This government feels like the residue of a decade of power consolidation. We’ve gone from figures like Seán MacBride, Liam Cosgrave, Frank Aiken, Simon Coveney, and others who at least brought weight and experience to Foreign Affairs, to what looks like a classic case of failing upwards with Simon Harris and Helen McEntee.
It’s genuinely striking how thin the talent is on the government front benches and at ministerial level. And yet these are the people now representing Ireland in talks that could shape the country for a generation.
I know someone who worked closely with him and said he was genuinely decent and very hard working. 2 things that made him a bit of a villain in his own party
Not surprising though. Why subject yourself to the abuse and regular death threats at a high level public role in Ireland when you could make 10x more in the private sector as a consultant and live a quiet life if you’re competent.
Or better yet, become a CS exec and wield all the power of state with none of the accountability along with better pay. Even better again, the mongs of ministers will do everything you say, and you can use them as human shields. And all this in a niche so hidden you get to think you're the smartest person in the universe.
The only thing that is striking is that as Minister for Europe she had an excellent reputation and was regularly praised in the press and by peers such as Donald Tusk What seems to have changed was when taking on the vested interests in the Gardai along with Drew Harris a vicious and frankly misogynistic campaign was directed at her. Given you've never met her and haven't actually given a reason why she "failed upwards" I can only assume you are heavily influenced by this social media campaign...
She got in riding the pity wave after the death of her well liked father. I remember in the bi election people literally saying how nice she seemed and that she was the spit of Shane and her uncle. Also, she literally got her start through nepotism by becoming her father's tax payer funded paid assistant. And since then she's just failed upwards; a classic party establishment figure story.
They vote for who they feel is the best candidate. Doesn't necessarily mean that they're the right candidate.
Also, they vote for who they feel best serves their interest in their constituency, all politics is local as they say. They don't vote for her to be minister for justice and now minister for foreign affairs. That's decided by the government. Let's face it, she is out of her depth at this level. A minister for soundbites. The Garda escort down the streets of Dublin while declaring it "safe", before all shit hit the fan with the Dublin riots will never not be the most cringeworthy shit I've witnessed in quite a while. You couldn't write it.
Yes? Clearly he did the bare minimum in his constituency to get reelected. Any (alleged) criminal behaviour should have had him struck off but unfortunately that (potential) ball was dropped.
You understand that just because two things are called the same thing, that that doesn't make them the same thing?
What other coalitions of countries did in the past has nothing to do with what this current group will do. Sending peacekeepers to Ukraine, at Ukraine's request, is very different to invading a country.
Being against it based on the name has to be one of the dumbest things I've seen around here in a while, and I'm not meaning to single you out, there's multiple people at it.
Oh trust me im against it for many other reasons. But the name used is 100% meant to be a downplaying of what it is, which is a military pact among the same countries that have committed war crimes in the past.
I very much oppose Russian aggression in ukraine, but that does not mean I support our government signing us up to a war. If Ukraine and russia agree to peace and both agree to peacekeepers then fine. But sending ''peacekeepers'' somewhere that peace has not been agreed on both side, means we are sending our troops to an active war. Which is against our military neutrality
The name is a literal description of what it is, and it's not the same group of countries. Notably the US is not in it, while France, Germany and most other European countries are. Reading too much into the name seems bizarre to me.
It is not about being signed up for war, the sending of troops is about peacekeeping. There are no plans to send them before the hostilities stop. The point of other countries sending troops is to stop the war from starting again. It is not to send them into an active war.
Sending troops on peace keeping missions is something we've done a lot of and many take pride in. I don't see why this should be different.
Ireland needs to start expanding our military in preparation for such a deployment. We're also going to need to make sure our troops are able to operate allied militaries tanks given we have none of our own.
She is utterly useless at everything she does. Only a TD because of her father. No experience, no ability. Ran to leo for everything while minister for justice and will be just as useless in her current position.
People love to moan about our politicians, who are no better or worse than most countries. Why don’t the perpetual moaners run for election instead of wasting their time on Reddit or FB? Because they can’t handle the heat, don’t want to work all hours and be pestered by constituents who only want a favor to them and to hell with everyone else. It’s a thankless job made even worse these days by the abuse politicians receive on social media and even at their family homes.
By all means criticize policy but get over the dumb personal attacks.
I’m complaining because we’re not a part of the coalition of the willing.
We don’t support Ukraine militarily which is a moral wrong imo.
When the war is over and the true horrors are revealed, our inaction will be jarring. It’s not like I’m asking to send Irish men and women there, I don’t think I ever would, but we’re sending absolutely zero military aid. That’s morally incorrect. Ukrainians have a right to resist occupation and we have a duty to be on the right side of history and as a former colonial nation to resist imperialism, be it by Israel or by Russia.
Which Irish political party has run on a platform of increased military spending?
Cathal Berry ran as an independent TD largely on the basis of his military experience and looking after our armed forces in 2020. He was not re-elected in 2024. The Irish electorate clearly don't want money spent on the military.
You base your political opinions based off of the positions of political parties? So if a position isn’t held by a political party, you’re not allowed to hold it?
You only vote for a party that you perfectly align with 100% on every issue?
