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what should the Irish military be capable of doing?
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23-05-2007 10:27am#1
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Bambi wrote:
Also: Fielding members who arent morbidly obese for important commemorations
When was the last time you seen a morbidly obese soldier on a guard of honour?.
Before the present LIFE tests there was a problem in the Defence Forces with alot of over weight soldiers, but that came down to alot of things. The age profile was very high, plus a recruiting embargo which last over ten year's mean't soldiers were committed to a huge workload and phyical training went down the tubes. At the time individual units were responsible for their members doing their IT 1/80's test, so soldiers were 'marked up' for the test.
Sorry, I know this isn't answering the OP's question but I couldn't let that one go unanswered.
As for the question. Cushtac more or less hit the nail on the head, 'at least' a mech battalion with proper support elements, and strong political backing.0 -
Around the time they reinterred the bodies of kevin barry et al..there was some right porkers in that kickline
Seem to remember seeing a few last year during the footage of the easter commeration down in limerick if memory serves
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Bambi wrote:Around the time they reinterred the bodies of kevin barry et al..there was some right porkers in that kickline
Seem to remember seeing a few last year during the footage of the easter commeration down in limerick if memory serves
You'd have to jog my memory, no good just writing about it here.0 -
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MooseJam wrote:the Irish military should be capable of retaking the six counties
the girl guides are capable of taking NI at the moment, you just drive up the motorway after 3pm on POETS day.
theres then a more serious issue of whether the IDF could hold NI, even without British action...
(the answer of course is no)0 -
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MooseJam wrote:the Irish military should be capable of retaking the six counties
HERE, HERE Moose:)OS119 wrote:the girl guides are capable of taking NI at the moment, you just drive up the motorway after 3pm on POETS day.
theres then a more serious issue of whether the IDF could hold NI, even without British action...
(the answer of course is no)
Not trying to start a bithcy arguement OS119 or insult you, but I beg to differ. Firstly I believe when we are taking back the six counties I don't see it been like, the Army waiting at the border and at the stroke of say, midnight tearing across the border to fill the vaccum left by the British army (well, that's my opinion anyway). There has to be economic/administrative incorporation, it has already started, and that will take a decade or two to streamline the two states. I mean it's not that difficult, we're not trying to unite north and south Korea are we ? As for holding the six counties, the loyalists have their own fascist/secterian motivation, but they are in the main a creation and tool of the British military intelligence. Without the backing of Britain - their nothing, nothing whatsoever. I come form a border county, and not trying to stip old annmosity's up, but in our grandparents time the unionists who ended up on this side of the border were as " Ulster will fight and Ulster will be right" "we'll fight to tthe last man and there will be a bloodbath etc " as across the border. ( Remember, Edward Carson was from Dublin, indeed the head branch of the Orange Order was in Dublin, before Micheal Collins and his Squad arrived up in a lorry one day and evicted them out the door and made it Sinn Fein's HQ ) When Britian said they were going, what was the reaction of the Unionists on this side of the border - nothing.
Fair enough, they were in a minority, ( though in East Donegal for example, they were a majority ) and nationalists in unionist secterian strongholds like Portadown, Larne, Ballymena etc would certainly have to be paid special attention to, but a long term loyalist campaign against a United Ireland, without the support of British military and intelligence, it would run it's course very quickly.0 -
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OS119 wrote:i think there is a distinct difference between 'taking the six counties' and 'assuming responsibility for law and order having been invited to do so following a plebicite and detailed planning and inter-governmental - and societal - co-operation over the transfer of soveriegnty'.
lets take the second option - the only likely one - first:
in the early 1970's only 35% of the NI population was 'unhappy' with the status of its government, and only a small minority of that figure actually did anything about being unhappy - whether that was street rioting, joining an armed group or just providing moral, political or logistic support to those groups. yet somehow the British Army managed to deploy some 25,000* troops to NI and the place still looked like a charnel house.
i'm puzzled to think why, given PIRA's capability to manage a long-standing military campaign - often without a foreign backer - people think that Loyalists won't be able to do the same?
can you tell me how, given a theoretical 65% approval vote for a UI with 35% against, and a similarly small proportion of the 'against' vote actually engaging in either violent street protest or actual terrorism, the mighty forces of the Republic (see that 8,500 man army struggle to put 850 men overseas at any one time....) could possibly hope to contain, far less roll-back, the best-case scenario of just widespread street violence?
add a functioning terrorist group to the mix and you are going to have a situation which actually threatens the new state itself.
* the 25,000 troops were from an army of between 150 and 200 thousand, they were rotated regularly and often had 50 troop carrying and observation helicopters available to assist operations, the RUC at the time was between 15 and 20 thousand strong.
