It's a lesson that hardly warrants a full library: an aphorism on a kitchen wall should be enough if the message resounding in your own heart doesn't suffice. But what is there to learn? Just play nice and don't go murdering each other. People say it's important to read up on wars, on how and why they were conducted, in order to learn from the experience. Both the intellectual and the romantic approach do nothing for me to detract from my conviction that at the root of war there is pure evil, plain and simple, no matter how much yarn you spin around it.

All these pages that glorify, rationalise and romanticise the biggest atrocities mankind has committed never managed to ignite my interest much. The territory of military history books in bookshops is mostly undiscovered terrain for me. 'With correct timing and in suitable country, with or without the help of the local population, a small specially trained force can achieve results out of all proportion to its numbers.' It is a story about the meaning of courage. The result is an exhilarating tale of fearlessness and heroism, recklessness and tragedy of extraordinary men who were willing to take monumental risks. It has opened its secret archives for the first time, granting historian Ben Macintyre full access to a treasure trove of unseen reports, memos, diaries, letters, maps and photographs, as well as free rein to interview surviving Originals and those who knew them. Now, 75 years later, the SAS has finally decided to tell its astonishing story.

So began the most celebrated and mysterious military organisation in the world: the SAS. In the summer of 1941, at the height of the war in the Western Desert, a bored and eccentric young officer, David Stirling, came up with a plan that was radical and entirely against the rules: a small undercover unit that would inflict mayhem behind enemy lines.ĭespite intense opposition, Winston Churchill personally gave Stirling permission to recruit the toughest, brightest and most ruthless soldiers he could find.

Ben macintyre sas