I believe in neutral self sustainability in our military but it’s not my most important position.
Most parties advocate for increased investment in our Defence forces.
We should ban American use of Shannon airport, buy EU arms rather than American and work to reduce our reliance on it as it’s sliding into authoritarianism and has always been an imperialist power.
Why should we give military support? How should we give it. We have no arms production, we have fuck all in terms of actually military support to give.
We’re far better off, far more cost effective, and far more useful, by focusing on humanitarian aid and other non-military aid
Yes, sufficient to support them. Doesn’t mean necessarily military support. It’s a better use of our money if we focus on humanitarian aid, while those countries who have a domestic arms industry can focus on military aid
With how how much the Irish Govt seems to hate the Irish people. would any Young Irish Man want to go off and fight for, and more than likely die for this Govt?
Martin after telling us that there was no crumbs for us peasants in the budget, turned around and gave e125 Billion to Ukraine. Not doing for Ukraine my foot.
You think we still shouldn't take it as a slap to the face. Being told there's no money for us and then handing another e125 over to Ukraine without a second thought?
Spending money on our defence which is what Ukraine is doing, it’s defending the EU, is extremely worth it.
The EU is the reason why your and my generation isn’t the poorest population in Western Europe anymore and it’s worth defending.
Russia randomly attacking countries in our east cannot be tolerated.
Your tax cut, which you probably deserve (I’m assuming you’re in the squeezed middle) when to hospitality through the vat cut, who took the cut, didn’t say thanks and asked for more.
The people want neutrality not military adventurism and destruction. We weren't involved in Iraq and we should not be involved in this. We have better things to spend our hard earned taxes on.
You don't know what "the people" want, nor do you speak for "the people".
We weren't involved in Iraq and we should not be involved in this. We have better things to spend our hard earned taxes on.
What the hell has Iraq got to do with the Russian invasion of Ukraine? You just keep saying these things as if they're self evidently true. I don't think it's self evidently true that we have better things to spend money on than helping a fellow European nation resist invasion from an imperial Great Power.
I don’t understand how many of the same people who rightly rejected Americas imperialist invasion of Iraq and Israel’s genocide of Palestine are unable to reject Russias imperialist invasion of Ukraine and China’s threatening of Taiwan.
Why can’t people be consistently anti imperialist?
People will pick as side and support the imperialism of that side. People on here supporting America stealing Venezuela’s oil and other people softly supporting the conquest and occupation of Ukraine. It’s maddening.
I don’t want to go to war, I want to give tangible military support to an anti imperialist effort and to the self determination of the Ukrainian people.
' I don't think it's self evidently true that we have better things to spend money on than helping a fellow European nation resist invasion from an imperial Great Power.'
I reference Iraq because of the coalition of the willing narrative jingoism. Just as well they didn't call themselves the coalition of the winning eh. Good name for a band though.
There's been far more serious failures in housing and health nobody gives a shit about in comparison, and no improvements in crime from the new Justice minister. But none of them get nearly the same level of ire.
Given that Ireland has been undergoing a long-term decline in crime rates, surely she's a success? (If one craves simplistic narratives such as calling somebody a failure.)
I'm just remembering the vile & sustained campaign against her and the Commissioner by some really nasty vested interests in the Gardai, Sinn Fein and the far right. Pretty much every crime metric is substantially down despite a significantly growing population including the first year when nobody died of criminal gun violence and the breakup of the Kinehan cartel, so my question to you is on what basis you made that comment or is it simply that you are you easily influenced by social media campaigns and if so which one.
It's not odd. The current front bench and minsters are the weakest lineup of politicians we've seen in a generation, regardless of gender.
To make it painfully clear compare politicians like Mary Robinson, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, Mary McAleese, Mary Lou McDonald, Mary Harney or Ivana Bacik to Norma Foley and McEntee, it's clear they're not close to the same caliber. And the country deserves better.
I'd have the same issues with Minister Patrick O’Donovan representing us too, the man is sub par on any scale.
Might as well send a second use wet tea bag …..hard pushed to think of a more useless ineffectual and dare I say not the brightest minister in recent history…..
We are not seen as neutral in any serious sense. We host and facilitate US multinationals inside the EU, we use the euro, and we are completely socially, politically, and economically embedded in the EU. We are the epitome of the West on all fronts. This new idea that we are “militarily neutral” but politically and economically aligned is just semantics.
No serious external actor actually treats Ireland as neutral. That belief mostly exists in our own domestic debates. In reality, we take the full benefits of EU membership while expecting countries like France and others to carry the security burden of our economic and political system. We can’t even agree to commit to even basic, non-provocative investments like serious cybersecurity, airspace monitoring, or protection of critical infrastructure. The default response is simply to do nothing. Anything more than nothing is fearmongering and a plethora of other random excuses.
The reality is that Ireland remains heavily dependent on the post-war world order that is clearly rapidly breaking down. Yet there is almost no willingness to adjust our security or defence thinking to that reality. We are living off yesterday’s guarantees while refusing to prepare for tomorrow’s risks. The neutrality policy was great and served its purpose well at the time of WWII, but the world has changed so much and is now changing even more again, and we have a lot of maturing to do as a nation. We are in some form of collective denial about what’s going on in the world. It’s not just us, many EU countries also have a lot of growing up to do. For 3 generations, EU leaders allowed the US call the shots, to the point that we don’t even know how to have our own foreign policy positions. But that’s changing faster than even any international relations professor could ever imagine.
