Madam, – JA Barnwell (December 14th) asks: “Why has the announced American escalation in Afghanistan prompted virtually no response in ‘neutral’ Ireland? Bunreacht na hÉireann (Article 29) advocates the ‘pacific (ie non-military) settlement of international disputes’.” The number of armed US troops that have passed through Shannon airport so far in 2009 exceeds 230,000. That’s almost a battalion of troops each day. That amounts to about 23 times the size of the Irish Defence Forces, in direct breach of the Hague Convention on Neutrality.
The probable reason why there has been no response to this by the vast majority of the Irish people is that they either don’t care, or choose to ignore the fact that over one million people, including up to 250,000 children, have died in the unlawful and unjustified wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, with Irish Government complicity.
This issue is far more serious than the combined effects of the child abuse scandal, the political corruption scandals, the banking scandals and the economic crisis. – Yours, etc,