Senator Zappone has replaced Senator Denis O'Donovan on the committee. She is very welcome and I look forward to working with her. We have a heavy work programme and her assistance will be most welcome.
Report into Deaths of Three Soldiers in the Lebanon: Discussion with Minister for Defence
I thank the Chairman and I look forward to working with him.
I wish to acknowledge the presence of the family and friends of Corporal Fintan Heneghan, Private Mannix Armstrong and Private Thomas Walsh. On behalf of the committee, I welcome them as observers to these proceedings and express my condolences to them on their loss. I invite the Minister to make his opening remarks.
On 19 December 2011, I published the review of Mr. Frank Callanan, SC, into matters relevant to the deaths of Corporal Fintan Heneghan, Private Mannix Armstrong and Private Thomas Walsh. They died tragically on 21 March 1989 while serving with "C" Company, 64th Infantry Battalion, United Nations Interim Force in the Lebanon.
I appointed Mr. Callanan in April 2011 to carry out the inquiry following the emergence of new evidence in the course of preparation of a legal case. I know that members of their families are here today and I have already said hello to them. I would again like to take this opportunity, like the Chairman and Members, to express my sincere sympathies to the families of Corporal Heneghan, Private Armstrong and Private Walsh on their tragic loss.
Corporal Heneghan, Private Armstrong and Private Walsh had been tasked on a detail to collect rocks for the constructing and enhancement of stone gabions around the camp at Bra'shit. These rocks were being collected in an area called the Green Rooms. As their vehicle was returning from this mission it drove over a landmine which detonated, causing the tragic deaths of all three men. At the time, the official UN board of inquiry found that there was no reason to believe there was any breach of the existing rules as laid down in the Irishbatt standard operating procedures. It further concluded that no UNIFIL personnel could be made responsible for the accident.
From very shortly after the tragedy some family members and colleagues raised concerns that issues arose relating to the deaths of the three men. These issues included an assertion that the track to the Green Rooms was out of bounds. These issues were raised both by way of legal proceedings and representations to the Minister for Defence over the years. My predecessor, former Deputy Michael Smith, appointed a senior official in 2003 to examine statements provided by the families from colleagues of the deceased. Following examination of the contents of these statements and consultations with the military authorities and the Office of the Attorney General on the issues raised, it was determined that a further inquiry was unlikely to come to an alternative view to that in the United Nations board report.
However, in 2011 new information came to light in the context of preparing for a legal action. This information, which had not been available previously, was significant and substantive in nature and related to deficiencies in the threat assessment and, therefore, the assessed level of threat pertaining in the mission area. Once this new information was brought to my attention, I determined that it warranted the carrying out of an independent review. I arranged for the families to be informed immediately of this decision and I appointed Mr. Frank Callanan, SC, to conduct the review. The review encompassed both a review of all relevant documents and interviews with such persons as considered appropriate by Mr. Callanan. In this regard, Mr. Callanan received a warrant which allowed him access to all personnel, facilities and documentation as he deemed appropriate in the context of his review. Mr. Callanan notes in his report that all those he interviewed, both serving and former members of the Defence Forces, co-operated conscientiously and truthfully with his review.
Mr. Callanan completed his review and presented his report to me in September 2011. I thank him for the excellent and comprehensive report he produced. It is clear from his report that the Defence Forces engaged in the UN mission in Lebanon at that time, were facing a very complex and difficult mission with limited resources. The report concludes that there was a systemic failure, not alone by the Defence Forces but by the UNIFIL mission as a whole, to respond to the increased threat from improvised explosive devices, lEDs, and from the danger of an attack by armed Islamic elements. For the information of the committee I would like to put on the record the specific findings from the report, which are as follows:
1. Given prior events, there was a deficient assessment of the threat confronting the 64th Infantry Battalion in UNIFIL both from lEDs and landmines placed by the Lebanese Resistance in the Irish Battalion Area of Operations and from the danger of a targeted attack by radical Islamic armed elements on the Irish Battalion, and a failure to adopt appropriate Force protection measures;
2. The three deceased soldiers should not have been sent from Company Headquarters up the track where they met their deaths in a landmine explosion without the track being first cleared for lEDs and landmines;
3. The procedures for checking for the presence of lEDs and landmines were insufficiently defined and applied. The training of the soldiers of the 64th Battalion in relation to the threat of lEDs was deficient;
4. The track on which the three deceased soldiers met their deaths had not been placed out of bounds either by the erection of a roadside sign or otherwise, and did not lie within the Israeli Controlled Area of South Lebanon. This had been an issue for the families.
