News & Views – Keep Ireland Neutral

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*20-05-2026

Neutrality and Anthropodicy
from The Irenaut, Spring 2024, 2024/1 Vol.2, pp 147-154. Updated May 2026
Mark Price

The following text appeared in the peace studies journal The Irenaut in 2024 (I have updated it accordingly). It addresses the critique sometimes made that Ireland is not and has never been neutral, and that therefore the campaign to protect Irish neutrality is futile or unfounded. The essay adopts the idea of ‘anthropodicy’ proposed by The Irenaut’s editors as an alternative to Leibniz’s ‘theodicy’ (the defence of God’s goodness in the face of evil and suffering).
Anthropodicy suggests that humans are ultimately good despite moral complexity, and my argument is that the historical cause of Irish neutrality is likewise positive despite compromises. I base this argument on the following distinction:

neutrality = realism imperialism = idealism

This is a reversal of the attitude of those that say neutrality is irrational or naive. European imperialism has always been founded upon a ‘civilising’ ideology, what today is passed off as humanitarian or human rights intervention, and the rhetoric from Brussels, Berlin, London and Paris in 2026 is squarely within this tradition. As I will show, Irish neutrality was born of a rejection of this ‘idealism’ going back to Wolfe Tone’s repudiation of England’s campaign against Spain in 1790, and reaching its apogee with James Connolly in 1914.

