Sir, - In reply to Joe Murray (July 24th), I would say that this is the type of attitude by governments over the years that has caused the Defence Forces to become so dilapidated and abused.
While no one doubts that hospitals need more money, the £250million in question was not a GAA-style handout but was raised through the sale of Defence Forces property and the streamlining of personnel. This should be a role model for many other State organisations (i.e.: RT╔ and the Civil Service).
The equipment being purchased will only help to equip the Defence Forces to the bare minimum that any first world military should expect, after far too many years of neglect.
Few can begrudge the Air Corps better search and rescue helicopters or the Army having armoured protection for its soldiers, especially in this time of difficult recruitment.
If we are going to have a military isn't it our duty to give our soldiers the best we can provide? The money shouldn't need to be conditional on European Rapid Reaction Force participation, they should have it anyway.
The No to Nice campaign manipulated the situation to make it seem like the only issue was our participation in the Rapid Reaction Force. This is nothing but a centralised crisis response organisation. The Defence Forces would use this to quickly move to a crisis area such as Kosovo or East Timor where it would be prepared to serve alongside nations who it would have trained with. Perhaps the No to Nice campaigners would rather live in a fantasy world where we didn't need a military or we could leave it in its poorly equipped state.
The Defence Force personnel do us all proud at home and abroad but it's about time we gave them the tools they need to survive in the future, Nice or not.
Ironically one of the biggest No to Nice militarisation campaigners was Sinn FΘin. Enough said! - Yours, etc.,
Rory Byrne, Portmarnock, Co Dublin