Defence Forces (Ireland) - History

History

The Irish Defence Forces trace their origins to the Irish Volunteers founded in 1913. The Defence Forces official title, Óglaigh na hÉireann, is taken from the official Irish language title of the Irish Volunteers. The Defence Forces cap-badge, and the buttons that are worn on Service Dress no.1 uniforms are also from the Irish Volunteers. The Defence Forces buttons still have the letters I V (Irish Volunteers) on them. Volunteers led by Patrick Pearse, took part in the 1916 Easter Rising.

After the rising the Volunteers gave allegiance to the First Dáil. At this time the Volunteers became known as the Irish Republican Army (IRA). The IRA waged a guerrilla campaign against British rule in Ireland between 1919 and 1921.

A Truce brought hostilities to an end on 11 July 1921 and the Anglo-Irish Treaty was signed on 6 December. The Provisional Government was then constituted on 14 January 1922. Many IRA men who fought in the War of Independence were dissatisfied with the Treaty and both Civil War or reoccupation by the British were possible. In February 1922, the Provisional Government began to recruit volunteers into the new Irish National Army. The Irish Civil War began on the 28 June 1922 between the Republican Anti-treaty IRA and the newly-recruited pro-treaty National Army. The Civil War ended on 24 May 1923, Frank Aiken IRA Chief of Staff ordered IRA volunteers to dump arms and the new Irish Free State slipped into an uneasy peace.

On 3 August 1923 the new state passed the "Defence Forces (Temporary Provisions) Act", raising "an armed force to be called Oglaigh na hEireann (hereinafter referred to as the Forces) consisting of such number of officers, non-commissioned officers, and men as may from time to time be provided by the Oireachtas." The establishment of the Forces was on 1 October 1924.

The state was officially neutral during World War II, but declared an official state of emergency on 2 September 1939 and the Army was mobilised. As the Emergency progressed, more and newer equipment was purchased from Britain and the United States. For the duration of the Emergency, Ireland, while formally neutral, tacitly supported the Allies in several ways. German military personnel were interned in the Curragh along with the belligerent powers' servicemen, whereas Allied airmen and sailors who crashed in Ireland were very often repatriated, usually by secretly moving them across the border to Northern Ireland. G2, the Army's intelligence section, played a vital role in the detection and arrest of German spies, such as Hermann Görtz.

Ireland became a member of the United Nations in 1955. The first contribution to peacekeeping was in 1958 when Army officers were assigned to the United Nations Observer Group in Lebanon (UNOGIL). Since 1958 the Defence Forces have had a continuous presence on peace support operations. The first armed peacekeeping mission was to the Operation des Nations Unies au Congo (ONUC) in 1960. The Defence Forces have been continuously on armed UN missions - except between May 1974 to May 1978 but did retain overseas unarmed observer mission during this period. In October 2009, a memorial to Irish personnel who served as United Nations peacekeepers was unveiled in the town of Fermoy. It records that there was a total of ninety Irish fatalities while on active service with the UN until that date.