in anger

• "fire in anger" (General Australian):

  (file)

in anger

1. (especially military) With the intent of causing damage or harm to an opponent; in combat, rather than in peacetime training.

   The Napier of Magdala Battery never fired a shot in anger: it never engaged in combat.

   • 2009 December 22, Gaetano V. Cavallaro, Futility Ending in Disaster: Diplomatic, Military, Aviation and Social Events in the First World War on the Austro-Italian Front, Xlibris Corporation, →ISBN, page 519:

     These craft [flying boats] were never perfected, never flown in anger and destroyed at war's end.

   • 2010 June 19, Ian Watson, The Royal Air Force at Home: The History of RAF Air Displays from 1920, Casemate Publishers, →ISBN:

     Over the years, B52s have been deployed in anger by the US Air Force in two conflicts, Vietnam and the Gulf. Despite the outcome of the former, the B52 acquitted itself with success both as a tactical bomber and in the strategic role  […]

   • 2025 June 24, Paul Nuki, Afshin Madadi, “Iran ‘hiding thousands of centrifuges’ to build nuclear bomb”, in The Telegraph:

     Sunday morning’s US raid on Iran’s nuclear facilities, involved more than 125 military aircraft and saw the first use in anger of the GBU-57 bunker buster, said to penetrate 60m underground before exploding.

2. In a real situation, rather than only in theory or as part of practice or learning.
   • 1998 July 29, Philip Wadler, “Functional Programming: An Angry Half-Dozen”, in Sophie Cluet, editor, Database Programming Languages: 6th International Workshop, DBPL-6, Estes Park, Colorado, USA, August 18-20, 1997, Springer Science & Business Media, →ISBN, page 25; republished as Rick Hull, editor, (Please provide a date or year):

     "Have you used it in anger yet?" The time is a dozen years ago, the place is Oxford, and my fellow postdoc has just scrutinized my new bike. He's admired the chrome, checked the gears, noted the Kryptonite lock. Now he wants to know if I've used it to serious purpose. Gleaming chrome is well and good, but will it run you through the woods? "Have you used it in anger yet?"

   • 2011 October 27, Alistair Aird, Ally McCoist - Rangers Legend, Kings Road Publishing, →ISBN:

     On the bench was Lorenzo Amoruso, who had yet to kick a ball in anger for the first team as he had been injured since his arrival the previous summer. He only had to wait nineteen minutes before he made his Rangers bow, as he was pitched into the white-hot heat of the Parkhead cauldron […]

   • 2012 July 9, Anton Rippon, Amazing & Extraordinary Facts - Football, David and Charles, →ISBN:

     At that point, Stoley gave up the cause and the Argonauts faded from history, still having yet to kick a ball in anger.

• Despite the use of the word anger, the phrase is not intended to describe (and generally does not describe) the emotional state of the person doing the action.

• Wicaksono, Rachel (6 August 2010 (last accessed)) “Fire in anger”, in Ask About English‎^[1], BBC World Service