Neutrality is not a shield

Tackling another assumption of (Irish) neutrality.

🎧 Available in audio

Hello again. This week I’d like to look at Irish neutrality again. I’m aware that this is becoming a bugbear of mine, but it’s also becoming more relevant as potential threats grow from all angles.

In short, this week I’ll be looking at the idea—which I think is a myth—that neutrality makes a country like Ireland safer. This is an argument that some people make explicitly and many more imply. It doesn’t hold much water. I’ll use some historical examples to show how misguided a notion it is, while describing what sort of stance can contribute to collective security. I’m a solutions guy, after all.

I’m going to ground this discussion in the idea of active neutrality vs. passive neutrality. You can think of it as “strong” or “weak” neutrality, but I appreciate that might be a bit too value-laden for some folks, and that’s okay.

The former is the idea espoused by countries like Switzerland and (until recently) Sweden and Finland. It can be summed up as:

I don’t want to be a part of your fight. Leave me alone, or you’ll regret it. I can punch back, you know.

The latter characterises countries like Ireland and Malta:

I don’t want to be a part of your fight, and I definitely don’t pose you any threat, so please leave me alone.

My baseline assumption is that Ireland is a “passive neutral” country. Yes, I know, neutrality is complex and yes, we are arguably not at all neutral, but let’s leave that aside for now. Assuming we were neutral, does this protect our country?

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Many people believe that “passive” neutrality protects us

The word “neutrality” means a lot of different things to a lot of different people (as I’ve discussed before).

For the purposes of this article, I’m talking about (and challenging) the anti-militarism strain of neutrality, which sometimes transmutes into the pacifist strain. Some principles of this ideology are:

• It’s wrong to take a life
• War is a bad thing
• The world in general devotes far too many resources to weapons and other instruments of war
• Governments are incentivised to spend scarce resources on weapons etc. because of undue influence wielded by the makers of said weapons and instruments of war (the military-industrial complex)
• The military-industrial complex has a vested interest in perpetuating war
• Wars are rarely (or, in the case of pacifists, never) justified
• If fewer resources went to militaries, then wars would be less likely
• If you spend money on defence, then you’ll inevitably get dragged into wars

Let’s get one thing straight: there’s an awful lot to like here. Apart from those last three, I’m in solid agreement.

The logic of these arguments is hard to deny. But the world doesn’t run on logic¹. If everyone followed the moral precepts which Jesus taught in the New Testament, then the world would be a much better place with no need for police, lawsuits, or customer service chatbots. But they don’t, so here we are.

The same applies to feelings on neutrality—but I’m getting ahead of myself. First, let’s look at who is actually saying what.

Ireland’s most popular political party, Sinn Féin, are avowedly pro-neutrality and even refer to it as a “strength,” both in parliamentary debates and in their public messaging:

Ireland’s recently inaugurated President Catherine Connolly is on record as opposing the military build of Germany and other EU countries in response to the Russo-Ukrainian War. Other parties of the opposition such as People Before Profit are vociferously pro-neutrality and anti military spending².

You might say I’m building a straw man here. Just because all these folks are for neutrality, does that mean they think neutrality makes us safer? I thought about this to make sure I was being fair. You either:

• Think passive neutrality makes your country safer, in which case, please read on for my respectful disagreement, or,
• You don’t think passive neutrality makes your country safer, but you’re still in favour of it. It’s one thing to put ideology ahead of your own self-interest, but to put it in front of the rest of your countrymen and women is beyond my comprehension.

Neutrality by itself never stopped a determined foe…

As I mentioned above, the hard facts don’t support the nice idea that neutrality protects. The most striking example of this was during the Second World War, where a stated policy of neutrality was no protection for the following European countries:

• Finland: invaded by the Soviet Union in 1939
• Norway: invaded by Germany in 1940
• Denmark: invaded by Germany in 1940³
• Estonia: invaded by the Soviet Union and then Germany
• Latvia: invaded by the Soviet Union and then Germany
• Lithuania: invaded by the Soviet Union and then Germany
• Iceland: invaded by the British in 1940
• Belgium: invaded by Germany in 1940
• The Netherlands: invaded by Germany in 1940
• Greece: invaded (unsuccessfully) by the Italians in 1940 and (successfully) by the Germans in 1941

The same tragic story played out a generation earlier for the Belgians during the First World War, and there are plenty of more recent examples too, such as:

• Cambodia (invaded by the North Vietnamese and bombed and invaded by the USA and South Vietnamese, the latter arguably leading to the growth of the murderous Khmer Rouge regime).
• Kuwait (invaded by Iraq in 1990).

The most obvious one, of course, is Ukraine today. You might argue (especially if you are a sceptic of the West) that Ukraine was flirting with NATO and the EU in the 2010s, therefore “provoking” Russia into invading.

Aside from the moral objection to this argument (it’s the most extreme form of victim-blaming I’ve ever seen), there’s a logical objection too. For all their links with NATO, Ukraine never joined, and so never got under the mutual defence umbrella. It was neutral, insofar as any country can be neutral in a world where there’s no war, only “special military operations.”⁴

Looking at that map above, there are a few countries which are right in way of all that fighting and yet remain stubbornly neutral throughout the war. What’s their secret? Let’s turn to that next.

…but neutrality and defence has deterred it

If you want to keep out of the fray, it helps if people will think twice before messing with you. Sweden invested heavily in its military in the lead-up to WW2 and could field 700,000 troops (including conscripts) by the end of the war. There was a bit of Realpolitik involved, which I’ve written about before in the Irish context. In Sweden’s case, their big and scary neighbour was Germany, so it made sense for them to play somewhat nice while still protecting their own people.