I met with the families and extended to them, on behalf of the Government, an apology for the failure to fully recognise by early 1989 the implications of the changed circumstances in the Defence Forces mission area in southern Lebanon and for the deaths of their loved ones. It can never be absolutely certain that their loved ones would have been saved if the Defence Forces had adopted a higher risk posture and appropriate protection measures, but it must be accepted that appropriate procedures could possibly have avoided this tragedy.
I believe that the Defence Forces have learned from the failure in this instance to undertake an adequate threat assessment and thus deploy appropriate force protection assets. I wish to reassure the families of Defence Forces personnel currently serving overseas that the issue of force protection is taken extremely seriously and that the military authorities deploy all necessary assets to protect our personnel, wherever they operate. In addition, threat assessments are constantly reviewed in light of changing circumstances and incidents having regard to the protection of our forces.
I, too, welcome the families. The Minister and I disagree on many things but the Minister's personal interest in this since his appointment to office is commendable. However, for 23 years before that, both the Defence Forces and the Department were not quite as commendable. It is extraordinary that after 22 years information that completely changes the entire approach of the Department and the Army suddenly became available. In an investigation that was supposed to have been carried out by UNIFIL, the United Nations, the Army, the Department of Defence and the Attorney General every aspect of this incident was supposed to have been investigated. Suddenly, out of nowhere, this information came to light. I do not know if the Minister is in a position to do so but could he elaborate on the nature of that information, the manner in which it was found after 22 years and whether it came from within the Defence Forces or from the UN?
Second, with regard to the findings which the Minister quoted in his remarks, I have difficulty with a systematic failure being blamed for the entire incident. If it was a private organisation, that could be defended and examined. However, this is the military, with a command and control structure. Somebody gives orders and somebody takes orders. Those taking the orders must have confidence in those who are giving orders and that the orders will be safe. On this occasion, that confidence unfortunately caused the death of three people. The Minister said there was a deficient assessment of the threat confronting the 64th Infantry Battalion. Who was responsible for putting that assessment in place? Was it the United Nations, UNIFIL or somebody in the Irish Army? The Minister said there was not appropriate force protection. Again, who was responsible for that?
The difficulty with putting it down to a systematic failure is that it blames everybody, that is, the culture and everybody who was there that day, and that is patently not the case. Those who went out to do their job did so in the hope that everything was in place, when clearly it was not. The difficulty with nobody being held responsible, and I am not looking for heads to be chopped off, is that this could happen again and nobody would be held responsible again. It would be put down to a systematic failure. When people are not held responsible in an organisation, there is the danger of something happening again. There is also the issue of the track not being cleared. The families and the colleagues still contend that there was a sign on the road that day warning people not to use the road. This continues to be a matter of division. Was it the UN or the Irish Defence Forces who sent the personnel on that mission that morning without ensuring the track had been cleared first?
RTE representatives were being kicked around this committee room in the course of another committee meeting this morning, and justifiably so. However, RTE has done the families in this case a service through the documentary by Seán O'Rourke in 2001 called "Brothers in Arms". I recommend that everybody look at it. A senior Army officer told Seán O'Rourke that night that the road was cleared ahead of the patrol heading out that morning. Now Mr. Callanan, whom I also praise, has said it was not cleared. Why did the Army contend that the road was cleared and in doing so, place the blame on colleagues of the three members of the Defence Forces who were killed? What information changed its assessment of that? What was the practice at the time, to clear tracks before people went out on patrol or to collect materials? This seems to be a failure in the command structure of the mission. The danger of putting it down to systematic failure is that we go back and, God forbid, this could happen again, although thankfully it has not in the past 23 years.
