SAS veteran Andy McNab says it is “madness” to investigate five members of his former regiment for killing a terror suspect.
He spoke out as it emerged the soldiers — whose regimental motto is Who Dares Wins — could face charges for opening fire at point-blank range in Syria in 2022.
Andy is a former Special Air Service sergeant[/caption]
They thought the man was wearing a suicide vest but author McNab, 64, said troops would be in danger if fear of prosecutions made them hesitate on missions.
He said: “The SAS are in the business of killing people — it’s not a knitting circle.
“We need them to make split-second life or death decisions.
“If you didn’t see, hear or feel what went on on the ground, it is madness for people to try and make judgments now, about something that happened two years ago.
“If soldiers on operations are always wondering what will happen two years down the line, are they going to be prosecuted, it’ll lead to hesitation and that’ll lead to soldiers getting killed.
“If we are putting people in those positions — to make life or death decisions — we have to get the right people and trust them to make the right decision.”
McNab was captured and held for six weeks on an SAS patrol in the Gulf War, which he fictionalised in novel Bravo Two Zero.
Ex-Major General Chip Chapman, who ran counter-terror operations at the Ministry of Defence, insisted the SAS was not above the law. He said: “All soldiers are held to account.”
The five SAS troopers are suspected of repeatedly firing at a suspect who was lying motionless behind a bush.
They found a suicide vest nearby — but he was not wearing it when he was killed.
Andy McNab is his pen name[/caption]
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