Introduction

The Irenaut’s idea that peace can be ‘an expression of human agency inherent in work’, which strives to recover ‘the origin of work and its goal of human amelioration’, brings to mind the battered ideal of Ireland’s neutrality. Neutrality can be seen as force for good in its own right, not just a refusal to take sides. Yet what we see when we look closely is that this force itself is morally complex; that key neutrality activists in history have often been involved in violence and compromise, yet have shown a realism founded upon a repudiation of imperialist rhetoric, of the perennial calls to join this or that ‘coalition of the willing’. Perhaps the ‘irenic work’ lies in rejecting
these subtle but powerful lures. The history of Irish neutrality has its idealist players (Wolfe Tone and James Connolly, and today’s anti-war activists) and its ‘realpolitikers’ (Eamon de Valera and perhaps recent Irish Taoiseach Leo Varadkar); the presence of both – sometimes even in the same person, as in the case of Frank Aiken in the 1950’s – can be offered as evidence in support of anthropodicy, the human drive towards the good despite contradictory behaviours. What history shows is how popular liberation movements – the Russian and German revolutions of 1917 and ’18, or the Irish revolutions of 1798 and 1916 onwards – have been decisively anti-war in their
programmes and outcomes, even as they themselves involved compromising alliances and violence. Ordinary working people don’t want war, even if sometimes their leaders (who never send their own children to die on the front) succeed in whipping up jingoism to serve imperialist ends. Our irenic task is to identify the contemporary reincarnation of imperialist ideologies.
Ukraine 2022 and the First World War
Irish neutrality, battle-scarred, some would say on its last legs, has come under renewed attack since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022. In response to the aggression by Vladimir Putin it seems merely bad form to sit on the fence. Everyone has been called on to take sides, and it seems which side you are on depends merely on whether you happen to live to the east or the west of the Donbas. Four years after the invasion, and two and a half years after Israel began its genocide of Gaza, the simple rights and wrongs of the situation have lost their moral sheen. When the world’s preeminent arms dealer is arming both the victim in one conflict and the perpetrator in the other (and indeed when the chief victim Zelensky has explicitly identified with the aggressor Israel while calling for more US weapons), we could be forgiven for getting confused about which side to take. What has become clearer is the need to articulate an alternative to taking sides.
Irish history offers a lesson which goes back to a public meeting held in Dublin in October 1914. At that time there was also a story being promoted by the capitalist press that there was a victim (Catholic Belgium) and an aggressor (heathen Germany), and a huge mobilisation was underway to send young working class men to give their lives in the cause of justice. In Dublin the leading newspapers, The Irish Independent and The Irish Times, featured enthusiastic illustrated reports of rallies convened by the leader of the Irish Party at Westminster John Redmond, who called on volunteers to go to war in return for the promise by the British that after the war, Ireland would be granted Home Rule. In fact it’s now acknowledged that most recruits went to war to escape poverty; some 35,000 were killed, countless others had their young lives ruined. The above newspapers gave no coverage to a large counter-meeting which was held against the war, convened by Connolly and the newly-formed Irish Neutrality League. The slogan of this movement would later be displayed on the banner over Liberty Hall which said ‘We Serve Neither King nor Kaiser but Ireland’. Beyond the mere opportunism of ‘England’s difficult is Ireland’s opportunity’ lay a broader vision of anti-war activism.
The similarities between autumn 1914 and spring 2022 are suggestive. Then and now it was the weaker power that began a new era of open conflict. Germany had entered late in the race between European powers to monopolise global resources. Redmond vigorously advocated participation in the war against Germany, just as today the leader of Fianna Fáil promotes Ireland’s integration with European militarism, in order to counter ‘the Russian threat’. Against this, Connolly was prepared to form ‘strange’ alliances against the war, and to put aside differences with other activists. The report of Connolly’s speech reads:
He had with him on the platform men drawn from all classes. There were labour men there, and men who by no stretch of the imagination could be called labour men. They had Home Rulers and Republicans, Socialists and Sinn Féiners (applause)…All of these represented ideals that were strangely different and ideas of the future that were strangely hostile…But having mentioned the things they disagreed on, he would now turn to the one thing upon which they all agreed, namely, that the interests of Ireland were more dear to them than the interests of the British Empire (loud applause). They wanted to emphasise the fact that the enemies of England were not necessarily the enemies of Ireland.
