaded a whole lot of other things would have to have gone tits up in the world first. Not saying we shouldn’t properly fund our defence forces but it should be realistic to our situation and size also.
We can defend our country with feelz
Ah the propaganda to force us to spend on military rather than social support continues. feck off.
Russia is not going to invade Ireland
It’s exactly what we need in Ireland right now. An expensive military-industrial complex to line up some pockets. Think of the endless opportunities for additional neglect and underfunding of other public services this could afford!
There’s a risk and reward situation at play here. If we’re being honest the risk of Ireland being invaded is very low, so then you have to look at the reward side of pumping loads of money into military defence. I’d argue that the rewards are moderate at best. It would help us if some small to medium sized nation decided to invade us, but then you get back to the fact that the risk of that happening is minute. If a large nation/superpower invaded us (still unrealistic, but slightly more likely), we are going to be defeated in traditional military combat no matter how much we invest, and we’ll just revert back to what we and other overpowered nations always revert back to, guerrilla warfare.
Ugh, it’s backwards the world is going. We need to spend big on defence, but in the form of cyber security.
“Please explain to me why Ireland is celebrating a centenary of its independence from the UK, yet, to defend that sovereignty, relies almost entirely on the UK?”
Oh, fuck off. Nobody is invading Ireland or will in the future. And if they do we’ll fight them for another 800 years if we have to. Ireland is a neutral country and others should follow our lead and push to demilitarise not build armies.
Ireland is not going to be invaded. Full stop. Anyone who thinks different needs to lay off the Fox News for a bit.
Countries should be reducing military spending and using this money to improve the lives of their citizens. Not wasting money out of fear.
If (and thats a big IF) the Baltic states are invaded, Ireland will help in anyway it can. Humanitarian aid, taking in refugees and introducing sanctions. We don’t need to waste millions/billions on military spending to be of use to the world.
In other news Dutch officials are worried about Ireland’s public transport infrastructure
Well come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough.
Haha I’m sceptical of our population’s ability to defend themselves against voting for the same idiots in the next election!!
Please explain to me why you fought for the Nazis during WW2.
Well I hope Irish officials are highly sceptical about Finland being able to defend its territory, seeing as it’s not an island, and right next to Russia!
Ireland was occupied for a long time, it always amazes me how Irish people just assume that everyone loves them and they won’t be invaded. Ireland is a great strategic island between the UK and US.
We are a very naive nation and this thread is full of people who simply don’t live in the real world. “Ireland won’t be invaded” is just complete empty air.
| go for Nato.
Just curious as to why the Finns who aren’t in Nato (yet) are the ones advocating for Ireland joining the organisation.
Sure it would make sense coming from a Nato member.
Should ireland have a defence force similar to smaller countries with expeditionary abilities or means to defend against a large scale invasion..? Debatable..
Should ireland have a defence force capable of doing the basic of a military arm of a country?
Absolutely and at the moment its failing at that HARD.
we cant patrol our water territories, we have no means to detect or intercept hostile planes (begore you even tell me about the low chances of invading.. maybe think about the potential of a hijacker situation)
We also have no capacity to airlift large quantities of irish citizens out of a hostile country and have to yet again rely on others.
Either get rid of the defence forces and accept that as a country we will roll over at the first sign of trouble and have to depend on the brits to save us.
Or.. fund the defence forces to such a degree that the can do the BASICS of a military force
Fuck this half in half out BS
Say what you want about the Brits, but our agreement with them for them to intercept any unknown aircraft in our airspace is mighty handy for us, and them ofcourse
Being sandwiched between two military powers definitely has its benefits
I know what he’s getting at. Even a weak Russian invasion force easily takes over our country. And we’re basically assuming we’ll be treated differently to Ukraine by the US and UK. If all they do is try send us some equipment we’d have no chance. We’d need actual bodies and people trained to use some of the equipment.
Thing is the UK probably would treat us differently. Take away our shared history, for their own interests alone they’d probably have to help defend us. It’s a good gamble to rely on them to protect us. And it’s what they get for the 800 years.
