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THE DEPARTMENT OF Health has published the full governance structure of the National Public Health Emergency Team (NPHET) after concerns were raised around transparency and accountability.
NPHET, chaired by Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan, was convened at the end of January this year to coordinate the country’s response to Covid-19.
Members of that team are now front and centre, guiding the government in its actions and driving the public messaging around Covid-19.
Questions were raised last week by Labour leader Alan Kelly and Fianna Fáil leader Micheál Martin around NPHET’s transparency and accountability given its input into Government decisions around restrictions and public health measures.
Let’s take a look at who sits on NPHET and its various subgroups, and what each group’s function is.
NPHET
According to the Department of Health, NPHET for Covid-19 was established on 27 January.
It takes its lead from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and is tasked with overseeing and providing “expert advice, guidance, support and direction for the overall national response” on both a regional and national level.
There have been previous NPHETs established in Ireland in response to public health threats such as swine flu.
Membership, as previously reported by TheJournal.ie, comprises of representatives from across the health and social care service including the Department of Health (DOH), Health Service Executive (HSE), Health Protection Surveillance Centre (HPSC), Health Information and Quality Authority (HIQA) and Health Products Regulatory Authority (HPRA).
According to the Department of Health, NPHET’s Terms of Reference include overseeing and providing direction, directing the collection and analysis of required data, directing communications at local, regional and national level and evaluating the readiness of Ireland’s health service to manage Covid-19.
Evaluating the health service’s capacity is done with a view to standing NPHET down eventually. That decision will be made by Dr Holohan in consultation with other members.
NPHET currently meets twice per week and, according to the Department, actions, decisions and recommendations are made by consensus of all members.
In terms of communication and transparency, NPHET’s recommendations are sent by letter to Minister for Health Simon Harris and to the HSE CEO Paul Reid after each meeting.
It was raised earlier this week that NPHET’s meeting minutes had not been published since 11 April.
In response to concerns raised around transparency, Dr Holohan said earlier this week that the delay in publishing minutes was down to a “workload issue”.
According to the Department, NPHET’s Secretariat “work diligently to finalise the minutes of the meetings as quickly as possible after the meetings, bearing in mind the pace of the current pandemic public health crisis.”
Here’s a full list of who sits on NPHET:
EAG
In addition to NPHET, which currently has 32 members from across the health sector, there are a number of sub-groups working alongside it.
This includes the Expert Advisory Group (EAG) to NPHET, chaired by Dr Cillian de Gascun, director of the National Virus Reference Laboratory at UCD, who provides an update every Tuesday on lab testing numbers and capacity.
There are 27 members of the EAG, the function of which is to monitor and review evidence as well as “identify gaps, and update and provide clear, evidence-based expert advice on preparedness and response,” according to the Department.
There’s also the EAG Research Subgroup chaired by Professor Colm Bergin, Consultant Infectious Diseases, St. James’s Hospital and Professor of Medicine at Trinity College Dublin.
Comprised of 11 members, its role is to hone in on priority research topics, explore potential collaborative possibilities to advance Covid-19 research and to monitor and to monitor and track development at a European level.
Subgroups
Then there’s the Acute Hospital Preparedness Subgroup of NPHET, chaired by Tracey Conroy, Assistant Secretary, Acute Hospitals Policy Division at the Department of Health.
It was established on 3 March and its 12 members are tasked with oversight and ensuring the preparedness of the acute hospital system to deal with a significant increase in hospital admissions due to Covid-19.
Another subgroup of NPHET is the Behavioural Change Subgroup which was established on 18 March and is made up of nine members.
Chaired by Kate O’Flaherty, Head of Health and Wellbeing at the Department of Health, this group is charged with providing advice and researching population behaviours and drivers.
It advises the Communications Group on how best to communicate public health advice like washing hands, respiratory hygiene and social distancing.
Next up, the Guidance and Evidence Synthesis Subgroup of NPHET, chaired by Dr Máirín Ryan, Deputy Chief Executive and Director of Health Technology Assessment at HIQA.
This subgroup is made up of 18 members and its role is to report to NPHET on the public health and clinical guidance relating to Covid-19, currently in development and to be developed in Ireland.
Modelling Group
To an extent, there’s some crossover on who sits on which subgroup and the heads of each subgroup also sit on NPHET.
For instance, Professor Philip Nolan, president of the National University of Ireland in Maynooth, who also heads up the Irish Epidemiological Modelling Advisory Group.
