Ren Ligon

Renford Ligon is an accomplished US Army Special Operations Senior Non-Commissioned Officer (Master Sergeant) with 25 years of Military and Civilian experience. He is a hands-on leader with years of operational experience spanning 1993 to 2017. He has a proven track record during many national level crisis events while serving as a US Army Special Operations Senior Operator and Military advisor (Contractor) assigned to the SOUTHCOM and CENTCOM Areas of Operations.

Born in Pottstown, PA, and raised in Los Angeles and Dayton, Ohio, Ligon attended Hibbing Community College in Hibbing, MN, on a football scholarship. After Hibbing lost in the junior college national championship, Ligon was forced to leave school when the town deemed uninhabitable the football dorms where all the Black players happened to live—leaving all of them with nowhere to live. Shortly after returning to Dayton, Ligon decided to join the Army in 1992.

After Basic Training, Ligon attended Airborne school at Fort Benning, GA, graduating with honors. He was assigned to the Airborne Rangers, 1st Ranger Battalion (1/75th Ranger Regiment) in Savannah, GA. The 75th Ranger Regiment, also known as Army Rangers, is an elite light infantry special operations force that is part of the United States Army Special Operations Command. After the Ranger Regiment, Ligon was reassigned to the United States Army 160th Special Operations Aviation Regiment (Airborne), abbreviated as 160th SOAR—a special operations force of the United States Army that provides helicopter aviation support for general purpose forces and special operations forces.

From there, Ligon joined the United States Army Special Forces, colloquially known as the Green Berets due to their distinctive service headgear. The Green Berets are one of the most elite fighting forces in the world, with only about 7,000 active members. They are a special operations force of the United States Army designed to execute such operations as unconventional warfare, foreign internal defense, counter-insurgency, special reconnaissance, counter-terrorism, information operations, counter proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, and security force assistance. Other duties include combat search and rescue (CSAR), counter-narcotics, hostage rescue, humanitarian assistance, peacekeeping, psychological operations, and manhunts. Many of their operational techniques are classified.

Ligon attended the following specialized military schools: Airborne, Basic Leaders Course, Ranger School, Jumpmaster, Mountain Warfare Winter Course; Survival, Evasion, Resistance and Escape (SERE) (High Risk); Special Forces Qualification Course, Sniper School, International Morse Code, Special Forces Close Quarters Combat.

Ligon was engaged in many overseas deployments, some of them classified. He has been deployed in the following countries: Egypt, Afghanistan, Colombia, Argentina, Iraq, Bahrain, Dubai, Spain, Santiago Chile, Ecuador, Mexico, Bahamas, Brazil, Haiti.

Ligon met his wife Angel while living in Savannah, GA. She continues to work as a schoolteacher. They have a teenage son, Thomas.

After his retirement in 2012, Ligon worked as a government contractor in Afghanistan, providing support to the soldiers deploying to Afghanistan. He is currently working for the government as a military planner and is taking Hollywood by storm as an actor.