A series of inconclusive investigations into recent intelligence and security incidents have highlighted worrying deficiencies in national security in the run-up to Ireland’s presidency of the European Union. National security is not only about possessing operational capabilities to defend against threats; it is also about having clear systems of command and communication.
Ireland’s lack of the latter – which is highlighted by the long-delayed publication of a national security strategy – is a serious issue.
The first incident was the Government response to serious allegations about espionage within the Oireachtas – specifically reports in a newspaper last year that an elected representative had been compromised and manipulated by a foreign intelligence service. Further reports suggested that gardaí had found nothing to substantiate the allegations against the unnamed politician. But through it all the Government has remained largely silent, and the public is no wiser about which – if any – of the stories were correct.
Then there were the apparent sightings of suspicious drone activity in the vicinity of the flight path of Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskiy during his visit to Ireland in December, which sparked another investigation. In the days after the incident Minister for Justice Jim O’Callaghan concluded that this was a sophisticated operation “generated for the purpose of putting pressure on EU and Ukrainian interests”. Minister for Defence Helen McEntee told the Oireachtas in February that there was “a criminal investigation” and that she had “no doubt that there will be a result to that”. She went on to say that any potential deficiencies in co-ordination between Government agencies during the incident was “an operational matter”, which the garda leadership could consider as they saw necessary. The following month O’Callaghan said neither the Government nor the gardaí knew who was responsible the drone operation.
Prof Barry O’Sullivan of University College Cork told an Oireachtas committee in April that the Defence Forces concluded that a Russian “dark ship” was responsible for targeting Zelenskiy’s aircraft. Fine Gael TD James Geoghegan intervened to remind him that, “the Minister for Justice was unequivocal that An Garda Síochána does not know, and the Government does not know”. The Government has also not explained the failure to procure counter-unmanned aerial systems (C-UAS) defence capabilities before the incident, since this was identified as a priority in the Department of Defence’s 2020 capability development plan. Our European partners could be forgiven for being unimpressed.
In March an investigation by The Irish Times, carried out in co-operation with the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, revealed that Aughinish Alumina in Limerick is exporting large amounts of alumina to Russia. The raw material is used to make aluminium, which is then sold to a trading company that supplies dozens of Russian arms manufacturers. On April 28th, Minister for Enterprise Peter Burke did not answer a question in the Dáil by Social Democrats TD Cian O’Callaghan about whether his department had received a risk assessment on the potential military end use of alumina exports from Aughinish. Some weeks later, following increasing scrutiny in Brussels, the Government announced that its investigation into Aughinish would conclude in the summer.
Governments in other EU member states have imposed complex, and sometimes costly, sanctions to ensure that raw materials do not end up being used to manufacture weapons that murder and maim in Ukraine. In contrast to Ireland, the Australian government took immediate action in 2022 to suspend the export of alumina to Russia, concluding that some of these would be inevitably directed towards Russia’s war in Ukraine. Alumina is an important European material, critical to European defence and other sectors. Consequently, there are many other potential export destinations for Aughinish Alumina. The failure by the Government – which has lobbied for Aughinish to be excluded from EU sanctions – to explore (and insist on) such alternatives has frustrated the Ukrainian government and those EU member states facing increased Russian aggression on their borders.
Meanwhile, a long-promised overhaul of Ireland’s national security vetting system and the classification of government materials has yet to be completed.
Repeated promises that such a deficit could be quickly addressed are misplaced. The type of gold-standard developed vetting processes in other EU member states generally take years to construct and require a significant injection of personnel as well as enabling legislation. And the State still lacks the communications interception legislation and the signals intelligence service required to carry out critical counter-intelligence investigations. These would also act as a deterrence and defence against threats from extremists.
This month the Government announced it will provide guidelines to the higher education and research sector to guard against industrial espionage, including “dual use” intellectual property that can be used by foreign states seeking to gain a military advantage. This is welcome but it comes nearly two years after the European Commission made a recommendation on the issues, and four years after it was reported that an alleged Russian spy, Sergey Cherkasov, graduated from Trinity College Dublin while using a false Brazilian identity.
The targeting of Ireland by foreign intelligence services or extremists has put the Common Travel Area (CTA) between Ireland and the UK under scrutiny. Both states may need to move towards a more integrated model of border policing – such as that seen between the Benelux countries – if the freedoms of the much-valued CTA are to endure without any significant alteration.
The day-to-day custodianship of national security is not merely an operational matter. It must be a constant strategic priority for the Government. Only the highest office of the executive, the Department of the Taoiseach, can formulate the policies to ensure a multi-agency, long-term delivery of this most serious of sovereign obligations. Strategic direction, clear communication and urgency about national security is still badly lacking at the heart of the Government as Ireland assumes the EU presidency.
Dr Edward Burke is an assistant professor in the history of war since 1945 at University College Dublin