Unless people are comfortable with Europe drifting toward a US-style or Chinese-style model of society, and are indifferent to preserving the European model of governance, then EU states need to accept that the status quo is no longer sufficient. Protecting Europe’s social, political, and economic model requires the Union to mature institutionally and undergo serious structural reform.
We aren't "meant" to be anything. The constitution is silent on the matter of neutrality and it's up to the government of the day to make a decision based on our national interests. It's not in our national interest for Russia to invade either Ukraine or Europe. Therefore on this matter we are categorically not neutral. How we exercise our sovereignty demonstrating our non-neutrality here is for the government to decide.
Ireland claims to be “militarily neutral” that doesn’t mean we don’t take political sides or we don’t have allies. We have rightly supported Ukraine in defending themselves from invasion.
It’s a fudge. We are politically and economically aligned with our EU partners, the UK, and US, but because we are not part of NATO we can also claim to be “non-aligned”.
In practice thanks to our location and the lack of a perceived external threat we basically don’t have a military, we can send troops on nato peacekeeping missions and that’s about it.
I don't understand the neutrality debate in 2025. Imagine a Russian soldier standing over you beating you with the rusty end of an AK47 while you scream "I'M NEUTRAL" in defence. There is no difference in Putins mind between political cooperation and military. They would kill us nonetheless. Time to embrace the modern world I say
I mean yeah? I disagree with some of their ideas and policies, but they do have them. I prefer the Socdems ones, but SF and Labour both do propose plenty of solutions. PBP have a lot of policies that seem more like and ideal than a realistic solution, but they’re also full of ideas.
They have the benefit of not being stuck in a status quo they built and want to maintain. Unlike FF/FG, who seem mostly happy with the status quo, unsurprisingly since they built it, which makes it much harder to think of new changes
Great stuff. I'm sure you'll share their policies on EU defence then.
As an aside "ideas" are worthless. Costed policies that deal with tradeoffs is what serious politicians and parties devise because they have a realistic chance of being implemented. The difference between ideas and policies was demonstrated by the incompetent PBP motion on fox hunting.
Whether you agree or disagree with FF or FG as government parties they have to live in reality and not la la land that much of the opposition occupies. To whit the steady shift of Mary Lou McDonald to the centre as the reality of power requires and not the amateur dramatics of the SocDems or PbP.
Do you think Ireland is in a position to end that war?
Afaik, most if not all of the left parties support maintaining military neutrality, sending humanitarian aid to Ukraine, and supporting the principles of international law.
They all probably have their foreign policy positions on their websites if you want to know their full positions
I think Ireland as part of a cohesive EU defence capability has a significant part to play to end that war. Tell me, are you one of the folks that says Ireland should do nothing about climate change because Ireland's too small and that it's up to China to solve global warming? Just testing the water as I see some significant contradictions on this position in the Irish "left".
We have no business aligning with the so called "coalition of the willing" Previous so called coalitions of the willing are responsible for destroying the middle East over the past thirty years. We are a neutral nation and the government has no mandate for this level of involvement.
I thought we took pride in sending troops to act as peacekeepers?
Do you think "coalition of the willing" is a brand name or something? You understand that just because things are called the same thing, it doesn't mean they are the same thing?
So you don't understand that just because something has a similar name to something else that they are not the same thing.
Oh and there is no peace in Ukraine
The troop deployment aspect of the coalition of the willing in reference to Ukraine is about a group of countries who are willing to place troops in the country to act as peacekeepers once there is a halt to the conflict. They are to stop it starting again.
Do you think there are no similarities. Same protagonists, same sinister disregard for human life, same greed. Perhaps it's just a coincidence theory.
So you agree there needs to be peace, which will need to be negotiated at some point. The sooner the less dead kids there will be but it will end in negotiation.
Why do we need a so called coalition of the willing. Why not use the existing UN peacekeeping structures with a mandate from the security council. They have been deployed numerous times when the peace deals were struck. Why would the Russians trust the coalition of the five eyes after what happened to Saddam and Gaddafi. Also after what happened to the little of the USSR after the collapse.
Why not use the existing UN peacekeeping structures with a mandate from the security council
You are joking right? You can't be that oblivious. The security council that has Russia on it? The same Russia that is the hostile state in this conflict?
The Russians don't need to trust the coalition at all, except in so far that they can trust them to fight back if Russia tries to invade Ukraine again, and to pull their nations into a future invasion attempt.
Also, why do you keep going on about five eyes? The US is not included in the coalition of the willing, and there are far more than the remaining five eyes countries in it.
Do you have an actual point or are you just throwing out terms? Are you going to make a coherent point or just continue to make it clear you have no understanding of the topic?
That's a fine and wonderfully naive tankie perspective.
We aren't neutral and haven't been so in a long long time. To be neutral is to be able to defend yourself and stay out of other business like Switzerland for example. We are heavily reliant on our neighbours and partners for defence amongst other things.
