The man in the white suit, who had reported on wars in four continents, had come to Dublin to speak of peace and his largely military audience did not want him to stop.
Mr Martin Bell, former war correspondent turned MP, was at the National Museum of Ireland's new premises at Collins' Barracks to praise the role of Irish soldiers on United Nations peacekeeping duties and to reminisce on his time as a "war zone thug", as he was once described by a US competitor while reporting for the BBC from former Yugoslavia.
At a public lecture to mark 40 years of Irish peacekeeping, he said: "You Irish have many advantages - you have no colonial past, you never persecuted anyone - and you speak an international language, English, in a way that (pause for wolfish grin) almost everyone can understand."
Mr Bell said he regretted the tendency of some of his countrymen to see Britain as the deputy sheriff of the world with the US as the sheriff. "I am a great believer in the United Nations, despite its problems. I count Kofi Annan (UN secretary general) as a friend, but he has inherited a flawed organisation . . . if anyone can put it right he can."
The UN must have sufficient resources to match its mandate and should have its own dedicated troops, as many problems arise from troops having two sets of masters, Mr Bell said. There can only be one when effective military intervention is required.
The media had affected the way war is waged. "The bombings of Dresden and Hamburg at the end of the second World War might not have continued if satellite dishes had been beaming back news of the devastation to English homes."
Mr Bell said he had started his war reporting career 30 years ago dealing with battle-plans and military strategies. "Then I realised that people were more important." He also stopped talking to brigadiers and generals to find out what was going on. He talked to sergeants and other ranks instead. "They knew what was going on, and they could read a map."
He explained his recent career change thus: "I am an accidental MP. Nothing in my career in war zones prepared me for confrontations with Neil and Christine Hamilton." Mr Bell ran as an Independent candidate against Neil Hamilton, the sitting Conservative MP for Tatton, in April 1997. He won in a hard-fought battle in which Mrs Christine Hamilton played a vociferous part. He says he will serve one term only.
As an MP with experience of war - and peackeeping - he has an opportunity to make his views known, a freedom which he did not have as a reporter. The link between his two careers was clear enough, he said. "Either we make a difference or we fill a space."
"Your Irish peacekeepers have in 40 years made a difference, lost 76 casualties and saved thousands of lives. You should be proud of them - I am."