Why Shannon Airport remains a key gateway for the US military

RTÉ News​

3 days ago

Questions over Ireland's role in the United States' military supply chain have long been asked.
Millions of US soldiers have passed through Shannon Airport over the past two decades as it transformed into a significant transit point for the US military, particularly for its operations in the Middle East.
But while US on the ground military involvement in Afghanistan and Iraq has come to an end, figures show that Shannon Airport continues to be constantly and consistently used by the United States.
Data obtained and analysed by RTÉ News shows that between 2022 and 2024, nearly 2,000 US military aircrafts and US civil air operators with declared munitions of war on-board applied for exemptions to stop in Ireland.
The flights were frequently to and from Germany, Poland, Bulgaria and Kuwait.
These planes are not routinely searched or inspected by Irish authorities. Only 0.1% of applications from US civil aircraft were refused to land or fly over Ireland due to the "nature of the total munitions of war proposed to be carried", the Department of Transport told RTÉ News.
No US military aircraft was prevented from landing in Ireland over that three year period, according to figures from the Department of Foreign Affairs.
The Government maintains that while Ireland is not politically neutral, it is militarily neutral - meaning it is making a distinction between armed engagement and foreign policy positions.
However, Shannon is used frequently by the United States, with dozens of military and civilian aircraft with weapons onboard landing and taking off every month, with little intervention or checks.
To what extent is this military traffic within the parameters of Ireland's long-standing practice of neutrality?
Shannon Airport
On the edge of Europe, Shannon Airport is at a strategic location.
It is the most westerly airport in Europe - a key and quiet facility that does not have the hustle and bustle of transport hubs of London and Amsterdam.
Shortly after it opened in 1945, Shannon Airport became a convenient transatlantic refuelling stop for US military and diplomatic flights.
Soviet carrier Aeroflot had established a base there, allowing flights from the Soviet Union to refuel in Ireland before travelling onwards to countries such as Cuba and Angola.
Shannon became the biggest Soviet transit airport outside Moscow until the 1990s. Pictures of world leaders stopping at the airport can be seen in its departure halls.
US President John F Kennedy flew into Shannon Airport in 1963 for his historic tour of Ireland and more than 40 years later another US President, George W Bush, posed for photos with US marines headed to Iraq.
Already this year, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky have held press conferences and meetings at the Co Clare airport.
Links with the United States go back decades.
The early 90s marked an uptick in the airport being used by aircraft connected to the US military during Operation Desert Storm in the Gulf.
It was ramped up further at the turn of the century when, following 9/11, Shannon Airport became a key transit hub for US troops travelling to Afghanistan and Iraq.
The Irish government had offered the use of Shannon to the US government for landing and refuelling facilities after the terror attacks after a UN Security Council Resolution which requested states work together to bring to justice those responsible for 9/11.
In 2003, the Dáil voted to support the government's policy of continuing to grant overflight and landing rights in Ireland to US military and civilian aircraft.
Defence and Security consultant Dakota Wood told RTÉ News that Shannon is attractive because it is less trafficked than a very large airfield like Frankfurt and has good ramp space.
Mr Wood, who served for two decades in the US Marine Corps, said there are many considerations that go into choosing an airport and Shannon "has proved to be a very useful through put point".
Over ten years from 2001 to 2011, over two million US military personnel flew through Shannon Airport.
2005 was the busiest year when nearly 2,000 aircraft carrying 336,000 personnel flew through the airport.
What are the rules?
Under the Air Navigation Order 1952, no foreign military aircraft is permitted to fly over, or land in the State without the 'express invitation or permission of the Minister'.
However, under the terms of a specific arrangement dating from 1959, US military aircraft can overfly without prior notification on condition they are unarmed, carry only cargo and passengers, and comply with navigational requirements.
Permission must also be sought to land and take off in Ireland as long as there are no arms or munitions on board, no involvement in military exercises or operations originating in Ireland, and no intelligence gathering.
Civil and military aircrafts intending to carry munitions of war, or weapons through or into Irish territory must apply for a special exemption from the Irish Government to land or fly over Irish airspace.