I'm sick and tired of this narrative. Neutrality doesn't mean sit back and do fuck all and let other pick up the pieces. It's also always worth giving our input. Ireland has a lot of soft power. We should try keep it and not fall into Pacific island irrelevance where we just get used and abused and bullied by larger nations. If you want neutrality we need to start building towards it.
Need an FCA well trained for boots on the ground, and the main focus of the Defence Forces should be Ranger type activity.
Need a Navy capable of actually patrolling our waters and boarding any boat for any reason.
Our Air Corp should have interception capability, we are at the edge of the Atlantic and we still dont have primary radar - if an aircraft turns off it's transponder it's invisible to us. This is in the works, but aside from getting out the binoculars out there isn't much else we can do.
I'm sorry if you're sick of opinions that differ from yours. Unfortunately that's the price of life in a democracy. Perhaps an autocracy would be more to your liking.
Bit of a wild take considering you're the one advocating for us to sit by and let an autocrat dominate our eastern neighbours. The same autocrat who has been eying up our strategic infrastructure (undersea cables), economy (again, undersea cables) and is a major source of fuel inflation and hence fuel poverty in our country.
You're right though, we are a democracy. We voted in the clowns we have leading our country, so let them try to do their jobs at least.
You seem so focused on the name of a working group that is meeting and an erroneous conflation with historical events , that you fail to see the benefit of said working group trying to find the best way to protect its interests. Those interests involve peace and social, economic and political stability in Europe.
You let Dougal do a funeral?!?
https://i.redd.it/wu7bsflsaqbg1.gif
May as well send an inanimate carbon rod.
Hail to the Rod
in Rod we trust
Rod Rod Rod
I for one welcome our new our new Rod overlords
That rod is employee of the month.
This government feels like the residue of a decade of power consolidation. We’ve gone from figures like Seán MacBride, Liam Cosgrave, Frank Aiken, Simon Coveney, and others who at least brought weight and experience to Foreign Affairs, to what looks like a classic case of failing upwards with Simon Harris and Helen McEntee.
It’s genuinely striking how thin the talent is on the government front benches and at ministerial level. And yet these are the people now representing Ireland in talks that could shape the country for a generation.
No fan of FF or FG but Simon Coveney would've been a good Taoiseach.
A great Taoiseach actually. And I'm not FG supporter at all.
Way better than Leo
I know someone who worked closely with him and said he was genuinely decent and very hard working. 2 things that made him a bit of a villain in his own party
Not surprising though. Why subject yourself to the abuse and regular death threats at a high level public role in Ireland when you could make 10x more in the private sector as a consultant and live a quiet life if you’re competent.
Or better yet, become a CS exec and wield all the power of state with none of the accountability along with better pay. Even better again, the mongs of ministers will do everything you say, and you can use them as human shields. And all this in a niche so hidden you get to think you're the smartest person in the universe.
That didn't stop Coveney from going against Varadkar for the leadership.
He was already in politics at that time though. I’m talking about competent people entering
Why did Simon Coveney actually resign? When does a career politician with the top spot clearly in his future walk away from the whole thing?
Wouldn't you resign if your party was rewarding a promoting the likes of Harris to leadership. Imagine have to work with them, painful.
The only thing that is striking is that as Minister for Europe she had an excellent reputation and was regularly praised in the press and by peers such as Donald Tusk What seems to have changed was when taking on the vested interests in the Gardai along with Drew Harris a vicious and frankly misogynistic campaign was directed at her. Given you've never met her and haven't actually given a reason why she "failed upwards" I can only assume you are heavily influenced by this social media campaign...
I swear they are trying to anoint her as the next Taoiseach
Live coverage of her arriving at the talks after hearing that parts of Paris can be little dangerous.
How many ministerial pensions is that she will have now when she's finished? 3, 4? And for what? She's out of touch with everything that happens.
That’s a dreadful picture. She looks like she just got in trouble for not doing her homework.
Not this shit again
https://preview.redd.it/z3z8y8r1bsbg1.jpeg?width=606&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=991f0223324a455f2efb4e4350f2354a9122fb45
Whatever people think of her, she’s an elected TD and a government minister. It is appropriate for her to attend.
Truth is she inherited her position.
She was democratically elected, you absolute 🤡
How did she get on the ballot
Nominated by the party membership at whatever convention they hold, I would think.
That only gets a candidate on the ballot, still requires the votes to be elected..
She got in riding the pity wave after the death of her well liked father. I remember in the bi election people literally saying how nice she seemed and that she was the spit of Shane and her uncle. Also, she literally got her start through nepotism by becoming her father's tax payer funded paid assistant. And since then she's just failed upwards; a classic party establishment figure story.
Ok, sympathy gets you elected once, but she got re-elected three more times since.
Which is it in your opinion, either everyone who voted for her is an idiot or her constituents are sufficiently happy to re-elect her?
They vote for who they feel is the best candidate. Doesn't necessarily mean that they're the right candidate.
