Blunt and bold, the SAS soldier I knew

Indeed, in recent years this lowland Scot must have been one of the most well-known special forces characters across the entire globe, especially following his appearance on several TV programmes about the now famous regiment.

Ironically, when many members and ex-members of the small regular Hereford-based unit have taken to hiding their identity – apparently from fear of attracting undue attention from terrorists – John was one of the first to express the opposite view.

In typically prosaic B Squadron language, he held that this approach, other than being careful about home details, was “a right load of bollocks”.

A former Royal Engineer, he volunteered for the regiment long before it became a household name, not only out of a sense of adventure, but because he wanted to learn more about soldiering.

His path to worldwide fame started at precisely 19:23 on Bank Holiday Monday, 5 May, 1980, when live on television he was seen as one of Blue Team’s sudden assault across the balcony of the Iranian Embassy in Princes Gate, South Kensington.

At that point, like all other members of Blue and Red teams, he was dressed in black overalls and balaclava, wearing a respirator and carrying a Heckler and Koch MP 5 sub machine gun, which contrasted starkly with the white background of the building.

This image is an iconic one, still seared into the psyche of the nation, which up until that dramatic moment had very little knowledge of what the regiment was about.

His immediate actions, including the despatch of stun grenades, led to the release of the journalist Sim Harris and, crucially, distracted the six terrorists inside.

Meanwhile, Red Team, at the rear of the embassy building, carried out – or rather struggled to carry out – the main assault (one of the newly-purchased abseil ropes jammed, leading to a short delay and the serious burning of one of the troopers).

The SAS action, mounted after a six-day containment operation by the Metropolitan Police (which was curtailed on the orders of Home Secretary Willie Whitelaw following the appalling execution of Abbas Lavasani, the embassy press officer) lasted a mere 17 minutes.

It led to the safe release of the remaining hostages taken by the six Iraqi terrorists who had been demanding freedom for a little-known region close to Iran, known as Khuzestan. Five of them died in the attempt – the sixth, Fowzi Nejad, was released from prison only very recently.

Leaving the regiment much later a well-respected and decorated individual, John became involved in a number of private ventures, as well as two marriages.

TV appearances apart, he ran a small pub in Herefordshire for a while, but it is believed that litigation problems with the MoD over his public pronouncements eventually led him to move abroad and to Greece.

More recently, in 2009, his anguished face once more appeared in the headlines, this time as he agonised over the death of his beloved son, Paul, a sergeant in 2 Rifles who had been killed (some say typically like his father) trying to rescue a comrade in Afghanistan.

Many have observed that John never got over this loss – especially as he always hoped his son would follow him into the SAS – and that the surrounding trauma may have contributed to his premature death, at the age of 61.

He was a larger-than-life character, but a canny operator all the same, and the sort of individual anyone would want to have around in a tight situation.

His wry sense of humour was never far from the surface and it was always a comfort to him that the moment he appeared on the balcony at Princes Gate, the bank holiday showing of one of John Wayne’s films was spiked.

On this occasion, his Darth Vader-like image frightened the producers and the nation; but really it was his obvious integrity and that moustache which impressed us all.

l Clive Fairweather was second-in-command of the SAS during the 1980 Iranian embassy siege