Qualla: Army Ranger Wing

Army Ranger Wing: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ominae, CC BY-SA 4.0. Eighty-five percent of candidates fail Module One of selection. The Army Ranger Wing - the special operations force of the Irish Defence Forces - typically tests 40 to 80 applicants each year through a ten-month selection course called the SOFQ, and most do not make it past the first five months. Those who pass earn the unit's motto, taken from an old Fianna poem: 'Glaine ar gcroi, neart ar ngeag, agus beart de reir ar mbriathar' - the purity of our hearts, the strength of our limbs, and our commitment to our promise. The unit lives by it on the gallops at the Curragh Camp in County Kildare, where it has been based since its founding on 16 March 1980.

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Image: Ominae | CC BY-SA 4.0

Army Ranger Wing: From a Course to a Wing

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Irish Defence Forces from Ireland, CC BY 2.0. The thread starts in 1969, when Irish Army officers returned from the United States Army Ranger School at Fort Benning, Georgia, and ran the first Ranger course in Ireland. The courses produced Special Assault Groups - 40 Rangers trained in combat skills, engineering, and ordnanc...

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Image: Irish Defence Forces from Ireland | CC BY 2.0

Army Ranger Wing: Green Role and Black Role

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Joguwa86, Public domain. The Wing's missions are divided into two operational modes. The 'Green Role' covers conventional wartime special operations - offensive operations behind enemy lines, long-range reconnaissance patrol, sabotage, the capture of key personnel, intelligence gathering. The 'Black Role...

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Image: Joguwa86 | Public domain

Army Ranger Wing: Liberia, Chad, Mali

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Rama, CC BY-SA 2.0 fr. Most of the Wing's overseas deployments have been with United Nations and EU peacekeeping missions. In Liberia in 2003, twenty heavily armed Rangers were dropped by helicopter at the town of Gbapa to defuse a hostile situation in their area of operations - which by area covered a...

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Image: Rama | CC BY-SA 2.0 fr

Army Ranger Wing: Kabul, Sudan, the Boarding of Matthew

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit DickClarkMises, CC0. Some of the Wing's most public operations have been extractions. In 2005, Rangers and Arabic-speaking intelligence officers deployed to Baghdad after the journalist Rory Carroll was abducted by al-Qaeda-affiliated militants; Carroll was released unharmed. In 2011, during the Liby...

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Image: DickClarkMises | CC0