Sas Quotes

Above all, I feel a quiet pride that for the rest of my days I can look at myself in the mirror and know that once upon a time I was good enough. Good enough to call myself a member of the SAS. Some things don't have a price tag. ~ Bear Grylls

A friend once asked me what qualities were needed for SAS. I would say to be self-motivated and resilient; to be calm, yet have the ability to smile when it is grim; to be unflappable, be able to react fast and to have an 'improvise, adapt and overcome' mentality. ~ Bear Grylls

The streets, at least in this part of town, seemed impossibly clean in comparison to London. The public telephones were unvandalised. For a London telephone booth to look like that it would have to be guarded around the clock by the SAS. ~ Clive James

The SAS is the most elite of the special forces in the world. They are not people who go out and advertise; they keep it inside. They don't want anybody to know about them. ~ Taylor Hackford

The rush I got from crime was better than that of glue, drink or hash. I loved playing cat and mouse with the local coppers. He Who Dares Wins, the SAS motto, was very applicable to my life then. ~ Stephen Richards

The Piper's playing again, and there's a full orchestra.'
There was a long silence as Andrew deciphered the cryptic statement. 'A FULL orchestra? ~ D.J. Stutley

The great thing about the British SAS was that they viewed war the same way the American Special Operations community did. You didn't win by thinking inside the box and following someone else's rules. You turned the box upside down and made your own rules, no matter what the enemy threw at you. ~ Brad Thor

No one was expecting the six-man team of elite SAS officers to storm the prison, but that is exactly what they did do. Hurling stun grenade and tear gas canisters, they entered the jail through a skylight before freeing the terrified prison warder. ~ Stephen Richards

I woke in bed, sweating and breathing heavily. It was the third time I'd had this nightmare: reliving that horrible feeling of falling, out of control, toward the ground.
I was now on month two of just lying there prone, supposedly recovering. But I wasn't getting any better.
In fact, if anything, my back felt worse.
I couldn't move and was getting angrier and angrier inside. Angry at myself; angry at everything.
I was angry because I was shit-scared.
My plans, my dreams for the future hung in shreds. Nothing was certain any more. I didn't know if I'd be able to stay with the SAS. I didn't even know if I'd recover at all.
Lying unable to move, sweating with frustration, my way of escaping was in my mind.
I still had so much that I dreamt of doing.
I looked around my bedroom, and the old picture I had of Mount Everest seemed to peer down.
Dad's and my crazy dream.
It had become what so many dreams become--just that--nothing more, nothing less.
Covered in dust. Never a reality.
And Everest felt further beyond the realms of possibility than ever.
Weeks later, and still in my brace, I struggled over to the picture and took it down.
People often say to me that I must have been so positive to recover from a broken back, but that would be a lie. It was the darkest, most horrible time I can remember.
I had lost my sparkle and spirit, and that is so much of who I am.
And once you lost that spirit, it is ha ~ Bear Grylls

Once upon a time there was a Scottish SAS soldier in Kabul. He met a Soviet Spetsnaz soldier. They were enemies first, then shagged for nine years, fell in love at some stage. Dragons, battles, and damsels in distress in between, until an evil wizard took the Spetsnaz away. The Scot and the damsel battled the vile foes, until the Russian returned, but the evil spell still hat him in its claws. More dragons, battles, knights in not-so shiny armour later, the spell got broken, the Princes got reunited, and our Russian and Scotsman kind of lived happily ever after. (Dan) ~ Aleksandr Voinov

Once the screws left, most of the six or seven boys who had been overpowered by the SAS were not in any fit state to move, never mind talk. In May 1988 Malkie and Sammo and one other boy, whose name escapes me right now, got a total of twenty-seven years between them for mobbing and rioting and assault. ~ Stephen Richards

In the end I concluded, nothing ventured, nothing gained. (A vital ethos to follow if life is to have flavor, I have since learned.)
I knew I should at least attempt Selection.
If I failed, well at least I would fail while trying. Facedown in the dirt. Knowing that I had given it my all. (Oh, and what's more, I knew that the SAS required secrecy from anyone attempting Selection, which was perfect. If I failed, I concluded, at least no one would know!)
So that was the plan; but in truth, if I could have had any idea of the pain and battering that my body would go through on Selection, I would have realized it was insane to continue with this mad dream.
But luckily, we never really know what the future holds. ~ Bear Grylls