Also, they vote for who they feel best serves their interest in their constituency, all politics is local as they say. They don't vote for her to be minister for justice and now minister for foreign affairs. That's decided by the government. Let's face it, she is out of her depth at this level. A minister for soundbites. The Garda escort down the streets of Dublin while declaring it "safe", before all shit hit the fan with the Dublin riots will never not be the most cringeworthy shit I've witnessed in quite a while. You couldn't write it.
Michael Lowry anybody!
Yes? Clearly he did the bare minimum in his constituency to get reelected. Any (alleged) criminal behaviour should have had him struck off but unfortunately that (potential) ball was dropped.
They can be happy idiots, its not an either/or
That's the truth of the matter
Brutal cop out if your td is incompetent
To make up the numbers, nod clap & sign when she’s told to
That’s the vast majority of them
We should not be signing up to war coalitions simple as
people are confusing the coalition of the willing with the ramstein group
colaition of the willing is the post war peace keeping force
Really should have chosen a different name.
It’s also what GW Bush called the alliance that invaded Iraq with the U.S… Not great pedigree as far as coalition names go lol
The last ''coalition of the willing'' resulted in the Iraq war so imma gonna call bullshit there lad
You understand that just because two things are called the same thing, that that doesn't make them the same thing?
What other coalitions of countries did in the past has nothing to do with what this current group will do. Sending peacekeepers to Ukraine, at Ukraine's request, is very different to invading a country.
Being against it based on the name has to be one of the dumbest things I've seen around here in a while, and I'm not meaning to single you out, there's multiple people at it.
There's people responding not having a clue what they're talking about at all.
Oh trust me im against it for many other reasons. But the name used is 100% meant to be a downplaying of what it is, which is a military pact among the same countries that have committed war crimes in the past.
I very much oppose Russian aggression in ukraine, but that does not mean I support our government signing us up to a war. If Ukraine and russia agree to peace and both agree to peacekeepers then fine. But sending ''peacekeepers'' somewhere that peace has not been agreed on both side, means we are sending our troops to an active war. Which is against our military neutrality
The name is a literal description of what it is, and it's not the same group of countries. Notably the US is not in it, while France, Germany and most other European countries are. Reading too much into the name seems bizarre to me.
It is not about being signed up for war, the sending of troops is about peacekeeping. There are no plans to send them before the hostilities stop. The point of other countries sending troops is to stop the war from starting again. It is not to send them into an active war.
Sending troops on peace keeping missions is something we've done a lot of and many take pride in. I don't see why this should be different.
Willing for who? Britain and such are already talking about conscription.
Absolutely right
As the people of the middle east about their experience with coalitions of the willing and their crusades for democracy.
Ireland needs to start expanding our military in preparation for such a deployment. We're also going to need to make sure our troops are able to operate allied militaries tanks given we have none of our own.
They should give her a colouring book and some crayons and send her over to a table in the corner until the meeting is over.
Why are people complaining about this?
Its Helen, the perpetually outraged are perpetually outraged at her
She is utterly useless at everything she does. Only a TD because of her father. No experience, no ability. Ran to leo for everything while minister for justice and will be just as useless in her current position.
Democratically elected.
You should run against her and show how it's done.
Competency is what’s highlighted here and her lack of it from past roles
Im not sure what the point of your post is? Yes she was elected and unfortunately elevated to positions she not no right to be in.
She was out of her depth as justice minister and will be drowning as minister for FA.
People love to moan about our politicians, who are no better or worse than most countries. Why don’t the perpetual moaners run for election instead of wasting their time on Reddit or FB? Because they can’t handle the heat, don’t want to work all hours and be pestered by constituents who only want a favor to them and to hell with everyone else. It’s a thankless job made even worse these days by the abuse politicians receive on social media and even at their family homes. By all means criticize policy but get over the dumb personal attacks.
Complains about moaners, then moans about moaners.
I’m complaining because we’re not a part of the coalition of the willing.
We don’t support Ukraine militarily which is a moral wrong imo.
When the war is over and the true horrors are revealed, our inaction will be jarring. It’s not like I’m asking to send Irish men and women there, I don’t think I ever would, but we’re sending absolutely zero military aid. That’s morally incorrect. Ukrainians have a right to resist occupation and we have a duty to be on the right side of history and as a former colonial nation to resist imperialism, be it by Israel or by Russia.
But we've provided plenty of other aid so your complaint is bollocks.
The comment is only bollocks if we provided military aid. Which we didn’t.
We did provide various bits of military kit though.
We have been training Ukraine military on demining which counts as military aid imo
I’m sure the Ukrainians can bandage the Russians out of their country.
You must be a keen fan of the Russian method of caring for the wounded.
Because giving humanitarian and medical aid while also giving military aid where we can is impossible?
If farage went full fascism and invaded the 26 counties, I’d fully expect military support from Eastern Europe.
We have fuck all military aid to give and gave what we could.
Yes we have fuck all due to FFG negligence.
I’m against us having fuck all.
Which Irish political party has run on a platform of increased military spending?
Cathal Berry ran as an independent TD largely on the basis of his military experience and looking after our armed forces in 2020. He was not re-elected in 2024. The Irish electorate clearly don't want money spent on the military.
