🇮🇪Ireland is considering asking larger EU nations for security assistance during its forthcoming EU presidency, including sending a warship to Dublin for air defence. irishtimes.com/ireland/2025/…

Not true Rob. I set up Commission on future of the DF because I knew we needed a dramatic increase in funding & capacity, something I’d been asking for for years. Perhaps now we need to go further but that Commission Report is template for increases in Defence Budgets & Capacity

🇮🇪Ireland is considering asking larger EU nations for security assistance during its forthcoming EU presidency, including sending a warship to Dublin for air defence. irishtimes.com/ireland/2025/…

For a country that is neutral and militarily non-aligned, we seem to be asking for a lot of military support from the allies we say that we don't need.

I understand the frustration within our DF, of course I do. But now is also a time to reach out internationally for partnership on core defence interests, while planning for a significant increase in our own capacity over time.

108th Anniversary of the Bolshevik-led October Revolution: 25 achievements of the Soviet Union - Rapidly industrialized from an agrarian society to the world's second-largest economy via Five-Year Plans. - Electrified rural Russia through the GOELRO plan, powering industrial growth. - Expanded the Trans-Siberian Railway to over 9,000 km, connecting the vast empire. - Rebuilt post-WWII economy faster than any nation, despite losing 27 million lives. - Eradicated famine through collectivized agriculture, feeding a population of 290 million. - Provided economic aid to over 100 developing nations, building infrastructure worldwide. - Launched Sputnik 1, the world's first artificial satellite, kickstarting the space age in 1957. - Sent Yuri Gagarin as the first human into space on Vostok 1 in 1961, orbiting Earth. - Achieved the first woman in space with Valentina Tereshkova's solo flight in 1963. - Turned the tide of WWII by defeating Nazi forces at the Battle of Stalingrad in 1943, pivotal to Allied victory. - Boosted literacy from under 30% to near 100% through universal free education. - Provided free universal healthcare, eliminating major epidemics and extending life expectancy. - Offered free higher education, graduating millions of scientists and engineers annually. - Granted women full suffrage in 1917 and integrated them into the workforce at unprecedented rates. - Built the world's largest standing army, ensuring security during the Cold War. - Constructed the first nuclear power plant in Obninsk in 1954, advancing peaceful atomic energy. - Became a founding member of the UN and permanent Security Council seat in 1945. - Pioneered jet aviation with the MiG-15, dominating early Cold War skies. - Dominated Olympic medal counts, especially in gymnastics, weightlifting, and wrestling from 1952-1988. - Fostered world-class ballet and symphonies, with Bolshoi Theater as a global icon. Previously, ballet and music were only available to the elite of society. - Developed early computers like the MESM in 1950, foundational to Soviet tech. - Advanced theoretical physics, with contributions to quantum mechanics by Landau and others. - Implemented strong workers' rights, including union veto power over firings. - Achieved gender parity in STEM fields, with women comprising 50%+ of scientists. - Pioneered space stations with Salyut 1 in 1971, precursor to the ISS.

The WSJ’s news pages are extremely good, but its op ed section has been populated by headbangers for years and no one should pay a blind bit of notice to it.

Another Ireland-hostile opinion piece in the The Wall Street Journal, the paper of record of corporate America. Free-riding needs to end. Leadership in Dublin is needed urgently.