Monetary Union-Political Union-What Next?

truthisfree

Rb wrote: »

China was just an example, plucked from the air. The island is a good resource for attacking other countries from though.

Ah RB in all honesty, who would invade us? our very strategic position is also our protection, If anyone came near us the US and the UK would be in like a shot. They would not want this country in the hands of a superpower like China or Russia at any cost.

No need to build that bunker.

Purple Gorilla

Didn't the German Constitutional Court say that there can't be an EU Army because it is one of the areas which has to remain the exclusive competence of member states? It said that an EU Army would invalidate basic law and a referendum would be required which would mean a transition into an EU Federal State?

truthisfree

prinz wrote: »

The armies we have How long does it take for this to sink in?

Prinz, Sarkozy has drawn up plans for an army with 360,000 men, oops, and women! they are to have intervention capabilities! I have always been proud that the EU was not like the UK and US with it's seemingly continuous wars going on. That will end, as sure as I am tapping on this keyboard.

rumour

prinz wrote: »

The armies we have How long does it take for this to sink in?

Europe cannot be defended by a bunch of 27 uncoordinated armies turning up to do battle, Braveheart style!!!

Command structures are required and have been since the beginning of recorded history. Loyalty is a prerequisite I mean we can't have SIPTU coming in and balloting for a strike. You cannot achieve these things by your methods.

That is the most convincing argument I've heard yet to put Ireland really at the fringes of Europe.

prinz

truthisfree wrote: »

Prinz, Sarkozy has drawn up plans for an army with 360,000 men, oops, and women! they are to have intervention capabilities! I have always been proud that the EU was not like the UK and US with it's seemingly continuous wars going on. That will end, as sure as I am tapping on this keyboard.

IIRC correctly Sarkozy did a lot of talking about the EU and the military, I think personally it was tiny-man syndrome. Most of his suggestions were quickly ruled out by other European leaders, political and military. Do you have a link for thie 360,000 member army? All I can see is a call to create a number of Rapid Reaction Corps (i.e. with intervention capabilities to prevent things like Srebrenica from happening), important to note that these RRF are not under EU central control, but are under the control of the countries who make up each group.

rumour

Purple Gorilla wrote: »

Didn't the German Constitutional Court say that there can't be an EU Army because it is one of the areas which has to remain the exclusive competence of member states? It said that an EU Army would invalidate basic law and a referendum would be required which would mean a transition into an EU Federal State?

That is my understanding also, but I doubt a referendum will get in the way of that.

I don't know the truth or not to the telegraph article (which is suitably timed for an Irish audience) but this path to an EU army is well underway.

prinz

rumour wrote: »

Europe cannot be defended by a bunch of 27 uncoordinated armies turning up to do battle, Braveheart style!!!

Command structures are required and have been since the beginning of recorded history. Loyalty is a prerequisite I mean we can't have SIPTU coming in and balloting for a strike. You cannot achieve these things by your methods.

That is the most convincing argument I've heard yet to put Ireland really at the fringes of Europe.

What are you talking about? SIPTU? There are command structures, alliances, pacts, combined exercises etc.

rumour

prinz wrote: »

What are you talking about? SIPTU? There are command structures, alliances, pacts, combined exercises etc.

And where is the one for the 27 states of Europe? Who is in command?

Judgement Day

rumour wrote: »

And where is the one for the 27 states of Europe? Who is in command?

NATO? With what's left of the Brits and the US doing the donkey work.

Scofflaw

Judgement Day wrote: »

Nothing if you don't mind Irish soldiers being killed to fight wars caused by European imperial legacies and to further the cause of European arms manufacturing. Ireland does not have an indigenous arms industry and therefore has nothing to gain from getting involved in European conflicts.

Erm, not quite the case:

Part of our alleged 'neutrality' means that fully fledged weapons systems cannot be manufactured in the 26 Counties. So, for example, Timoney Armoured Personnel Carriers) cannot be produced here in Ireland. Professor Timoney, a one-time employee at Alvis, a British company that makes tanks, designed the Timoney APCs, and the company transfers the technology to others to produce under licence. So, for example, the Kuwaiti armed forces run about in the Vickers Valkyr, which was produced under licence in Belgium in conjunction with Vickers, using Professor Timoney's designs.

But although Ireland cannot produce the fully fledged weapons system here, that doesn't mean that components of weapons systems can't be manufactured. In 2000, 1,155 individual export licences for military goods were issued by the Department of Enterprise. Components went to Africa, the Middle East, Asia and continental Europe.

In addition, 37 global licences were issued. A global licence gives a company licence to export a particular product for a year, whereas the individual licences are to a specific consignment. It's hard on the basis of global licences to find out what went where and might have helped to kill whom. But that is the arms trade. Big bucks and heavily camouflaged.

