From Oman to the Gulf
The author of this remarkable memoir is exceptionally well placed to comment on events which, through the publication of a number of pseudonymous SAS accounts, have all too often been widely promoted as "the full story". "The way they tell it" he writes, "is not the way it happened," and it is typical of the man that he should choose to put his own name to these controversial, dramatic and often thought-provoking memoirs - in doing so, he corrects many of the distortions and exaggerations of earlier accounts.
'Eye of the Storm' does not always make comfortable reading, and many will be surprised to find the author occasionally critical of the regiment he loves, but in which at times he found stupidity, bad faith, and even incompetence. His insight into SAS involvement in world events over a quarter-century is interspersed with his undramatised descriptions of ferocious and bloody fighting, of horrific death and astonishing acts of heroism. The narrative is peopled with a cast of extraordinary individuals, as well as soldiers who have since become household names, among them: General de la Billiere, General Rose, US General Schwarzkopf (Stormin Norman).
The book includes: SAS selection and training details; information on weapons and equipment; details of operations (where it is safe to give them).
This is a balanced, truthful and long-overdue account of the SAS in action and out of it, by a decorated soldier uniquely fitted, both by character and by his senior position in the regiment, to tell of events as they really happened. It is earthy, dramatic, often extremely funny, occasionally disturbing and always intensely interesting.
