Left hypocrisy on army’s role

I AM disgusted at the hypocrisy of the left (Labour, Greens and SF-IRA) regarding the maintenance of the triple-lock on the Irish army serving overseas.

The left doesn’t want our army to be sent abroad to help the innocent victims of natural disasters and despots without a UN mandate.

Big deal, except that this mandate must be given by the UN security council whose five permanent members have a veto including, by implication, a veto over our army.

In essence, the left want Bush, Blair, Jintao, Chirac and Putin to be the supreme joint commanders of our army.

The left’s policy is that if some future dictator is murdering thousands of people, then our army must sit idly by unless the UN authorises an intervention.

Just think about it. If just one of the UN Big Five, because of their own petty national self-interests, veto such authorisation, then the left is adamant that our army must stay at home twiddling their thumbs, polishing their boots, and closing their ears to the screams of the tortured and dying.

Is the left seriously arguing that unless we have a permission slip signed by Bush, Blair, Jintao, Chirac and Putin, then we can’t help stop genocide.

Is this how cheaply the left treat human life, that they are prepared to let it be snuffed out without a whimper because of a legal technicality?

The left are always scaring us with stories of a European superstate commanding our army in some future imperialist war of colonial aggression.

Yet the same people insist that our army must be under the command and control of the UN.

We joined the EU via referendum, but there was no referendum to join the UN. There are democratic elections to the EU, but there is none to the UN.

The EU requires that all member states be democratic and respect human rights. But there are no such standards for UN membership. We don’t need or want the left treating us like children, saying we can’t go outside unless nanny UN says so. Ireland is a sovereign country with the maturity and confidence to decide for itself whether its army should be sent abroad to protect freedom and human life.

Jason FitzHarris

Rivervalley

Swords

Co Dublin