This group comprises 25 members from across universities, HSE, Department of Health and HIQA.
This group’s function is to capture how Covid-19 has spread throughout the Irish population and to develop the capacity to enable real-time modelling of Covid-19 in Ireland which in turn will inform NPHET’s decision-making.
The group itself is made up of three subgroups; Epidemiology Modelling, Demand/Supply Modelling and Geospatial Mapping Modelling.
In addition to this Modelling Group, there a further five subgroups.
These include the Health Legislation Subgroup of NPHET (19 members), the Medicines Criticality Assessment Group (27 members), Medical Devices Criticality Assessment Group (13 members), Pandemic Ethics Advisory Group (9 members), Vulnerable People Subgroup (30 members), Health Sector Workforce Subgroup (20 members).
As can be seen, Ireland’s response to Covid-19 is a considerable, multidisciplinary operation.
As well as the above-mentioned groups there’s also the Special Cabinet Committee at Government, the Crisis Communications Group and the HSE National Crisis Management Team feeding into NPHET’s response and acting on its recommendations.
To see the full details of functions and membership of each Covid-19 group, click here.
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What can you say when your country’s defence minister is a teacher , butcher or college drop out.
@Lei tatt: I never understand that. Defence minister never worked in a military roll, minister for education never worked in an education roll, minister for health never worked in a healthcare roll, minister for justice never worked in law or in the guards. None of them have any experience in the positions they are in and often get moved around to different position then wonder why the healthcare, guards, army etc are in a terrible state
@John: The current minister for justice was a barrister. The current minister for finance has a first class honours degree in BESS and was a sales director for proctor and gamble. The current minister for health has a PhD in political science. She has also worked as a solicitor and barrister.
There are capable people in some of these roles. Some of these roles are beyond fixing, though. See the health system for details.
@John: in fairness, we’ve had several doctors as Ministers and even Taoiseach and that wasn’t exactly a rip-roaring success now was it ?
@honey badger: Jim O’Callaghan just came out and said that shoplifters and drug users should no longer be prosecuted instead of building more prisons. BESS in Trinity is a degree that force-feeds Keynesian economics into its graduates, and Pascal Donoghue is no different in this regard. His fiscal policies have overseen an increase in the national debt every year and increased in the size of the government budget every year also. Jennifer Carroll MacNeill has no proper experience in the private sector and cannot be expected to run the HSE efficiently. She’s a career politician and has presented no sort of visions whatsoever on how to cut the red tape and shrink the size of the HSE and its budget, which has doubled since 2015. Problems aren’t solved because there is no appetite to do it.
@John: answers the question why irish government is so incompetent. They simply keep appointing same people to the different roles every 4 year to keep them all on ona gravy train. Nobody cares about the competence its all job for the boys.
@Lei tatt: They can only appoint ministers from the pool of elected TDs. If your complaint is that there are not enough experts becoming TDs, then maybe being a TD isn’t quite the gravy train that many on here would have you believe.
@Lei tatt: the US head of Defence is a news anchor, so I don’t think that’s necessarily the end all. It’s a civilian type of role.
@John: because they’re all conmen just wanting to extract extortionate amounts of taxpayers money for doing absolutely nothing right
@William Jennings: They are using the new prison to house asylum seekers we clearly shouldn’t have taken in!!
@honey badger: I never mentioned the minister of finance and never said current I’m talking about in general, Donnelly, McEntee and multiple other ministers had absolutely no previous experience in the roll they were in and then we wonder why the various departments are in tatters. Everything can be fixed with the right people with determination in place. It’s a rear thing these days though
@John Moylan: nope it wasn’t because they weren’t working where their experience is. Doctors should stick with healthcare
@Lei tatt: yep 100% agree
The enemy in Ireland is within. Politicians who make decisions based solely on what’s best for them instead of what’s best for the Irish people is the ongoing issue, not an imaginary invading Army.
@Dog Tired: Nail on the head
@Dog Tired: yawn
It seems bizarre to go to the USA for advice when they operate on a vastly different scale.
Any of the Nordic countries or France would seem a more obvious choice.
@Thomas Sheridan: don’t be talking sense now Thomas, you should know that government never do anything that actually makes sense.
@Thomas Sheridan: This has everything to do with the US arms industry making millions and nothing to do with sense, unfortunately.
