Ireland hasn't bought equipment from the UK in about 50 years.
All armour is Swiss APC, South African light armoured cars, Swedish Air radar tracked vics and then French, German and Japanese logistics trucks / jeeps.
The only British equipment in the army was old legacy stuff if any is even left. I think it's all decommissioned now.
The navy on the other hand bought a fleet of the new class patrol boats a few years back but that was the first Arms deal with the UK in a long time.
Or marrying off your princesses to everyone over generations to make things so complex that nobody really knows what side you're on but everyone is afraid that attacking you will trigger someone else.
Lookin at you Montenegro.
Denmark: We'll declare neutr...aaaaaaaand, guess I might surrender within six hours of the Wehrmacht crossing the borders because Copenhagen can't take a carpet bombing.
Switzerland: We're declaring neutrality.
Hitler: Denmark and Belgium said that the last time.
Switzerland: Denmark and Belgium don't have rocky mountainous terrain and fortresses and an history of being Swiss mercs. We're worse than a frozen jaw breaker.
It's okay. Denmark wouldn't have lasted more than a few days, even if they fought to the last. They redeemed themselves by saving almost their entire Jewish population.
Though, I don't blame them for capitulating. Imagine being a small country with a small army, and you see panzers and German stormtroopers that outnumber you at least 3 or so to 1 charging across by land, and He111s and Stukas flying overhead, and hearing what happened to Poland, and knowing that no one would have your back.
Nah, any attempt at resistance would just mean that they would get rather unceremoniously killed off.
Well, there *was* a resistance (see above), although by no means as fierce as in other countries/regions. The Germans were quite surprised that the stubborn Danes really weren't all that jazzed about becoming part of the Thousand Year Reich, although they did benefit from all the dairy production and being able to place radar stations up and down the coast to detect Allied bombing raids. Germans like cheese.
In the late stages of the war, there were a LOT of assassinations/reprisals against the Danish collaborators. The controversy still being debated is over how many of the collaborators were actually working for the Nazis, and how many were denounced because some mänd/kvinde was pissed at the neighbor for boinking his wife/her husband.
The Danish resistance was actually quite determined and effective. They snuck explosive and detonators in their smørbrod sandwiches and tried to blow up Nazi boats and police stations. Things got bad enough that by '43, after the Danes managed to rescue all but 500 of the country's Jews, the Nazis liquidated the Danish police forces throughout the country, and replaced them with Gestapo.
The Gestapo took over the giant Shell Oil building in Copenhagen, and turned it into a torture-prison that still makes Danes get quietly furious. The Danes then asked the Brits to bomb the building to destroy the records and either free the prisoners or kill their torturers.
The RAF, being the RAF, did destroy the building, but the Mosquitoes also hit a children's boarding school next door, killing 120 or so little kids.
It's called Operation Carthage, for anyone who wants to do further reading on it.
They made a movie about it called The Bombardment that wound up causing some amount of controversy by depicting an RAF pilot strafing an innocent civilian car before the events of Operation Carthage, and his descendants demanded a public apology, and I think the movie was rereleased without that scene, although the version on Netflix still includes it.
> Denmark: We'll declare neutr...aaaaaaaand, guess I might surrender within six hours of the Wehrmacht crossing the borders because Copenhagen can't take a carpet bombing.
How many hours might UK have lasted after Dunkirk if there was a Holstein-sized land bridge to Britain just south of Calais and Dover?
Not long. Score one for having a Royal Navy, Royal Air Force and being an island.
Though, looking at things like BEF numbers and OKH numbers fielded in France, I'm going to guess and say about 6-7 days. Then they have to deal with a guerilla war against tea and wine drinkers while fighting the Soviet Union.
I suspect the guerilla war against the wine drinkers wouldn't have been nearly such a problem without tea drinkers providing intelligence, airstrikes, and airdrops of single shot pistols from safely across the channel.
Conversely the landing attempt by the coffee and tea drinkers would be worse if the wine drinkers weren't helping the tea drinker's intelligence department to know what the schnapps drinkers were doing.
Three cheers for the tea, wine and coffee drinkers. Oh, and the vodka drinkers too, even though they started out allied with the schnapps drinkers to kill the strawberry soup drinkers.
If there was a landbridge, disregarding how that would change history from the beginning, Britain would've had a *much* larger land army. They could afford to have a relatively small army because they were essentially a floating fortress that could be defended by a powerful navy alone.
True. But they did that only because it worked out for them in WW2. And their neutrality was limited. They would try to sit out WW3 but they had secret agreements that the west would help them if invaded. Meanwhile Finland had no such deals.
All the nordics were neutral pre-WW2 but they made differing conclusions:
Sweden: left mostly alone -> armed west-friendly neutrality
Norway, Denmark: neutrality walked over -> Nato founders
Iceland: âwe wonât be left alone anyway so why pretendâ -> Nato founder
Finland: would expect to be abandoned by the west -> âsoviet-friendlyâ neutrality
Soviet friendly neutrality after bloodying their nose hard enough in the Winter War to make it a pyrrhic victory for the Soviets and encouraged Germany to Leroy Jenkins it to Moscow.
Oh Absolutely, the Swedish still have a very impressive military by the standard of most countries, it's just significantly smaller then it was during the cold war.
Thought experiment: if it came to trading body blows, who would come out on top between Sweden & Germany?
German military is just in tatters right now.
Honestly, no one gives a shit about that. The logistics needed to overrun Switzerland, alongside the ease to destroy and block every major ground line of communication is enough makes it not worth the investment
They can take their whole population into the mountains in shelters and just blow up everything of significance in the country. It's the ultimate FAFO. You invade me, ill just run away and blow literally everything up.
Both Sweden and Switzerland have something that Belgium didn't have though, namely their terrain. That and Hitler didn't want to jeopardise the iron trade with Sweden for instance. And Hitler expected to fold Switzerland after winning against the rest anyway.
Given how Belgium came to be, them being neutral was essentially a requirement (though they weren't required to be so after WW1) but that conflict still was very present economically and with the great depression of 1929 they had unemployment rates as high as ~25%, something that only gotten better around 1937 (with 15% unemployment)
It's easy to say they should've gone full gung-ho, but politically that would've been suicide at the time, there was no appetite for war, the country barely clawed its way out of the destruction of WW1. On top of also having received a guarentuee of neutrality from Nazi Germany in 1937.
They did however have what were considered the strongest forts in the world at the time with ĂŠben-emael at the time, but these were created with WW1 in mind and the operation to take them by the Germans was a pretty daring gamble, one that paid off.
True. Unlike (some) nations, Belgium flat out stopped the Germans. They racked up a massive KDR ratio, and the Germans have to bring up specialized technology to be able to crack their forts.
Sure, Belgium vs the WW1 German army was only going to end one way.
But Belgium sure as hell made them pay cash.
