Cormac O'Keeffe: Schism between Department of Defence and Defence Forces a huge challenge
This newspaper published a story online - “Ireland has one Department of Defence civil servant for every 23 soldiers” - based on the academic article written by Lieutenant (now Captain) Brian Clarke in the Defence Forces Review 2020 which sparked a furore along Department of Defence corridors. File picture.
For a serving officer in the Defence Forces, it did seem a risky article.
To have a go, as some might call it, at your parent department - the Department of Defence - in an official journal that can be accessed by the wider public was a bold military manoeuvre.
And the unavoidably political nature of his argument – essentially that operational control of the Defence Forces should be wrestled from the civil servants and put into the arms of soldiers - was bound to upset mommy and daddy.
Not only were they not tipped off that the incendiary paper was about to the published in the , but they first had to hear about it when it was reported online in this newspaper.
Thanks to Freedom of Information documents released to the recently, we know the furore that kicked off along Department of Defence corridors.
The saga reveals, not for the first time, the schism between the Department of Defence and the Defence Forces, but also the challenge facing wider Government in bridging this divide and, most likely, rebalancing power between the two defence arms of the State.
Shortly after 9.30am on December 3, 2020, this newspaper published a story online based on the academic article written by Lieutenant (now Captain) Brian Clarke in the Defence Forces Review 2020.
The headline told the story: “Ireland has one Department of Defence civil servant for every 23 soldiers”.
The story said that this ratio was more than seven times the ratio in Sweden and 10 times that of Finland, both countries that are neutral and non-aligned.
The paper said this reflected the “all-encompassing” role of the Department of Defence in Ireland in running the Defence Forces, in stark contrast to the structure of other neutral or non-aligned countries in Europe.
It said that if Ireland did not change the command structure of the Defence Forces, it would enter an uncertain global security environment with a “largely criticised” system of governance that is “far outside” standard international practice.
The analysis, written by Lt Brian Clarke, said comparisons with Sweden and Finland, both neutral and non-aligned, highlighted a different military set-up to Ireland.
He said the Department of Defence in Finland has 130 members of staff, 20 of whom have a military background, and that the Finnish Defence Forces boasts 33,000 full time members. He said this gives an employment ratio of one civil servant for every 254 full-time soldiers.
Sweden has around 140 civil servants in its Department of Defence and 22,700 full-time military personnel – giving a ratio of one civil servant for every 162 soldiers.
He said Ireland has 354 civil servants in the Department of Defence compared to the establishment figure of 9,500 professional soldiers, giving a ratio of one civil servant to 26 soldiers.
More recent figures on staffing levels show there are only 8,434 soldiers, giving a current ratio of one civil servant for every 23 soldiers.
Lt Clarke said the civilian command of the Defence Forces stems from uncertainty during the early days of independence and that the Department of Defence has developed “an even more involved role in military affairs” over recent decades.
“The governance structure in Ireland is restrictive of the military,” he said, saying that no officer in the Defence Forces had command over the entire organisation, even on behalf of the Minister for Defence or the Government.
He said the department has an “all-encompassing role” over the entire organisation and that the secretary-general of the department, “an unelected official, can now at times hold de facto command” of the Defence Forces.
Lt Clarke said that aspects of this “civilian-heavy” approach has been the subject of some criticism from retired members of the General Staff, military representative associations, academia and politicians.
He said retired generals had alleged that the department acted contrary to the best advice from military and international experts and demonstrated the inflexibility and “obsessive rigidity” of the Civil Service.
Citing reports in the , he said the working relationship between senior officers and civil servants has been described as “toxic”.
He said the Representative Association of Commissioned Officers (RACO) described the relationship between officers and the department as “divisive and dismissive”.
The Taoiseach's High level Implementation Plan, sold to @defenceforces personnel as the solution to the DF Retention Crisis, has been allowed to fail. Promises not delivered, locked out of pay talks by @IRLDeptPER and then force fed an 'Agreement' and expected to ballot on it? pic.twitter.com/OAEQM5JvQw
— RACO (@RACO_DF) February 13, 2021
He said a Workplace Climate Survey of the Defence Forces by the University of Limerick found “micromanagement” and increased involvement of the department in operational decisions that was an “increasing concern” for all ranks.
Lt Clarke said there were some “notable differences and similarities” in other defence forces that identify themselves as neutral or non-aligned militarily.
He said that generally speaking the international norm appears to centre command on the entire military vested in a military officer or officers, who are directly under the command of government.
“This differs greatly from Ireland’s model of command being directly from the Minister for Defence to military formations, circumventing the Defence Forces’ general staff in the process,” he said.
The review was edited by Lieutenant Commander Paul Hegarty and produced in academic collaboration with Dublin City University School of Law and Government.
The 280-page journal contained papers from 28 contributors, mainly academics and serving and former military people. It’s the kind of official academic analysis that is singularly lacking in Irish policing circles.
On that, it would be hard to imagine a serving garda having such a strong take on the Department of Justice. So, perhaps it wasn’t surprising that the Department of Defence blew a gasket, as revealed in the FOI documents.
Department claims of not being invited to the launch and not being consulted about the paper are strange given the open promotion of the publication on social media for some weeks beforehand.
On the morning the article appeared, the head of the Department of Defence communications Brigitta O’Doherty said she had a “serious issue” with the article and said to a colleague that the review had been “given to the ” but hadn’t crossed her desk.