The political establishment in 1914 regarded anti-war activists as ‘either cowards or enemies’ (John Dillon). The rhetoric of warmongering was similar then to now: there were widespread reports of a rampaging invading force raping women and killing priests in Catholic Belgium during the early days of the war, and posters appeared on billboards. ‘Have you any women-folk worth defending? Remember the women of Belgium. Join today,’ one said; others appealed to ‘gallant Irishmen: It Will be Too Late to Fight When the Enemy is At Your Door, So Join Today’. Today the best-selling newspapers are fed rumours about Russian designs on our Atlantic seaboard, cyberspace and ‘undersea cables’, even as the only evidence that Russia posed a threat to the latter was the accusation – soon debunked – that Russia had sabotaged (its own) gas pipeline to Germany in the Baltic Sea in 2022. A piece in the Irish Times began with ‘Over the past two years Ukraine has been – literally – the first line of European defence against Russian predation’. However, the innocence of Belgium then has been transferred to Ukraine today with more
difficulty, which has increased as the ethnic complexities of the Donbas become more fully understood. Only elite commentators seem impervious to any acknowledgement of NATO and the West’s role in provoking Putin’s attack, and anyone who points this out is accused of ‘parroting Kremlin talking points’. Yet even as it’s clear that most people want a peace deal in Ukraine and an end to war, those ‘experts’ are lining up to tell us that now we need to join a European army and increase defence spending.
In fact the moral ambiguity which destroyed the certainty of the Allied cause took far longer to undermine the idea of World War I than it did to cast doubt on the ‘cause’ of the Ukraine War, which is showing signs of coming apart as an ideological project after just a few years. Connolly’s insight that the war in Europe was an inter-imperial conflict between elites – rather than a war between ‘nations’- is now commonplace among official historians; likewise the description of today’s Ukraine war as ‘proxy’ is now commonly used by non-mainstream analysts. The global rift of which the 1914 -18 war was the symptom had to do with shifts in the balance of power in Europe, whereas in 2022 the rebalancing is occurring not within Europe, but between ‘the West’ on one hand, and China and the Global South on the other. After forty years of globalisation, in which manufacturing industry has been outsourced from Europe and North America to cheaper labour markets, the world may be said to be divided between authoritarian producer regions, and liberal democratic consumer states, where weak economic growth has become dependent on financialisation (private debt, derivative trading etc.). Producers and consumers have come into conflict along the fault line of eastern Ukraine.
In 1914 Connolly was responding to the official Irish policy of supporting the war effort by pointing out that Ireland’s interests were not those of the British Empire. In 2022 the Irish Neutrality League was reestablished in order to defend Irish neutrality against strenuous efforts by political elites to enlist Ireland on behalf of Ukraine against Russia. Lies were told and quickly exposed, such as the idea that Ireland would only offer ‘non-lethal’ assistance to the Ukrainians.
Yet believers in the righteousness of the anti-Russian or anti-German cause were not mere cynics. In fact neutrality advocates were the ones then as now who appear to be the sober realists. Wanting peace has usually meant wanting it now rather than after many more lives are lost, when some sort of peace deal will have to be worked our anyway. In this sense perhaps World Wars I and II, with their myths of total defeat of the Bad Guys, have served as encouragement to liberal imperialism with disastrous prolongations of subsequent wars.
This raises the difficult question, which nonetheless gets to the heart of neutrality as a positive force, of Irish neutrality and the Nazis. Surely no-one should be neutral in the face of Nazism? And yet this was exactly de Valera’s policy in 1939. In the report of the Consultative Forums organised by the Irish government in 2023 into changes in Ireland’s security and defence policy, much was made of the moral ambiguities of de Valera’s neutrality. Anti-neutrality advocates seem to place great store in the ideal of all-or-nothing. Because they make the common mistake of confusing neutrality with moralism, they think they’ve delivered the coup de grâce by pointing out its equivocations. A suspicion of moral duplicity has been cast over Irish mid-century policy. While sending ambulances and fire tenders to Belfast after German bombing in 1941 might be seen as a forgivable derogation from strict neutrality, allowing Allied planes to overfly Donegal during the war and sharing intelligence seems more like complicity. The post-war agreement with the British RAF to allow overflights and interceptions of ‘hostile aircraft’ in Irish airspace has been described as Ireland ‘freeloading’ on Britain for her security. But as recent Taoiseach Varadkar pointed out when questioned about this in 2024, if the British were to intercept enemy planes over Ireland, ‘…they would be doing it to protect themselves, not us’. Varadkar’s realism is not inconsistent with neutrality as a positive force for good in the world. In its earliest expression by Wolfe Tone, Irish neutrality is in the first instance a rejection of great power politics. When Britain was contemplating war with Spain in 1790, and expecting its Irish vassal to step up to the mark with military support, Tone wrote in his first pamphlet:
We should then look to our own internal resources, and scorn to sue for protection to any foreign state: we spurn the idea of moving as a humble satellite around any power, however great, and claim at once, and enforce, our rank among the primary nations of the earth.
‘The Spanish War’, Theobald Wolfe Tone (1790).