Fine Gael https://pidgeon.ie/manifestos/docs/fg/Fine%20Gael%20GE%202024.pdf
You base your political opinions based off of the positions of political parties? So if a position isn’t held by a political party, you’re not allowed to hold it?
You only vote for a party that you perfectly align with 100% on every issue?
I believe in neutral self sustainability in our military but it’s not my most important position.
Most parties advocate for increased investment in our Defence forces.
Perhaps we shouldn't be providing any
How many dead Ukrainian children does it take you to get off, tovarisch?
How about Dictator Trump.
We should ban American use of Shannon airport, buy EU arms rather than American and work to reduce our reliance on it as it’s sliding into authoritarianism and has always been an imperialist power.
Why should we give military support? How should we give it. We have no arms production, we have fuck all in terms of actually military support to give.
We’re far better off, far more cost effective, and far more useful, by focusing on humanitarian aid and other non-military aid
Because a neutral country was invaded by their predatory neighbour who was endeavouring to annex them. That's sufficient reason to support them.
Yes, sufficient to support them. Doesn’t mean necessarily military support. It’s a better use of our money if we focus on humanitarian aid, while those countries who have a domestic arms industry can focus on military aid
With how how much the Irish Govt seems to hate the Irish people. would any Young Irish Man want to go off and fight for, and more than likely die for this Govt?
Martin after telling us that there was no crumbs for us peasants in the budget, turned around and gave e125 Billion to Ukraine. Not doing for Ukraine my foot.
Your tax cuts were given to McDonald’s, not to Ukraine.
The tax budget is its own thing.
You think we still shouldn't take it as a slap to the face. Being told there's no money for us and then handing another e125 over to Ukraine without a second thought?
No.
The slap in the face is tax cuts for McDonald’s.
Spending money on our defence which is what Ukraine is doing, it’s defending the EU, is extremely worth it.
The EU is the reason why your and my generation isn’t the poorest population in Western Europe anymore and it’s worth defending.
Russia randomly attacking countries in our east cannot be tolerated.
Your tax cut, which you probably deserve (I’m assuming you’re in the squeezed middle) when to hospitality through the vat cut, who took the cut, didn’t say thanks and asked for more.
Both are slaps in the face.
Not really, one is protecting European security and therefore our prosperity.
The other is welfare for millionaires.
The people want neutrality not military adventurism and destruction. We weren't involved in Iraq and we should not be involved in this. We have better things to spend our hard earned taxes on.
You don't know what "the people" want, nor do you speak for "the people".
What the hell has Iraq got to do with the Russian invasion of Ukraine? You just keep saying these things as if they're self evidently true. I don't think it's self evidently true that we have better things to spend money on than helping a fellow European nation resist invasion from an imperial Great Power.
I don’t understand how many of the same people who rightly rejected Americas imperialist invasion of Iraq and Israel’s genocide of Palestine are unable to reject Russias imperialist invasion of Ukraine and China’s threatening of Taiwan.
Why can’t people be consistently anti imperialist?
People will pick as side and support the imperialism of that side. People on here supporting America stealing Venezuela’s oil and other people softly supporting the conquest and occupation of Ukraine. It’s maddening.
We are a neutral country. If you want to join an army and go to war join the british one.
I don’t want to go to war, I want to give tangible military support to an anti imperialist effort and to the self determination of the Ukrainian people.
Just like the rest of the EU.
We're not part of the coalition of the willing! Haha. Anti imperialist? Are you joking?
What part of my comment indicated that I want us to use our army in Ukraine?
' I don't think it's self evidently true that we have better things to spend money on than helping a fellow European nation resist invasion from an imperial Great Power.'
This part.
[removed]
I reference Iraq because of the coalition of the willing narrative jingoism. Just as well they didn't call themselves the coalition of the winning eh. Good name for a band though.
Young blonde woman
There's a very incel-y vibe to these comments, alright.
are we all forgetting the abject failure she was as minister for justice?
There's been far more serious failures in housing and health nobody gives a shit about in comparison, and no improvements in crime from the new Justice minister. But none of them get nearly the same level of ire.
Who determined that she was a failure?
Given that Ireland has been undergoing a long-term decline in crime rates, surely she's a success? (If one craves simplistic narratives such as calling somebody a failure.)
I'm just remembering the vile & sustained campaign against her and the Commissioner by some really nasty vested interests in the Gardai, Sinn Fein and the far right. Pretty much every crime metric is substantially down despite a significantly growing population including the first year when nobody died of criminal gun violence and the breakup of the Kinehan cartel, so my question to you is on what basis you made that comment or is it simply that you are you easily influenced by social media campaigns and if so which one.
Hello Helen
I'm not. Anything that gets her out of the country and away from the levers of power is a good thing.
I would've thought they'd send Simon, he's the most experienced tea maker in the Dáil.
Can we send someone else?
Norma Foley has the hair for the job.
Weird to drag another, unrelated woman into the conversation.
It really does seem odd the extreme response on this thread that would not happen if we were sending a man, pretty much any man to this event.
It's not odd. The current front bench and minsters are the weakest lineup of politicians we've seen in a generation, regardless of gender.
