- published: 19 Nov 2014
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The United Kingdom Special Forces (UKSF) is a UK Ministry of Defence Directorate which also has the capability to provide a Joint Special Operations Task Force Headquarters. UKSF is commanded by Director Special Forces (DSF), a Major General.
UKSF was formed in 1987 to draw together the Army's Special Air Service (SAS) and the Special Boat Squadron Royal Marines (SBS), which was renamed the Special Boat Service at the same time, into a unified command, based around the former Director SAS who was given the additional title of Director Special Forces. The directorate has been expanded by the creation of the Joint Special Forces Aviation Wing, the Special Reconnaissance Regiment and the Special Forces Support Group.
UKSF assets undertake a number of roles, with a degree of interaction and interoperability:
The badge of each UKSF unit shares a representation of the Sword of Damocles (or Excalibur) in common.
The UKSF is supported by a number of units:
The Joint Special Forces Aviation Wing provides fixed-wing and rotary-wing support to UKSF. Four units of the Army Air Corps (AAC) and the Royal Air Force (RAF) are thought to have the task of supporting British Special Operations:
Special forces, or special operations forces are terms used to describe highy-trained military units trained to perform unconventional, often high-risk missions.
Special forces, as they would now be recognised, emerged in the early 20th century, with a significant growth in the field during the Second World War.
Special forces capabilities include the following:
Special forces have played an important role throughout the history of warfare whenever the aim has been to achieve disruption by "hit and run" and sabotage, rather than more traditional conventional army combat. Other significant roles lay in reconnaissance, providing essential intelligence from close to or among the enemy, and increasingly in combating terrorists, their infrastructure and activities.
Chinese strategist Jiang Ziya, in his Six Secret Teachings, describes recruiting talented and highly-motivated men for serving in specialized elite units with such functions as commanding heights and making rapid long-distance advances.Hamilcar Barca in Sicily (249 BC) had specialized troops trained to launch several offensives per day. In the late Roman or early Byzantine period, Roman fleets used small, fast camouflaged ships crewed by selected men for scouting and commando missions. Similarly, Muslim forces also had several naval special operations units, including one which used camouflaged ships to gather intelligence and launch raids, and another which consisted of soldiers who could pass for Crusaders who would use ruses to board enemy ships and then capture and destroy them. While more commonly known as spies and assassins, Japanese ninja were sometimes used as assault troops or fortress guards, or otherwise fought alongside more conventional soldiers. During the Napoleonic wars, rifle and sapper units were formed who held more specialised roles in reconnaissance and skirmishing and were not committed to the formal battle lines.
Sergeant ‘Andy McNab’ DCM MM (born 28 December 1959) is the pseudonym of an English novelist and former SAS operative and soldier.
McNab came into public prominence in 1993, when he published his account of the Special Air Service (SAS) patrol, Bravo Two Zero for which he was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal in 1991. He had previously received the Military Medal in 1980, awarded for an action whilst serving with the Royal Green Jackets in Northern Ireland during 1979.
In addition to Bravo Two Zero he has written two other autobiographies and a number of fiction books.
McNab was born on 28 December 1959. Found abandoned on the steps of Guy's Hospital in Southwark, he was brought up in Peckham, with his adoptive family. He did not do well in school so dropped out and worked at various odd jobs, usually for friends and relatives, and was partly inspired to join the British Army because of his brother's time in the army.
He was involved in petty criminality until being arrested for burglary. In 1976, shortly after his arrest, he aspired to a career as an army pilot, but failed the entry test. In the same year, he enlisted with the Royal Green Jackets at the age of sixteen.
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