Switzerland is even more famously neutral. During WW1 they mobilised over 250,000 soldiers to protect their border. The front line between the French and German forces ran right up to this “Kilometre Zero” point which had clearly marked fortifications for the avoidance of doubt:

The scale of this mobilisation was dwarfed by Switzerland’s WW2 call-up, which saw 850,000 soldiers at its peak. As with Sweden, part of their neutrality involved trading in goods with belligerents, chiefly the Germans.

The Germans (and probably the Allies, eventually) had a plan for conquering Switzerland. But they never attempted to put it into force, despite having greater strength in numbers once they conquered France. Why?

The crucial point about armed neutrality is that it’s a deterrence strategy. You don’t need to match your potential opponent soldier-for-soldier or ship-for-ship. You just need enough for him to think twice about attacking because the stakes are higher.

A neutral country with un-bombed factories, intact railways, fat cows, ripe fields, and millions of able-bodied young men of fighting age is a wonderful prize for a belligerent. They might be in a war for their survival, and your neutral paradise can offer them the edge they need. What do they care if your factories and infrastructure get bombed, your farms and fields burned, and your men blown to bits?

However, if those young men are wearing uniforms and bearing arms then they might, in fact, slow down your attack. They might even hold you off for a while and force you to commit more brigades and divisions to the effort. And is it really worth it, knowing that they’re a people who will resist your entirely reasonable efforts to get them to join your cause?

A similar situation (and similar Realpolitik) applied in Ireland during WW2, which I’ve written about before. It decided to remain neutral and rapidly strengthened its defences to deter either side from invading.

In 1942 the Irish Army held an exercise with 20,000 troops of two divisions. I’ve always heard that it was the biggest exercise taking place in Europe that year. Whether or not this is true, you have to put it in the context that most other European armies were carrying out operations at the time, so not having a couple of divisions to spare for manoeuvres is understandable.

Take a look at the newsreel footage below (full video and link to archives here). Don’t they look like a jolly bunch! This is preferable to living under foreign occupation and being sent to fight wherever they want you.

I’m not arguing that Ireland’s military capabilities in WW2 were better than those of the Belgians or Dutch or Danes, and that’s why we were never invaded. After all, the country also had a huge advantage courtesy of its geography: out of the way and surrounded by water.

Plenty of smaller European countries were invaded by superior forces, and there are some who could never have held off the enemy even if every man, woman, and child had had a gun.

Active neutrality is no guarantee that you’ll be safe from potential enemies. But it’s better than the alternative.

Conclusion: A shield is the best shield

As I said near the top, I do appreciate the logic of “I won’t hurt you, so please don’t hurt me.” I’m sure many of my military comrades will roll their eyes when I say: I can see where you’re coming from.

I don’t fully buy it, though, and I don’t think history or contemporary experience supports it. As we’ve seen in recent days and weeks, the strong will do as they wish, while the weak will suffer as they must.

The United Nations is often cited as the supposed answer to this “might is right” chaos. But the veto which is enjoyed by the Permanent Five members of the Security Council means that decisions are becoming rarer and rarer.

Even if we assumed a United Nations that was working as intended, however, we still couldn’t stand down the world’s militaries. The only way that the UN can or could enforce its decisions is through the pooled military might of its constituent members.

Neutrality isn’t useless just because it isn’t a shield. There are plenty of reasons to be neutral, some of which are good. And abandoning neutrality is no guarantee of safety either. Just ask that country who sent troops to fight and die in support of their NATO allies in foreign adventures, only to now see those same allies threaten to take part of their territory.

If you want to be neutral, then you need to get up off your arse and do something about it. It’s not a passive choice, but rather an active one. It requires investment, commitment, and hard work to secure your territory, airspace, and seas against potential belligerents.

Neutrality isn’t a form of defence. Defence is a form of defence.

If you want to find out more about some of the material I’ve discussed here, and fancy a no holds barred analysis of Ireland’s defence posture (or lack thereof), then I highly recommend Thomas Theiner’s interview with John Mooney on The Dark State podcast last December.

Finally, if you want to read the rest of the Irish neutrality series, here are all the articles:

• Neutrality and Ireland (Part 1): The case in favour of Irish non-alignment.
• Neutrality and Ireland (Part 2): The case against Irish military non-alignment.
• Ireland and the Defence Industrial Complex: Can Ireland participate in defence tech and innovation while “staying neutral”?
• Three locks for the price of one: Explaining Ireland’s “triple lock” on defence.

Thanks for reading and please remember, if you haven’t already, to subscribe using the link below. Please also share this article with a friend and help me broaden my reach. Every little helps! See you next week.

Cover picture: Generated by ChatGPT. Prompt: “Can you show soldiers getting shot at by enemies, but they don’t have rifles to shoot back, only white flags which they’re trying to use to stop the bullets.“

1. Relevant exhibits: Liberation Day tariffs, North Korea’s Kim dynasty, the enduring popularity of reality TV (a problem I’m not immune to), as well as many aspects of organised religion. ↩︎
2. There are opposition parties that thread the line between neutrality and military spending. The Social Democrats and Labour both support additional spending but also advocate “neutrality” in the sense of supporting UN peacekeeping and the UN Security Council’s control of Irish troop deployments overseas. ↩︎
3. There was a communications SNAFU which meant that the Danish Army put up no resistance. Because of this failure, Denmark introduced a military directive in the 1950s that soldiers need to fight back, whether or not they have orders. This is incredibly relevant at the time of writing because of the USA-Denmark Greenland situation. ↩︎
4. This is not just a Russian trait. The US never declared war on Iraq (either time), Afghanistan, or even Vietnam. Declarations of war have become less common since the end of WW2, although they haven’t disappeared. ↩︎