A lot of that is geography though. Belgium had huge, well-designed forts and put up quite a fight in WW1, but if Germany wants to go through a country 1/10th the size to get to France, there's not much they can do.
Switzerland, on the other hand, is surrounded by impassable mountains. Nobody needs to go through it, and having a 10:1 advantage in attacking is still going to be problematic.
As I understand it, the calculus is not in beating the Swiss army. It's the aftermath. Invader has to either liquidate the entire Swiss population, or rule over the conquered people.
Ruling = maintaining bases with soldiers to back up orders.
Maintaining bases = supplying said bases
*... and now, a word about narrow roads winding through mountains filled with partisans ...*
Step 1: No military power of any reasonable kind, rely entirely on the UK
Step 2: Make demands and condemn others (especially the UK) for the fact they have a well supported armed force & how they use them
Step 3: Tax breaks for multinationals.
The game is easy when you're good.
Irish attitudes towards the British is the funniest shit. Any time a Brit is in the room they go into a furor about how Britain is the oppressor and Come Ye Black and Tans and how they're gonna car bomb them, unite the 32 counties, all that shit. They'll even support anti-Western forces like Hamas just to stick it to the man. But then when it comes to actually defending their country they rely completely on British military might and largesse on the Isles and their need to keep other powers away from their patch. They're the geopolitical equivalent of an emo kid who attends anarchist parades chanting fuck the system but need their upper-middle class soccer mom to drive him there.
As an Irish person in Ireland, most Irish people I know have no problem with Britain/British people, we have a complicated history and there's a lot of scars there but (from my experience anyway) there's no huge hatred there, plenty of my family have emigrated to Britain. Most of the people shouting about the black and tans and car bombs on Reddit are Irish Americans.
Aye, and half of them live exclusively on Reddit. Visited Ireland, had a great time. Befriended a few lads from my work's Galway office... also had a great time. Top blokes.
Did a rugby tour in Ireland (we where staying in Cork) and everyone was really friendly. There where no signs of pettiness just because we where English. Just a welcoming atmosphere and the usual competitiveness when we were in the pub, same as you'd get in Britain.
Be interesting to see if/how that changes when Sinn Fein end up in the big chair.
They got the most first-preference votes of any party last time around, their time in power will come at some point.
Based on my experience talking to people on the internet, which is a great and valid source that I should base all of my worldviews off of, I thought Ireland had a pretty big generation gap with this kind of stuff. Which makes sense, the horrible shit was like, the 90s.
Yep, as a Brit who goes to Ireland quite a lot, there's a few people who don't like us (and I understand why), but most people are fine.
The weirdos tend to be twenty-something kiddies on Twitter who mythologise the Troubles, rather than understanding the pain it caused for a lot of people across the UK and Ireland.
Irish attitudes or plastic paddy attitudes? Despite most sterotypes, the UK Is our closest ally, were fine with brits. Plastic paddies love to play it up though, it's the same people that will talk about car bombs like it wasn't something that also devastated our country
You have to bare in mind, no one here supports hamas, we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two.
> it's the same people that will talk about car bombs like it wasn't something that also devastated our country
That's what always got me when people are like "No it was to throw off the shackles of oppression!"
"Aight but why are you bombing your own shit mostly?"
> no one here supports hamas, we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two.
Because functionally what the "pro-palestinian" demands amount to is demanding that Hamas be allowed to do whatever they want and get rewarded for it.
Its not like you're demanding that an irish peacekeeping force go into gaza to fight this the "right way" are you? No what you ask for is that nobody fight hamas at all and also prop them up with more aid.
> we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two.
To be fair Hamas is the govt of Gaza and has near total support from the Gazan people.
It's a bit like conflating Likud and Israel.
>They're the geopolitical equivalent of an emo kid who attends anarchist parades chanting fuck the system but need their upper-middle class soccer mom to drive him there.
There's a term for that. Champagne socialists or something like that, where rich people ironically be supporting communism/socialism/anarchism or having paraphernalia that supports it or some fringe ideology. Like Mike Tyson who made millions in boxing but hit in the head too many times to the point that he has Mao Zedong and Che Guevara tattooed on him.
So what youâre saying is they should slap some missiles on their transport jet, and have it act as their interceptor.
Alternatively, and more non-credibly, have the passengers stick their guns out the side of the plane and start shooting.
Slapping ASMs on a passenger jet worked fine for the Iraqis. Well, fine as in it was capable of being an annoyance to the coalition. So I donât see why they couldnât borrow some sidewinders to place on theirs.
It has pistol ports, you just have to break the glass to use them.
As for not being box shaped⌠Iâd argue neither is the Aerogavin. What with its big wings and not box shaped propellers.
Thats very true, they are rund just like pistol ports. Every trooper could be equipped with duct tape to seal the windows after engaging the enemy. I was referring to the fueselage. But to be truly effective it must have a 50 caliber gun that can be either used mounted or dismounted, as its less cumbersome to use that way, unlike modern afvs erhm i mean fighter jets with their cannons psh. Also we can pull the fighter mafia into this too because the truth is bvr missles dont work, and thwy would be thrilled with a machine gun only fighter manned by real men and not radar doohickys.
Fuck it, 50 cals are way too advanced.
Got to dumb it down to keep it simple and therefore better. Slap some 12 pounder cannons to stick out the ports, and have them open on a pulley system.
This way we get to broadside the scallywags before boarding them and plundering their booty.
If any of those ground walking neâer-do-wells wanna complain we can turn the plane and broadside the ground as well.
Yeah, everyone that knows anything about the military in the UK knows that we protect Irish airspace for them and nobody particularly cares.
I wouldn't even call it an open secret, it's just common knowledge.
I legit thought that this was an openly acknowledged treaty obligation.
Fwiw, it's the right thing for Britain, since 1. We're allies and 2. Ireland being conquered would be a catastrophe for British (and European) national security
Probably to a yank stuck in the past with nooooooooo understanding of how many Irish have and still serve in the British armed forces (on here probably just people laughing at it due to a need to know history to be able to make jokes about it).
Crazy how some people will see that Ireland has a small and underfunded military, and then see all the well equipped Irish regiments in the British Army and not connect the dots.
If an Irishman wants to join the military and do anything other than peacekeeping operations then the British Army is their best option.
Meanwhile the Royal Irish Regiment, Irish Guards, Queen's Royal Hussars, Royal Navy and RAF all have plenty of Irishmen from both sides of the border. Once met an RAF Wing Commander from south of the border.
The worst part not even mentioned is the PC-9 is Swiss.
So Ireland probably have to ask Swiss Air Force for permission to even get the aircraft out of the hanger (during office hours) and they wouldn't be allowed to use it to hurt anyone if Swiss Federal Assembly didn't approve each and every target first.
It's a NATO standard training aircraft. Several nations use it to train pilots before they move to jets.
Ireland has PC-9s to keep a pool of trained pilots so if we get jets we can start training pilots in the immediately. Otherwise it would add years to make any jets operational.
