Dr. Scott Fitzsimmons:

With respect to PESCO, fairly new PESCO projects have been announced in the past while that directly touch on this issue. There are two undersea infrastructure PESCO projects; I encourage Ireland to at least take on observer status in these projects so we can see what is out there. It does not commit us to anything but since is a key aspect of our national defence, we should be aware of the technologies and capabilities we could adopt if we would like to increase our capacity in this area. With respect to the UK air defence agreement, it needs to be discussed much more openly in Ireland than it is. That is the biggest change I would like to see. Whether any changes occur over the next ten years or so, as I said earlier, I favour incrementalism. The most important thing that needs to happen is complete transparency. The people of Ireland and elected officials must know what they are agreeing to in order to make informed decisions. While this agreement is often referred to as a "secret" agreement, it is not. It is simply an agreement that is not talked about nearly as much as it should be.