On a moonless night in early 1943, a small group of heavily armed jeeps slipped across the Tunisian border and into Axis-held territory. Their mission was top secret and extremely risky – to travel hundreds of miles through the desert to link up with advancing Allied forces and provide vital intelligence on enemy positions. Leading this daring operation was Major David Stirling, founder of an elite new British Army unit known as the Special Air Service or SAS. Riding along with Stirling was 21-year-old Trooper Mike Sadler, already a veteran of several hair-raising SAS exploits behind German and Italian lines.
The strategic situation in North Africa at the time was precarious. After defeating the Germans and Italians at El Alamein in October 1942, the British Eighth Army under General Bernard Montgomery was pushing west towards Tunisia. Meanwhile, American and British troops had landed in Morocco and Algeria during Operation Torch, advancing east. In between, however, Axis forces maintained a tenuous grip on supply lines through Libya. Disrupting those lines and pinpointing enemy units for attack by the main Allied armies was a key mission of the SAS.
Stirling had pioneered the concept of small, highly mobile teams conducting special reconnaissance, intelligence gathering, and sabotage deep in enemy territory. The SAS underwent intensive training in desert survival, navigation, demolitions, and hit-and-run tactics. Armed with machine guns and powerful Lewes bombs, they became experts at appearing out of nowhere to strike high-value targets, then vanishing back into the wilderness.
The SAS quickly proved its worth in North Africa. Between November 1941 and December 1942, Stirling‘s men destroyed an estimated 400 Axis aircraft in nightly raids on airfields. They also tied down large numbers of German and Italian troops in fruitless attempts to hunt them down. One analysis suggests the SAS accounted for 10-15% of all Axis losses in the Desert Campaign, despite numbering just a few hundred men. Their success was a key factor in the Allied victory.
For Mike Sadler and the dozen other men on the 1943 Tunisia mission, the first challenge was simply reaching their destination undetected. They drove for days on rarely used tracks, navigating by compass and the sun. Occasionally, they glimpsed enemy patrols or aircraft in the distance, but managed to avoid contact. At one point, they had to abandon several jeeps loaded with extra fuel, leaving them exposed with no backup.
As they neared the front lines, the danger increased. One night, the SAS column nearly blundered into a German airfield. "We suddenly found aeroplanes appearing around us," Sadler later recalled. "It was a nightmare." The next day brought disaster when an Afrika Korps unit surprised the SAS team as they slept in a desert wadi. "I was being kicked by somebody," Sadler remembered. "I looked up and there was an Afrika Korps fellow poking me with his Schmeisser [submachine gun]."
In a split-second decision, Sadler and two others made a run for it, scrambling up a hillside under fire. "It was that or end up in a POW camp," he said. For the next week, the three men made an epic trek across the desert to reach safety, marching over 100 miles with little food and only a leaking goatskin of water to keep them alive. "Along the way we met bad Arabs and good Arabs," said Sadler. "We were stoned by the bad ones but the good ones gave us an old goatskin full of water. We had to tie up holes in the sides."
Exhausted and in tatters, Sadler and his comrades finally reached French lines near the oasis of Tozeur. But their ordeal wasn‘t over. Since they were now in the American sector, the French couldn‘t vouch for them, and U.S. forces initially treated the men as possible German spies. Only after being taken to New Zealand General Bernard Freyberg were they able to report what they had learned about Axis positions and terrain. Sadler was then evacuated, while David Stirling and the rest of the SAS team remained in captivity for the duration.
For the SAS, the mission had been a costly failure, but Sadler‘s harrowing escape and the intelligence he brought back were vital proof of the bravery and determination of these elite soldiers. The SAS went on to play a key role in the Allied invasions of Sicily and Italy, then France, the Netherlands, Belgium, and Germany, often operating far ahead of conventional units. Stirling himself was captured in Tunisia in early 1943 and spent the rest of the war as a POW, but his vision of special forces engaging in raids, counterinsurgency, intelligence gathering, and winning "hearts and minds" set the standard for decades to come.
After the war, Sadler rarely spoke about his time with the SAS, preferring to focus on the future. But his story, along with those of other early special forces soldiers, needs to be remembered. As British military historian Damien Lewis notes in his book "SAS Ghost Patrol", these men "laid the foundations for all modern special forces operations, whether it be the SAS, Delta Force, Seal Team Six or others." Their physical toughness, mental resilience, and ability to adapt and innovate in the harshest environments imaginable was remarkable.
Perhaps even more extraordinary was the psychological strain these soldiers endured. Operating in small groups in hostile territory, often outnumbered and with little chance of rescue if things went wrong, required a unique mindset. "You developed a sort of fatalism that you probably wouldn‘t come out alive," one SAS veteran admitted. "But there was an intense loyalty to one another and you did the job because it had to be done." This combination of individual initiative and fierce commitment to the team would define special forces culture down to the present day.
In the annals of WWII, names like Stirling and the SAS may lack the same recognition as a Montgomery, Patton, or Rommel. But their impact on the war was significant and their legacy is felt whenever special forces are called upon to undertake dangerous covert missions far from public view. As Damien Lewis writes, "We owe it to them to record their stories and remember their sacrifice. For it was through such men as these…that the Allies‘ victory over Nazi Germany was made possible."
Mike Sadler never considered himself a hero, insisting he was merely doing his duty. But heroes are often those reluctant to claim that title. His quiet courage and indomitable spirit in the face of incredible odds exemplify the ethos of the SAS and all who follow in their footsteps. As we approach the 80th anniversary of the SAS‘s founding, it‘s fitting to recall his tale and pay tribute to the elite soldiers who have risked all to protect our freedom.
