For days at a time, SAS operatives lay hidden in freezing hedgerows and fields, watching and waiting. Discovery could mean capture – or death.
In this episode of SAS: The Shadow War, The Independent’s world affairs editor Sam Kiley enters the covert surveillance war between British Special Forces and the Provisional IRA. One former soldier recalls a terrifying encounter in South Armagh, when a farmer soaked his hiding place in petrol and told his young son to strike a match.
As the IRA adapted its tactics and the conflict intensified, the dangers extended far beyond the men concealed in the undergrowth. Through first-hand accounts, Kiley reveals the risks of a war fought largely out of sight – and the toll it took on those caught up in it.
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