Ireland's recent success in software has undoubtedly been an attraction in the field of digital technology, which, as Jane's Defence Weekly points out, is "the next generation of military software". According to Magill magazine, Dublin based GeoSolutions produces an "electronic Battlefield Management System", which allows a commander to track his troops' movements. Iona Technologies sold communications security software to a US agency "responsible for designing and maintaining the US army's nuclear arsenal".


IDA help

Ireland is especially well placed to subcontract into this highly specialist multi-billion dollar market. Partly as a world leader in electronic engineering and information technology, but also precisely by virtue of our neutrality. As a recent investigation in Magill magazine pointed out, "the IDA in the US uses Irish neutrality as a marketing tool". In the last few years, the IDA has given at least Û48 million in aid towards US multinationals that produce components for fighter aircraft and other war machinery.

Data Device Corporation (DDC) in Cork is one such company producing electronic components. The IDA gave it Û3 million. DDC components go into the 'nerve system' of the Apache, Euro fighter and Rafale attack helicopters. Apache helicopters have had a high profile in the Israeli war against the Palestinian people. Other DDC hybrid products go into missiles, radar, sonar, secure communications and night vision equipment, and DDC has full MIL-STDS certification. This certificate means the products meet the requisite standards of the US military programmes.


AfrI's list

Action from Ireland (AfrI), which over the past few years has played a major role in the attempt to expose the largely hidden but growing involvement of Ireland in the arms trade, wrote to a number of listed companies in Ireland with MIL-STDS approval standards. The list includes DDC in Cork, Analog Devices in Limerick, which produces components for US fighter aircraft, and Schaffner Intepro Systems, also in Limerick one of whose customers is the RAF.

It has long been known that Cork is a base for a number of armaments industries. Best known of these is MOOG Ltd (Ire) which according to Jane's International Defence Directory, produces 'gun stabilisation systems', turret stabilisation systems and electrical equipment for wheeled armoured vehicles. The company makes electronic controllers for a range of tanks and anti-aircraft guns, including the Bofors L-70 Air Defence gun, which are known to be part of the ordinance of the Indonesian armed forces.

Also in Cork is The National Micro-Electronics Research Centre at University College Cork, which although anxious to explain to AfrI's enquiries the 'non-military nature of its activities, has clients heavily involved in the arms trade, including British Aerospace, GEC Marconi, Thomson CSF, Thorn EMI, Moog and DDC.

Tax Free Zone

Shannon Tax Free Zone hosts a number of the companies listed, including Befab Safeland LTD, whose products include 'Runway arrestors capable of arresting the full range of military aircraft', which it supplies to air forces across the world, and Westinghouse Electric Systems and Logistics Ltd, which supplies Bus Analysers, which are a vital part of modern military aircraft.

There are several other companies in Clare, like Essco-Collins in the tiny village of Kilkishen. The parent company has 80% of the world's market in radomes, the round covering for radar antennae systems. Their customers have included Mexico, Egypt, China, and a deal through US arms giant, Boeing, which was bound for Saudi Arabia; a deal, through the Italian firm, Alenia, where the final destination was the Turkish Armed forces; and another for the Middle East brokered through French military giant, Thomson-CSF.

Judgement Day wrote: »

I would suggest that instead of getting involved in a European army it would be more beneficial to the Irish people if at least 50% of the existing army was transformed into a paramilitary police force to regain control of the asylum at home.

I'm not entirely certain what you mean by that, but it does sound extraordinarily sinister.

cordially,
Scofflaw

Judgement Day

Scofflaw - thanks for you thoughtful response. I am well aware that a few Irish companies are involved in a fairly minor way in the international military industrial complex - I'm a regular Phoenix reader since the rag mag started. However, when compared to the likes of British Aerospace, Marconi, British Nuclear Fuels, Boeing etc.etc. Ireland's contribution is miniscule compared to Britain's. The British population therefore have an obligation to fight wars as their economy allows the production and export of arms to anybody with enough money to buy them. The morality of sacrificing their own poorly equipped soldiers to fight in these wars may be questionable but that is a matter for the British people.

As regards my comment about a disbanding about 50% of the Irish army to turn them into a paramilitary force to retake the asylum - perhaps paramilitary is an unfortunate word in the Irish context and what I meant was something like the Spanish Guardia Civil or the Italian Carabinieri.

In the national context law and order has broken down in Ireland and, despite the retirement of the IRA, the army still has to provide protection for the money convoys all over the country. Indeed, it is something of a tourist attraction in DG when the whole town is brought to a standstill once a week by heavily armed troops, jeeps, and garda cars. It could almost be marketed to visitors like the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace!

All I am suggesting is that clearly the gardai are not up to the job on their own and a new paramilitary force would be. Other than maintaining stability at home why does Ireland need a defence force at all as in the event of a serious threat we would be totally dependent on the UK/NATO?

Sorry for taking this thread way off topic.