Anti-neutrality advocates today like to point out the alleged amorality of refusing to take sides, and the undoubted fact that Ireland is not a ‘primary nation’ which is in any position to ‘enforce’ anything. Our military is tiny by world standards and relatively ill-equipped. Their response to this is to suggest that Ireland should accept its ‘duty’ to contribute to its own security by joining military alliances, whether NATO-based or centred on the emerging European military industrial complex.
Neutrality however is not some reluctance or refusal to fight for justice or to accept responsibility for one’s own security, but a rejection of hegemonic dictates. It requires eagle-eyed discernment and a refusal to take sides in great power conflicts. Neutrality is not about failing to help a victim of an attack, but about spurning calls to extend the rescue into a ‘cause’. This is crucial to irenic work because it insists on the work of historical analysis, coupled with civil society activism to counter war propaganda. No attack is ever merely a bad act, but takes its part in some historical sequence or other. In this sense it is perfectly acceptable to help out Belfast victims of German bombing, and to want to save victims of Nazism, while refusing to take sides with either the Allies or the Axis powers. It is these ‘causes’ which produced both the horrors of Nazism and the excesses of Allied counterattacks (British and US bombing campaigns, including the inexcusable use of atomic bombs). Similarly one can condemn Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, but it behoves one to understand that this occurred partly as a result of thirty years of provocations by the West, including NATO expansion to the east and interference in Ukrainian democratic politics. This is necessary because whatever solution is available to the war in Ukraine, it must involve an agreement which addresses the security concerns of both sides. Irish neutrality is under attack today by people (all of them elite ideologues) who are adamant that the aggressor must be punished. Only from a position of neutrality, regardless of the fact that one side took the first step to war, can a peace deal be arrived at, as opposed to some putative retributive ‘justice’. What anti-neutrality imperialists in 1914 and today have in common is a moral crusade against ‘wrongdoing’ (confined of course to that attributed to imperial foes), rather than a programme for peace.
The most interesting figure in the history of Ireland’s twentieth century neutrality, after Connolly, is Frank Aiken. During the 1950s and 60s he played an active role in the UN working towards conflict resolution (Irish UN membership had been delayed until 1955 because of a Soviet veto which was caused by Ireland’s wartime neutrality). Aiken was opposed in his policy of Cold War neutrality by Sean Lemass (later to be the Taoiseach who oversaw the first state’s first economic boom), who wanted Ireland to join the Anglo-American sphere of interest. However, it was arguably Ireland not taking sides in World War II which gave Aiken the opportunity to play a leading role in promoting nuclear non-proliferation treaties. Like Connolly, Aiken’s adherence to neutrality shouldn’t be confused with pacifism per se: both men were involved in violent revolutionary activity: Aiken was a prominent IRA commander during the Irish revolution, and may even have been responsible for a serious war crime during the Irish Civil War. Yet even as early as then, when he attempted to broker a pact between de Valera and Michael Collins which could have averted hostilities, he appears to have had an instinct for conflict resolution. His work at the UN in the 50s and 60s paved the way for Ireland’s distinguished role in UN peacekeeping, granting this small ex-colony a presence in international affairs far greater than its military or economic might, something which would not have been possible but for her neutrality. This is what ‘positive neutrality’ means.
It’s this peacekeeping role which has become the target of today’s critics of Irish neutrality.
When the European Union decided to reform its structures in the 2001 Nice Treaty, including setting out plans for enhanced military cooperation, the Irish people rejected it in a referendum, partly because they feared it would compromise Irish neutrality. In order to get the treaty passed a second time, the Government got a military opt-out secured on behalf of the people. This included formal recognition of the so-called Triple Lock, whereby any plan to send more than 12 Irish soldiers on a peacekeeping mission abroad would require the consent of (a) the Dáil, (b) the Government and (c) the UN Security Council or General Assembly. Starting at least in 2013 the Government has been trying to roll back this assurance as follows:
This constraint may lead to an inability to act on occasions where there is a pressing moral or security imperative and overwhelming international support to do so, but where UN sanction is not forthcoming, in circumstances where a veto is exercised by a permanent member of the Security Council acting in its own national interests. (2013 Green Paper on Security and Defence).
Today’s Irish Neutrality League campaign in defence of the Triple Lock and against the US military use of Shannon airport. These activists have huge majorities of the population behind them (as recorded in successive polls), because the Irish population – including many recent immigrants – identifies with a history of colonisation more common in the Global South. Yet as the generation of leaders like Aiken who had fought for independence fades into the distant past, the danger posed
by today’s ‘Redmondite imperialists’ grows stronger.