Why is it that every time Ireland’s defence spending is discussed in the news (an increasingly common occurrence, it must be said), the consensus is: “we don’t have to fear a land invasion, therefore there’s no call to spend anything”?
Yeah, sure, a land invasion is logistically unlikely. But this is the 21st century, and there’s more to defend against than Viking raids.
Ireland has an airspace, territorial waters and cyberspace that are worth defending. Being an island nation, the economic survival of this country depends on the ability to trade physical goods and information. The exchange of physical goods requires unfettered access to Ireland’s ports and airports, and the exchange of information is reliant on physical cables that are in the sea, as well as more abstract software infrastructure of the kind that may be vulnerable to so-called “cyber” attacks. This is what the article says!
“bUt tHe RuSSiaNs aREn’T GoInG tO InVaDE uS”
Why would we need to. We’re neighbours with one of the strongest countries on the globe, we’re somewhat friendly with the strongest, and we’re good at whinging when we want something. Who the fuck are the Brits gonna let walk into Ireland. If they’re invading us they’re planning something related to the UK, so they’d be a very minimal help.
Not wrong
According to a mate of mine the DFs plan is to stash gear. Hide among civilians and go full Taliban/provo so essentially a surrender and after the damage is done engage in a harassment campaign.
If Kyiv did similar we wouldn’t be having this discussion,Ukraines gov would be decapitated/puppeted and it’s map would look significantly smaller.
27 comments
Ah yeah no shit my dude
I don’t get this article. Is our current spending not commensurate with the level of threat of an invasion which is surely very low? Why fund the defence forces to the gills to ship them off for peacekeeping, it doesn’t make sense.
In other news water is wet
> As one senior official puts it: “Please explain to me why Ireland is celebrating a centenary of its independence from the UK, yet, to defend that sovereignty, relies almost entirely on the UK?”
Every small nation relies on its neighbours behaving reasonably in order to maintain sovereignty. That’s why humanity – including Finland – was carved into empires for most of recorded history. Up to the present day, Finland relies on Russia not attacking it in order to remain free; up to the ’90’s Finland was isolated internationally due to the USSR. It is now joining NATO on the realisation that its neighbour is not to be relied upon to respect their independence.
It’s a bit rich for a nation that has spent countless fortunes on war over the past century and a half *and still lost* to be telling us we need to tool up. The geopolitical landscape where Ireland needs to fear invasion just does not exist.
We should at least be able to patrol our territory. Look at the state of our radar, it’s embarrassing.
If Ireland were to be invaded a whole lot of other things would have to have gone tits up in the world first. Not saying we shouldn’t properly fund our defence forces but it should be realistic to our situation and size also.
We can defend our country with feelz
Ah the propaganda to force us to spend on military rather than social support continues. feck off.
Russia is not going to invade Ireland
It’s exactly what we need in Ireland right now. An expensive military-industrial complex to line up some pockets. Think of the endless opportunities for additional neglect and underfunding of other public services this could afford!
There’s a risk and reward situation at play here. If we’re being honest the risk of Ireland being invaded is very low, so then you have to look at the reward side of pumping loads of money into military defence. I’d argue that the rewards are moderate at best. It would help us if some small to medium sized nation decided to invade us, but then you get back to the fact that the risk of that happening is minute. If a large nation/superpower invaded us (still unrealistic, but slightly more likely), we are going to be defeated in traditional military combat no matter how much we invest, and we’ll just revert back to what we and other overpowered nations always revert back to, guerrilla warfare.
Ugh, it’s backwards the world is going. We need to spend big on defence, but in the form of cyber security.
“Please explain to me why Ireland is celebrating a centenary of its independence from the UK, yet, to defend that sovereignty, relies almost entirely on the UK?”
Oh, fuck off. Nobody is invading Ireland or will in the future. And if they do we’ll fight them for another 800 years if we have to. Ireland is a neutral country and others should follow our lead and push to demilitarise not build armies.