The Minister and the Army have apologised to the families. The colleagues of the men who were there on the day, however, have not had an apology yet. They witnessed the event and its aftermath and some of them were in some way blamed afterwards. Through the years those colleagues and their families have had to fight a lonely fight to get to this point. That fight included former members of the Defence Forces, people who put their lives on the line for this country, getting letters asking them to desist from corresponding with the Army about this issue. As late as May 2010, former colleagues were requested to cease their correspondence with the Defence Forces in letters signed by a very senior member of the armed forces. Had they desisted, we would not be here today and Mr. Callanan's report would not have been issued. The colleagues who were there on the day deserve an apology, particularly for the way those who tried to follow the truth were treated.
Has the Minister corresponded with the United Nations about the new correspondence? It has completely changed the view of the Department and the view of the military. Does the new information have implications for the manner in which it conducted its investigation in 1989-90? The Minister included UNIFIL in the systematic failures. What was the UNIFIL response to its inclusion, bearing in mind my concerns about that excuse?
I thank the Deputy for raising the various issues he has raised. This was an issue of great stress to the families and colleagues of the three deceased members of our Defence Forces for many years. I went through the history of the inquiries in my opening statement and I will not delay the committee by repeating what was said. The appointment of Mr. Callanan was effected within four to five weeks of my assuming the position of Minister for Defence. I was conscious of the background to the matter. Although I had not personally previously met with the families, I was aware of issues surrounding this event.
The Deputy asked how information became available. There was a pending court case and it became available in the context of key evidence becoming available as a consequence of those who would have been called to give evidence in the court case furnishing evidence that was not known prior to that event. I do not know why this was not previously known; I was only four or five weeks in the Department and I had a number of predecessors in that position in the preceding years. Effectively the information that became available was key evidence from Commandant Lane that gave rise to the inquiry. The information became available that was not clearly available on a paper basis in the context of the review that had taken place some years earlier and clearly was not information that was available in the context of the United Nations original inquiry or, if it was, it was not factored into the outcome. As soon as the information became available, and I considered its implications, I was of the view that an independent review was essential. The report goes into the background in great detail. I am conscious the families and the committee have read it so I will not repeat its contents but that new information that had not been factored into any previous report resulted in the conclusions reached by Mr. Callanan.
I hope in circumstances where I acknowledge nothing can be said to rectify the dreadful tragedy, that the information that has become available has provided the families with a greater insight and acknowledgement of what occurred. The RTE programme, which I saw many years ago, placed substantial emphasis on the area where the tragedy occurred as being a "no go" area and that there were indications that troops should not be there. That was comprehensively addressed in Frank Callanan's report. I am aware there are probably still some members of the Defence Forces who would be of the view there was some sort of indication that that area was restricted but he has dealt with this in great detail in his report and expressed the view that it was not the case.
I cannot, however, in response to the questions raised, and it would be wrong of me to do so, reassess the conclusions of a very comprehensive report. The Deputy asked if I could identify an individual who was responsible for what went wrong. There was clearly a failure to understand the level of threat posed based on previous incidents that had occurred. That is well documented in the report. The failure was not a failure of a single individual, rather it was a failure of UNIFIL in the context of its responsibilities at command level and it was a failure within our Defence Forces at that time. It was not something a lone individual was responsible for. The report details the incidents that should have given rise to a concern about the level of threat that was posed. Quite properly, it reaches the conclusion that the area, if it was to be entered, should have been checked prior to entry for IEDs or land mines and that did not happen.
I am not in a position to cast any more light than Mr. Callanan has done. It is important something that has been a genuine cause of concern, inquiry and dispute in circumstances where three members of our Defence Forces lost their lives and where a tragedy occurred we would all prefer that it never had occurred, that we are now at a point where there is a far greater understanding of the background to the events and what happened. In the context of current practice, the lessons of this dreadful tragedy have been learned. Everything has been done in recent years and is being done now to ensure threat levels are adequately and properly assessed and that our troops in southern Lebanon at present have all of the protections necessary and all proper procedures are applied in that context. The report was furnished to the United Nations and we received an acknowledgment. I am not aware the UN, as an organisation, has revisited the issue and the Department has not received a substantive detailed response from the UN. I regard the Callanan report as very important in getting to the truth of the background of what occurred. It was an independent review and members of the Defence Forces who participated in that mission at various levels fully co-operated with Mr. Callanan, which he noted, and discussed issues with him. I am sure some members of the Defence Forces who were there may have a different perspective on the matter, but this is an independent report by an individual of impeccable integrity. I hope it has provided some assistance to the families, who have been looking for a very long time for a further report on the dreadful events that happened.