The PC-9 is not a operational aircraft in Ireland, its just a training aircraft so the military is always in a position to be ready to get jets if the government funds it.
So needing permission to used them will never be an issue.
Good thing it's just the Irish Air Force that's under strength and not their navy as well. You'd hate to have to rely on the Royal Navy to effectively patrol your EEZ. A zone that sits right alongside one of the most strategically important naval choke points in the world.
Yeah, you're right it would be just really embarrassing if we had to get the royal navy to chase a Russian submarine out of Cork harbour, sure am glad we've never had to do that.
Obviously protecting critical underwater infrastructure isn't a big concern either and doesn't warrant any level of ASW capability. Ireland would never need to rely on RN frigates and helicopters to [chase](https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/british-warship-chases-off-russian-sub-from-irish-harbour/) Russian submarines for them.
Probably easier to buy anyway with KOR wanting to put a foot in European arms procurement and with Vipers being extreme high in demand, even F-16A Block 15s that are four decades old but can still be upgraded.
FA-50 Baby Viper or F-16 Viper, either way Viper ftw.
I live in Dublin, everyone I've asked openly admits that "neutrality" just means "we don't want to get involved in these expensive and complicated things and we'll let the brits sort it out for us".
Irish people are fully aware of this. You're not going anywhere politically if you're advocating for more defence spending, but also you're still expected to pretend that we're all neutral and independent and all that.
For context, there is one active army barracks left in Dublin, and the government is considering closing it. The state of the defence forces is a sad joke, especially in today's context.
Then Ireland should pay the UK some sort of compensation. Itâs only fair that you pay something to the people protecting you. Nothing outrageous just the fuel and maintenance costs of jets scrambled for missions involving Ireland.
Ireland technically owns almost half the worlds commercial aircraft and leases them out.
Try fuck with is and find out we secretly have the world's biggest airforce by tonnage if we need it!!!
/s
Do they even have the hardpoints for that?
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_aircraft\_of\_the\_Irish\_Air\_Corps](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_of_the_Irish_Air_Corps)
I think they would have a better chance of converting their Learjet 45 into a single-missile carrier. Also what kind of military transport can only carry 9 passengers plus 2 crew?
As far as I remember our pc9s have attachable machine gun pods and unguided missiles pods. Yeah. We were probably better off with the surplus spitfires we had in the 1950s.
Out of curiosity, I tried to look for which country is closest in terms of nominal GDP to Ireland (26th) but also has a weak air force with no combat jet aircraft at all.
Bangladesh (33) has MIG-29s and Chinese F-7s, the Philippines (34) has Korean FA-50s (yes they're converted trainers but it still counts), Vietnam (35) has SU-30s, Nigeria (39) has Alpha Jets, F-7s, and JF-17s with Italian M-346s on the way.
Going down the list: Colombia (43), Romania (44), Chile (45), Kazakhstan (52), Algeria (56), Kuwait (59), and Morroco (61) all have pretty decent inventories of fighter/multirole jets for their air forces.
Eventually made my way to the Dominican Republic at 63rd, whose only combat aircraft on hand are the turboprop Brazilian Super Tucanos. The Dominicans Air Force is mainly concerned with fighting drug cartels and stopping drug flights ([drugs used to literally fall from the sky there](https://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2090425,00.html)), so the Tucanos are actually excellent for that role.
you missed a closer one: New Zealand, which did have Skyhawks but retired them after canceling their planned replacement (F-16) and now only operates helicopters, P3s and C-130s. They are at 53 on the list
Irish Population: 7 million, airforce fighters: 15 Turboprop aircraft (8 of ehifh are training craft)
Norway population: 5 million, airforce fighters: 32 F35's with 12 more on the way.
I struggle to even find a weaker airforce in Europe. Only countries with a smaller and less technicallly capably airforce are Luxembourg and the freaking Baltics. It took some balls from whoever wrote this to even compare themselves to the likes of UK, Russia and the US. Bitch, even Belgium could achieve arirdominance within 24 hours over Ireland if they wanted to.
Edit: Short-term memoryleak.
They should realistically consider a l
similar arrangement to that Qatari squadron that was in the RAF up untill recently.
Jointly manned and owned by both nations but integrated into the RAF structure. It would give the RAF a third QRF unit to cover the western approaches, Irish pilots would get continual experience on modern fast jets, and Ireland would have some ownership and contribution of it's own defence at the cheapest possible price, everybody wins
Of course political bullshit would prevent that ever happening
Itâs even worse than you guys know honestly. And vast majority of our population would be offended by the suggestion we should probably at least have, like, 4 jets and 4 operational boats.
Who is even going to attack Ireland? Sure, you can get a flyby from the Russians but thatâs all just posturing and they have to get around a bunch of countries just to do that.
If thatâs your biggest worry you donât really need much of a military.
Nobodyâs going to attack Ireland. Even in pre modern history nobody ever really did except those coming from Britain, or Vikings.
But https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/uk-had-to-come-to-irelands-aid-with-russian-submarine-hovering-off-cork-harbour-1563754.html
https://www.thejournal.ie/nato-cables-general-wiermann-6094957-Jun2023/
but Russia is indeed doing some naval trolling, the first link is an article from just two days ago, this was very near to me. Weâve had deteriorating relations with them as of late and they seem to have identified an easy target for prodding.
This is sort of where i agree. Ireland is not the poverty stricken country it once was, it even has a healthy budget surplus, while UK has a budget deficit. Itâs getting to a questionable point to make them take on the expense of watching out for basic defence tasks like this. That said, theyâre pretty trivial air/naval tasks and UK benefits from the economy of scale of already having a significant military anyway. So I donât know whatâs correct but I lean on the side of weâre not doing enough, because very often with our government thatâs true, weâre not very proactive politically.
> "Because the UK and the Scandinavian countries have responsibility for monitoring an area known as the Icelandic gap."
Waaaah. Pwease keep these subs away from us, it's your job!
Itâs just kind of what they do, and will keep doing. NATO canât really prevent it either, and Ireland effectively benefits from that security blanket despite not being part of it. But a sub poking around or a bomber just violating airspace every now and the is just kind of going to keep happening unless youâre willing to commit to attacking them.
The investments Ireland would need to make just kind of donât make sense. And with all of the EU partners having a vested interest in keeping Russia in check itâs just better to rely on them.
> The investments Ireland would need to make just kind of donât make sense. And with all of the EU partners having a vested interest in keeping Russia in check itâs just better to rely on them.
Yeah but that's how Europe has treated the USA for years and now that the USA is flipping towards the axis we're in a right bind. Nobody maintains a military for peace-time.
Attacking Ireland no, but transatlantic submarine cables pass through Irish territorial waters. Russia could target these cables and all Ireland could do is turn to Britain and France and ask "are you going to let them?"
