Fighter jets for the Air Corps?

To my mind, the manpower crisis is essentially a separate issue. A current issue that should be being addressed now, with existing resources.

The CoDF report is more strategic in nature and I'm not sure what it could or would do to address pay issues that date back to the treatment of allowances in the cuts of 2008 and the hamstringing of pay policy by continuously linking it to other grades within the public service, when that simply does not reflect the reality of a DF career.

Manpower issues are a creation of the Dept of Public Expenditure, not the Department of Defence and aren't going to be addressed by a report thats meant to highlight gaps in national defence infrastructure. If that report needs to be three months late to be useful, so be it.

I disagree, we were never looking to be a modern fast jet force, the implication being that force could be called into active combat.

We are looking only for an air defence squadron to intercept potential threats from heavy aircraft in our area of responsibility that are failing to follow the rules or properly use transponders etc.

The F-16 still fits the bill perfectly for me. If the Gripen manages to stay in production as a second line fighter, so much the better, but widespread adoption of the F-35 changes absolutely nothing for Ireland.

Vipers getting expensive to maintain as they age. They wouldn't have the modularity of systems, or avionics that Gripen does.

Hence the attraction of new build F16 and F15's.

I used to call it the Falcon, dunno when I switched. Probably after reading "...vipers in the storm.."

Surprised the the Finn's didn't split the order - ( I know that brings extra cost and complications) , but if the Americans are finding the operating cost of the f35 high you could fly the shite out of the grippens - knowing their cheaper ,and it'd keep the swedes next door sweet ...

While they havent gone for Gripens, they and Sweden are essentially joined at the hip as Nordic brothers (and long established customers of American hardware). They cooperate very closely on all matters, political and defence. They both fear Russia and both have Northern and Baltic flanks to worry about. Finland also has the extra bonus of being ethically related to Estonia so they have a strong interest in that part of the Baltic. Not taking the Gripen is not a friendship breaker for them.

But like no

Your point is valid it's a shame to have give back money, but like no

Been the government here

Without any pilots, ground crew, weapons, storage, ground based radar... 21st century my arse. The money should have gone to the Lake class deal.

No. Both.

Get few Turkish drones they were battle tested recently and will be much cheaper than any other alternative given the state of their economy. Do some recruitment drive on twitch you get plenty of gamers with a lot of experience and little to no morals or regret if some civilian target get bombed and we are set to even help with some nato humanitarian interventions.

Seriously why on earth would we need any fighter jets. Any agressor would have to get through UK first and when they do there will be not much left to defend here anyway.

Hopefully people in Ireland can finally abandon the play pretend notion of neutrality.

You can't claim Ireland is a neutral country when you allow other jurisdictions to freely use your airspace without actively enforcing restrictions.

Switzerland are neutral because they actively enforce their own airspace.

I think you need a different approach on your questions because you sound like a troll.

Cop on, Ireland invested €867.5m in its overseas development assistance programme in 2020, dont tell me were broke. Over 7 Billion gone into fighting Covid too in 2021.

Why do you think we're broke ... ?

There's a myriad of other - more urgent things to spend money on - especially for a small state off western Europe ..