I welcome the families to the Oireachtas Joint Committee on Justice, Defence and Equality. I extend my deepest sympathy to them on the loss of these three young soldiers in this dreadful tragedy. I take this opportunity to commend our Defence Forces who serve on UN peacekeeping missions. They do the State a great service and honour. I know from members of my immediate family in the Defence Forces who have served on UN missions that it is a very difficult job. We all have a direct interest in this issue. It is important that the families know that Members of the Oireachtas know these soldiers died for peace, which is very honourable. We are very proud of them.
I welcome the Minister's apology, but as my colleagues, Deputy Dara Calleary said, the families have experienced a great deal of pain and hurt and have had to wait a long time for the report.
The Minister spoke about systemic failure, that their training was deficient and that the soldiers should not have gone up the track. There are two core issues. First, I hope the families are getting the maximum support from the Minister and the Department. Second, how do we prevent those types of situations developing in the future? I know one cannot prevent accidents in a conflict. Are the safeguards now in place to reduce the chances of a repeat of this happening and will all the recommendations of the report be implemented?
In all deployments, a detailed threat assessment is carried out by the intelligence directorate of the Defence Forces. There is an assessment prior to the deployment of troops to the Lebanon and the threat assessment is kept under constant review while we have troops there. It incorporates local knowledge and international and UN assessments. UNIFIL HQ also produces threat assessments. Our director of intelligence conducts independent assessments from Defence Forces sources to ensure appropriate force protection at all times. I can assure the Deputy that I have regular sight of reports on threat assessments in areas in which we have troops on UN duty. These assessments are considered very seriously and there is a constant oversight of where our troops are located, be it in a large contingent of troops such as the current contingent of troops in southern Lebanon or the smaller number of six troops engaged in the UN monitoring group in Syria. There is constant threat assessment undertaken that is factored into their deployment and their day-to-day engagements and activities. This is of course of crucial importance. It is a great tragedy that these three brave individuals who were in the Defence Forces lost their lives. It is very important that people do not lose their lives through mistakes of a systemic or other nature.
The reality is that these missions are dangerous. We should never underestimate the dangers posed to our troops when engaged in UN missions abroad, even in areas that appear to be relatively stable. An incident can suddenly flare up, and some group of individuals engaged in terrorist activity or local unrest can behave in a way that places our troops at risk. We are very conscious of this and there is a great awareness of ensuring that necessary steps are taken. It is fair to say, without it being in any way a criticism of the past, that training is now more sophisticated and a great deal has been learned about deployment on UN missions. At UN level there is better communications now than occurred in the past on occasions, without saying that this is an issue in this case.
It was very important that this review was conducted, that the information that has come to light was made available to the families and was published. Of course, this report of itself provides additional learning and insight for the Defence Forces in future missions.
I thank the Minister for his report. I welcome the families of the three young soldiers who were killed. My colleague, Deputy Calleary, incorporated all the points I would have made.
It is an absolute scandal that the families have been waiting for 23 years for this report, which I do not believe will bring closure. It is heartbreaking for the families to have had to wait for such a long time for the truth. I am delighted that the Minister was able to initiate this process.
I thank Deputy Ferris for her comments. I think it is important that we got to the point where this review was undertaken and concluded. It was fortuitous that new information became available that we were able to act upon.
I thank the Minister. We are all agreed that it was commendable that this report was initiated, finalised and worked on with such dilligence. I hope it will be of some help to the families at this time. Nothing that we can do or say can help in the way we would like.
Sitting suspended at 4.18 p.m. and resumed at 4.20 p.m.