Long-term, as a sovereign state we need to be able to take on that role ourselves. Having Irish personnel embedded on the vessels policing our waters will build up practical experience of immense value to the state - but only if we then hold on to the personnel. We unfortunately cannot told personnel because of a disastrous pension change made by Michael Noonan in the Kenny government. Skilled personnel leave not because they want to, but because they cannot afford to stay under the pension rules. So the private sector snaps them up. Until the pension rule is changed we will continue to lose experienced people in the Defence Forces and the the Gardaí.
Peacekeeping millions were another means of building up practical experience, but the aim of Putin and Trump to collapse the UN means they intend to veto all future peacekeeping missions in the Security Council. So traditional style peacekeeping is effectively dead. The UN did make a significant change in peacekeeping at the start of the century. The lack of a UN standing army meant that it took months, sometimes up to a year, for a UN force to be assembled and implement a mission. Faced with the risk of genocides during the gap between the UN Security Council and boots on the ground, Kofi Annan adopted a procedure of asking international bodies with military forces, the African Union, NATO and the EU, to send in forces to implement the UN resolution until the UN peacekeepers could get there. Neutrals all served in these missions at the request of the Secretary-General, and then would transfer to the UN peacekeepers when they arrived.
With Putin and Trump determined to veto all missions, one option being reviewed to bypass vetoes is for the UN draft resolution, though vetoed, would be implemented by an international force as a 'draft resolution'. Ireland could not do this, because of the ridiculous Triple Lock as it requires resolution be approved by the Security Council. Every other neutral is perfectly happy to serve in a mission implementing a draft resolution.
That is the reason the ridiculous Triple Lock needs to be binned. If it is, Ireland would be permanently barred from peacekeeping by Trump and Putin's vetoes. No other neutral has a triple lock. In fact every other neutral thinks it is bonkers. They cannot understand how any sovereign state can give a veto over the use of its armed forces to the US, UK, France, Russia and China on anything. The principle of sovereignty should give the state and nobody else control over its armed forces.
⏩ Jim Duffy is a writer-historian.
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