The Garda Emergency Response Unit and armed detectives have been drafted in to provide security around a US navy vessel docked in Dublin for a week on a goodwill mission.
Armed ERU members were patrolling the waters of Alexander Basin at Dublin Port last night. The US command ship USS La Salle arrived in Dublin on Monday.
It sailed here from its home port of Gaeta, Italy, where it will return when its goodwill mission is complete. The crew hosted a visiting party from the Irish Naval Service yesterday, while an on-board reception was held last night for Irish military and defence officials.
The ship is commanded by Capt Herman Shelanski. He told The Irish Times his crew's mission here was not connected with the visit to Ireland next month of US President Bush.
"[Coming to Ireland] is the entire reason for the trip. There's no other thing that we're doing besides travelling from Gaeta directly here, and then we'll travel right back. It's our own goodwill visit to come up here and strengthen the ties of our nations."
He added that part of the mission here, as with other goodwill missions, was to afford foreign nations an opportunity to see an alternative side of the US military than that reported in the world media, including reports from Iraq.
"I think it makes a big difference to people, person to person, when they meet Americans they understand and they talk to them about what we are trying to do ... We want peace as much as anybody does. This war on terrorism is everyone's war."