Permission must be sought even if the weapons on the aircraft are not loaded with ammunition or immediately usable, which is part of the policy to support Ireland's neutral stance.
US civil aircraft apply for permission from the Department of Transport to carry troops and equipment across Irish airspace or land at airports, such as Shannon.
Charter and cargo carriers, including Omni Air International and Atlas Air, which often operate under government and military contracts are the most commonly used.
Ireland could deny or ground flights if it were to become clear that weapons or undeclared military cargo were on board.
How many flights?
In recent years, from 2022 to 2024, almost 2,000 US military and US civil flights with munitions of war on board stopped in Ireland.
Over those three years, a total of 978 US military flights landed at Irish airports, mostly in Shannon.
New data from the Department of Transport, obtained and analysed by RTÉ News, shows that during the same period, more than 1,000 applications were made by US civil operators with munitions of war on board to land at Shannon Airport.
These applications were for what the department calls "tech stops" - brief landings to refuel and perform maintenance checks.
Only 0.1% of them were refused due to the "nature of the total munitions of war proposed to be carried", according to the department.
More than 1,700 applications were made from US civil aircraft with munitions of war on board to fly over Irish airspace. A majority of the munitions of war were unloaded "personal issued weapons of troops, with no ammunition".
One flight in 2022 had "ammunition only" listed in the description of munitions of war. More than 820 applications were made for US civil aircraft with munitions onboard to stop or fly over Irish airspace in 2024 - 279 of them stopped at Shannon Airport.
Two of the 543 applications made to fly over Ireland with munitions of war were refused. On 8 July, an Omni Air International flight travelling from Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport in Hungary to Pittsburgh International Airport in the US was refused permission to overfly.
Three weeks later, on 30 July, another aircraft from the same airline was refused permission to fly in Irish airspace from Pittsburgh International Airport in Pennsylvania to Hungary's Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport.
The Department of Transport told RTÉ News that they were refused "based on the nature of the total munitions of war proposed to be carried".
In relation to US military aircraft, 357 landing requests were granted in 2024. In 2023, 860 applications were made by US civil aircraft with munitions of war on board to land or fly over Ireland. 258 stopped at Shannon Airport, one at Dublin airport.
Nearly 600 flew over Irish air space that year. Former US president Joe Biden visited Ireland in April of that year when there was a clear increase in traffic.
The same year, there were 530 landings by US military aircraft granted at Irish airports, mostly in Shannon.
However, it is worth noting that the US Embassy submits the statistics on military aircraft overflights to the Department of Foreign Affairs on a monthly basis - it is not data collected by the department.
2022 saw just more than 1,000 applications made by US civil air operators to overfly or land with munitions of war.
Permission was denied to one of the 467 made to stop at Shannon Airport for the same reason as the Hungary flights in 2024, said the Department of Transport.
The flight refused was an Omni aircraft on 21 May 2022 from Washington Dulles International Airport to Poland which was due to land at Shannon Airport. The same year, 91 US military aircrafts landed in the country.
Hundreds of the flights were to and from common destinations such as Germany, Poland and Bulgaria - all key hubs for NATO operations.
Germany is home to the Ramstein Air Base and several major US military installations.
There was a noticeable increase in traffic when the US was boosting troops in Europe following Russia's invasion of Ukraine. Kuwait, a long-standing US military hub in the Middle East, is also regularly travelled to which is home to approximately 13,500 US forces based in Camp Arifjan and Ali Al Salem Air Base.
It is used as a staging area for troops rotating in and out of many Middle East countries and onward links to Israel or Gulf allies.
Are they checked?
There is little intervention or checks when it comes to these aircrafts.
Calls have been made for inspections to ensure they are not carrying weapons or detainees.
Retired US army officer and analyst of US foreign policy, Daniel L Davis, stopped at Shannon Airport via a civil aircraft following his deployment to Iraq in 2009 and told RTÉ that he was required to have his weapons on him.
"I was required to have my side arm and rifle with me at all times but it was definitely not loaded, had no ammunition with it. But I was very much required to maintain positive control over it at all times," he said.