Conclusion

12. Connolly and Tone were of course the most active sorts of activists, namely, revolutionaries. In their day they were almost universally vilified and demonised, yet today have public squares and main train stations named after them. Connolly’s politics were to be radically changed when he saw how the outbreak of war in 1914 led to the collapse of the Second International, as socialists all over Europe took sides with their respective capitalist rulers. In his remaining few years we see how he came to an accommodation with nationalism. The line for which he is best remembered, ‘The cause of Ireland is the cause of labour’, is cited to explain how he became aligned with the
Irish Republican Brotherhood, who didn’t hold to socialist principles. In truth it must be acknowledged that in this Connolly too was operating out of realpolitik: he had come to believe that national and socialist questions were synonymous in the case of Ireland. Lenin and Bukharin’s critique of imperialism can ground Connolly’s anti-war politics in Marxist theory if need be, but it would be a mistake to overlook his own experiences and difficulties with left factionalism at home and in America.

13. The idea I’ve been working towards is an anti-idealist neutrality. Even as we suspect that the Irish Taoiseach Micheál Martin is acting in the interest of his future career as an elite Eurocrat, it’s hard not to believe that he believes the lies he’s parlaying about Russian threats to Ireland (the same might’ve been true of Tony Blair in the lead-up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003; David Runciman described him at the time as a ‘sincere liar’). In like manner there’s no reason to believe John Redmond was intentionally misleading Irish people as he talked-up the pro-war cause in Kaiser Wilhelm then and Vladimir Putin today make for perfectly believable villains. What’s more challenging is to identify the precise confusions which class warriors like Plekhanov and Kautsky were suffering from when they called on their followers to press Pause on the revolution in order to deal with ‘the enemy’, not least because some of their views were demonstrably true: for instance, Germany was the aggressor, just as Russia is today. But Connolly and Lenin’s analysis calls for a more rigorous dissection of the concept of ‘nation’. Kautsky’s apparent acceptance of the right of German workers to defend their interests from their British and Russian counterparts must be rejected as false socialism. Some of the constituents of US left-leaning politicians Bernie Sanders and John Fetterman are no doubt securely employed making rockets and missiles, the sale of which the American government facilitates to states like Israel and Saudi Arabia, engaged in more or less genocidal attacks against Palestinian and Yemenese innocents.
This could plausibly explain the hesitation (Sanders) or refusal (Fetterman) to call a halt to weapons sales to Israel. This is where we must look to analyse the use and abuse of nationalism. We can argue that anti-imperialist nationalism is always the ‘cause of labour’, but any other nationalism is probably being invoked (more or less cynically) to garner popular support for ruling-class programmes. The crucial weakness of European elites today resides in their attempt to put together an imperialist army without the heady intoxicant of nationalist rhetoric. The fear mongering around Putin can only go so far. Eventually everyone must become neutral, and sit down to the messy business of making peace.

Mark Price works as an architect in Dublin and was formerly a lecturer in University College Dublin and Queens University Belfast. He is a member of the Irish Anti-War Movement and Irish Neutrality League.

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*14-04-2026:

Members of the Oireachtas invited to meet Lelia Doolan as she arrives at Dáil.

Peace group ‘Lex Innocentium 21st Century’ has contacted the individual members of the Houses of the Oireachtas to ask all TDs and Senators to meet with Lelia Doolan as she completes her Walk for Peace to the Dáil on Wednesday 15th April at noon. Lex Innocentium wrote:

Dear [TD/Senator],

Lex Innocentium 21st Century were delighted to join Ms. Lelia Doolan on her walk from Shannon Airport to Dáil Éireann over the past fifteen days. Lelia’s message is that the use of Shannon Airport by US Military (or any other Military currently engaged in war or war-related activity) makes Ireland, a neutral country, complicit in that war – including the deaths of thousands of innocent people and damage to the natural environment. War is never the solution!.

Lelia and her fellow walkers plan to arrive at Dáil Éireann tomorrow morning, Wednesday, the 15th of April. If this inspirational 91-year old woman can walk the entire width of Ireland to hand in her message to the Oireachtas, the least you can do is to come out and meet her.

Lelia is not on a tractor or in a truck. She is on foot. This is a march of peace for peace. You should legitimise this peaceful method of protest by meeting it in person.

Yours faithfully, Marian Naughton, Seán English and Elizabeth Cullen

on behalf of Lex Innocentium 21st Century

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*12-04-2026:

WILLIE O’DEA TD: Parties must end the doublespeak around triple lock or Defence Forces could become a political pawn. source: Irish Independent. 12th April 2026.

https://www.independent.ie/opinion/willie-odea-parties-must-end-the-doublespeak-around-triple-lock-or-defence-forces-could-become-a-political-pawn/a1010323238.html

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*7-03-2026:

Full text of speech by Mr. Eamon O’Cuív, former Minister/TD on ‘The Future of Irish Neutrality‘ delivered at Léacht Lex Innocentium 21^st Century Wynns Hotel

