Not to go too deep into this controversial topic but back in the 70's and 80's, the government had the option of either investing in education or investing in areas such as military. Had they chose to invest in military, we would have a defence force to be proud of, one that could actually defend our seas, one that could defend our skies in the event of international leaders coming to Ireland or in the case of a terrorist incident, and us not having to call on the RAF or French Air Force to do so. However, that would mean education wouldn't have gotten the investment it did, and had Ireland not had the intelligent, well-educated young population it had from that period to work hard for companies such as Intel, Dell etc during the 90's, we wouldn't be as wealthy as we are today, as our wealth and prosperity is directly due to us being well-educated, which is due to our government investing in our education system. So they sacrificed something other countries wouldn't to have a young well-educated population that would lead to a better and propsperous economy.
So although what people say about our military is perfectly valid and true, you have to think what would've been had our government chosen not to invest in things like education...
Also the thing that annoyed me about that artcile wasn't the military comment but this:
"Somebody looking like Buffy comes on, starts speaking but makes no sense. Oh, it was Irish."
Which conveys the ignorant British attitude towards the Irish language, or what they call the 'Leprachaun Language'.
