85 Years Ago: SAS Cleared Hot
Below, signed 10 November 1941, is the Eight Army order for Operation Squatter, the first SAS mission, which was to be executed on the 16th-18th November, with men drawn from “L” Section, 1 S.A.S. Bde.
Conceived by Lt. David Stirling, the 57-man raid began with a clandestine parachute drop via five twin-engined Bristol Bombay transports behind Axis lines to destroy German and Italian aircraft on the ground at forward airfields (Gazala and Timimi), in support of the planned British Operation Crusader offensive.
SAS volunteers jumping from steel gantries while undergoing parachute training at Kabrit, Egypt. 7 November 1941. Smith, Albert Norman Mitchell and Clements, Harold John K.P., No. 1 Army Film and Photo Section, Army Film and Photographic Unit. IWM (E 6390)
SAS volunteers emplane into an RAF Bristol Bombay transport aircraft prior to a practice jump while undergoing parachute training at Kabrit, Egypt. 7 November 1941. Smith, Albert Norman Mitchell and Clements, Harold John K.P. No. 1 Army Film and Photo Section, Army Film and Photographic Unit. IWM (E 6404)
While it sounds classic North Africa SAS, Squatter was an absolute failure, with one Bombay lost, killing 15 operators right off the bat, and the rest of the force scattered across intractable desert during a freak desert gale and rainstorm, their surviving explosives soaked and useless. Just 22 survivors managed to ex-fil on foot in some 36 hours to a rendezvous point with the LRDG, while everyone else was killed or captured.
Post-Squatter, the SAS took a cue from the LRDG and switched from paradrops to trucks and jeeps, which proved key later, such as in Paddy Mayne’s wildly successful Tamet Airfield Raid the next month and the 18-jeep Sidi Haneish Airfield Raid the following July, by which time the force had grown to some 400 men.
Colonel David Stirling, founder of the Special Air Service, with an SAS jeep patrol in North Africa, 18 January 1943. Keating, Geoffrey John, No. 1 Army Film and Photo Section, Army Film and Photographic Unit. IWM (E 21338)
The SAS was disbanded at the end of the war, but reformed as a Territorial unit in 1947—21st Battalion, Special Air Service Regiment (Artists Rifles)—and was formally added to the Army list as the 22nd SAS in 1952.
Based at Hereford since 1960, the Regiment’s boathouse color has gone on to live its own life.