The leader of the Green Party, Eamon Ryan, last week caused a major row in government by announcing the closure of Cathal Brugha Barracks, an important military campus, to provide for the building of social and affordable housing. Evidently the announcement took his ministerial colleagues by surprise, not least embattled Simon Coveney, the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Defence.
The FG Seanad leader In the Seanad sharply criticised Ryan’s announcement last Thursday as “ill-judged and made at the wrong time”. That suggests that Ryan might only be guilty of jumping the gun, but it left open the issue as to whether his predicted closure is planned or contemplated. She promised an early debate in the Seanad on the future of the Defence Forces. Yesterday the closure announcement was disavowed completely by Fianna Fáil Acting Leader Senator O’Loughlin as “without foundation”.
There is, by the way, plenty of space in Dublin 6 for badly needed social and affordable housing without effectively eliminating the presence of the Defence Forces in our capital.
If the Rathmines is closed, the Defence Forces will have only one small space in the greater Dublin area, McKee Barracks, an elegant and ornamental Victorian barracks on Blackhorse Avenue now used mainly for army administration and as the Dublin base of the Army’s equitation school. If one of the Army Brigades is still to be stationed in Dublin, McKee Barracks will not suffice.
This is all part of a wider picture of continued run-down and asset-stripping of the Defence Forces. In 1999, this paper reported that the Defence Force’s strength was 11,500. Now its nominal strength is 9,500 but recruitment is causing huge problems in keeping the Defence Forces functional.
We have got to the point where the Naval Service has ships tied up for want of crew. The Air Corps is hopelessly under-equipped to carry out even basic defence, maritime and security functions. The Army has huge retention problems based on low pay – an issue to be addressed by a Commission. The scandal of loyal serving soldiers having to scrape by with Family Income Supplement was truly shocking.
It is well to remember the fundamental democratic constitutional role of the Defence Forces. They are the protector and ultimate enforcer and defender of the democratic authority of the State itself, acting in the aid of the civil power. The President is the constitutional commander in chief of the Defence Forces. Officers hold their commissions from the President.
The Oireachtas is the only body which can raise and/or maintain any military or armed force in the State. The Defence Force is our constitutional bulwark against armed aggression or rebellion. All of this is confirmed in the Constitution – our basic law.
We need a deterrent to terrorism and para-militarism as well as control of our territorial airspace and seas. The Defence Force intelligence section is the agency which has responsibility for external security threats to our State.
We have a growing population and growing wealth but we are allowing the Defence Force to wither and atrophy. Our capacity to participate in UN operations is increasingly under pressure. We led a UN operation in Mali; we couldn’t do that now. We have no effective control of our own airspace and faltering control over our maritime economic zone, as Martin Wall and Conor Gallagher wrote here last June. We totally lack any military grade radar or sonar capacity.
We are sitting ducks for many types of imaginable armed and hostile challenges to the State including cyber-warfare. We will only truly appreciate the awful risks we are taking when it is far too late to respond.
There are arguments for and against joining NATO; I think we are better off remaining outside it, like Sweden, Switzerland, Finland and Austria. They, however, take their defence seriously. Are we less exposed than the Swiss? But if we were a member of NATO, the folly of spending so little on our defence would be writ large for us by others.
The Reserve Defence Force has been wound down hugely. As a former FCA member, I doubt the wisdom of having so few of our citizens with elementary military training that would assist the Permanent Defence Force in any national crisis. Like, the Garda Reserve, the Army reserve is being left to wither for want of political interest or support.
Simon Coveney stated last week that “capacity issues” were undermining the Defence Force and “needed to be addressed”. He added that he has “accepted this for a long time”. He thinks the forthcoming publication of the Commission on the Defence Forces will “trigger a very fundamental debate in Ireland about how we financially resource military and defence issues”.
We need commitment from Government to the Defence forces – not a short-sighted, demoralising, and “ill-judged” sound-bite about bulldozing the only significant Defence Forces base in Dublin city or county.
We have taken out the battery in the national smoke alarm. Heaven help us when a fire starts.
(Photo credit By Irish Defence Forces – Niemba 50th Anniversary Wreath Laying Ceremony in Cathal Brugha Barracks)