The Future of Irish Neutrality

The Constitutional basis for Ireland’s approach to defence and foreign affairs is set out in several articles in the Irish Constitution. These are-:

Article 5

Ireland is a sovereign, independent, democratic state

Article 29 1

Ireland affirms its devotion to the ideal of peace and friendly co-operation amongst nations founded on international justice and morality

Article 29 2

Ireland Affirms its adherence to the principal of the pacific settlement of international disputes by international arbitration or judicial determination

Article 29 3

Ireland Accepts the generally recognised principles of international law as its rule of conduct in its relations with other states

Article 29 4 4

Ireland Affirms its commitment to the European Union within which the member state of that Union works together to promote peace, shared values and the well-being of their peoples.

Article 29 4 9

The State shall not adopt a decision taken by the European Council to establish a common defence pursuant to Article 42 of the Treaty on the European Union where that common defence would include the state.

Article 42 of the Treaty on the European Union (TEU) establishes the framework for the EU’s Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP). Key to this is Article 42(7), the mutual assistance clause, which mandates that if an EU Member State is the victim of armed aggression on its territory, other member states must provide aid and assistance by all means in their power.

Part of the context of this is that it is part of the broader Common Security and Defence Policy, which aims to provide the EU with operational capabilities for peacekeeping, conflict prevention and strengthening international security.

Invocation Article 42(7) has been invoked once by France in November 2015 following the Paris terrorist attacks.

I believe it is imperative in order for Ireland to adhere to its constitutional obligations that it pursues an independent foreign and military policy at the UN and at meetings of the EU. This is possible and we see many of the larger EU countries acting unilaterally on foreign and defence policy when the case suits them

Already it is constitutionally forbidden for Ireland to join a mandatory EU defence pact, and my view is that it is against the spirit of the Constitution, if not the letter of the law, to become a part of any common defence arrangements voluntarily on a case-by-case basis. An example of this is the so called “Coalition of the Willing”.

So, the question arises! What policies we should adopt and how can we be pro-active on the international stage in line with our Constitution?

Defence of our island

The first obligation of a state is to make its territory as safe as possible for its citizens to live in.

One of the most important protections we have, whether it is personal or a country, is to create a situation that nobody if out to harm or kill you. Unknowingly we all apply this principal in our everyday lives as we largely avoid situations of potential danger, and we try to create a society that is relatively safe.

Ireland is a relatively safe country to live in day to day with a largely unarmed police force and a public few of whom carry personal protection weapons or spend significant money on day-to-day personal security. In other societies despite high expenditures on personal security, and many people carrying personal protection weapons there is a much higher risk to life

Similarly to personal security, the first basis of security for a country is to not threaten any other country and not be seen to be aligned militarily with countries with overseas interests that appear to pose a threat. In other words, to avoid situations that by association you get drawn into wider worldwide conflagrations. We have seen an example of this in the recent US/Israel v Iran war which the UK got drawn into when their base in Cyprus was attacked and where now the Secretary General of NATO Mark Rutte is sabre rattling on behalf of NATO against Iran as part of a domino effect.

In the Irish case we are better off trying to ensure we stay apart from alliances that have as members countries such as the USA, France and UK which have overseas bases in many parts of the globe protecting their interests. Many of these bases in the case of France and the UK are remnants of their imperial past.

In our case our first object should be to not get drawn by association into a conflict. Secondly, we should through our embassy network and through foreign embassies accredited to Ireland stress our policy of military neutrality and our constitutional values of the adherence to international law and the pacific resolution of international disputes. Irrespective of our differences with various countries we should keep strong diplomatic ties with them all and in a polite but forceful way diplomatically outline our views and values to them and impress on them -:

1. That there is no reason to attack us or our infrastructure as we will do them no harm and

2. That in the event of attack we will stand our ground in the most appropriate way open to us at the time.

There should be a reasonable and detailed assessment of the risks to our sovereignty and appropriate action to strengthen our resilience including reasonable and focused investment in our defence forces.

