'This important book tells the sorry story of how Australian special forces came to specialise in targeted assassination, doing the dirty work for a corrupt local government propped up by American power, without Australian army or political leaders being able to give them a good reason for risking their lives'  Geoffrey Robertson AO, KC, author and human rights barrister 

It was Australia's longest war, and also our most secretive.

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In the craggy mountains, green belts and digital battlefields of Afghanistan, concepts of heroism and decency started to warp and Australian special forces operators moved apart on the question of how the war should be conducted - with tragic consequences.

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For more than a decade, Australia's special forces (SASR) were pushed to the limit as brutal engagements killed 20 Australians and an estimated 11,000 Afghans. Also pushed were the limits of Australian and international law, as Australia's operators fought against - and with - brutal tribal warlords and narco-barons.

Increasingly enmeshed in a US-led targeting program that attempted to kill its way out of the war, the Australian SASR became one of the most feared and lethal force elements in the country. But with a corrupt Afghan government, ancient enmity washing into each Afghan valley, and Canberra and Washington uninterested or bereft of strategy, kill/capture missions became their own end, not a means.

In the aftermath of the war, rifts, rumours and media reporting triggered an independent Inquiry into alleged war crimes, the subsequent Brereton Report and a sensational defamation trial - challenging the hard-won reputation of our elite forces, including Australia's most visible and decorated soldier.

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