The Government needs to clarify the type of overseas mission it envisages sending Irish troops on that it has been prevented from doing up to now by the Triple Lock, Fianna Fáil TD Éamon Ó Cuív has said.
The former minister said he was surprised by his party leader, Tánaiste and Minister for Foreign Affairs Micheál Martin when he announced the Government plans to dispense with the Triple Lock whereby Irish troops can only be deployed on missions that are UN authorised and approved by the Government and the Dáil.
The Triple Lock is seen by many as a cornerstone of Irish military neutrality, but Mr Martin last week said it hands the five permanent members of the UN Security Council “a veto over our national sovereign decision to deploy troops to peacekeeping missions as we see fit”.
However, Mr Ó Cuív said he would like to hear from the Government what sort of missions does it envisage sending Irish troops on if the Triple Lock is removed and what type of missions does it believe the Triple Lock has prevented Irish troops from participating in because of the UN approval requirement.
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“When they say that there are missions that we can’t go on and everybody accepts that there should be an exception when you are going on a humanitarian rescue mission but I’m wondering what other missions do they have in mind when they say that the Triple Lock is preventing us from going on?
“I think we need to know that before we can make any judgment on what has been said in the last week, I think there’s a need for a very deep debate as to the role of Irish troops as I would have always seen us as performing in a very strict non-partisan peacekeeping role.”
Mr Ó Cuív said he would have reservations “about any type of activity other than humanitarian rescue” and pointed out there had never been a shortage of UN approved missions that Irish troops could be sent on and the reality was that there were more UN missions than Ireland had troops to deploy.
He acknowledged that any change removing the requirement of UN approval would mean any future deployment would still require both Government and Dáil approval, but he would still have concerns about not requiring UN authorisation as the Triple Lock had stood Ireland in good stead over the years.
“Are we going to make out more clearly what kind of military operation that we are going get involved in abroad that we cannot get involved in at the moment? As I said, it has never seemed to me that there has been a difficulty in finding missions to send our soldiers on as pure peacekeepers.”
Mr Ó Cuív was speaking at Kilmichael in West Cork after he delivered an oration to mark the 103rd anniversary of the ambush by Tom Barry and the Flying Column of the Third Cork Brigade of the IRA of a party of Auxiliaries from Macroom on November 28th 1920 during the War of Independence.
Addressing an attendance of around 500 people at the isolated site of the ambush on the Macroom to Dunmanway Road, Mr Ó Cuív took issue with some recent commentary referring to Ireland’s fight for freedom between 1919 and 1921 as the Irish Revolution rather than the War of Independence.
“A political revolution to most people means the overthrow of a government by physical force – what happened in December 1918 was that the British government were overthrown in Ireland, not by physical force but by the democratic will of the people as expressed in the ballot box.”
He said the then IRA, or Volunteers, “were not gun men but the Army of the Republic who were forced to take up arms to defend the democratic wish of the people”.
Separately, Mr Ó Cuív said Fianna Fáil should go into opposition after the next general election unless it is the largest party in any future coalition deal.
“Otherwise you will just see the demise of the party,” the Galway West TD said.
“I think it’s well known that back in 2016 I thought we should have gone in with Sinn Féin. We were twice their size, but it didn’t happen. I think Fianna Fáil represents a broad spread of Irish political life and should always aspire to that, I don’t think becoming a niche minority party was ever our role.”