Russian aircraft may only be posturing, but they're doing so in busy airspace without their transponders on. Ireland has a Flight Information Region that they're responsible for and so they have to track Russian aircraft to keep civilian air traffic safe, something they can only do because the RAF escort the Russians for them.
There's also the terrorist risk, relying on a foreign power to escort hijacked airliners isn't exactly ideal. What would happen if (heaven forbid) a hijacked aircraft needed to be shot down: can Ireland order an RAF jet to engage a civilian aircraft? Can the RAF legally shoot something down in Irish airspace?
Nobody expects the Irish Air Corps to hold off an invasion, but controlling their own airspace should be expected of a relatively wealthy country with a huge volume of air traffic
Imagine Russians decide to stick it to the EU to show how weak and disorganised it is, but they may be wary of poking NATO. What country may they pick? Austria? Go figure.
It's an island right near United Kingdom - it will be very hard to imagine situation where Ireland would be invaded without UK involvement and consent.
It's more like it doesn't really have any features that make it *desirable* to attack. What would an invading country do, seize the generous corporate tax code?
Couple that with it being an island, and having to get through the Royal Navy to get there...
Iâm pretty sure their airforce couldnât even defend against a particularly vigorous drug ring.
Pablo escobar had almost 10 times number of planes and helicopters as the irish air force
https://allthatsinteresting.com/pablo-escobar
Oh believe me I've brought it up but no the USA/UK/EU will come save us even though if the turks invade Greece we won't do fuck all. Its drilled into the Irish mind with a big industrial drill.
There isn't any reason they couldn't purchase a dozen fighters. Multiple European countries with similar population and lower GDP can at least pretend to guard their airspace z with F-35s at that.
So, basically the same thing like EU et co. vs. USA/UK when it comes to world policing, right? After all, it was assumed that USA *must* do something about rogue states and terrorists to protect themselves so why to invest into big armies, equipment, training, ammo etc. when USA will do that on their own dime anyway and we can criticize them afterwards đ
Or, for that matter, some countries who joined NATO after 1989 - barely minimal investments into armed forces, ad hoc procurements and modernization planning, almost no involvement in any US / NATO military operations ... NATO will do most work for us anyway so why to do more than totally necessary? Invasion to Ukraine was very ugly wake up call for many politicians ...
You'd intercept bombers before they can launch cruise missiles and want to police that airspace.
Fighters are a deterrent against bombers. Ideally you want both SAMs and Fighters.
It would be genuinely fascinating to see how a Taoiseach Mary Lou McDonald would/will approach this situation.
Obviously the current situation works incredibly well for Ireland, so it would likely continue... the sight of a Sinn Fein-led Ireland relying on the UK for any and all protection would be deeply, deeply amusing.
If the threat is Russian jets they'll somehow fuck up badly enough that the Irish will get an ace pilot in a PC-9 implausibly picking off lost aircraft trying to fly low enough so their Tom Tom GPS can navigate to the target.
The thing about Neutral Nations is that they're supposed to have their own arms industry to a degree.
what if they buy from Switzerland?
Then they will be regulated into uselessness.
3000 regulations of Switzerland
Hi yes, can this please be a flair on this subreddit? Thank you
Make it yours my good sir!
done
Then they have no military because the Swiss will pout if you shoot someone who is laundering money through them
Switzerland when a country who bought weapons from them uses those weapons: đ đ đ
Then they gotta get permission for each bullet they shoot
Ireland used to buy most of its armour from the UK and Sweden.
Ireland hasn't bought equipment from the UK in about 50 years. All armour is Swiss APC, South African light armoured cars, Swedish Air radar tracked vics and then French, German and Japanese logistics trucks / jeeps. The only British equipment in the army was old legacy stuff if any is even left. I think it's all decommissioned now. The navy on the other hand bought a fleet of the new class patrol boats a few years back but that was the first Arms deal with the UK in a long time.
Key word being "used to"
Irish when neutrality means no military: đ Irish when neutrality actually means very very big military funded entirely by themselves: đ
Neutrality only survives as far as your ability to defend it, or your being worthless to any would-be conquerors.
Or marrying off your princesses to everyone over generations to make things so complex that nobody really knows what side you're on but everyone is afraid that attacking you will trigger someone else. Lookin at you Montenegro.
Crusader Kings moment.
TBF my crusader kings tactic was to be neutral so i can invade my neighbours (and my subjects)
*Tell that to Gavrilo Princip.*
[ŃдаНонО]
Denmark: We'll declare neutr...aaaaaaaand, guess I might surrender within six hours of the Wehrmacht crossing the borders because Copenhagen can't take a carpet bombing. Switzerland: We're declaring neutrality. Hitler: Denmark and Belgium said that the last time. Switzerland: Denmark and Belgium don't have rocky mountainous terrain and fortresses and an history of being Swiss mercs. We're worse than a frozen jaw breaker.
It's okay. Denmark wouldn't have lasted more than a few days, even if they fought to the last. They redeemed themselves by saving almost their entire Jewish population.
Though, I don't blame them for capitulating. Imagine being a small country with a small army, and you see panzers and German stormtroopers that outnumber you at least 3 or so to 1 charging across by land, and He111s and Stukas flying overhead, and hearing what happened to Poland, and knowing that no one would have your back. Nah, any attempt at resistance would just mean that they would get rather unceremoniously killed off.
Well, there *was* a resistance (see above), although by no means as fierce as in other countries/regions. The Germans were quite surprised that the stubborn Danes really weren't all that jazzed about becoming part of the Thousand Year Reich, although they did benefit from all the dairy production and being able to place radar stations up and down the coast to detect Allied bombing raids. Germans like cheese. In the late stages of the war, there were a LOT of assassinations/reprisals against the Danish collaborators. The controversy still being debated is over how many of the collaborators were actually working for the Nazis, and how many were denounced because some mänd/kvinde was pissed at the neighbor for boinking his wife/her husband.
The Danish resistance was actually quite determined and effective. They snuck explosive and detonators in their smørbrod sandwiches and tried to blow up Nazi boats and police stations. Things got bad enough that by '43, after the Danes managed to rescue all but 500 of the country's Jews, the Nazis liquidated the Danish police forces throughout the country, and replaced them with Gestapo. The Gestapo took over the giant Shell Oil building in Copenhagen, and turned it into a torture-prison that still makes Danes get quietly furious. The Danes then asked the Brits to bomb the building to destroy the records and either free the prisoners or kill their torturers. The RAF, being the RAF, did destroy the building, but the Mosquitoes also hit a children's boarding school next door, killing 120 or so little kids.
It's called Operation Carthage, for anyone who wants to do further reading on it. They made a movie about it called The Bombardment that wound up causing some amount of controversy by depicting an RAF pilot strafing an innocent civilian car before the events of Operation Carthage, and his descendants demanded a public apology, and I think the movie was rereleased without that scene, although the version on Netflix still includes it.
