Ireland and European intelligence: trust and mistrust in Europe’s weak link?

This article evaluates Ireland’s place in Europe from an intelligence and defence perspective. Ireland is a relative puzzle in the European intelligence landscape: despite being a high-tech economy with large multinational corporations, Ireland’s neutrality, combined with a fear of becoming embroiled in military alliances and intelligence operations, has led to a reluctance to improve or grow Ireland’s intelligence capabilities and to contribute to European intelligence and, by extension, the defence of Europe. This goes against the needs of Europe today: the Russian invasion of Ukraine has caused Europe to reevaluate and reengage with issues surrounding intelligence and defence on a scale not seen since the Cold War. Across Europe, there have been moves towards greater intelligence sharing due to transnational terrorism. This article investigates the role of trust and mistrust in intelligence collaboration concerning Ireland in the broader European context. How can trust in Ireland’s role in intelligence be built, how is it lost, and how may it be repaired or regained? We further investigate how it may affect intelligence cooperation between Ireland, within the European Union, and between Ireland and the United Kingdom.