What’s the normie, middle of the road, Irish view on our neutrality, and the war in Ukraine? In a single word, the answer appears to be: Confused.
The first two poll results here – carried out by Red C for yesterday’s Sunday Business Post – seem to suggest a clear cut almost majority view in favour of abandoning neutrality and helping out the poor Ukrainians.
But just you wait for the third question, and the results of that one. Hoo boy.
POLL
Red C / Sunday Business Post
Q. “Ireland should join the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) to boost its security.”
Agree: 48%
Disagree: 39%
Unsure: 15%March 2022
— Ireland Votes | #Vote2024 (@Ireland_Votes) March 26, 2022
POLL
Red C / Sunday Business Post
Q. “Ireland should send weapons, such as anti-tank weapons, to the Ukrainian government.”
Disagree: 48%
Agree: 39%
Unsure: 13%March 2022
— Ireland Votes | #Vote2024 (@Ireland_Votes) March 26, 2022
POLL
Red C / Sunday Business Post
Q. “Ireland should drop its policy of neutrality.”
Disagree: 57%
Agree: 30%
Unsure: 14%March 2022
— Ireland Votes | #Vote2024 (@Ireland_Votes) March 26, 2022
Ask people directly if they want to join NATO, and 48% agree. Ask them if they want to send arms, and… 48% agree.
But ask them if they want to just come clean and abandon neutrality, and have done with it, and you find that…. 30% agree. Almost one in five Irish people, then, or the 18% who do want to join NATO but do not want to abandon neutrality, seem to have a very flexible definition of the word “neutral”.
None of this should be that surprising, in truth. The first two questions, though ostensibly about neutrality, aren’t really about neutrality. They’re really questions about the Ukrainian war: Do we stand with Ukraine? Sure, we do. Send them guns. Join with NATO, who are Ukraine’s best friends. That’s the side we’re on in the current conflict.
But a broader abandonment of neutrality? Eh, hold your horses.
What’s happening here in other words is pretty clear: Irish neutrality is, and will always be, a practical stance, not an ideological one. We are not, as a country, committed to just letting everybody else fight it out and sitting on the side-lines ourselves. In fact, the national disposition about Ukraine has been anything but neutral: Both the Government, and the people, are resolutely anti-Russian in the context of this war. We have joined every sanction on Russia, for example – sanctions that the Russians claim are part of an “economic war” on the Russian Federation. If they’re right about that, then Ireland is definitely a belligerent. And we’re all fine with that.
The notable difference is that while we might wish to align with NATO in this specific incident, people are much more squeamish about a broader, more permanent, alignment. For example, in 2003, Danish troops joined the Americans in Iraq, as did the Poles, and many other small countries. It’s fair to say Irish people would have been much less enthusiastic about NATO membership had it meant being asked to send a battalion or two to “liberate” the middle east.
Which is why perhaps “neutrality” isn’t the word we should be using at all about our national posture. When it comes down to it, Ireland is not neutral, and doesn’t really ever express a desire to be: We are, pretty consistently, ideologically anti-war, and diplomatically non-aligned. We want the choice to “opt out” rather than to have our foreign policy committed to an alliance. We’re a non-aligned country, not a neutral one.
That makes sense, in the context of Ireland still being a very young country, only just over a century old, and more sense again in the context of our political past. For several centuries, Irishmen fought and died in the wars of others around the world, in the armies of the United Kingdom, and of various European powers opposed to the United Kingdom. The idea of fighting alongside the English and being called to their wars rankles people particularly. We’re very eager to preserve that, hard-fought, element of our independence.
But it also seems clear from these polls, at least, that Irish people don’t especially want a dogmatic neutrality that prevents us from helping those who we deem worthy. The fact that almost 50% of Irish people are in favour of sending weapons to Ukraine is significant: It shows that they consider the country not neutral, in the restrictive sense, but neutral only in that it is free to aid who it chooses.
The real debate in Ireland then is not between “neutrality” on the one hand and “NATO” on the other: it is about what the word “neutrality” means. For the hardcore nationalist or left winger, the definition is very literal: No help to anybody, ever, and no fighting in other countries wars, ever. For the more moderate, liberal, internationalist types, neutrality just means “flexibility” – the choice to do what we want, when we want, on our own terms.
In that argument, people are relatively evenly divided. But when you go down the road of asking people to abandon neutrality altogether, they become much more attached to it.
Anyway, if this all hurts your head, don’t worry. This issue will last for as long as the war in Ukraine does, and then we will forget all about it, rather than resolve this particularly thorny issue. We’ll worry about it again the next time there’s a war. Why take a decision today, when a few platitudes will get you through, after all?