Fighter jets for the Air Corps?

There is order gone in for 4 H145Ms and the replacement fleet for the AW139s will be annoucend soon.

As for SAR thats a touchy subject at the moment.

As you say, that would be a mighty expansion of both forces, not something that would happen quickly but ambitious, can just imagine some heads exploding. Gripen is good, but with the rumoured US weight throwing on the Columbian order is there questions there?

The question is, is this just a scoping exercise, or something with real intent?

However the helicopter situation is already being handled (to LoA2 level anyway) with the purchase of the 145s and the replacement of the 139s starting, granted if we are talking moving to the baseline of LoA3 then we need more of them as well.

I know the runway is still there in Finner but when was it last used and how long would it take it to make it operational? When was the last time fixed wing used it?

Sounds good. Let's hope they'd go for something decent, SAAB the minimum choice. Anything above, probably unrealistic as too pricy?

There certainly seems to be language being used that hasn’t been before:

https://www.thejournal.ie/tanaiste-convinced-of-need-for-ireland-to-have-fighter-jets-and-move-to-highest-defence-funding-6636062-Feb2025/

Beyond the knowledge of the public, they've known it for years that the arrangement with the RAF in Scotland will come to an end.

The intel and the threat assessments shared at Munich and the slew of meetings since seems to have finally broke through our Politician's usual impassiveness regarding security.

The threat posed to Europe and the North Atlantic in an era of US strategic pivot to the Pacific? Should not be underestimated. Plans that were long in place for NATO to be reinforced by airlifted troops immediately landing to use pre-positioned stocks of heavy equipment? Are IMHO not far off being abandoned in the US effort to move gear to the Pacific.

The lack of any NATO navy, not just the US in having the capacity to provide sufficient ocean escort to keep reliable sea lift capacity open in the event of a wider European war is also significant. The lessons the Royal Navy learnt the hard way in WW1 & 2? Forgotten and honestly? Likely unaffordable too. The likelihood of multiple "escorts" being built for convoy service is low but their necessity in an Atlantic conflict cannot be understated.

Factors such as that lack of escort capacity within NATO no doubt play in to calls for Ireland to step up and do more to defend it's waters. If we can monitor the economically vital subsea infrastructure within our EEZ independently? It's a few less hulls that NATO needs to plan for having tied up babysitting our "neutrality".

On the likelihood of fast jets? Long needed and my opinion as has been shared plenty of times on this sub forum, is that SNN and a co-basing arrangement with a European partner are the best & safest way to build experience & competency.

The jump from turboprop to Mach 1+ jets is massive and history demonstrates just how difficult that jump is. Many air forces have tried it, with massive support from their patrons in the USA, USSR & even France & UK. Very few managed to become capable of independent ops. Reliance upon advisors & independent civilian contractors persists today even in the "best" of those Air forces.

We are, as many folk on this sub forum have long warned, entering the find out stage of FAFO. Our orders will join the tail of long queues, even for quality 2nd hand gear.

Let us hope that Ireland and indeed Europe haven't squandered time and that we can still build capacity & capability quickly enough to deter rather than defend, but? We absolutely must build that ability to defend.

oh look, preliminary thinking has the fighters based out of Shannon, with civilian maintenance, at least eight, better 12-14:

https://www.irishtimes.com/ireland/2025/03/01/plans-to-base-combat-jets-at-shannon-airport-at-annual-cost-of-100m/

The article in today's IT also mentioned that the maintenance and servicing of the fighters would be outsourced - "carried out by private companies" - another stumbling block dispensed with.

Pilot training to be completed overseas (as expected).

Its like defence policy is being directed from this forum now.

I have no problem with that, it just feels a little surreal.

Somewhere back on this thread I posted a plan for a Shannon base, including a sketch of a station and facilities

I think its more than fair to adopt a "money where the mouth is" approach to this, as you say when it comes to defence, a hundred year record is hard to overturn. But if Martin was against this we would already have seen a slap down of the story by now, and it can't be ignored just how much all European nations are suddenly reconsidering long held assumptions, given yesterdays shitshow in the Oval Office, how do you think our visit will go?