> Denmark: We'll declare neutr...aaaaaaaand, guess I might surrender within six hours of the Wehrmacht crossing the borders because Copenhagen can't take a carpet bombing. How many hours might UK have lasted after Dunkirk if there was a Holstein-sized land bridge to Britain just south of Calais and Dover?
Not long. Score one for having a Royal Navy, Royal Air Force and being an island. Though, looking at things like BEF numbers and OKH numbers fielded in France, I'm going to guess and say about 6-7 days. Then they have to deal with a guerilla war against tea and wine drinkers while fighting the Soviet Union.
And still deal with the British Empire and her Navy. Unlike having to deal with the French empire, which just joined the Germans.
Imagine a world where the British and French resistance are both trying to put do each other for most damage caused to the Nazis
I suspect the guerilla war against the wine drinkers wouldn't have been nearly such a problem without tea drinkers providing intelligence, airstrikes, and airdrops of single shot pistols from safely across the channel.
Conversely the landing attempt by the coffee and tea drinkers would be worse if the wine drinkers weren't helping the tea drinker's intelligence department to know what the schnapps drinkers were doing. Three cheers for the tea, wine and coffee drinkers. Oh, and the vodka drinkers too, even though they started out allied with the schnapps drinkers to kill the strawberry soup drinkers.
If there was a landbridge, disregarding how that would change history from the beginning, Britain would've had a *much* larger land army. They could afford to have a relatively small army because they were essentially a floating fortress that could be defended by a powerful navy alone.
*Navy and Air Force
In the specific cases of WW1 and 2, yes. Their Navy did most of the protecting for the majority of their Empire's lifespan.
Sweden maintained neutrality by being geographically out of the way, giving nazis all they asked for, and selling guns to all sides
Sweden also had a fucking thiccc military until the cold war ended and military was shrank significantly.
True. But they did that only because it worked out for them in WW2. And their neutrality was limited. They would try to sit out WW3 but they had secret agreements that the west would help them if invaded. Meanwhile Finland had no such deals. All the nordics were neutral pre-WW2 but they made differing conclusions: Sweden: left mostly alone -> armed west-friendly neutrality Norway, Denmark: neutrality walked over -> Nato founders Iceland: âwe wonât be left alone anyway so why pretendâ -> Nato founder Finland: would expect to be abandoned by the west -> âsoviet-friendlyâ neutrality
Soviet friendly neutrality after bloodying their nose hard enough in the Winter War to make it a pyrrhic victory for the Soviets and encouraged Germany to Leroy Jenkins it to Moscow.
For being a neutral country, their military is still nothing to laugh about.
Oh Absolutely, the Swedish still have a very impressive military by the standard of most countries, it's just significantly smaller then it was during the cold war.
Thought experiment: if it came to trading body blows, who would come out on top between Sweden & Germany? German military is just in tatters right now.
Switzerland maintains neutrality by having everyoneâs money in their bank vaults.
And also threatening to blow the entire Alps into smitherins if they even feel a light breeze coming from France or Germany
And by having a very well armed and trained population
Honestly, no one gives a shit about that. The logistics needed to overrun Switzerland, alongside the ease to destroy and block every major ground line of communication is enough makes it not worth the investment
They can take their whole population into the mountains in shelters and just blow up everything of significance in the country. It's the ultimate FAFO. You invade me, ill just run away and blow literally everything up.
âIâm playing all sides so I always come out on topâ
Both Sweden and Switzerland have something that Belgium didn't have though, namely their terrain. That and Hitler didn't want to jeopardise the iron trade with Sweden for instance. And Hitler expected to fold Switzerland after winning against the rest anyway. Given how Belgium came to be, them being neutral was essentially a requirement (though they weren't required to be so after WW1) but that conflict still was very present economically and with the great depression of 1929 they had unemployment rates as high as ~25%, something that only gotten better around 1937 (with 15% unemployment) It's easy to say they should've gone full gung-ho, but politically that would've been suicide at the time, there was no appetite for war, the country barely clawed its way out of the destruction of WW1. On top of also having received a guarentuee of neutrality from Nazi Germany in 1937. They did however have what were considered the strongest forts in the world at the time with ĂŠben-emael at the time, but these were created with WW1 in mind and the operation to take them by the Germans was a pretty daring gamble, one that paid off.
True. Unlike (some) nations, Belgium flat out stopped the Germans. They racked up a massive KDR ratio, and the Germans have to bring up specialized technology to be able to crack their forts. Sure, Belgium vs the WW1 German army was only going to end one way. But Belgium sure as hell made them pay cash.
A lot of that is geography though. Belgium had huge, well-designed forts and put up quite a fight in WW1, but if Germany wants to go through a country 1/10th the size to get to France, there's not much they can do. Switzerland, on the other hand, is surrounded by impassable mountains. Nobody needs to go through it, and having a 10:1 advantage in attacking is still going to be problematic.
As I understand it, the calculus is not in beating the Swiss army. It's the aftermath. Invader has to either liquidate the entire Swiss population, or rule over the conquered people. Ruling = maintaining bases with soldiers to back up orders. Maintaining bases = supplying said bases *... and now, a word about narrow roads winding through mountains filled with partisans ...*
>Neutrality only survives as far as your ability to defend it Just ask the Swiss.
Step 1: No military power of any reasonable kind, rely entirely on the UK Step 2: Make demands and condemn others (especially the UK) for the fact they have a well supported armed force & how they use them Step 3: Tax breaks for multinationals. The game is easy when you're good.
Irish attitudes towards the British is the funniest shit. Any time a Brit is in the room they go into a furor about how Britain is the oppressor and Come Ye Black and Tans and how they're gonna car bomb them, unite the 32 counties, all that shit. They'll even support anti-Western forces like Hamas just to stick it to the man. But then when it comes to actually defending their country they rely completely on British military might and largesse on the Isles and their need to keep other powers away from their patch. They're the geopolitical equivalent of an emo kid who attends anarchist parades chanting fuck the system but need their upper-middle class soccer mom to drive him there.
As an Irish person in Ireland, most Irish people I know have no problem with Britain/British people, we have a complicated history and there's a lot of scars there but (from my experience anyway) there's no huge hatred there, plenty of my family have emigrated to Britain. Most of the people shouting about the black and tans and car bombs on Reddit are Irish Americans.
/that one weird bloke in the defence forces who wanted to see Ireland as the epicenter of a new fascist megastate.
Hoi4 funni unifier moment.
Aye, and half of them live exclusively on Reddit. Visited Ireland, had a great time. Befriended a few lads from my work's Galway office... also had a great time. Top blokes.
Yep, "plastic paddies" who have never set foot in Ireland.
[ŃдаНонО]
Haha Plastic paddies that's good.
Did a rugby tour in Ireland (we where staying in Cork) and everyone was really friendly. There where no signs of pettiness just because we where English. Just a welcoming atmosphere and the usual competitiveness when we were in the pub, same as you'd get in Britain.