One of our biggest challenges is the retention of trained staff in the defence forces due to inadequate remuneration. This should be addressed forthwith.

We also need to strengthen drug interdiction as drugs cause so much havoc and loss in our country.

In relation to maritime infrastructure there should be clarity in relation to our responsibilities and single sovereign power to protect and enforce our rights not only in our territorial waters (12 miles offshore) but also in our economic zone.

We have many assets in our waters including fishing rights, gas pipelines, electricity connectors, telecommunications cables, harbours and ports as well as shipping.

Unfortunately, most of our fishing rights are already given away through our membership of the EU and botched fishing negotiations stretching back to 1973.

The question in relation to telecommunications cables is first to establish our responsibilities and then consider how best to protect them and whether cyber-attacks are a more likely method of disruption than physical attack on the cables.

In the air I totally support the acquiring of primary radar and any other method of collecting information on the misuse of our air space by “bad actors”. Once accurate data is available then it will be possible to really assess how best to minimise the risk to us form this source and how best we might defend ourselves.

On land the greatest threat from outside the state is not that we would be faced with outright war but that there would be terrorist attacks by people from societies who would have seen their countries destroyed by war, financed and armed from the major world powers. Again, aside from normal intelligence work our greatest protection is if Ireland is seen as a haven of world justice and a supporter of international law.

Another source of concern for me is the fact that part of our Island is controlled militarily by the UK which is much more likely to be a magnet for attack than Ireland. At the very least the Irish Government should insist on a protocol agreeing that any change in the present defence arrangements in terms of bases in NI would not take place without the agreement of the Irish Government.

As the 9/11attacks, the assassination of US presidents, the drones that closed Brussels airport and the blowing up of the Nord Stream pipeline showed there is no absolute defence against all types of attack even for the countries that spend the most on defence. So let us not delude ourselves that any of the alternatives to our policy of a hierarchy of peaceful settlement of international disputes, neutrality as outlined, diplomacy and reasonable defence will make us more immune to attack. The opposite is really the truth.

Ireland’s role on the world stage

Ireland over the decades has a proud record in both the League of Nations and the United Nations in supporting International Law and promoting peace through for example the lead we gave on nuclear non-proliferation and peace keeping.

In relation to the UN Ireland should become more vocal than ever on the central role of the UN in world affairs. We should seek support for changes to its outdated structures that dates back over 80 year and seek to make it more powerful and democratic.

There is a need for the UN to have a mechanism to give an independent view as to whether the actions of a nation in war were legal or not.

Furthermore, at UN level there is a need to once again tackle the issue of the proliferation of nuclear arms, and here again we should give a lead.

If the world is to reduce war and avoid destroying our world and impoverishing people, the UN must tackle the arms race and seek to reduce the arms produced in the developed world many of which are used in the poorest of countries. If the money spent on arms in the Third World was spent on development aid the world would be a better place.

In relation to the EU, Ireland must oppose recent moves to deregulate how arms are produced and sold creating a dangerous precedent for global security.

Ireland should also oppose all EU budgetary aid to the arms industry and oppose promoting arms production and sales as an EU international sales growth area. We should also go further and make it clear that we will not fund arms production from our large contribution to the EU budget.

I have noted, recently, that 5 EU countries – Latvia, Lithuania, Finland, Poland and Estonia have announced their intention to withdraw from the Ottawa Convention against the production and placing of land mines. Land mines mainly kill and maim civilians and were banned for that reason. Again, we should be vocal in the UN and the EU in our opposition to this.

Ireland should not get involved in international military missions not related to humanitarian relief, natural disaster or rescue unless there is a UN mandate going with it.

I note that the recently published heads of the 2025 Defence Bill in head six states that Ireland will only participate in an International Force if that acts in accordance with the “the principles of the United Nations Charter” or “the principles of justice and international law”. As we have seen in recent weeks some countries acting unilaterally claim they are acting according to these principles when they clearly are not. Unfortunately, they were not held back by any requirement to validate their claim pending UN endorsement. We are now attempting to go down the same road as part of our voluntary abandonment of neutrality in favour of a voluntary “Common Defence” in Europe.