Later, an examination by a department communication specialist and sent to various top people in the department, from secretary general Jacqui McCrum down, said: “A story published in today’s entitled “Ireland has one Department of Defence civil servant for every 23 soldiers” has been shared across social media with a large number of Twitter users commenting on the story.
"DefenceIreland was among the accounts to post links to the article, seeing 18 likes and 3 retweets. journalist Cianan Brennan also shared the post, prompting 5 replies, 22 likes and 11 retweets. IDFOC’s thread on the article accumulated more than 50 likes in total.”
Ireland has one Department of Defence civil servant for every 23 soldiershttps://t.co/DzUj4aHGF2
— Cianan Brennan (@ciananbrennan) December 3, 2020
It gives an analysis of social media traffic on the Defence Forces Review and on an article by Conor Gallagher in the , which after being published just an hour earlier, had already seen 5 retweets and 15 likes.
An email early the following morning from Ms McCrum to Chris Donoghue [press adviser] and Ms O’Doherty, said that in relation to the Defence Forces Review the Chief of Staff had asked Assistant Chief of Staff Adrian Ó Murchú to “launch an investigation, but I think that will be primarily into content”.
She added that “this is the operational risk come through to reality and I now need action to mitigate against something like this and the ARW article happening again”.
The department provided a briefing for the Government Press Office in relation to the paper, which said that the department had not been consulted about the article.
It added:
It said that a “superficial review” of other countries showed that the figures in the article were “substantially out of line” with actual numbers in terms of both civil and military personnel and that the comparisons made and conclusions drawn were “quite misleading”.
Assistant secretary-general at the Department of Defence, Ciarán Murphy, emailed the Review’s editor, Lt Cdr Paul Hegarty, asking if anyone “actually checks” the figures in the article and if a correction should be issued.
The following week, Lt Col Gavin Young, head of DF Public Relations, responded on behalf of Lt Cdr Hegarty. He said the review had gone through a strict peer-review process.
He said the editor rechecked the footnotes in the paper and cross-checked them against the sources provided.
“The numbers Lt Clarke has referenced based on his analysis and interpretation for his paper are correct,” Lt Col Young said.
He added that the DF Press Office “received no contact from Cormac O’Keeffe of the ” about the review and that there was no press release before the conference.
He said it had been highlighted on social media beforehand and that the review was on the DF website for around 36 hours before 3 December.
When the asked the Department of Defence had anyone in the department raised the issue with Chief of Staff Mark Mellett prior to his decision, a Department of Defence spokesperson said this was not the case.
The spokesperson added: “In addition it should be noted that the investigation was not ordered by either the Secretary General of the Department or the Minister.”
A statement from the Defence Forces said: “Assistant Chief of Staff is currently conducting a review and will report to the Chief of Staff on its completion.”
It is understood the review is in relation to corporate and academic governance and is expected to be finalised in the next few weeks.
Commandant Conor King, general secretary of RACO, the representative body for officers, said: “RACO was interested to discover that our Association was the subject of an investigation ordered by the Chief of Staff – the Association had not been advised of this.
“To answer your question regarding any concerns for our member Lt Clarke, RACO has none. The DF prides itself on being a learning organisation with a ‘just culture’.
"Indeed, he has actually been promoted to the rank of Captain in the period since the publication of the article, though this is entirely coincidental.”
Other sources confirmed the promotion but also said it was part of Capt. Clarke’s “normal career trajectory”.
From the outside the row doesn’t look good, a point taken up by long-time observers of Irish defence.
“The furore is emblematic of the problem, i.e. that there would appear to be a culture of mutual resentment and even suspicion between the two parts of the Defence Organization (DoD and DF),” said Professor Ben Tonra of the UCD School of Politics and International Relations.
“For reasons rooted in history, structure and organisational culture(s), the two elements have a proclivity to see in each other some species of antagonist, rather than partner. This does neither element any service and structurally weakens our defence infrastructure.”
Dr Edward Burke, Director of the Centre for Conflict, Security and Terrorism at University of Nottingham, defended Lt Clarke’s right to write such an article.
“The DF Review is not a restricted publication – and I think it would be a shame for it be so," he said. "It is a singular opportunity for members of the Defence Forces to offer informed, academically peer-reviewed analyses of the strategic and operational challenges facing their organisation and Irish defence in general."
"It would be more acceptable if it was about his own institution, such as a querying of military preparedness to respond to a specific threat or to conduct a certain type of operation. However, the article clearly shows frustrations on the part of the author that should not be ignored."
He added: "In that sense the DF Review is serving its purpose – this is a warning that the relationship between the department and the Defence Forces needs to be urgently addressed. Instead of shutting down criticism, criticism should be responded to and communication improved.”
Dr Burke said the Minster for Defence and senior officials needed to ensure that there were more opportunities for a direct and constructive dialogue with officers.
He said: "Department of Defence officials should also be given a fair hearing when it came to their distinctive role in drafting and administering defence policy."
The relationship between the Defence Forces and the Department should be an issue for the Commission on Defence Forces, which just recently started its work - but it is not clearly set out in its terms of reference.
But one of the terms does state: “The Commission will examine the structures in the Defence Forces as well as the work of the White Paper Command and Control project to date.
"In that context, the Commission will consider the most appropriate governance and effective high-level command and control structures in the Defence Forces”.
This certainly leaves it open to members and former members of the Defence Forces, as well as their representative bodies, and academics, to raise the power relationship with the Department.
That would leave the commission little option but to at least highlight the matter, if not address it head on.
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