Just look at the situation Ireland is in: - RAF needed to defend Irish skies. DoD refusing to publicly acknowledge this. - Royal Navy and other partners needed to support against hostile activities in Irish EEZ and Irish waters. - Defence spending ambition not at the races.

- Ireland is blind to risk with no national security strategy and no national intelligence agency. - Ireland has no dedicated Minister for Defence. - Defence managerial power & strategic direction reside with civil servants who often don't have defence and security backgrounds.

- The Defence Forces are at their lowest strength in the history of the State. - The Reserve Defence Forces is on its knees with <1,000 Reservists available. - Defence is issue No.1 in Europe and most Irish MEP candidates will try to dodge the hard security questions.

- The EU backed us to the hilt on Brexit, & in return, Ireland won't support European security meaningfully or send a single bullet to Ukraine. - The UK is exploiting our weaknesses & forcing immigration down our throats, reshaping our politics domestically as well as in the EU.

- The government isn't investing its meagre budget in lethal weapons. Capital procurement is centred around radars, C295s & multi-role vessels. Not fast jets, artillery, air defence missiles. - Ireland's neutrality holds no standing as it collaborates with partners on sanctions.

- Ireland has no notable arms industry and can not supply its own ammunition. - Ireland's economic model rests heavily on foreign direct investment & connectivity. Both of which are at risk through hybrid threats and aggression.

- The Irish civil service are actively trying to impose gagging orders on military personnel to prohibit their ability to speak truth to power. I would go on, but I'm sure you get the idea. If Ireland wants to be taken seriously, it needs to behave seriously.

Ending with a focus on the positive side, though. The Defence Forces is largely stacked with high performing talent. It represents the best of Ireland with an insatiable appetite to do more and be more. But it needs political will, political backing, and political leadership.

That is what the Taoiseach should be focusing on. We are living in what is arguably being termed as the pre-war era. The time to prepare for a crisis is before it happens.

@RobGilbey Our political class, and more so our society at large need to realise that we are in fact in pre-war times, and we need to either be able to fend for ourselves in the event of a war, or join NATO and become part of the integrated European defence

@RobGilbey From who is our neutrality at risk? What % of GDP should we spend on defence going forward? What would we get for it? How much of a deterrent would it be? Where would you raise taxes to cover it? Wealth tax? Up corporation tax? Or would you cut public services?

@RobGilbey In the past 50 years what NATO/US war has Ireland missed out on the most?

@RobGilbey I mean, you could make the argument that Ireland isn’t actually neutral - our pronouncements at diplomatic level, our supports for a particular side in a conflict…not exactly conforming to the traditional definition! This business of being ‘militarily neutral’ is meaningless!

@RobGilbey According to Lockheed Martin!

@RobGilbey 💯 correct. Ireland needs to grow up. We need a plan to invest in our own defence forces and layer the expenditure so that it compounds out capabilities over time. We also need to set some unshakeable priorities.

@RobGilbey Neutrality is always at risk. The concept is as sound as ever. Think of this way, "Ireland doesn't start wars"

@RobGilbey Well said. This the reality the Irish Government will not face. Other small countries, far less prosperous then us, can afford Health, Education, Housing etc + viable defence forces. A first duty of a Govt is to protect it's people and nation. We are failing badly.

@RobGilbey Totally agree with you, the triple lock is used in a totally disingenuous way! If we are serious about being neutral let’s have an army air force and navy that can go in some way to defend our country.