Therefore, what we need is a process of validation of all our foreign military actions by the competent authority, which is the UN. This is exactly what we have at present. Therefore, the Triple Lock should remain as the third leg on the stool and the independent validation of our foreign military actions. Instead of further weakening the UN we should be reforming it and strengthening it.

There are those who will say I am an idealistic dreamer and not living in the real world.

In response I will quote the works of PH Pearse

“Since the wise men have not spoken,

I speak that am only a fool;

A fool that has loved his folly

Yea, more than the wise men their books or their counting houses

or their quiet homes,

……….

O wise men, riddle me this:

What if the dream comes true?

And if millions unborn shall dwell in the house that I shaped in my heart,

The noble house of my thought

source: Éamon Ó Cuív.

pics: Oireachtas.ie / facebook.com

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*14-03-2026

The government opens the gate to NATO – under British leadership.

The government is seeking closer maritime co-operation with Britain and other NATO countries. The first National Maritime Security Strategy [1] outlines plans that defence minister McEntee said could entail seeking naval assistance from Britain and France during Ireland’s EU presidency that starts on July 1.

The strategy said Ireland would in the second quarter of this year “commence an agreement” with the NATO countries in the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) [2] “to participate in appropriate activities”. McEntee said the scope would involve “looking at training, looking at how we can identify and manage specific and certain types of risks in our maritime domain . . . we are looking at ways in which we can co-operate more in these types of partnerships”.

The JEF was initially a British-only formation, conceived at a time when British forces were overstretched in Afghanistan and Iraq. The concept was first set out [3] in 2012 as a force “capable of projecting power with global effect and influence.”

And as a rapid response force distinct from NATO. It also includes NATO members Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway and Sweden. Its activities are focused around the North Atlantic. For the moment, the government does not envisage joining the JEF itself, but rather participating in activities of the so-called JEF+, an enhanced partnership structure which enables ad hoc co-operation and is widely perceived as a gateway to NATO.

The JEF was an example of how NATO allies implemented the Framework Nations Concept [4] where groups of allies would work together under the leadership of a framework nation to develop rapidly deployable capabilities. In the case of the JEF, Britain provides the headquarters—known as the Standing Join Force Headquarters [5] —and the commander, plus the lead commando, airborne, armoured, aviation, air, and maritime task groups.

The national units involved are planned to be deployable in a range of combinations and capable of responding to a variety of contingencies. Once at least two member states agree to do something, JEF arrangements can be triggered; other countries can then decide whether to take part. For the units involved in the JEF, the group has become a vehicle to increase interoperability through an intensive program of exercises. The JEF also provides a framework for regular discussions of military issues among defense ministers, chiefs of defense staff, and heads of government.

The tight geographic focus of the group has allowed them to forge a closer network of relationships than would have been possible just under a pan-NATO umbrella. The ultimate vindication of this was the quick and smooth integration of former neutrals Sweden and Finland – who joined JEF in 2017 – into NATO after 2022. This was largely built on the work they had done with the other JEF members to develop common principles of operation and understanding in both the military and political spheres, a road that Ireland has already significantly progressed along.

Concurrently, the government is updating a memorandum of understanding with Britain ahead of a bilateral summit this month, which will focus on maritime security. It has also begun negotiations with France on enhanced co-operation and information sharing. The government is also purchasing sonar and radar, due for delivery next year though anti-drone capabilities are expected to be in place for the EU presidency. Ireland will also host a summit of the 47-member European Political Community, including Ukraine, during the period of its EU Presidency.

None of these moves have been approved by the electorate. On the contrary, popular support for neutrality stood at seventy percent in a recent Sindo poll. Even by the standards of Micheál Martin’s recent definition of ‘military neutrality’ in reply to Mairead Farrell TD, this can only be considered a betrayal of the trust of the electorate, especially when taken in the context of the planned abandonment of the Triple Lock.

source:

https://thepeoplesnews.home.blog/2026/03/14/the-government-opens-the-gate-to-nato-under-british-leadership/

image:

https://jefnations.org/

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