Ireland is not going to be invaded. Full stop. Anyone who thinks different needs to lay off the Fox News for a bit.
Countries should be reducing military spending and using this money to improve the lives of their citizens. Not wasting money out of fear.
If (and thats a big IF) the Baltic states are invaded, Ireland will help in anyway it can. Humanitarian aid, taking in refugees and introducing sanctions. We don’t need to waste millions/billions on military spending to be of use to the world.
In other news Dutch officials are worried about Ireland’s public transport infrastructure
Well come and have a go if you think you’re hard enough.
Haha I’m sceptical of our population’s ability to defend themselves against voting for the same idiots in the next election!!
Please explain to me why you fought for the Nazis during WW2.
Well I hope Irish officials are highly sceptical about Finland being able to defend its territory, seeing as it’s not an island, and right next to Russia!
Ireland was occupied for a long time, it always amazes me how Irish people just assume that everyone loves them and they won’t be invaded. Ireland is a great strategic island between the UK and US.
We are a very naive nation and this thread is full of people who simply don’t live in the real world. “Ireland won’t be invaded” is just complete empty air.
| go for Nato.
Just curious as to why the Finns who aren’t in Nato (yet) are the ones advocating for Ireland joining the organisation.
Sure it would make sense coming from a Nato member.
Should ireland have a defence force similar to smaller countries with expeditionary abilities or means to defend against a large scale invasion..? Debatable..
Should ireland have a defence force capable of doing the basic of a military arm of a country?
Absolutely and at the moment its failing at that HARD.
we cant patrol our water territories, we have no means to detect or intercept hostile planes (begore you even tell me about the low chances of invading.. maybe think about the potential of a hijacker situation)
We also have no capacity to airlift large quantities of irish citizens out of a hostile country and have to yet again rely on others.
Either get rid of the defence forces and accept that as a country we will roll over at the first sign of trouble and have to depend on the brits to save us.
Or.. fund the defence forces to such a degree that the can do the BASICS of a military force
Fuck this half in half out BS
Say what you want about the Brits, but our agreement with them for them to intercept any unknown aircraft in our airspace is mighty handy for us, and them ofcourse
Being sandwiched between two military powers definitely has its benefits
I know what he’s getting at. Even a weak Russian invasion force easily takes over our country. And we’re basically assuming we’ll be treated differently to Ukraine by the US and UK. If all they do is try send us some equipment we’d have no chance. We’d need actual bodies and people trained to use some of the equipment.
Thing is the UK probably would treat us differently. Take away our shared history, for their own interests alone they’d probably have to help defend us. It’s a good gamble to rely on them to protect us. And it’s what they get for the 800 years.
Why is it that every time Ireland’s defence spending is discussed in the news (an increasingly common occurrence, it must be said), the consensus is: “we don’t have to fear a land invasion, therefore there’s no call to spend anything”?
Yeah, sure, a land invasion is logistically unlikely. But this is the 21st century, and there’s more to defend against than Viking raids.
Ireland has an airspace, territorial waters and cyberspace that are worth defending. Being an island nation, the economic survival of this country depends on the ability to trade physical goods and information. The exchange of physical goods requires unfettered access to Ireland’s ports and airports, and the exchange of information is reliant on physical cables that are in the sea, as well as more abstract software infrastructure of the kind that may be vulnerable to so-called “cyber” attacks. This is what the article says!
“bUt tHe RuSSiaNs aREn’T GoInG tO InVaDE uS”
Why would we need to. We’re neighbours with one of the strongest countries on the globe, we’re somewhat friendly with the strongest, and we’re good at whinging when we want something. Who the fuck are the Brits gonna let walk into Ireland. If they’re invading us they’re planning something related to the UK, so they’d be a very minimal help.
Not wrong
According to a mate of mine the DFs plan is to stash gear. Hide among civilians and go full Taliban/provo so essentially a surrender and after the damage is done engage in a harassment campaign.
If Kyiv did similar we wouldn’t be having this discussion,Ukraines gov would be decapitated/puppeted and it’s map would look significantly smaller.