Almost 200 soldiers participated in a full-scale exercise in Kilworth, north Cork, yesterday ahead of their six-month deployment to Kosovo as part of the KFOR peacekeeping force.
Yesterday 166 men and women from the 28th Infantry Group based in Kilkenny and Clonmel arrived at Kilworth range for the exercise.
The Army's new high-tech tactical battle management system, which utilises global positioning devices to keep track of all military movements, got its first outing in a tactical exercise. The system was designed by Dublin based technology company Geo Solutions exclusively for the Irish Defence Forces.
Throughout yesterday other Irish soldiers posing as enemy insurgents were engaged in scenarios with the troops.
Throughout the day roadblocks were mounted and soldiers also patrolled the region. Late last night and early this morning the most spectacular section of the exercise took place with the Army launching a "clearance operation" on a hillside.
Simulated explosions and the firing of blank rounds lit up the night sky as the culmination of Operation Kilworth was launched.
According to Comdt Brendan O'Shea, the exercise is just a part of the overall training for soldiers heading to Kosovo. "This is just a section of nine months of intensive training for the troops. It is to ensure that they are in a very high state of readiness.
"The scenarios we play out here are exactly what the soldiers in Kosovo can experience , we must restore law and order to a destabilised area and make our presence known to the locals so that they feel safe," he said. According to military officers the possibility for armed conflict in Kosovo is low but the soldiers must be prepared if hostilities were to erupt.
"Kosovo is almost a province of Albania and there is an underlying ethnic tension there. The Army is there to make sure a lid is kept on it," added Comdt O'Shea. The threat assessment for the area states that organised crime, ethnic tensions, conflict within mixed villages and dangerous driving by the locals are the main concerns for Irish soldiers.