Explores the official history of the Australian SAS, a special forces unit of the Australian Army, from it's inception t | dHNfazQxYUFPLURJaXM
Category
📺
TVTranscript
00:00 They operate in strictest secrecy at the cutting edge of Australia's defence.
00:07 They're creative, unorthodox and comfortable in chaos.
00:19 For over 50 years the Australian SAS has put their lives at risk deep in enemy territory.
00:26 This is the only television history ever supported by this highly secretive regiment.
00:33 We take you beyond the stereotypes to reveal the unexpected story of the real people who
00:47 transformed SAS from the ugly duckling of the Australian Army into pride of place as
00:54 Australia's force of first choice.
01:01 We take you on a journey through the history of SAS operations in both war and peace, starting
01:16 with the rise of special forces in World War II.
01:20 We penetrate the philosophy of the fearful SAS selection course and follow SAS into the
01:26 savage jungles of Borneo and Vietnam.
01:30 In response to the rise of global terrorism and asymmetric warfare, we'll see SAS reinvent
01:35 itself as Australia's crack counter-terrorist force.
01:40 Its versatility flourishes in third world operations in Timor and Africa.
01:45 It weathers the Black Hawk disaster and the Tampa crisis.
01:50 In the recent operations in Iraq and Afghanistan, SAS has excelled itself.
01:57 Using rare archival and amateur vision, we examine the unusual, unorthodox military culture
02:03 of SAS. A culture that relishes change and has continually reinvented itself to survive.
02:10 We examine how SAS soldiers think and what makes them so successful.
02:17 And during survival course you're taught to catch a cobra, how to cook a tarantula and
02:26 a scorpion.
02:28 We were taken to 10,000 feet and just thrown out and just thought ourselves out quick smart.
02:34 The sky, the ground, the sky, the ground, the sky, the ground and you just tumble.
02:39 We would help them with their health problems and we had some really significant results
02:46 there. Perhaps help deliver children. Try and do something about the hygiene in the
02:55 village which was pretty ghastly.
02:59 We were not afraid of the American GIs, Australian infantry or South Vietnamese troops. But we
03:06 hated the Australian SAS Rangers because they make comrades disappear very suddenly.
03:13 People need to remember that the 1970s was a period awash with terrorism. The Red Brigades,
03:22 the PLO, the PLFP.
03:24 So we were able to get probably within five to six metres, be able to put two rounds in
03:31 rapid pace, basically within an inch of each other. That was expected.
03:38 I knew that General Mattis wanted us to physically and psychologically dislocate the Taliban in
03:46 the south.
03:47 And she was just sitting there with blood dripping and not saying a word. We had no
03:52 idea where to start. Everybody had horrific injuries like this and there were hundreds.
03:58 We kept pushing. We didn't want to destroy any of the civilian infrastructure because
04:01 again the whole aim of this was to get Iraq back on its feet very quickly as an upstanding
04:08 member of the global community.
04:10 An example was the thing that I termed as the Temple of Doom. He came up with a plan
04:17 of breaking the sound barrier above the two cement silos. He came down very low, very
04:22 fast, straight over the cement factory but didn't break the sound barrier.
04:26 He got on the radio and said, "How was that?" I said, "That was excellent, mate. It was
04:29 fantastic but you didn't break the sound barrier." And he was absolutely devastated.
04:33 And he asked me again if he could have another go. I said, "Sure, have another go."
04:37 And he come back around. It was a thunderous crack. And it was done right over the top
04:43 of the cement conning towers or cement silos.
04:47 We were able to disarm all the guards.
04:52 During the battle it became apparent that a lot of the B-52 strikes were wasted on probably
04:58 missions that didn't need to be conducted. So we requested through the CAOC that we get
05:03 control of the B-52s, which we did, and had airstrikes conducted in an area where I thought
05:09 the enemy would be affected to a greater extent.
05:12 Our team leader, Matt, had incredible tactical cunning. Matt began to have an "aha" moment.
05:19 He all of a sudden began to realize and shape the picture of the battle space through the
05:26 enemy's eyes. He began to realize that if I was the enemy, this is where I would be
05:33 reinforcing, this is where I would have my mortar positions, this is how I would run
05:37 my supply line. I was able to task the Predator to look at those areas. And as the Predator
05:43 was moving around and looking at those areas, lo and behold, there was the enemy.
05:48 The mortar positions were tents, they were trucks carrying ammunition, they were encampments
05:57 of the enemy, and most of these were along creek beds.
06:00 When the gunships checked in at night, inevitably they would find something there, report back
06:04 to us what they see. We would give them a clear hot, which means that they could engage.
06:10 We utilized the A-10s. There was two A-10s. And then as the Predator would find a new
06:15 target, I'd roll the A-10 on that target, and the gunship would continue firing on that
06:21 one. And then the Predator would find another target. And then I would move the C-130, the
06:27 AC-130, to that target. We leapfrogged.
06:30 Many nights we had four gunships, you know, back to back. One would turn up full and go
06:35 home. And the Americans call it Winchester. When they're Winchester, they run out of all
06:38 ammunition. So they would check in full and go home, Winchester, four of them in a night.
06:44 That happened for a lot of nights.