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A former senior officer within the UK Special Forces has revealed to a public inquiry, during confidential sessions, that two previous heads of these elite units deliberately suppressed evidence pointing to potential war crimes committed by the SAS. This witness, identified only as N1466 in the inquiry, stated that in 2011 he had handed over what he described as “explosive” material indicating “criminal behaviour” to the then-serving director of special forces. Furthermore, he testified that the subsequent director, who assumed command in 2012, was aware of the issues in Afghanistan but chose not to take appropriate action.
N1466’s testimony is particularly notable because it is the first time a former senior special forces officer has claimed that senior SAS leadership systematically concealed allegations of war crimes. He confirmed that neither of the directors in question reported these serious allegations to the Royal Military Police (RMP), despite the legal obligation within British military law requiring commanders to alert the RMP when any serious criminal conduct is suspected within their ranks. Due to the inquiry’s confidentiality rules, the names of the former directors accused cannot be publicly disclosed.
The impetus for this Afghan inquiry followed the BBC Panorama investigation in 2022, which exposed that during a six-month deployment, 54 detainees and unarmed men had been killed under suspicious circumstances by the SAS. The investigation also pointed to the failure of the 2012 director special forces, General Sir Mark Carleton-Smith, to report these grave claims to military police. At the inquiry’s start, both Carleton-Smith and his predecessor, Lt Gen Jonathan Page, were named in relation to allegations that they neglected their duty to inform the RMP about these incidents.
The witness N1466 described how his concerns began in early 2011 when he observed SAS operational reports from Afghanistan indicating unusually high numbers of killings with disproportionately few enemy weapons recovered. His suspicions heightened after a night raid resulting in the deaths of nine Afghan men, though only three weapons were recorded as seized. Years later, BBC Panorama visited the scene and found bullet holes confined near ground level. Experts suggested this was evidence that the victims had been shot while lying down, casting doubt on the SAS’s claim of a firefight. N1466 also mentioned whistleblower reports of SAS personnel boasting in training about indiscriminately killing all “fighting-age” males, regardless of threat, which, along with operational reports, left him convinced that war crimes had occurred.
In response to his concerns, in April 2011, N1466 initiated a review of recent SAS activities carried out by another special forces officer. The review’s results were described as “startlingly bad,” and he relayed these findings to the director special forces at the time, emphasizing the likelihood of criminal behaviour. Despite this, the director opted not to involve the military police but instead commissioned an internal review of SAS tactics, which amounted to little more than a superficial investigation. N1466 condemned this as a deliberate attempt to cover up the issues, noting that the subsequent review accepted the SAS’s version of events without scrutiny.
Bruce Houlder KC, a former director of service prosecutions, emphasized the legal responsibility on commanding officers to report suspected crimes, including murder. He stated, “If this came to my knowledge I would have asked the service police to investigate the DSF for that failure to report in 2011.” Ultimately, N1466 did report the evidence directly to the Royal Military Police in January 2015, nearly four years after initially raising his concerns and only after the RMP had launched Operation Northmoor, investigating the SAS. He expressed regret for not making this report sooner, observing that earlier intervention might have prevented further unnecessary deaths, including those of two toddlers shot in their beds during a 2012 SAS raid in Nimruz province.
The 2012 director special forces has rejected the allegations made by N1466. In a statement to the BBC, he asserted that none of his senior commanders raised concerns or presented evidence of unlawful killings during his tenure, and he promised a detailed response to the inquiry at the appropriate time. The former director from 2011, however, did not provide a comment when approached
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