PSNI is now down to 15k all told, with 11,500 full-timers. Garda Siochana is about the same strength but obviously covering a much wider area and so unlikely to be able to provide much in the way of re-inforcements.
look at those figures hard, even in a transfer of soverienty with massive public support the military and police forces of the 'new' 32 county state will be utterly unable to cope with the common street aggro that will accompany a change in stutus, let alone any 'insurgent' campaign.
as for the first option, that of a military invasion of NI while it remains UK soveriegn territory (and given the wish of the UK to get rid of NI at the first opportunity, ie: as soon as a majority will vote for seperation/unification) with a majority of the population wish for it to remain British: the current forces of the RoI could take NI, the current British force is not on an operational footing, its not a fighting force per se, its a garrison and administrative force that is without most of its heavy fighting equipment.
the UK would have two options, the most ammusing - and complete - would be to let you keep it and watch the RoI discover in painful technicolour that it had bitten off far more than it could chew while keeping a book running on who you'd ask for help from first. mines £50 on the EU.
the second, perhaps more immediately satisfying but somewhat more expensive (and of course with the nightmare result that we'd get NI back), would be to have the BA's 70-odd WAH-64D Apache's spend a week or so scouring Ireland of anything painted - or wearing - green in the permisive air environment you so kindly have as national policy. concurrently the RAF would introduce its GR4 force to somewhere unsandy for a change and the Irish Government and people could spend a week or so (in dark cellers) deciding if increasing your population by 1,685,000 people - a million of whom don't like you - was worth the loss of your road and rail network, your powerstations, your oil and gas industry, your airports, your telecoms industry, your military, your merchant fleet, your ports and harbours and having the RN set-up camp around your shores ensuring that nothing more than wind and rain gets in.
no one will help you, indeed no one will touch you with a stick. you've just invaded the soveriegn territory of a UNSC P5 state, one that has nuclear weapons and one with whom you had concluded a treaty - by popular referendum - detailing your recognition of its sovereignty and your joint upholding of the wishes of its population to live in the state of their choosing. just so you know, this is what it felt like to be Iraqi in early 1991.
now, can we get back to reality?
Well thank you for the snotty, I know best reply ( I was civil enough to you, but if that's the way you want it - fine). BTW, are you from the 'mainland' ? Anyway, regarding the scenarios you posted about.
In your own words " lets take the second option - the only likely one - first: " in the early 1970's....the British Army managed to deploy some 25,000* troops to NI and the place still looked like a charnel house. "
Did it ever occur to you that the actions and thuggery of the British army in the early 1970's actually exasperated the situation instead of calming things. And it wasn't because of a 'mistaken approach or lack of understanding of the situation' by the Brits, but typical British colonial type arrogance of putting the boot into the locals and terrorising them into submission. Randomly murdering civilians, attacking civil rights marches, harrassing and beating up the Nationalist community at checkpoints and barrack/police cells, kicking in doors, thrashing furniture, and smashing the religious statues, " we'll teach you fcuking Oirish some fcuking manners " etc Very british, VERY, VERY british. I haven't the slightest doubt that if the brits were increased to 50,000, the Provo's would have doubled their violence. 1972 had the highest number of brits deployed there carrying out their thuggery, it also was the most violent year by the IRA, can you see the connection ? Thanks to the Brits thuggery, IRA membership and support rocketed north and south of the border and overseas, especially in America, their main source of weaponry at the time ( the loyalists main source of weaponry at the time was the British army's UDR).
" i'm puzzled to think why, given PIRA's capability to manage a long-standing military campaign - often without a foreign backer - people think that Loyalists won't be able to do the same? " The lack of reaction of unionism to the formation of the 26 county free state and with it, the abandonment of thousands of unionists to it as well as the loss of 1/3 of Ulster proper already explains the brave stand the unionist community can take without the support of Britain - practically zilch. While the military capability of the loyalists was never a fraction of the Provo, even with covert british support and direction. The mode of operation of the loyalists, often carried out under the influence of drink, was typically shooting an innocent Catholic taxi man in the back of the head after requesting him to drive them into a loyalist area or standing at the door of a pub opening fire on the innocent people inside. A long term campaign by the loyalists countered by unsympathetic armed soldiers and police etc, without british support would be beyond the slightest capabilty of the loyalists. Indeed, I'd say the criminal gangs of Dublin and Limerick are capable of more violence than the loyalist gangs - doesn't take 25,000 soldiers and thousands of guards to keep them down to a minimal
" given the wish of the UK to get rid of NI at the first opportunity, " Funny trying to get ride of a place youv'e spent billions holding onto for several decades isn't it ? I suppose it's not been held onto because of the imperialist ravings of it's ruling class, but due to " bearing the white man's burden " by the British to stop those thick, mad Paddy's from killing themselves. Ah, gee, shucks, and we're so ungrateful.
