The Complete History of the SAS by Nigel McCrery

Author:Nigel McCrery [McCrery, Nigel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, Military, Special Forces, Biography & Autobiography, World War II, General, Historical
ISBN: 9781787396968
Google: V7w6EAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Welbeck Publishing Group
Published: 2021-06-18T01:05:15+00:00

6

1980s

NORTHERN IRELAND TO GIBRALTAR

THE 1980S DID not start well for the SAS, especially for those working in Northern Ireland. Special Branch (SB) of the Royal Ulster Constabulary (RUC) would occasionally get certain information that required the skills of the Regiment. Unfortunately, SB was always very tight-lipped about the source of this information. While this was good security practice, it didn’t help those troops who carried out operations.

In one incident, SB requested the SAS Armagh unit take on three separate tasks. The first job was to watch two part-time policemen whom the IRA was planning to assassinate. The information from the SB clearly stated that they would be hit close to home. This was straightforward work for the SAS, who inserted an observation post (OP). All they had to do was sit and wait...

The second task was to protect a public house, which the IRA had threatened to burn to the ground. This was another simple operation which, once again, involved inserting an OP and waiting for the IRA to turn up. Logistically, servicing two OPs with resupply and changing over men was not too much of a problem, until the weekend came around – at which time Special Branch had an operation requiring every man in the field.

It would seem that one of the local underlings in the IRA had seriously upset the organization. The punishment for his crime was to be kneecapped, with the job being carried out by a leading IRA member. Special Branch was desperate to catch such a leading IRA figure in the act and employed a massive surveillance operation each weekend. This involved the SAS, E4A (an SB surveillance unit) and 14 Intelligence Unit in a huge stakeout of a particular Republican haunt, which ran a disco every Saturday night. The problem for the SAS was one of manpower, and in order to commit itself to the weekend operation it was forced to lift the OP on the public house every Saturday night.

On the second week, the guys in the OP watching the home of the two policemen were spotted by a local farmer and asked to be withdrawn. SB was informed of the dilemma and begged the SAS unit to stay in position. The final decision was down to the men on the ground, who opted to withdraw. However, 12 hours later, as the two police officers were returning from duty, their car was badly shot up. The IRA had positioned themselves between the house and where the SAS OP had been. Had they remained in place, they would have had the IRA gunmen. As luck would have it, only one of the two policemen was injured in the attack.

The following weekend, every available man was committed to the operation around the disco, and as usual the OP on the pub was pulled off for the night. The surveillance operation went smoothly but, as with the previous two weekends, nothing happened. At around 02:00, the operation was called off. One SAS car was to drop off the crew for the pub OP on its way back to base.

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