First into Action

UPDATED EDITION WITH NEW INSIGHTS

The first Special Boat Services memoir written from the inside...

The SBS was first into battle a month before the SAS in the Falklands War and again in the Gulf War, yet hitherto it is the SAS that has had by far the higher profile. The SBS draws its manpower solely from the Marine Commando Units, and the Royal Marines are the oldest and most battle-honoured regiment in the world.

First Into Action tells how Duncan Falconer was recruited into the SBS at Poole in Dorset weeks after completing Royal Marines training. Several years later he joined the top secret 14th Intelligence Detachment in Northern Ireland. The book graphically describes the ruthless regimen of the SBS selection course and includes revelatory accounts of Special Forces operations in Ulster, the Falklands and the Gulf War. It also describes the intense rivalry between the SAS's individualist mentality and the more team-based, Marine ethos of the SBS.