In 2009, Amnesty International alleged that rendition flights operated by the United States passed through Shannon. It claimed that the State was facilitating uninspected CIA flights through Irish airspace which were bringing detainees to centres such as Guantanamo Bay.
Most recently, the Irish Government is examining a report that a flight carrying deportees from the United States to Africa, against a judge's order, stopped Shannon.
Professor of International Law at the University of Notre Dame Mary Ellen O'Connell said Irish authorities should be "very clear" that it will not permit the United States to transport weapons bound for unlawful armed conflict through Ireland.
"This is my area of expertise for almost 40 years… the United States is using military force all around the world unlawfully especially in the Middle East and Africa," said Prof O'Connell, who has worked in areas of international law on the use of force, international dispute resolution and international legal theory.
She said there could be problems for Ireland if there are any munitions landing at Shannon that is ending up in unlawful conflicts.
"Ireland should have complete control over planes that land at Shannon that are carrying munitions… anything destined for a war zone. It's important for Ireland which stands tall on so many of these issues of international law to take seriously this principle not to assist a country in any way that's using military force unlawfully" she added.
Former Lieutenant Colonel (Ret.), Daniel L Davis said that much of the travel is to Bulgaria and Germany which has nothing to do with combat.
"For me it seems like it wouldn't violate any neutrality unless they were… are helping the US in a combat operation," he said.
"The United States had an issue for helping Saudi Arabia around 2015… to help it to combat missions against Yemen and the Houthis. Even then we tried to claim that we were not party to the conflict, even though we were directly helping refuelling etc. But something like this where you literally just land at the airport and refuel, and use the facilities I think that would be two or three levels distant from it," he said.
Use of Shannon by the US does not affect Ireland's policy of military neutrality, according to the Irish Government.
A spokesperson for the Department of Foreign Affairs said Ireland's policy of military neutrality is characterised by non-membership of military alliances and non-participation "in common or mutual defence arrangements".
"This policy is fully consistent with foreign military and state aircrafts being allowed to enter Irish sovereign airspace or land in the State under certain circumstances," they said.
A peace activist and contributor to Shannonwatch, a group which has monitored US activity at the airport for twenty years, said he believes Shannon Airport is a 'de-facto' military base for the United States.
Edward Horgan, who has spent two decades protesting the use of Shannon Airport by the US military, said now is the time for the US to be forbidden from using the airport.
Last year, the Department of Transport confirmed that nine civilian aircraft, reported by The Ditch website, carried munitions of war which were destined for Israel over Irish sovereign airspace.
"I spent 22 years in the Irish Defence Forces, was heavily involved in logistics and logistics play a huge role in modern warfare. Shannon Airport is being used as a logistic hub for the US military.
"This is particularly important at the moment and particularly inappropriate with the genocide that is happening in Gaza," he said.
Military bases deployed in a foreign territory usually have a formal legal agreement or treaty with the hosting nation. A base usually has a permanent military presence and control over part of a secure site for the use of military-specific operations or missions.
The Department of Foreign Affairs said this week that they have not been notified of any US Military Officers permanently based at Shannon Airport.
Figures show that US military aircraft and civilian aircraft regularly and routinely land and refuel there with minimal oversight by the authorities here.
However, the Irish Government insists that the US military's use of the airport is subject to strict conditions include no arms or ammunition without specific permission and that no operation missions are launched from Shannon.
Other civilian airports in neutral countries with significant US military logistical use, but not military-controlled or designated bases, include Switzerland and Austria. Similar to Ireland, all US military flights must declare their purpose and contents but physical inspections are limited.
Retired US army officer Davis said that he believes it is not a de-facto military base.
"What would distinguish it from a military base if you had fighter jets on there. If you had routine military transport aircraft, if you had US air force facilities… like what we do in the Middle East, in Qatar for example or Kuwait.
"We have parts of the whole airfield that are fenced off and it's just US territory there, that's what I consider a base but this sounds more like a leasing agreement and an arrangement to use existing facilities," he said.