Mr. Eddie Mulligan:

We are 100% happy that members of the Reserve Defence Force are carrying out their ceremonial role effectively. However, clarity is required in respect of our crisis role. The Government has asked us to augment the Defence Forces in crisis situations but we need to be prepared for such situations. In particular, we are being cut out in the training necessity, or what a commander perceives would be a training necessity. The White Paper mentions aid to the civil power and aid to the civil authority tasks as an area where support could be given. However, there is no particular Reserve Defence Force syllabus for that area. To some extent, training for that role can really only be acquired by completing the job in hand. In that regard, there is a necessity for people to be operationally driving the training requirements of the Reserve.

On further training, chapter 8 of the White Paper states, "Notwithstanding the ability of the PDF to undertake day-to-day operations and to deal with a range of contingencies, there are circumstances where operational demands could exceed the capacity of the PDF." The document goes on to give as examples of such circumstances: "... a significant deterioration in the international security environment resulting in a conventional military attack on this State, a large scale security event at home, certain civil contingencies that could require large scale Defence Forces' support, e.g., a major pandemic, events that require a sustained effort over a prolonged period of time ..." The White Paper states that the Reserve Defence Force offers a cost-effective means of mitigating the risk of the Permanent Defence Force being unable to meet operational requirements.

Taking chapter 8 into account, together with the suggestion of particular response teams set out in chapter 3.3 in respect of the defence of the State from armed aggression, we must bear in mind that the generation of military capabilities can have significant lead-in times. If the definition of a crisis situation is nor sufficiently clear, it could lead to an implied view than an aggressor will effectively work to a timescale that is convenient to the Defence Forces. In reality, maintaining military capabilities for a worst-case scenario on an ongoing basis would be prohibitively expensive. This is where the Army Reserve and the Naval Service Reserve can provide an ability to transition immediately into an organised and capable insurgency force with established resources, skills, tactics and leadership, such as the command control we have at the moment. Under the current Reserve model, resources, skills and leadership instruction extend from national to local level and there is a capacity to transition quickly into a well-resourced, well-organised and well-dispersed local insurgency organisation under the single-force concept, which emphasises the importance of a local Reserve Defence Force as a bedrock element of defence policy. In order to realise that role, we must be prepared for it. However, the definition of the crisis element within the White Paper does not allow for that. It must be incorporated within the operational day-to-day implementation of the role.

In the case of the Naval Service Reserve, we are carrying out a role at the moment where there have been shortages of personnel within the Naval Service. Going by the definition in the White Paper, are we to take it there will never be such shortages of personnel into the future and, if so, what exactly would define a crisis? Will we have one commanding officer who will decide we are not in crisis through shortage of personnel, in which case Naval Service Reserve personnel will not be asked to support seagoing vessels, even though we could have a commander on a particular seagoing vessel who is seriously short of personnel during a particular trip? It is a question of who defines what constitutes a crisis. We have had situations where leading hands were given their own watch going forward.

Another issue to consider is that the Naval Service Reserve is currently performing an information-gathering function within the primary ports around the coast. In the Waterford unit of the Reserve, for instance, we go out and patrol weekly, carry out sighting reports and pass them, through a reporting mechanism, back through operations within the naval base. In other words, the Naval Service Reserve has de factobeen carrying out a port security role, albeit through a voluntary organisation, within the Waterford, Cork, Limerick and Dublin port areas. In the current economic climate, it does not make sense that, via the definition of "crisis", we may be effectively undermining the assets we have within the Naval Service Reserve when it comes to protecting our ports. Is the White Paper inadvertently undermining a vital voluntary asset for coastal information-gathering on behalf of the State? In short, we are worried the White Paper might undermine the deterrent function we are performing.