Over 250 foreign-born personnel joined the Defence Forces in the last five years

The Taoiseach, Micheál Martin, Minister for Foreign Affairs and Minister for Defence, Simon Coveney and the Defence Forces’ Chief of Staff Vice Admiral Mark Mellett DSM attending the Naval Service 75th anniversary in Cork on Saturday, 4th September 2021. Picture: Julien Behal

The country is becoming ever more reliant on foreign-born personnel joining the Defence Forces, with 264 signing up in the last five years.

Figures obtained by PDForra, the association which represents enlisted members of the military, show how multi-cultural the Defence Forces has become in such a short period.

For example, 226 personnel (207 male and 19 female) who joined up since 2016 were born in 18 countries in Europe.

They were born in the likes of Britain, France, Italy, Poland, Belgium, Ukraine, Austria, Germany, Serbia, Czech Republic, Latvia, Finland, Croatia, Romania, Hungary, Lithuania, Russia and Moldova.

Meanwhile, PDForra also got information from the military authorities about a further 38 who recently joined the Defence Forces, but who were born in non-European countries and the range is quite considerable.

They were born in Australia, South America, North America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East.

Many of those who have joined up in recent years moved to Ireland with their families.

Earlier this year the Defence Forces welcomed its first Rastafarian to its ranks.

Ansoumane Firkins, the first Rastafaria naval recruit. 

Ansoumane Firkins was born in the Czech Republic to parents who came from Guinea, West Africa. He entered the Naval Service.

He has been allowed to keep dreadlocks because this is part of the Rastafarian religion.

Ansoumane was part of a 25-strong Naval Service recruit class which passed out last April and included sailors born in Brazil, Latvia, Romania and Croatia.

It comes as the number of Irish born members quitting the Defence Forces continues unabated.

Several delegates at the recent PDForra annual conference in Killarney, Co Kerry spoke on the podium about how they are planning to leave the country's military shortly, even though they are nowhere near retirement age.

In 2016, a total of 690 people joined the Defence Forces, followed by 751 in 2017, 612 in 2018, 595 in 2019 and 533 last year.

By contrast, 679 left the Defence Forces in 2016, followed by 742 in 2017, 740 in 2018, 882 in 2019 and 636 in 2020.

Therefore despite major recruitment drives in recent years, there was a nett loss of 498 personnel over the period 2016 to 2020.

Concerns have also been raised that the fallout from the RTÉ 'Women of Honour' investigation - which detailed sexual abuse, bullying and harassment suffered by females at the hands of male superiors - will see fewer women joining.

As it was, recruitment of women into the Defence Forces was not increasing as planned by the military authorities.