The city of Shannon in County Limerick is packed full of visitors. Shannon sees plenty of visitors each year, most of them tourists; it does contain the closest airport to the United States in Europe. For the protest over the Irish government’s allowing U.S. military aircraft to refuel in Ireland before flying to the Middle East, however, there are few tourists. Most of the visitors are protesters, heading out to Shannon airport to protest. The protesters, crying U.S. violation of Irish neutrality, have shown complete ignorance of the situation. Whether U.S. military planes are allowed to land in the Republic of Ireland is a complicated issue involving interpretation of the Irish Constitution. Any blame placed must be laid at the foot of Taoiseach (Prime Minister) Bertie Ahern, not on the United States.
The protests, which rely solely on strong rhetoric, sadly misconstrued facts and inflamed emotion, have over-simplified the point of contention: a specific clause of the Republic of Ireland’s Declaration of Neutrality. Ireland has declared itself neutral since World War I, and has largely kept to that policy. Ireland strongly asserted this during World War II by refusing to expel German diplomats despite strong British pressure. Delegates from Dublin traveled to Germany at the close of World War II to offer condolences to the Nazi party for the death of Adolf Hitler, just to prove they wanted no part of the war.
The few intelligent protesters argue, correctly, that the constitution, amended by the Defense Act of 1954, does not allow for any foreign military on Irish grounds. The act states, “”No person shall, save with consent in writing of a minister of state, enter or land in the state while wearing any foreign uniform. No person shall, save with the consent in writing of a minister of state, go into any public place in the state while wearing any foreign uniform.”” With thousands of U.S. troops heading to the Middle East, U.S. military aircraft have been confirmed to land in Shannon for refueling. With some of the more zealous protesters camping at the airport to take pictures of U.S. soldiers walking through the airport in their fatigues, there has been a public outcry by many left-wing organizations that the United States has now taken to bullying Ireland.
This is absurd, of course. As with most leftist propaganda, lies and half-truths run around the country 10 times before the truth can even pull its pants up. These radical protesters, upon hearing about the Defense Act, immediately assume the worst and do not deal with the complications that arise from other governmental declarations.
The first thing conveniently ignored by the protesters is that Ireland has been making exceptions to its own rules since World War II, all within legal limits of the constitution, or at least without public disapproval. Despite allowing Nazis to stay in Dublin, the Irish government still assisted British and American intelligence agents in spying on Nazi diplomats. Without Ireland making exceptions to its neutrality, many pieces of intelligence critical for the Normandy invasion would not have been discovered.
Also, Ireland has often allowed foreign aircraft to fly over County Donegal, which lies in between the United States and Northern Ireland. Though the planes never land in the Republic during these situations, the initiation of this policy was a significant departure from the strong-worded constitution which, in many politicians’ interpretation, does not allow any other military in Irish airspace.
Furthermore, Ireland has signed on to the European Union’s declaration to help in the war on terrorism. Despite Iraq’s poor to nonexistent affiliation with Sept. 11, the European Union frowns on Ireland for only half-heartedly joining the coalition against terrorists.
Finally, and most importantly, Ireland could easily expel the U.S. troops and forbid any more landings by U.S. military aircraft. In fact, the loss to the U.S. military would be minimal, since the flight to any of the airports within British areas are less than an hour’s flight away from Shannon. The United States would not react harshly to an Irish expulsion, mainly because Ireland has little presence in current U.S. foreign policy. Plus, it would be poor diplomacy to alienate a member of the European Union with tensions already high with Germany and France.
In the end, despite all the interpretations and exceptions, the answer will come with the consent or rejection by Taoiseach Ahern and his current administration. If he has signed a document allowing for U.S. troops to land, no one has produced it. Unfortunately, the prime minister has been silent on these matters. Thus, the protesters have taken to the streets assuming that Ahern is in a conspiracy with the U.S. government to obtain oil from the toppling of Saddam Hussein.
Ahern is largely ignoring the protests, possibly because the protesters seem to be as mindless as ever. Many at Shannon airport have taken to bringing children along, using them as shields against the Garda when they attempt to arrest unruly protesters. One organization has now stated that, unless the Taoiseach expels U.S. military aircraft, it will travel to Iraq to be human shields against the evil United States and its lapdog, Ireland, who is now in “”silent collusion”” with the warmongering Bush.
The uninformed madness even extends to seated politicians. Labour Party foreign affairs spokesperson Michael D. Higgins said that it’s time to take a stand against a “”foreign policy based on hate.”” Hate? In the same statement, the United States is labeled an emotionless, imperialist nation, bent on nothing but oil for its own wealth. Suddenly we are threatening war because we are full of hate? The leftist inconsistency knows no bounds in this country.
Regardless of the protesters’ rants, the blame is squarely the Taoiseach’s. His party, Fianna Fal, is squarely in control of the government and has decided to ignore the public, even though the opposition party, Fianna Gael, is rapidly gaining ground by embracing the outcry. Once Ahern’s administration decides how to face up to its silence, the protesting will become merely an anti-war rally again. Unfortunately, because Fianna Fal has remained silent, protesters have gained credibility that they should have never been given.
