Irish troops to serve under EU flag

The Government is committed to allowing Irish troops to participate in a new EU rapid reaction force in three years' time, confident in the belief that recent developments in European security do not threaten neutrality and therefore do not require a referendum.

The Government will also participate fully in new EU institutions that begin operating this month to co-ordinate the EU's military and common foreign and security policy activities. Once again, the Government rejects arguments that participation in these bodies will require a referendum.

The new military force, agreed at the Helsinki summit in December, and this further development in European security has led to accusations that Ireland is moving into a European military alliance by stealth. The Government rejects the argument.

Firstly, it maintains, this is not a European army in the sense of being a standing force with headquarters and barracks. It is only a facility whereby troops from the EU member-states can be brought together under an EU flag for specific operations, and dispersed again once the particular operation is over.

Secondly, the operations in which it will become involved are those listed under the European Union's so-called Petersberg Tasks - humanitarian, search and rescue, peacekeeping and peace-making missions. Irish participation in these, the Government says, has already been approved in the referendum on the Amsterdam Treaty and therefore does not require further approval.

The Green Party, one of the main opponents of moves towards greater Irish involvement in European security co-operation, agrees that a referendum is not legally required. "That's what we said during the Amsterdam referendum campaign," according to Mr John Gormley TD of the Green Party. "We have agreed the Petersberg Tasks including peace-making, which amounts to making war. The Government can now agree to common defence without reference to the Irish people."

What they could not do, he says, is agree to merge the Western European Union with the European Union. This, he says, is because of the commitment in the WEU obliging all members to come to the defence of other members if they are attacked. Such a mutual defence commitment would amount to joining a military alliance, and therefore require a referendum.

The State is, however, steadily moving into central EU defence and security co-ordination. An Army officer will sit on the new EU interim military committee, which meets for the first time next week. The nucleus of an EU military staff is also being created within the European Council Secretariat, and an Irish officer will participate in this group as well. This group is intended to prepare early-warning reports and assessments of potential crises for the Council of Ministers.

Finally, an interim political and security committee begins operation this month, and a representative of the Department of Foreign Affairs will sit on it.

The Government insists that no referendum is necessary before Irish participation in these bodies. As with the rapid reaction force, these bodies are confined to dealing with Petersberg Tasks, and Irish involvement in such activity has already been approved by referendum on the Amsterdam Treaty.

What these moves point to is not common defence in the old sense of the word. The growing military co-operation is not designed to defend the EU against outside aggressors; what is emerging is EU military capacity to deal with crises outside EU borders. No mutual defence commitment would be required for participation in EU military activities for this purpose.

The plan for a rapid reaction force of up to 60,000 troops is part of the response to perceived threats of instability, particularly arising from unresolved nationalist questions to the east of the EU's present borders.

However, these are all developments being agreed at European level by EU member-states, the majority of whom are in NATO and therefore have no problem with common defence.

This week Fine Gael published a policy document calling on the Government to argue for a common EU defence, with a mutual defence commitment agreed as a protocol to a new treaty rather than being in the treaty itself. The effect of this would be to state the principle of common EU defence, but to allow Ireland to decide on a case by case basis whether to become involved in particular conflicts.

This move to greater EU defence co-ordination will have a price tag attached. Ireland will have to train troops for participation in an EU force and is likely also to have to fund the Irish military contribution to such forces. The fact that it will cost money was made clear last week by the Portuguese Defence Minister Castro Caldes, who said: "The build-up of the EU's future military capabilities will have an impact in our defence budgets as well as in our national public opinions."