@Thomas Sheridan:
Not very safe hiring anyone from the U.S whle Dumpty is in charge.
@Thomas Sheridan: Mending fences?
@Thomas Sheridan: More than correct. Big notions from Trumpland won’t work here.
@Thomas Sheridan: because it will cost millions and millions to play with the USA where we would have got the same education from one of said countries for less than half the millions the Irish government is about to waste yet again
@Thomas Sheridan: It would be wrong to go against the USA. If you disagree, please leave.
@Thomas Sheridan: or our friends to the east , surprisingly our armed forces already work closely and collaboratively . Yes we have a shared history much of it fraught and not benign but we are neighbours and now friends .
@Thomas Sheridan: in time, you will see NATO(US Navy and Air Force bases)on your West coast to contain Russia’s encroachments.
Spend it on housing building programs to help those who do an honest daily work.
@Niall Whelan: more money for housing won’t work money is not the issue. Shortage of workers is the biggest problem
@finbarr walsh: actually, shortage of workers is not what’s impeding house. Over-regulation, Planning, non-construction and land costs are.
@finbarr walsh: rubbish, building personnel are highly mobile ,and follow well paid jobs.
We had battalions of immigrant builders for the Celtic tiger bonanza.
Market rigging, from finance, site development, phased planning , and political kowtowing to lobbyists is the cause of scarcity ,not workers.
This is the American army that has never won a war on its own .
@Oweke 68: that also know very little about defence only attack. America are always attacking other countries and don’t have to worry about any country attacking American soil. Ireland is the complete opposite, we’ve no interest in attacking another country but want to strengthen our defence so makes no sense in asking American agencies for advice, they have a totally different mindset.
@John: the US is next to impossible to attack.
@Oweke 68: didn’t they beat the Brits in the war of Independence in 1783?
@Oweke 68: Who would you prefer, Hama
@Oweke 68: They basically defeated the Imperial Japanese Armed Forces on their own by island hopping across the Pacific without any help from anyone.
@Joe Willis: really? World trade centre comes to mind! Also because of how many nukes they have no country in their right mind would attack them. Suggesting we get a load of nukes?
@John: Plus, no doubt this US advisory agency will no doubt recommend a large volume of military toys from the US military industrial complex that will be destroyed on Day 1 of any impending attack on us anyway! This is a bad idea on every level. Using the template of a similar “non-offensive” country with similar physical boundaries the way to go. Not being advised by an agency with the vested interests of an aggressive superpower at the core of its interests.
We could mobilise the west Cork fishermen to keep the Russian Navy at bay.
@Willie Marty:
♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ ﾟ.And the boys who bet the Russian Foe were the fishermen of County Cork.♫⋆｡♪ ₊˚♬ ﾟ.
@Dan Murphy: gwan Christy
@Willie Marty: That’s about the best you can do now, not meant facetiously. You must appreciate the need to contain Russia, and the West needs you to step up and do your bit.
Why go with a Pentagon related agency? The US military has lost more wars than it has won since WW2 and doesn’t exactly have a great track record of intelligence analysis from the Bay of Pigs to yellowcake uranium.
Why not talk to countries like Sweden and Finland from whom we could learn a huge amount?
@Brendan Murphy: and they mightn’t even let us in with the bowl of shamrock.
This is long overdue but the right decision was made to start the process of catching up with Europe. Nobody is obligated to protect Ireland but Ireland. It’s an embarrassment to think otherwise, while depending on favours upon bigger countries.
We also need to increase GDP spending in line with Europe and discuss why countries are in NATO. It is to protect Europe which we are part of , I’m sure some of those countries would prefer not to be in it as well ! But they join anyway to defend themselves and others. We are not the country from a 100 years ago so the excuses / reasons don’t apply anymore.
@Niamh King: Protect Ireland from who?
@Rochelle Hart: it’s like the cold war again, gravy train of taxpayers money for big defense contractors lobbyists.
@Rochelle Hart: You never know who but you do need to be ready just incase. I mean we don’t even control our own air space.
@Dere: Roman maxim: “Those who desire peace, should prepare for war”.
@Rochelle Hart: another clueless lefty
@Rochelle Hart: if it wasn’t for NATO protecting democracy, then any stronger military country could potentially cause trouble. I’m sure Russia or China wouldn’t have a problem with a nice landing zone in the EU… the point is why don’t people think for a moment what if there was no NATO or if all countries had the attitude of just looking in their back garden.