The journey up to battle camp started badly.
"If you can't even load a bloody truck with all your kit properly, then you've got no bloody chance of passing what's ahead of you, I can assure you of that!" Taff, our squadron DS, barked at us in the barracks before leaving.
I, for one, was more on edge than I had ever felt so far on Selection.
I was carsick on the journey north, and I hadn't felt that since I'd been a kid heading back to school. It was nerves.
We also quizzed Taff for advice on what to expect and how to survive the "capture-initiation" phase.
His advice to Trucker and me was simple: "You two toffs just keep your mouths shut--23 DS tend to hate recruits who've been to private school."
The 23 SAS were running the battle camp (it generally alternated between 21 and 23 SAS), and 23 were always regarded as tough, straight-talking, hard-drinking, fit-as-hell soldiers. We had last been with them at Test Week all those months earlier, and rumor was that "the 23 DS are going to make sure that any 21 recruits get it the worst."
Trucker and I hoped simply to try and stay "gray men" and not be noticed. To put our heads down and get on and quietly do the work.
This didn't exactly go according to plan.
"Where are the lads who speak like Prince Charles?" The 23 DS shouted on the first parade when we arrived.
"Would you both like newspapers with your morning tea, gents?" the DS sarcastically enquired.
Part of me was tempted ~ Bear Grylls

He shuffled up to the stake and examined the impaled, naked, dead man. The stake entered his anus and protruded through his gaping mouth, his death mask frozen in a look of horror. ~ Anthony Hulse

The SAS Reserve tends to be made up of former paratroopers and commandos who still want a challenge, but it is open to civilians. ~ Bear Grylls

I was attached to the SAS from time to time, but we are forbidden - former, present, or future - to discuss any specific operations. ~ Christopher Lee

!!!!!!!!!!NO TRESPASSING!!!!!!!!!!
All trespassers will be shot on sight. All survivors will be shot again. ~ SAS Institute

I was soon discharged from the rehab center and sent back to the SAS. But the doctor's professional opinion was that I shouldn't military parachute again. It was too risky. One dodgy landing, at night, in full kit, and my patched-up spine could crumple.
He didn't even mention the long route marches carrying huge weights on our backs.
Every SF soldier knows that a weak back is not a good opener for life in an SAS squadron.
It is also a cliché just how many SAS soldiers' backs and knees are plated and pinned together, after years of marches and jumps. Deep down I knew the odds weren't looking great for me in the squadron, and that was a very hard pill to swallow.
But it was a decision that, sooner or later, I would have to face up to. The doctors could give me their strong recommendations, but ultimately I had to make the call.
A familiar story. Life is all about our decisions. And big decisions can often be hard to make.
So I thought I would buy myself some time before I made it.
In the meantime, at the squadron, I took on the role of teaching survival to other units. I also helped the intelligence guys while my old team were out on the ground training.
But it was agony for me. Not physically, but mentally: watching the guys go out, fired up, tight, together, doing the job and getting back excited and exhausted. That was what I should have been doing.
I hated sitting in an ops room making tea for intelligence officers.
I tried ~ Bear Grylls

Dad always warned that it was misleading when one imagined people, when one sas them in the Mind's Eye, because one never remembered them as they really were, with as many inconsistencies as there were hairs on a human head (100,000 to 200,000). Instead, the mind used a lazy shorthand, smoothed the person over into their most dominating characteristic
their pessimism or insecurity (something really being lazy, turning them into either Nice or Mean)
and one made the mistake of judging them from this basis alone and risked, on a subsequent encounter, being dangerously surprised. ~ Marisha Pessl

I got bored and then joined the British SAS. It was five very exciting years of my life, and then I'd always had this passion for swimming, so started swimming around the world, in some of the most exotic and distant and dangerous locations. ~ Lewis Pugh

Uncle Lo sas that it's not a party until there's salsa. It's a party rule, right?' She looks to Jane.
'Well...' Jane muses the idea for too long.
I cut in, 'My dad could also eat five hot sauce packets for brunch and nothing else.'

'Famous ones,' Farrow calls out and our heads turn to him. 'There's no salsa rule for parties. Not normal. ~ Becca Ritchie

So that is how we came to be standing in a sparse room, in a nondescript building in the barracks at SAS HQ--just a handful out of all those who had started out so many months earlier.
We shuffled around impatiently. We were ready.
Ready, finally, to get badged as SAS soldiers.
The colonel of the regiment walked in, dressed casually in lightweight camo trousers, shirt, beret, and blue SAS belt.
He smiled at us.
"Well done, lads. Hard work, isn't it?"
We smiled back.
"You should be proud today. But remember: this is only the beginning. The real hard work starts now, when you return to your squadron. Many are called, few are chosen. Live up to that." He paused.
"And from now on for the rest of your life remember this: you are part of the SAS family. You've earned that. And it is the finest family in the world. But what makes our work here extraordinary is that everyone here goes that little bit extra. When everyone else gives up, we give more. That is what sets us apart."
It is a speech I have never forgotten.
I stood there, my boots worn, cracked, and muddy, my trousers ripped, and wearing a sweaty black T-shirt.
I felt prouder than I had ever felt in my life.
We all came to attention--no pomp and ceremony. We each shook the colonel's hand and were handed the coveted SAS sandy beret.
Along the way, I had come to learn that it was never about the beret--it was about what it stood for: camaraderie, sweat, skill, hu ~ Bear Grylls