If being an unaligned country with a large army is no deterrent to Putin's ambitions is it time for ROI to join Nato?
Yes, people like yourself when they want to play with toy soldiers from their comfy home.
THe only person here who advocated Ireland invading a NATO member is you, by the way, no one else. Take ownership for once.
Russia wouldn't be that interested in Ireland, Limerick, Clare and North Kerry would be enough to establish an Atlantic Sea base with airport close by.
We are back to 'invasion' now from the guy who wants to make it possible for the Irish government to send troops wherever it wants, militarily or in a peacekeeping/humanitarian role. ROFL
Wrong, I never said anything about an 'invasion'.
Ah, I see you have this on repeat. Always trying to change the topic, always trying to weasel out of your own words and actions.
Yes, I want the Irish Government to send its troops to Mongolia, Morocco and the Moon, that is exactly what I want Francie.
Putin never said anything about an 'invasion' either, funny that eh?
As I said, Putin-bots be like Putin-bots. A marriage made in heaven.
You can stamp your feet all you want.
You have NO IDEA what a future Irish government may want to do.
Weasel words are coming from the guy who undermined his much vaunted earlier arguments - it was and is hilarious.
SO I will ask you again, using your logic re: removing the Triple Lock - what would us sending troops to a foreign country without a UN mandate be seen as Mark?
Correct, and you have a problem with this because you are not a democrat?
Nothing stopping a future Irish government from removing the Triple lock on Sunday (it's not in the constitution) so they can do what they want on Monday.
Your point I quoted above is not some gotcha, in fact, it backs mine up.
Then again, you did think Neutrality and the Triple Lock were in the constitution. Oh, we had to correct you a few times for that humdinger!
LOL
You can have UN mandates without the full backing of the UNSC... you do know that right? Come on, tell me you know that... you spent weeks arguing this and you don't know this?
Anyway, there are other ways to do peacekeeping. I can see some sort of EU peacekeeping force being deployed to Ukraine as an example.
I am still chuckling at your lack of knowledge on this issue Francie. For someone who is on here all day, you should really beef up on your fundementals.
Run from the question asked. Again.
A 'few' times?
Like others here, you just cannot help yourself when you make a faux pas of all your arguments previously. You misrepresent and lie.
I immediately accepted I was wrong. Would that others would do the same.
I missed where you admitted you were wrong. Be nice to have an apology for the over-vigorous way you defended your wrongness.
However, fairly early on in this thread I explained the constitutional provisions in relation to neutrality. As you appear to read most of my posts I am surprised you missed it.
Neutrality, the Triple Lock etc., were never in the Constitution, however, the Crotty judgement and various follow-ups would mean that joining an EU Defence Force, and probably NATO, would require the permission of the people in a referendum. Taking part in an individual EU peacekeeping mission would not. Declaring war would not require a referendum.
Putin also denies invading Ukraine, and Crimea a few years back.
I accepted that neutrality was not enshrined in the constitution blanch, a long way back in the thread.
You guys seem to have the problem here.
If somebody amassed massive weaponry and troops armed to the hilt on a border then it is fairly obvious what he plans to do. And absolutely obvious once he starts bombing the **** out of the place and killing people.
Jeez louise, some gall on you lads! 😁
We are already involved in the conflict in Ukraine in a humanitarian and non lethal way. An Taoiseach has made it very clear that while we are militarily neutral we are not neutral in an overall sense.
IMHO our current military neutrality has to be ditched. We are part of Europe most specifically the EU and that is where our future lies. IMHO we have a duty to play a role in our own and collectively in the EU's security. To refuse to do so as we currently do because well its highly unlikely we will be invaded is very selfish. I can see a debate about whether ending our military neutrality involves joining NATO or not as well but for me ending military neutrality and gradually increasing our military spending from its current paltry 0.3% of gdp until we get to about 1.5% of gdp is something we need to do.
It wasn't fairly obvious to Mary-Lou and the rest of Sinn Fein who were still defending Putin from NATO provocation when he was amassing that massive weaponry and troops.
However, that isn't relevant to the fact that you can amass all the troops you like or the handful of troops you like, but the "invasion" doesn't start until your soldiers cross that border, under whatever flag, disguise or form that you decide to send them in.
You better explain that to mark, who wants non UN mandated missions to be available to future Irish governments. He doesn't seem to be aware of the fact.
I was quite clear when I advocated for an aid mission that however it was seen and however illegal it was, it was still the morally correct thing to do to go to the aid of Irish people on an island where we constitutionally laid claim to where they lived.
What fact? That Mary-Lou was ignorant of the real world happenings? I think we all know that, yourself included, which is why you don't defend her pro-Putin stance anymore.
If its about the other paragraph, you are just blathering nonsense. There is nothing wrong with non UN mandated missions being available to future Irish governments and nothing in my post contradicts that. You must be misunderstanding again.
As for your last paragraph, you sound like Putin sending in his aid mission as the morally correct thing to do to go to the aid of Russian citizens in place where Russia laid claim to where they lived, and who were being persecuted in his opinion by the Nazification of Ukraine. He has more of an excuse than your 1969 "aid mission" aka invasion.
The Ukrainians didn't think he would invade blanch, you really need to get certain people out of that head.
We NEVER had an intention to 'invade', will you stop with the juvenile projection? Tiresome.
So you now think that protecting your own people is morally not the right thing to do?
Sinn Fein's soft stance on Russia right up to the end of December 2021 when Chris McManus voted against a resolution condemning Russia.
"While 548 MEPs voted in favour, Mr MacManus was among just 69 politicians who voted against the resolution on December 16."
We all knew from a fortnight earlier that Russia was going to invade.
Them's the facts, Francie, and you supported that stance.
Where did I 'support' that position?
You do know that you can vote for a party without supporting everything they do?
I did it for years while voting for FF, FG, Lab etc.
Party members defend everything to the death. See the government thread for instance. Easy to spot party members.
Why shouldn't the government send troops on peace keeping/peace enforcement /humanitarian grounds whenever they want .
Who should decide
Because I think the Triple Lock has safeguards for our forces built in. Quite simply, a UN mandate legitimises and safeguards (to the best extent possible) the mission.
being completely honest, the Irish do send troops wherever they want to... the problem is, we don't have a force big enough to send sufficient numbers to anywhere, that's why UN missions are usually in a contingent with some other country....
What the Irish do, they do well though, and usually work in training and support roles..... IT, Comms, EOD are all roles Irish DF have provided to a lot of non-UN missions... Afghanistan being one in particular recently, providing EOD training...
Yet, you are prepared to ignore that and support a unilateral invasion of the North?
You are a war monger at heart Francie, but pretend to us all you are a dove.
Yes mark, I knew an aid mission would be against the UN and legally wrong...how many feckin times does it have to be said?
YOU want to make it legal and disregard the UN...your faux pas.
So your past attempts to defend this invasion was wrong?
If an aid mission was seen by the UN as an invasion (it wouldn't have been and diplomatic measures would have ensued) then so be it, it was illegal.
YOU wish to make it legal whether it is morally wrong or right.