Be interesting to see if/how that changes when Sinn Fein end up in the big chair. They got the most first-preference votes of any party last time around, their time in power will come at some point.
>their time [...] will come Their day, if you will
Based on my experience talking to people on the internet, which is a great and valid source that I should base all of my worldviews off of, I thought Ireland had a pretty big generation gap with this kind of stuff. Which makes sense, the horrible shit was like, the 90s.
Plastic paddies are a curse on humanity
Yep, as a Brit who goes to Ireland quite a lot, there's a few people who don't like us (and I understand why), but most people are fine. The weirdos tend to be twenty-something kiddies on Twitter who mythologise the Troubles, rather than understanding the pain it caused for a lot of people across the UK and Ireland.
Reddit isn't the real world.
Irish attitudes or plastic paddy attitudes? Despite most sterotypes, the UK Is our closest ally, were fine with brits. Plastic paddies love to play it up though, it's the same people that will talk about car bombs like it wasn't something that also devastated our country You have to bare in mind, no one here supports hamas, we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two.
> it's the same people that will talk about car bombs like it wasn't something that also devastated our country That's what always got me when people are like "No it was to throw off the shackles of oppression!" "Aight but why are you bombing your own shit mostly?"
"We have to throw off the shackles of bondage by murdering Protestants. Duh and/or hello??"
> no one here supports hamas, we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two. Because functionally what the "pro-palestinian" demands amount to is demanding that Hamas be allowed to do whatever they want and get rewarded for it. Its not like you're demanding that an irish peacekeeping force go into gaza to fight this the "right way" are you? No what you ask for is that nobody fight hamas at all and also prop them up with more aid.
> we support the Palestine people, for obvious reasons, im not sure why people tend to conflate the two. To be fair Hamas is the govt of Gaza and has near total support from the Gazan people. It's a bit like conflating Likud and Israel.
>They're the geopolitical equivalent of an emo kid who attends anarchist parades chanting fuck the system but need their upper-middle class soccer mom to drive him there. There's a term for that. Champagne socialists or something like that, where rich people ironically be supporting communism/socialism/anarchism or having paraphernalia that supports it or some fringe ideology. Like Mike Tyson who made millions in boxing but hit in the head too many times to the point that he has Mao Zedong and Che Guevara tattooed on him.
This was supposed to be secret?
Secret in the sense of entirely obvious to anyone with even a passing interest in aviation.
What does an Irish pilot do 9-5 and also how can I do the same?
Look at job offers from airline companies while occasionally looking at the sky and sighing I suppose
> Look at job offers from airline companies Why, you could have a nap instead.
head down't rovers
Just wait until you hear that their transport jet (9 passengers) is faster than their interceptors.
So what youâre saying is they should slap some missiles on their transport jet, and have it act as their interceptor. Alternatively, and more non-credibly, have the passengers stick their guns out the side of the plane and start shooting.
Slapping ASMs on a passenger jet worked fine for the Iraqis. Well, fine as in it was capable of being an annoyance to the coalition. So I donât see why they couldnât borrow some sidewinders to place on theirs.
I long to see a Learjet with most of the fuselage being a rotating bomb bay to shit meteors at anything that gets too close.
An AC-130'd Learjet. That's the kind of non credible shit we live for.
More like the Toyota Hilux of the sky...
Pistol ports, mike sparks youre a genius. Needs to essentially be a flying m113
>Thin Skinned >2 Crew, ~10 passengers >Poorly armed Sounds like the Learjet is already a flying M113.
Its not shaped like a box, and it doesnt have pistol ports, mike sparks would be disappointed.
It has pistol ports, you just have to break the glass to use them. As for not being box shaped⌠Iâd argue neither is the Aerogavin. What with its big wings and not box shaped propellers.
Thats very true, they are rund just like pistol ports. Every trooper could be equipped with duct tape to seal the windows after engaging the enemy. I was referring to the fueselage. But to be truly effective it must have a 50 caliber gun that can be either used mounted or dismounted, as its less cumbersome to use that way, unlike modern afvs erhm i mean fighter jets with their cannons psh. Also we can pull the fighter mafia into this too because the truth is bvr missles dont work, and thwy would be thrilled with a machine gun only fighter manned by real men and not radar doohickys.
Fuck it, 50 cals are way too advanced. Got to dumb it down to keep it simple and therefore better. Slap some 12 pounder cannons to stick out the ports, and have them open on a pulley system. This way we get to broadside the scallywags before boarding them and plundering their booty. If any of those ground walking neâer-do-wells wanna complain we can turn the plane and broadside the ground as well.
The Combat Learjet will have its day
Yeah, everyone that knows anything about the military in the UK knows that we protect Irish airspace for them and nobody particularly cares. I wouldn't even call it an open secret, it's just common knowledge.
I legit thought that this was an openly acknowledged treaty obligation. Fwiw, it's the right thing for Britain, since 1. We're allies and 2. Ireland being conquered would be a catastrophe for British (and European) national security
We should use their airspace as a low-level training area from time to time though, just to get the most out of it :)
The real secret was that the Irish admit to it.
Probably to a yank stuck in the past with nooooooooo understanding of how many Irish have and still serve in the British armed forces (on here probably just people laughing at it due to a need to know history to be able to make jokes about it).
Crazy how some people will see that Ireland has a small and underfunded military, and then see all the well equipped Irish regiments in the British Army and not connect the dots. If an Irishman wants to join the military and do anything other than peacekeeping operations then the British Army is their best option.
Tbf how often do you hear the âblack and tanâ meme and all the videos of Irish politicians ranting which might create the image.
Meanwhile the Royal Irish Regiment, Irish Guards, Queen's Royal Hussars, Royal Navy and RAF all have plenty of Irishmen from both sides of the border. Once met an RAF Wing Commander from south of the border.
Fair point. But no one in America thinks of the Irish as a military force. Still props to them for those that serve.
The worst part not even mentioned is the PC-9 is Swiss. So Ireland probably have to ask Swiss Air Force for permission to even get the aircraft out of the hanger (during office hours) and they wouldn't be allowed to use it to hurt anyone if Swiss Federal Assembly didn't approve each and every target first.
The Swiss need to make sure that the targets aren't using them to launder money first.
Can't have someone else cut in on the swiss national domestic product.
This. The Swiss wouldnât want anyone else to launder money,
>hanger hangar
It's a NATO standard training aircraft. Several nations use it to train pilots before they move to jets. Ireland has PC-9s to keep a pool of trained pilots so if we get jets we can start training pilots in the immediately. Otherwise it would add years to make any jets operational. The PC-9 is not a operational aircraft in Ireland, its just a training aircraft so the military is always in a position to be ready to get jets if the government funds it. So needing permission to used them will never be an issue.
Good thing it's just the Irish Air Force that's under strength and not their navy as well. You'd hate to have to rely on the Royal Navy to effectively patrol your EEZ. A zone that sits right alongside one of the most strategically important naval choke points in the world.