To make it painfully clear compare politicians like Mary Robinson, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, Mary McAleese, Mary Lou McDonald, Mary Harney or Ivana Bacik to Norma Foley and McEntee, it's clear they're not close to the same caliber. And the country deserves better.
I'd have the same issues with Minister Patrick O’Donovan representing us too, the man is sub par on any scale.
Nothing to do with gender, just hair
May as well revisit sending Dustin the turkey to represent
Might as well send a second use wet tea bag …..hard pushed to think of a more useless ineffectual and dare I say not the brightest minister in recent history…..
We'll somehow come out of the meeting at war with NATO and Russia at the same time.
We’re not sending our best folks
Better off sending a rock
Are we meant to be a neutral country????
We are not seen as neutral in any serious sense. We host and facilitate US multinationals inside the EU, we use the euro, and we are completely socially, politically, and economically embedded in the EU. We are the epitome of the West on all fronts. This new idea that we are “militarily neutral” but politically and economically aligned is just semantics.
No serious external actor actually treats Ireland as neutral. That belief mostly exists in our own domestic debates. In reality, we take the full benefits of EU membership while expecting countries like France and others to carry the security burden of our economic and political system. We can’t even agree to commit to even basic, non-provocative investments like serious cybersecurity, airspace monitoring, or protection of critical infrastructure. The default response is simply to do nothing. Anything more than nothing is fearmongering and a plethora of other random excuses.
The reality is that Ireland remains heavily dependent on the post-war world order that is clearly rapidly breaking down. Yet there is almost no willingness to adjust our security or defence thinking to that reality. We are living off yesterday’s guarantees while refusing to prepare for tomorrow’s risks. The neutrality policy was great and served its purpose well at the time of WWII, but the world has changed so much and is now changing even more again, and we have a lot of maturing to do as a nation. We are in some form of collective denial about what’s going on in the world. It’s not just us, many EU countries also have a lot of growing up to do. For 3 generations, EU leaders allowed the US call the shots, to the point that we don’t even know how to have our own foreign policy positions. But that’s changing faster than even any international relations professor could ever imagine.
Unless people are comfortable with Europe drifting toward a US-style or Chinese-style model of society, and are indifferent to preserving the European model of governance, then EU states need to accept that the status quo is no longer sufficient. Protecting Europe’s social, political, and economic model requires the Union to mature institutionally and undergo serious structural reform.
We aren't "meant" to be anything. The constitution is silent on the matter of neutrality and it's up to the government of the day to make a decision based on our national interests. It's not in our national interest for Russia to invade either Ukraine or Europe. Therefore on this matter we are categorically not neutral. How we exercise our sovereignty demonstrating our non-neutrality here is for the government to decide.
Ireland claims to be “militarily neutral” that doesn’t mean we don’t take political sides or we don’t have allies. We have rightly supported Ukraine in defending themselves from invasion.
what does the term "militarily neutral" mean ?
It’s a fudge. We are politically and economically aligned with our EU partners, the UK, and US, but because we are not part of NATO we can also claim to be “non-aligned”.
In practice thanks to our location and the lack of a perceived external threat we basically don’t have a military, we can send troops on nato peacekeeping missions and that’s about it.
are you saying "militarily neutral" means "non-aligned with NATO" - is that an established meaning ?
It’s means Ireland is not a member of NATO or any other military alliance. If you want to know the “established” line look at dfa:
https://www.ireland.ie/en/dfa/role-policies/international-priorities/peace-and-security/neutrality/
https://www.ireland.ie/en/dfa/role-policies/international-priorities/peace-and-security/neutrality/
This is what it is defined as by the government, first paragraph.
I don't understand the neutrality debate in 2025. Imagine a Russian soldier standing over you beating you with the rusty end of an AK47 while you scream "I'M NEUTRAL" in defence. There is no difference in Putins mind between political cooperation and military. They would kill us nonetheless. Time to embrace the modern world I say
Neutral countries have the means to defend themselves and make at least some of their own military equipment.
Laughable, tell them your spending 0.25% gdp on all military.
She's not even willing to put on sensible shoes for a walk around the city
She hasn't a fucking rashers what's going on, or what we should be doing, she's an arsehole
FFG have no will to do anything beyond fleecing the public. Just hoping the EU force action
On the other hand SF, PBP, Labour are full of solutions. /s
I mean yeah? I disagree with some of their ideas and policies, but they do have them. I prefer the Socdems ones, but SF and Labour both do propose plenty of solutions. PBP have a lot of policies that seem more like and ideal than a realistic solution, but they’re also full of ideas. They have the benefit of not being stuck in a status quo they built and want to maintain. Unlike FF/FG, who seem mostly happy with the status quo, unsurprisingly since they built it, which makes it much harder to think of new changes
Great stuff. I'm sure you'll share their policies on EU defence then.
As an aside "ideas" are worthless. Costed policies that deal with tradeoffs is what serious politicians and parties devise because they have a realistic chance of being implemented. The difference between ideas and policies was demonstrated by the incompetent PBP motion on fox hunting.
Whether you agree or disagree with FF or FG as government parties they have to live in reality and not la la land that much of the opposition occupies. To whit the steady shift of Mary Lou McDonald to the centre as the reality of power requires and not the amateur dramatics of the SocDems or PbP.