We wouldn’t even be allowed an opinion to post any arguments for and against defence, similar to said countries listed above.
My question is, why do we need this .
Is Ireland not Neutral anymore
@New Boy: My question is: when were we neutral? It’s not in our constitution. We haven’t the ability to enforce our neutrality. We are non-aligned. We are defenceless. We are great at words.
@New Boy: even if we are neutral we still need to be able to defend ourselves to some degree if ever attacked.
@New Boy: The Swiss are neutral. They spend three or four times the amount on defence compared to Ireland and they don’t need or have a navy. Ireland don’t need to go mad but they need more boats patrolling, better air defence and to pay the defence forces in total a FAR better wage. They are treated terribly.
@Sean Finnegan: Just going to make the same point.
As an illustration Ireland is ranked 97th out of 144 on the Global Firepower Index.
Switzerland is 45th.
Just because you are ‘neutral’ doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have a plan.
@Stanley Marsh: Aint a ‘bad guy’ in the world gonna mess with the Swiss… there are many forms of defence.
@Stanley Marsh: The Swiss have a huge network of underground bunkers, to shelter the population in case of nuclear attack.
Imagine our government attempting to create even one underground bunker, keeping the debacle of the children’s hospital in mind.
@New Boy: nobody is neutral anymore. Neutral means vulnerable.
Maybe start with hiring and paying a decent wage to navy staff so the ships that are sitting up not being used can be put to use. Start with the basics. If you don’t have the staff nothing else is of any use. Bad idea too getting advice from a war hungry government agency.
Is this the same Pentagon that sent three highly dangerous Osprey military aircraft to fly over Dublin city in August 2023. Aircraft that fell out of the sky so often they had to be completely withdrawn from service. To this day, Micheál Martin still refuses to answer questions about how he allowed such dangerous aircraft to fly over Dublin.
‘grounded in American values’, God help us.
@Kieron King: Yup. ‘American values’ = lead in the drinking water
@Kieron King: Would you prefer Hamas values?
Why do we want “American values and approaches”?
@Nick Vasilakis: The garda are wearing baseball hats , says it all really.
@Nick Vasilakis: No offence, but by your name I suspect you’re eastern European, Greek or Dutch South African? Western Europe, but especially England and Ireland have specially strong historic ties with America (values and approaches) that has translated through adopted and adapted culture that flows strongly west to east. Your question comes perhaps 70 years too late.
@did you every wonder: In the words of Alan Partridge “They’ve rebadged them”.
@Nick Vasilakis: Why should Irish people be dictated to foreigners like you who act entitled? America has done more for us than your country no doubt.
@Nick Vasilakis: what are Irish values these days? Renal and delusion come to mind.
This is ridiculous, how much further are we going to go to appease Trump, and for M. Martin to get to the White House for St. Patrick’s Day. Is the Irish Defence Forces just going to become a Remote European Based Regiment of the American Defence Forces. If a Pentagon based Group is going to be responsible for the Modernisation, what checks and balances will be put in place to oversee their Recommendations and operation as you can bet they will have full access to our Forces Training, Planning and Capabilities, when completed, and probably most of the New Equipment they will be using will be Purchased from U.S owned Companies.
@Owen Mc: love to know how much this consultation is going to cost the Irish tax payer, probably millions
@John: I’m happy to contribute to defence given their far superior nature of the leaders east and west
@Owen Mc: Who would you prefer to appease? Hamas? Ukraine who do nothing for us except offload their problems?
Asking the fox to mind the chickens.
And how many years will that take. It should get Mr.Trump on board though….my advice still stands..do not join up.Maybe they will talk to the men whose lives were damaged to find out what is wrong with the Air Corps and not be bluffed by officers self serving viewpoints.
The consultation will cost more than 600m to be spent if history is anything to go by with our current leaders.
American advice. Step 1: Invade Middle Eastern country with loads of oil. Step 2: Give Billions of contracts in said country to your mates. Step 3: Give Israel whatever they want. Step 4: Eventually retreat with your tail between your legs, hundreds of thousands dead but your mates are obscenely rich now. Step 5: Repeat Step 1 in about 5-7 years
@FoxyBoiiYT: Think you need to shut your mouth. The news today showed ordinary Palestinians rejoicing to see the bodies of those Bibas children.
