A chara, – The defence policy review issued by the Tánaiste and Minister for Defence makes all the right noises regarding improving our military capabilities to “provide for the military defence of the State, contribute to national and international peace and security and fulfil all other roles assigned by Government” (“Ireland just as vulnerable to security threats as neighbours despite neutrality, defence review concludes”, News, July 25th). It is rightly an aspirational, forward-looking document.
However, to move forward, we need to know where we came from. Nowhere does the document mention the extraordinary failure of policy in recent decades which allowed the nation’s defence to reach its current level of decrepitude, nor does it acknowledge how challenging many of its aspirations are, especially as key metrics such as personnel numbers continue to trend in the wrong direction.
Of course I don’t expect a policy review to provide a full implementation roadmap, but an acknowledgement of the scope and scale of the challenge would be nice.
“Not a lot done, much more to do” would be an apt slogan. – Is mise,
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DONNCHA LENIHAN,
Dublin 3.
Sir, – A letter writer (July 30th) bemoans the lack of reference to neutrality in the defence policy review.
Perhaps the reason why is that the threat profile faced by the State has changed, and that neither our location nor neutrality afford us adequate protection anymore.
By ensuring that the Defence Forces are fit for purpose and equipped adequately, by entering into arrangements with our European partners regarding defence and security, we can ensure that the State is adequately protected for future years.
Our current situation, defenceless and neutral, offers little by way of protection. – Yours, etc,
CONOR HOGARTY,
Blackrock,
Co Dublin.