Thirty years ago, Air India Flight 182 was destroyed at 31,000ft off the West coast of Ireland by a bomb that had been smuggled on board before it left Montreal hours earlier.
All 22 crew and 307 passengers were killed and while 132 bodies were recovered; 197 were lost at sea. In the days afterwards, a young Irish Naval Service officer searched for the aircraft’s black box.
That same officer, Mark Mellett from Castlebar, is now a vice admiral – the State's first. The rank was established after Mellett's appointment in September to chief of staff of the Defence Forces – the first time a naval officer has held the role.
“We don’t know what’s around the corner, what challenges might face us,” he said in his first full interview, conducted shortly before Friday’s attacks in Paris.
“We are an instrument of government to respond to its priorities,” he says. “The biggest challenge is to ensure our force is ready, is usable and adaptable for the unknown unknown.”
Globalisation has redefined the concept of “national security” which has, he says, become increasingly complex, requiring a different type of military, ready for different types of work.
In short, Ireland needs soldiers, sailor and air crew who can act as “warrior-diplomat-scholars”, drawn from arts and science backgrounds, trained to prevent crime before it occurs.
Mellett has some experience. In July 1993, he stood on the bridge of the LÉ Orla in the darkness off the coast of Clare as they quietly tracked the Brime, a yacht carrying €25 million worth of cannabis.
Scuttle
When boarded, two of the yacht’s crew dashed below decks to try and scuttle the vessel. The pair were overpowered, and the hull’s valves were closed, in a seizure operation that lasted just 33 minutes.
For his role in handling what was then the largest haul of drugs in the State’s history, Mellett, then a lieutenant commander, received the Distinguished Service Medal.
In his first six weeks in office, Mellett has visited Irish troops in the Lebanon and on the Golan Heights, and, most recently, the LÉ Samuel Beckett in the Mediterranean.
“I was struck by the contribution that Unifil, together with Lebanese armed forces, are giving to safe and secure environment in Lebanon, which is already swelled by over a million Syrian refugees,”he said.
"If that environment wasn't facilitated in terms of being safe and secure, and trying to rebuild the institutions of a civil society where necessary, you'd only have greater migration flows out of Syria and Lebanon into eastern Europe.
“People shouldn’t have to trek halfway around the world to find a safe and secure place to live,” he says, though he is careful not to intrude on the policy questions best left to politicians.
The Naval Service responded to the Mediterranean crisis, helping to rescue 8,000 people, even if response had to be robust he says, with every migrant searched. “It wasn’t all Florence Nightingale, at times . . .”
Continued deployment of ships to humanitarian rescue next year will be a decision for the Government, says Mellett, as will any possible Irish involvement in peace enforcement or security operations at sea.
Irish ships do not participate in the EU’s “Operation Triton” security operation, and were deployed instead on a humanitarian remit under a bilateral agreement with Italy.
However, there is growing pressure to support the EU’s new Nav for Med naval force military operation in the Mediterranean, which aims to tackle migrant smugglers or and traffickers.
Triple lock
Sending an Irish ship into this arena would involve the “ triple lock ” of UN, Cabinet and Government approval, Mellett points out, and would, if it occurred, be for a “limited period”.
Currently, nearly 500 Defence Forces’ members are serving abroad, in 15 countries and one sea . Under existing rules agreed with the United Nations that number could rise to 850.
State security is “inextricably linked” with economic security, says Mellett, although he believes that the Defence Forces will start paying for itself and generating jobs by collaborating on innovation.
Already, the Army’s ordnance squad is working on bomb disposal technology with Co Kerry company Reamda, while the Naval Service is involved with University College Cork and Cork Institute of Technology.
High-tech kites
The latter project could generate 3,000 jobs, he says. Meanwhile, Government 2020 renewable energy targets have pushed the Naval Service’s plans to use high-tech kites to cut its ships’ fuel consumption.
Use of “smart” technology could can also prevent crime. An example can be found in fisheries management, where analysis of data for spawning-grounds is used to identify the areas where undersized fish may be targeted.
Mellett perceives climate change and rapid population growth as “negative vectors”, with competition for scarcer resources such as water causing further international instability.
In the Government’s new White Paper on defence, Ireland’s military neutrality is affirmed, but it commits to resources for overseas missions which are increasingly of a “peace-enforcing” nature.
However, it notes that the impacts of globalisation – as opponents of EU membership had feared back in 1973 – means that “threats to the EU are now regarded as threats to Ireland’s interests and welfare”.
“Sovereignty that is not upheld is more imaginary than real,” he says, including the illegal exploitation of fish stocks as a threat, along with terrorism, cyber security, pandemics and climate change.
Our sovereignty has been defended with force by the Naval Service. Thirty-one years ago, the LÉ Aisling fired 500 rounds over the bow of a Spanish trawler after the fishing vessel tried to ram the ship.
Mellett, who has a PhD in ocean governance, notes that Ireland’s sovereign jurisdiction is about 1,000,000 million sq km (386,000sq miles) – almost three times the size of Germany – even if 93 per cent of it is underwater. Today, Ireland’s waters hold “trillions of euros” of wealth -– some of it in hydrocarbons, but most of it still to be found, along with the potential for renewable energy and fisheries.
However, new challenges require new ways of thinking: “Greater diversity improves decision-making and encourages innovative thinking,” Mellett told The Irish Times.
The number of women in the military is to double from just in excess of 6 per cent. More women will make the Defence Forces more effective abroad, he says, especially in dealing with sexual violence in theatres of conflict.
Different voices
Equally, the need for different voices means the Defence Forces must respect and support lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) LGBT rights and different cultures.
The best leaders show “humility”, recognising that they are “facilitators” in their organisation, he says. Quoting Prussian general and military strategist Carl von Clausewitz, he notes that “the simplest thing is difficult”.
However, difficulties are not an excuse for inaction, Mellett argues. He invokes George Bernard Shaw’s assertion that “a life spent making mistakes is not only more honourable, but more useful, than a life spent doing nothing”.
