September 11th in Manhattan rendered Irish neutrality finally redundant, at least for this long-time defender of that policy. Loyalty and duty require that we now support the United States. I believe there are several reasons why the situation is, political and military terms, different from anything in the past. But the primary reason we should support the Americans is that not to do so would be wrong.
Irish neutrality was never intended to be an opting out of moral responsibility. It was, rather, a somewhat vague but nevertheless sincere effort to retain our independence, the better to avoid involvement in conflicts into which we had no input and over which we had no control.
It was the practical articulation of Article 29.1 of the Irish Constitution, which states: "Ireland affirms its devotion to the ideal of peace and friendly co-operation amongst nations founded on international justice and morality."
Although beset by many contradictions, Irish neutrality was never a matter of pragmatism, cowardice or hypocrisy. The origins of the policy were undoubtedly pragmatic, but it endured during times when the restraining voice of Ireland was an important one against nuclear proliferation and increasing militarisation in the world. It represented, quite simply, a reservation of the Irish position pending the emergence of clarity about each or any situation.
In impeding conscription to organisations such as NATO and Partnership for Peace, neutrality stood for the very simple principle of not desiring to be committed in advance. It had to do with raising a voice of conscience, restraint or refusal, as opposed to meek acquiescence in whatever our more powerful allies decided.
As such, I believe it was an admirable and clear-sighted philosophy. Those who have defended it are among the most idealistic people in the country.
But the world after September 11th is utterly changed. The ferocity, cunning, callousness and inhumanity of the attacks surpassed anything we have seen.
Certainly, there are arguments to be had about American foreign policy, about the bombing of Iraq, about the effect of trade sanctions on innocent people. But while these debates are continuing, there can be no doubt about our duty: we must be on the side of those who were so grievously assaulted on September 11th.
There can be no moral trade-off on the basis of the relative inhumanity of atrocities. We cannot claim to be sincere in our professed concern for Iraqi children if we can recognise the utter barbarity of what occurred in the US and see that it cannot go unanswered.
The United States is morally entitled to respond to these attacks, in whatever way its leaders, having taken due counsel and after appropriate reflection, decide.
It is clear also, of course, that our interests, including our economic interests, reside in supporting the United States. We are part of the western world, and therefore part of what has been attacked. Our neutrality would mean nothing to those who carried out this outrage. They would destroy us without compunction. Unless we support the United States against this barbarism, we are not entitled to the protection we will surely need if these agents of evil are not dealt with for good.
We should, of course, argue for compliance with the established rules of military conflict, but no more than that. Fundamentally, our foreign policy has always been pragmatic. It was based, quite sensibly, as much on self-interest as on principled objection to gratuitous militarism. What was sometimes disquieting was the extent to which Irish politicians were prepared to pay lip-service to neutrality while in opposition, and in office sell it down the river. Even more worrying was that the sell-outs were invariably made not in the face of some pressing moral imperative but in the sole interests of nurturing economic and political bonds with other western nations.
Over the years, we have continued to elect political leaders who had either no understanding of Irish neutrality or no genuine commitment to it. As a result, we have entered into tacit understandings with the United States, Britain and other European nations which it would be wrong to renege on now.
Since we failed to call a halt to the sell-out, it is now, as well as being an inappropriate time to plead Irish neutrality, far too late for this to have any credibility.
There is no loss of face for those who have defended our neutral stance. In fact, the present situation raises, in this context, an opportunity for a truly moral and pragmatic arrangement between hawks and doves: the prospect of the closure of Sellafield on the grounds that it represents the most likely target for terrorists intent upon wreaking in these islands the kind of havoc they created in the US.
Irish neutrality is not the only thing beset by contradictions: western military alliances have long laboured under the contradiction that, while ostensibly seeking to limit nuclear proliferation, they were also promoting the spread of nuclear technology for civil purposes.
In the US on September 11th we witnessed the handiwork of terrorists who have mastered the judo-fighter's trick of using his opponents strengths against him. It does not take much to imagine what might happen if such logic were to be directed at Sellafield. The closure and dismantling of Sellafied is therefore now an urgent military imperative.