Sniper Fire in Belfast

Sniper Fire in Belfast
Shaun Clarke

Ultimate soldier. Ultimate mission. But can the SAS survive working deep undercover among the terrorists of Northern Ireland?It is the 1970s, and a mean and dirty war is being waged on British soil. Sectarian violence is an almost daily occurrence and the terrorist groups, who finance their operations through robbery, fraud and extortion, engage in torture, assassination and wholesale slaughter.To cope with the terrorists’ activities the British Army need the support of exceptional soldiers who can operate deep undercover – the SAS. The regiment is soon embroiled in some of the most secretive, dangerous and controversial activities in its history. These include plain-clothes work in the towns and cities, the running of operational posts in rural areas, surveillance and intelligence gathering, ambushes and daring cross-border raids.Sniper Fire in Belfast is a nerve-jangling adventure about the most daring soldiers in military history, where friend and foe look the same and each encounter could be their last.

Sniper Fire in Belfast

SHAUN CLARKE

Published by HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk (http://www.harpercollins.co.uk)

First published in Great Britain by 22 Books/Bloomsbury Publishing plc 1993

Copyright © Bloomsbury Publishing plc 1993

Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd 2016

Cover photographs © Alain le Garsmeur “The Troubles” Archive/Alamy (background); Shutterstock.com (soldier and textures)

Shaun Clarke asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008154943

Ebook Edition © November 2015 ISBN: 9780008154950

Version: 2015-10-15

Contents

Cover (#ub0ea5bc4-4abb-5920-841c-24d8ae199084)

Title Page (#u8a172be7-4676-5f91-bb0c-b22288689782)

Copyright (#u449e01c3-bcc5-5483-987a-32e5673371ab)

Prelude (#u1bfd9e21-91be-5005-842c-d496324516c7)

Chapter 1 (#u8e0f20fd-74dc-5644-873f-70ef5d42a287)

Chapter 2 (#u194a7e99-ad10-5789-8e8f-046f75fb50bc)

Chapter 3 (#u8959700f-1771-5607-a125-d892cd8da58c)

Chapter 4 (#ua676c1a6-1809-5bb1-a730-920cf71d47e0)

Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 15 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 16 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 17 (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter 18 (#litres_trial_promo)

OTHER TITLES IN THE SAS OPERATION SERIES (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Prelude (#uf9f34f0b-ac0e-5cb8-96eb-379da35b3242)

Martin was hiding in a shallow scrape when they found him. He plunged into despair when he heard their triumphant shouting, then he was grabbed by the shoulders and jerked roughly up on to his knees.

The rain was lashing down over the wind-blown green fields, and he caught only a glimpse of the shadowy men in olive-green fatigues, carrying a variety of weapons and moving in to surround him, before he was blindfolded, bound by hands and feet, and thrown into the back of their truck like so much dead meat.

‘Face down in the fucking mud,’ one of them said, ‘digging through to Australia.’ The others laughed. ‘Looks a bit on the damp side, doesn’t he? That should save him embarrassment. We won’t notice the stains when the bugger starts pissing his pants – and that won’t take long, I’ll bet.’

Lying on his side on the floor of the truck, feeling the occasional soft kick from the boots of the men sitting above him, Martin had to choke back his panic and keep control of himself.

After so long, he thought. After so much. Don’t lose it all now …