@Beachvibe: How many Palestinian children murdered by the Zionists? Bet you simply don’t care
In all fairness we would need to spend hundreds of billions to bring our army to a point where they probably could defend the country. Considering all our more pressing issues, and how unlikely it is that anyone would ever attack us, is it worth it??
Buy all the latest military products you want. If you don’t pay the staff to utilise these military products real living wages these new pieces of equipment will be tied at a port or in an aircraft hanger or on the parade ground. Is the political establishment parties trying to remove neutrality
This is a good decision.
Even if I’d rather have seen us use China given their far superior growth in technological advancement.
Why do we need €600,000,000 worth of armoured vehicles.
The answer; we don’t!
This is all part of the headlong rush to demolish our prized neutral and non-combatant status. We should never the open to Ireland participating in foreign wars and aggression.
We need to scrap the military in its entirety and replace it with an armed aid to the civil power. Much more fit for purpose.
We’re being coached by a US body that has “American values and approaches” , who authorised this hijack by the US? Dig a bit deeper into this organisation upstream, dont tell me intelligence services dont scrape all the knowledge gained. Nothing should be shared with these guys , someone here is compromising our national security. Should be a pause and an inquiry.
@Mr “JonnieBoy” Johnson: Because we are and should be more like the US than your buddies in Palestine.
I wonder when the Arms lobbies looked at their map and thought ‘you know Ireland could be a good place to make a bit of money’? Maybe in the crash, maybe earlier… but we’ve been a target for a while I would think
If it is “pentagon-based” then it is not an agency, it is the US military itself.
I think someone drastically misunderstood something, or the firm drastically misrepresented itself.
I have no issue with seeking advice from an expert group. The simple truth is that the military needs assistance. Regarding the hardware, someone mentioned that we would purchase it from the Americans; however, the story indicates that we are currently negotiating with a French firm for €600 million worth of equipment. As for the ships we might need, they will likely be built in Europe or Asia. I assume that the helicopters will be of French or British origin, while if we decide to acquire jets, they will probably be the Eurofighter or similar aircraft of European construction. Although much of this is speculation, it seems logical. Historically, we haven’t purchased much hardware from American companies; even our handheld weapons are primarily of European origin.
All part of the Nato lobby push on willing FFG to make the preferred USA defence companies rich selling us what we dont need wonder why!!
Since we’re not at war, we should first of all see that our people are housed properly, not in bed sits, flats, or rented from wealthy landowners. The politicians in all parties have the highest number of landlords in Ireland
House the people first before you spend money on an army we don’t need as we beat the British Empire with just rifled and courage.
@Bat Collins: maybe our government should declare war on the housing and hospital debacles instead of looking to pick fights with Russia and Israel . I am no fan of either of them but to listen to some in Ireland you think our neutrality was hindering world peace .
@Bat Collins: Who are we ‘housing’? It’s an infinite list it seems? Transport affects more people, Healthcare too, if we’re reducing ourselves to one problem at a time we’ll be forever waiting. Tho I suppose we already are
@Bat Collins: The gov spent 1 billion euro on asylum seekers last year. Irish citizens were never a priority
Call a spade a spade. The US are offering defence advice, being all nice and making doe eyes at us, everything it can do to butter (lube) us up. And their only sole objective…..Keep Shannon open to their military aircraft. Because we would never accuse them of bringing weapons through our country, and we trust them 101% and would never ever embarrass them by actually wanting to check their cargo
@Nigel McAtamney: Excuse me? We owe the US more than they owe us. I don’t want to even hear the like of you barking. Another Hamas Palestine sympathizer no doubt.
The Pentagon can teach us how to meddle in countries we should’ve stayed the hell out of . How to make them worse than they were before we went in .
@Alan Brennan: And yet Ireland has been meddling. Giving 50 million euro to fund the Ukraine war. And protesting on the side of Palestinians who cheered when the bodies of those two Israeli children were revealed. Some things never change
We are a NATO protectorate, we have the security of a nato state without the responsibilities. We maintain a po faced air of superioty about our “neutrality “whilst hiding behind others. Neutrality is a cowards charter. It’s not a badge of honour its a badge of shame.
@Declan Young: Go live in Britain then, our only historic enemy and also a founding member of NATO – considering you seem to love it so much!
@Áine F: but it’s ok to ask other Europeans to die protecting us!!!