Sinn Féin voted against or abstained on almost every vote to punish Russia in the European Parliament.
If they take a side in the Russian invasion of Ukraine it certainly isn't the Ukrainian side.
What are their solutions to the Russian invasion of Ukraine?
Head to the Winchester and wait for things to blow over?
Do you think Ireland is in a position to end that war?
Afaik, most if not all of the left parties support maintaining military neutrality, sending humanitarian aid to Ukraine, and supporting the principles of international law. They all probably have their foreign policy positions on their websites if you want to know their full positions
Oh absolutely not. But sitting on the fence with fingers in our ears won't achieve much either.
I think Ireland as part of a cohesive EU defence capability has a significant part to play to end that war. Tell me, are you one of the folks that says Ireland should do nothing about climate change because Ireland's too small and that it's up to China to solve global warming? Just testing the water as I see some significant contradictions on this position in the Irish "left".
Seems the bould Helen is always willing. Wtf
I won't lie OP. I have no idea what you're on about.
Would you rather she not do her job? I'm no fan of her but are you just outraged because its her or because you think we shouldn't be there or what?
We have no business aligning with the so called "coalition of the willing" Previous so called coalitions of the willing are responsible for destroying the middle East over the past thirty years. We are a neutral nation and the government has no mandate for this level of involvement.
I thought we took pride in sending troops to act as peacekeepers?
Do you think "coalition of the willing" is a brand name or something? You understand that just because things are called the same thing, it doesn't mean they are the same thing?
Have you not heard about the other crusading coalitions over the past couple of decades. The five eyes feature very heavily. Check the history books.
Oh and there is no peace in Ukraine
So you don't understand that just because something has a similar name to something else that they are not the same thing.
The troop deployment aspect of the coalition of the willing in reference to Ukraine is about a group of countries who are willing to place troops in the country to act as peacekeepers once there is a halt to the conflict. They are to stop it starting again.
Do you think there are no similarities. Same protagonists, same sinister disregard for human life, same greed. Perhaps it's just a coincidence theory.
So you agree there needs to be peace, which will need to be negotiated at some point. The sooner the less dead kids there will be but it will end in negotiation.
Why do we need a so called coalition of the willing. Why not use the existing UN peacekeeping structures with a mandate from the security council. They have been deployed numerous times when the peace deals were struck. Why would the Russians trust the coalition of the five eyes after what happened to Saddam and Gaddafi. Also after what happened to the little of the USSR after the collapse.
You are joking right? You can't be that oblivious. The security council that has Russia on it? The same Russia that is the hostile state in this conflict?
The Russians don't need to trust the coalition at all, except in so far that they can trust them to fight back if Russia tries to invade Ukraine again, and to pull their nations into a future invasion attempt.
Also, why do you keep going on about five eyes? The US is not included in the coalition of the willing, and there are far more than the remaining five eyes countries in it.
Do you know what game theory and MAD are. Look em up. We're not dealing with Saddam or Iraq this time.
Do you have an actual point or are you just throwing out terms? Are you going to make a coherent point or just continue to make it clear you have no understanding of the topic?
Lets hear your wonderful proposal to achieve peace in Ukraine then?
That's a fine and wonderfully naive tankie perspective.
We aren't neutral and haven't been so in a long long time. To be neutral is to be able to defend yourself and stay out of other business like Switzerland for example. We are heavily reliant on our neighbours and partners for defence amongst other things. I'm sick and tired of this narrative. Neutrality doesn't mean sit back and do fuck all and let other pick up the pieces. It's also always worth giving our input. Ireland has a lot of soft power. We should try keep it and not fall into Pacific island irrelevance where we just get used and abused and bullied by larger nations. If you want neutrality we need to start building towards it.
Need an FCA well trained for boots on the ground, and the main focus of the Defence Forces should be Ranger type activity.
Need a Navy capable of actually patrolling our waters and boarding any boat for any reason.
Our Air Corp should have interception capability, we are at the edge of the Atlantic and we still dont have primary radar - if an aircraft turns off it's transponder it's invisible to us. This is in the works, but aside from getting out the binoculars out there isn't much else we can do.
I'm sorry if you're sick of opinions that differ from yours. Unfortunately that's the price of life in a democracy. Perhaps an autocracy would be more to your liking.
Bit of a wild take considering you're the one advocating for us to sit by and let an autocrat dominate our eastern neighbours. The same autocrat who has been eying up our strategic infrastructure (undersea cables), economy (again, undersea cables) and is a major source of fuel inflation and hence fuel poverty in our country.
You're right though, we are a democracy. We voted in the clowns we have leading our country, so let them try to do their jobs at least.
You’re not a big picture fellow, are you?
Just a prudent observer of geopolitical fuckery.
Seems you fail to observe the wood for the trees.
How
You seem so focused on the name of a working group that is meeting and an erroneous conflation with historical events , that you fail to see the benefit of said working group trying to find the best way to protect its interests. Those interests involve peace and social, economic and political stability in Europe.
WTF what? Do you know what her job is? Do you know what it entails?
Willing not to sign peace plan and spend money to sign it latter
Guess someone needs to make the tea