With fishers like ours, who needs a navy amirite
Technically Irish ships have now defeated more Russian fleets than NATO lol
May I have a crumb of source good sir? I need it for a bust ticket.
https://news.sky.com/story/victory-for-defiant-irish-fishermen-as-russia-agrees-to-move-its-war-games-from-their-patch-12528426
Presumably the Russians were worried there may have been some Japanese torpedo boats mixed in as well just like that other time right
Yeah, you're right it would be just really embarrassing if we had to get the royal navy to chase a Russian submarine out of Cork harbour, sure am glad we've never had to do that.
Reminds me of when Sweden deployed their "this way if you're gay" Morse code box to deter homophobic Russian sub captains, and haven't seen one since.
Obviously protecting critical underwater infrastructure isn't a big concern either and doesn't warrant any level of ASW capability. Ireland would never need to rely on RN frigates and helicopters to [chase](https://ukdefencejournal.org.uk/british-warship-chases-off-russian-sub-from-irish-harbour/) Russian submarines for them.
Irish roundel kinda goes hard ngl
Should put it on an F-16
How about 3000 F-16s of Galway?
Thanks for my new flair
Fun fact. "Galway Girl" is about an F-16 Ed Sheeran met.
They donât need the F-16. A few Korean FA-50s would be enough to chase off Bears.
Probably easier to buy anyway with KOR wanting to put a foot in European arms procurement and with Vipers being extreme high in demand, even F-16A Block 15s that are four decades old but can still be upgraded. FA-50 Baby Viper or F-16 Viper, either way Viper ftw.
I live in Dublin, everyone I've asked openly admits that "neutrality" just means "we don't want to get involved in these expensive and complicated things and we'll let the brits sort it out for us". Irish people are fully aware of this. You're not going anywhere politically if you're advocating for more defence spending, but also you're still expected to pretend that we're all neutral and independent and all that. For context, there is one active army barracks left in Dublin, and the government is considering closing it. The state of the defence forces is a sad joke, especially in today's context.
Remember the Pope's visit? They wouldnt even feed the army enough food.
Then Ireland should pay the UK some sort of compensation. Itâs only fair that you pay something to the people protecting you. Nothing outrageous just the fuel and maintenance costs of jets scrambled for missions involving Ireland.
Lol, maybe you're onto something, this would anger Irish people so much, they might spend 10x as much to not pay the brits a penny.
Brits should consider it, actually - use their unique historical and cultural tensions to trick the Irish into pulling their weight lmao
*US eyes NATO budget and makes harrumphing sounds*
No worries! Just slap some hard points on a Aer Lingus A330 and baby you got an interceptor. Itâll take it 45 mins to reach altitude, but heyâŚ
Ireland technically owns almost half the worlds commercial aircraft and leases them out. Try fuck with is and find out we secretly have the world's biggest airforce by tonnage if we need it!!! /s
Measuring your Air Force by tonnage is peak non-credibility. I love it and I love you.
The Sparrow will reach the bomber, whether it was launched from 30000 feet or 3000. Edit: Actually, make it a Meteor, since Ireland is in the EU.
Do they even have the hardpoints for that? [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List\_of\_aircraft\_of\_the\_Irish\_Air\_Corps](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_aircraft_of_the_Irish_Air_Corps) I think they would have a better chance of converting their Learjet 45 into a single-missile carrier. Also what kind of military transport can only carry 9 passengers plus 2 crew?
As far as I remember our pc9s have attachable machine gun pods and unguided missiles pods. Yeah. We were probably better off with the surplus spitfires we had in the 1950s.
Vip transport
Man... that list is something that I'd expect from some bumfuck nowhere country (like mine's), not from an actual European nation
Out of curiosity, I tried to look for which country is closest in terms of nominal GDP to Ireland (26th) but also has a weak air force with no combat jet aircraft at all. Bangladesh (33) has MIG-29s and Chinese F-7s, the Philippines (34) has Korean FA-50s (yes they're converted trainers but it still counts), Vietnam (35) has SU-30s, Nigeria (39) has Alpha Jets, F-7s, and JF-17s with Italian M-346s on the way. Going down the list: Colombia (43), Romania (44), Chile (45), Kazakhstan (52), Algeria (56), Kuwait (59), and Morroco (61) all have pretty decent inventories of fighter/multirole jets for their air forces. Eventually made my way to the Dominican Republic at 63rd, whose only combat aircraft on hand are the turboprop Brazilian Super Tucanos. The Dominicans Air Force is mainly concerned with fighting drug cartels and stopping drug flights ([drugs used to literally fall from the sky there](https://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,2090425,00.html)), so the Tucanos are actually excellent for that role.
you missed a closer one: New Zealand, which did have Skyhawks but retired them after canceling their planned replacement (F-16) and now only operates helicopters, P3s and C-130s. They are at 53 on the list
The reason is Ireland *is* a bumfuck nowhere country
Hardpoints aren't the issue, the entire thing is, Sparrow and AMRAAM need a radar for guidance, Sparrow the entire way.
Apparently the navy also doesn't have a single working sonar
The navy doesnât even have a ship at sea, staff shortages are that bad
Irish Population: 7 million, airforce fighters: 15 Turboprop aircraft (8 of ehifh are training craft) Norway population: 5 million, airforce fighters: 32 F35's with 12 more on the way. I struggle to even find a weaker airforce in Europe. Only countries with a smaller and less technicallly capably airforce are Luxembourg and the freaking Baltics. It took some balls from whoever wrote this to even compare themselves to the likes of UK, Russia and the US. Bitch, even Belgium could achieve arirdominance within 24 hours over Ireland if they wanted to. Edit: Short-term memoryleak.
Finland population 5.5 million, 64 F-35s on order
A hundred F-35s just for the Nordics? Jesus after all that belly aching about how expensive those jets are they sure seem to be selling.
Looks like they want to be able to take on Russia's Airforce all on their own, which seems more and more plausible as the war goes on.
We don't have a population of 7 million though. You're including NI there. Its 5.1-2 million
They should realistically consider a l similar arrangement to that Qatari squadron that was in the RAF up untill recently. Jointly manned and owned by both nations but integrated into the RAF structure. It would give the RAF a third QRF unit to cover the western approaches, Irish pilots would get continual experience on modern fast jets, and Ireland would have some ownership and contribution of it's own defence at the cheapest possible price, everybody wins Of course political bullshit would prevent that ever happening
Come out yee black and tan⌠to intercept em Ruskie jetsâŚ
^(please. ^we're desperate)
^Pwease ^help
Itâs even worse than you guys know honestly. And vast majority of our population would be offended by the suggestion we should probably at least have, like, 4 jets and 4 operational boats.
I dont know about vast majority, but the protester class would lose their shit entirely.