@Áine F: halfwit
@Declan Young: I would only denouce neutrality if we side with the US our closest ally. Not with Hamas, Palestinans or Ukraine which is probably what you want.
How many billion did the pentagon waste in the nato fake orchestrated Ukraine war that killed hundreds of thousands now we see why neutral minded Sinn Fein were damaged by the controlled and bought media before the election
… Look outta your windows, watch the skies
Read all the instructions with bright blue eyes
We’re W.A.S.P.’s, yeah, proud American sons
We know how to clean our teeth
And how to strip down a gun
… ‘Cause we’re the 51st state of America
Yeah, we’re the 51st state of America
This is the 51st state of America
Matt Johnston, The The.
@P0h2YVAL: 53rd. after Canada and Greenland!
Sleeveen & Traitor Martin pushing to join NATO. We owe 240, 000,000,000, Euro to lenders thanks to his Party F/F. We as a Country can not afford this Warmongering expenditure on toys for the boys. Health services in crisis, Housing and rent unaffordable, migration madness, and he wants to spend Billions on War Toys.
We will probably buy some other country’s out of date rubbish, we don’t need defence, we are a strategic location so when the time comes nato or the good old americans or Britain would defend it for themselves..with the amount of American troops in shannon at any given time and the Russian and American subs off the coast u can be sure the Chinese are there but none of the others can find them..so that’s more than enough!! Keep them Americans away or this 600 million will be 6 billion in 2 years!!! Our only threat are already here!! The government!
I would totally agree with remodeling our defence forces but not along a USA model. Most of us do not want trigger happy morons whose only idea of defence is attack!
@Padraig O’Brien: The Best defence is attack. How quickly you forget WW2.
@Keth 417: And how easily you parrot the Kremlin, who were “forced” to invade Ukraine using that same logic
@Padraig O’Brien: Ireland took sides with Arab nations and Ukraine. The activists on our streets and the government already endangered us
@Jason Memail: My point was limited entirely to the U.S forces quite literally rescuing Europe from the Nazis. And later, through the cold war, from the communists. Re: Communists, it would seem they have now evolved into the looney left movement/woke movement, especially the posh ones here and abroad who’d be the first up against the wall, should the commies ever come to power.
We should be using European contractors. America is a lapdog of Russia now. Not Allies anymore.
An Army of Officers. Wonder why the Israelis called them, The Johnny Walker Brigade.
Why invest more money in armor vehicles? Ukraine has shown that drone warfare has taken over
Even though it’s far easier to buy missiles and gunships than build houses, we would be gone in the first 24 hours, conventional war or not. This talk of arming ourselves….it’s another example of obeying the current panic within the EU to arm up. Also….if we can’t get enough house builders, where we get the (boy…& girl) soldiers? The cost of a standing army is expensive, just ask William tbe conquerer while waiting for the wind to change.
Did anyone ask the Donald Duck?
Yeah…let’s bring a knife to a gun fight. …not like we’re short of knives.
This should have happened a lot time ago. If we want to become one of the best, we have to learn from the best. Ireland currently spends 0.3% of GDP on defence, which is embarrassingly low. We’ve an air force with no fighter jets, a navy that can’t patrol its own waters and an army smaller than many police forces. For a start, the government has to take that necessary leap and start spending at least 2% of GDP on our national defence. Nothing is more irresponsible than a nation refusing to defend itself while relying on the goodwill of others. It’s time for us to join NATO as well. Irish politicians love to talk about “neutrality,” as if simply declaring neutrality will make enemies respect it. Ireland already benefits from NATO’s protection without contributing. That’s called freeloading.
All the neutrality dreamers are out in force once again, would be more in their line to understand what neutrality actually means.
Irish defence forces aka “Baldonnel flying club”
Know everything already! :) Don’t think they’ll appreciate listening to all their shortcomings
Whats with our much vaunted and highly paid public servants that they need consultants to advise on almost everything. Is it lack of expertise or just avoiding responsibility? In this case, why cannot our braided Air,Marine LandDefence chiefs be brought together to design a system to effectively protect our state.
The deficiencies are obvious to everyone, including the top brass and defence Ministers, so just take responsibility, get moving or get out.
Pull your weight and join NATO.
With Russian submarines off your western shores and overflights at a whim, it’s time.
Are we going in to regime changes now, that’s all the pentagon does
Would someone remove that repetitive nonsense post Beachvibe has at the end of every thread.?
No one will mess with us
have your say