" the UK would have two options, the most ammusing - and complete - would be to let you keep it and watch the RoI discover in painful technicolour that it had bitten off far more than it could chew while keeping a book running on who you'd ask for help from first. " My, my, the thick mucksavages been able to run an economy without the expertise of the british. This is similiar to the attitude among the brits that stated if the Eygptians took over the running of the Suez canal, without British know how, all they'd be able to do would be to grow potatoes along the bank. And then they wonder why their among the most dispissed nations on earth ?
" the second, perhaps more immediately satisfying but somewhat more expensive (and of course with the nightmare result that we'd get NI back), would be to have the BA's 70-odd WAH-64D Apache's spend a week or so scouring Ireland of anything painted - or wearing - green in the permisive air environment you so kindly have as national policy. concurrently the RAF would introduce its GR4 force to somewhere unsandy for a change and the Irish Government and people could spend a week or so (in dark cellers) deciding if increasing your population by 1,685,000 people - a million of whom don't like you - was worth the loss of your road and rail network, your powerstations, your oil and gas industry, your airports, your telecoms industry, your military, your merchant fleet, your ports and harbours and having the RN set-up camp around your shores ensuring that nothing more than wind and rain gets in. "
But to describe a scenario of the death of thousands of Irish people as " more immediately satisfying ", Well I just wonder what the indigantion would be if I, or any Irish person, were to post a scenario of say, Al Queda killing thousands of British civilians and call it " more immediately satisfying " ? When it DOES happen when some Islamist group kills hundreds of British people by explosions, gas, whatever, I'm sure you won't mind it it being called " immediately satisfying " ? And it will happen, people in glass houses etc.
Well, having a population of 13/14 times the size of Ireland, it doesn't take a genius to figure out that in a full military conflict Ireland wouldn't have a hope. I would have thought since the Suez crisis ( which they couldn't do on their own anyway but also needed the French) that any illusions of Britain indiscriminately throwing it's weight around were dead and gone. But a better case in point, the Cod War between Britain ( population 58 million) and Iceland ( population 1/4 million), (brave boys the British) in the 70's. The Cod Wars were a series of confrontations in the1970s between Britain and Iceland regarding fishing rights near the coast of Iceland. In defence of what Iceland considered their territorial waters, it invovled the tiny Icelandic navy ( even smaller than ours !) cutting British trawlers fishing nets and even ramming them. Britain very bravely sent out some ships from her mighty navy, a series of rammings and rounds were fired by both parties, the British embassy was burned down in Reykjavík, and with an enraged international world opinion, the mighty Royal navy slinked off back to the 'mainland'. Sad. No RAF force bombing Iceland into oblivion.
" no one will help you, indeed no one will touch you with a stick. you've just invaded the soveriegn territory of a UNSC P5 state, one that has nuclear weapons " Ireland is a member of the EU if didn't happen to know. The rest of the EU and world opinion wouldn't stand by and watch you lot throwing your weight around. The above example regarding Iceland illustrates Britian's real postition in the world, no matter how others like to daydream of imperial military greatness. And ofcourse not to mention the powerful Irish American lobby. A slight frown from America would stop Britain dead in it's tracks.
The scenarios you posted may just have been imaginitve imperial fantasies, but just face up to it, Britain is only a second rate power in Europe and a third rate power in the world. Now, can we get back to reality? 0 -
McArmalite wrote:" given the wish of the UK to get rid of NI at the first opportunity, " Funny trying to get ride of a place youv'e spent billions holding onto for several decades isn't it ? I suppose it's not been held onto because of the imperialist ravings of it's ruling class, but due to " bearing the white man's burden " by the British to stop those thick, mad Paddy's from killing themselves. Ah, gee, shucks, and we're so ungrateful.
" My, my, the thick mucksavages been able to run an economy without the expertise of the british. This is similiar to the attitude among the brits that stated if the Eygptians took over the running of the Suez canal, without British know how, all they'd be able to do would be to grow potatoes along the bank. And then they wonder why their among the most dispissed nations on earth ?
The scenarios you posted may just have been imaginitve imperial fantasies, but just face up to it, Britain is is only a second rate power in Europe and a third rate power in the world. Now, can we get back to reality?
even by your low standards, that was poor.:rolleyes:
as you mention reality, can I just point out that no one outside of Ireland (Except maybe the south of France;) )gives a monkey's chuff about Northern Ireland.0 -
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