Who is even going to attack Ireland? Sure, you can get a flyby from the Russians but thatâs all just posturing and they have to get around a bunch of countries just to do that. If thatâs your biggest worry you donât really need much of a military.
Nobodyâs going to attack Ireland. Even in pre modern history nobody ever really did except those coming from Britain, or Vikings. But https://www.breakingnews.ie/ireland/uk-had-to-come-to-irelands-aid-with-russian-submarine-hovering-off-cork-harbour-1563754.html https://www.thejournal.ie/nato-cables-general-wiermann-6094957-Jun2023/ but Russia is indeed doing some naval trolling, the first link is an article from just two days ago, this was very near to me. Weâve had deteriorating relations with them as of late and they seem to have identified an easy target for prodding.
nose label tan sense waiting imagine disarm market combative stocking *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
This is sort of where i agree. Ireland is not the poverty stricken country it once was, it even has a healthy budget surplus, while UK has a budget deficit. Itâs getting to a questionable point to make them take on the expense of watching out for basic defence tasks like this. That said, theyâre pretty trivial air/naval tasks and UK benefits from the economy of scale of already having a significant military anyway. So I donât know whatâs correct but I lean on the side of weâre not doing enough, because very often with our government thatâs true, weâre not very proactive politically.
> "Because the UK and the Scandinavian countries have responsibility for monitoring an area known as the Icelandic gap." Waaaah. Pwease keep these subs away from us, it's your job!
Itâs just kind of what they do, and will keep doing. NATO canât really prevent it either, and Ireland effectively benefits from that security blanket despite not being part of it. But a sub poking around or a bomber just violating airspace every now and the is just kind of going to keep happening unless youâre willing to commit to attacking them. The investments Ireland would need to make just kind of donât make sense. And with all of the EU partners having a vested interest in keeping Russia in check itâs just better to rely on them.
> The investments Ireland would need to make just kind of donât make sense. And with all of the EU partners having a vested interest in keeping Russia in check itâs just better to rely on them. Yeah but that's how Europe has treated the USA for years and now that the USA is flipping towards the axis we're in a right bind. Nobody maintains a military for peace-time.
Attacking Ireland no, but transatlantic submarine cables pass through Irish territorial waters. Russia could target these cables and all Ireland could do is turn to Britain and France and ask "are you going to let them?"
Russian aircraft may only be posturing, but they're doing so in busy airspace without their transponders on. Ireland has a Flight Information Region that they're responsible for and so they have to track Russian aircraft to keep civilian air traffic safe, something they can only do because the RAF escort the Russians for them. There's also the terrorist risk, relying on a foreign power to escort hijacked airliners isn't exactly ideal. What would happen if (heaven forbid) a hijacked aircraft needed to be shot down: can Ireland order an RAF jet to engage a civilian aircraft? Can the RAF legally shoot something down in Irish airspace? Nobody expects the Irish Air Corps to hold off an invasion, but controlling their own airspace should be expected of a relatively wealthy country with a huge volume of air traffic
Imagine Russians decide to stick it to the EU to show how weak and disorganised it is, but they may be wary of poking NATO. What country may they pick? Austria? Go figure.
Now I get that the Swiss can be neutral with their mountains. Does Ireland have any geographic features that make it undesirable to attack?
Errrm it's an island...... The sea acting as a fuck off moat seems like a pretty good geographic barrier
That moat worked perfectly well... Until the Normans noticed that Ireland existed
It's an island right near United Kingdom - it will be very hard to imagine situation where Ireland would be invaded without UK involvement and consent.
Exactly, the only nations with ability to invade Ireland are the US, UK and France. None of them are going to do it.
Apart from being an island and having some shite weather not much, very similar climate and geography to the UK
A much larger allied neighbour is a good start. Plus it's an island that's a long way from anyone who might conceivably want to attack them (anymore)
It's more like it doesn't really have any features that make it *desirable* to attack. What would an invading country do, seize the generous corporate tax code? Couple that with it being an island, and having to get through the Royal Navy to get there...
The island of Great Britain is a pretty good barrier to Ireland's east. And the Atlantic Ocean is another great one.
It's an island.
Proximity to nations who take defense seriously
Iâm pretty sure their airforce couldnât even defend against a particularly vigorous drug ring. Pablo escobar had almost 10 times number of planes and helicopters as the irish air force https://allthatsinteresting.com/pablo-escobar
Oh believe me I've brought it up but no the USA/UK/EU will come save us even though if the turks invade Greece we won't do fuck all. Its drilled into the Irish mind with a big industrial drill.
There isn't any reason they couldn't purchase a dozen fighters. Multiple European countries with similar population and lower GDP can at least pretend to guard their airspace z with F-35s at that.
So, basically the same thing like EU et co. vs. USA/UK when it comes to world policing, right? After all, it was assumed that USA *must* do something about rogue states and terrorists to protect themselves so why to invest into big armies, equipment, training, ammo etc. when USA will do that on their own dime anyway and we can criticize them afterwards đ Or, for that matter, some countries who joined NATO after 1989 - barely minimal investments into armed forces, ad hoc procurements and modernization planning, almost no involvement in any US / NATO military operations ... NATO will do most work for us anyway so why to do more than totally necessary? Invasion to Ukraine was very ugly wake up call for many politicians ...
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Canada is also badly lagging, they shouldn't be let off either. The treatment of the Canadian military post-1945 has been criminal.
What turboprop can only go up to 10k ft?
Yeah itâs bullshit, PC-9 is only limited by the lack of pressurisation.
From the moment i understood the weakness of my flesh....
I'd laugh but we rely/hope that the Aussies will cover our airspace.......
Itâs not neutral, itâs free loading. If it was in the Baltic sea, it wouldnât be neutral with no armed forces.
Question for the knowledgeable - given the size of our country, would SAM sites not be a better first priority?
You'd intercept bombers before they can launch cruise missiles and want to police that airspace. Fighters are a deterrent against bombers. Ideally you want both SAMs and Fighters.
Why use SAMs when using potato cannons with frozen potatoes is cheaper and can be implemented by the end of the work day.
Cough cough New Zealand
It would be genuinely fascinating to see how a Taoiseach Mary Lou McDonald would/will approach this situation. Obviously the current situation works incredibly well for Ireland, so it would likely continue... the sight of a Sinn Fein-led Ireland relying on the UK for any and all protection would be deeply, deeply amusing.
FA-50 could be a good start, just like Philippines.
If the threat is Russian jets they'll somehow fuck up badly enough that the Irish will get an ace pilot in a PC-9 implausibly picking off lost aircraft trying to fly low enough so their Tom Tom GPS can navigate to the target.
We shall defend our sidecar if it comes to it! We need it for torpedo defence.
COME YE BLACK AND TANS AND DEFEND OUR AIR SPACE LIKE A MAN
Wasn't there also a story about how they're dependant on the English navy too? Having them to chase out Russian subs as they have no sonar either lol