The Feather Men: secret SAS committee?

[Jan Klimkowski]

Wiki sez the following.

I've highlighted a key passage in bold.

The novel caused considerable controversy over the claim that it was based on real events. Publisher Bloomsbury described it as a "true adventure" when it was published in 1991. Fiennes claimed that the Feather Men had shown him detailed dossiers on the assassins and their victims, and requested that he write an "authorised" history of the group. A source in the Ministry of Defence told The Daily Telegraph:

Many events Fiennes describes simply never took place. Frankly, it's just another example of the Special Forces' reputation being exploited for commercial gain.

Fiennes himself remained vague on the story's veracity, asserting that it was up to the reader to decide whether it was fact or fiction, and suggested journalists subject events and people described in the book to "forensic examination", and to draw their own conclusions.[2] Fiennes describes his novels as "factional", meaning a blend of fact and fiction. The hardcover editions had the words "Fact or fiction?" printed on the covers, and contained an index, maps and photographs as a non-fiction book would. The paperback editions, however, presented the book as purely fiction and omitted the index and illustrations.[3]

However, there is a paperback edition of The Feather Men which includes photographs of the victims and other real life characters, a map (Oman in 1976) and other illustrations (e.g. a block diagram of the modification of the BMW car brake system to incorporate remote radio control) and an index. It was published by Signet in 1992 - ISBN 0-451-17455-0

In June 2010, Alice Clarke, the daughter of SAS soldier Major Mike Kealy whose death is depicted in The Feather Men at the hands of The Clinic, spoke out, saying that her father had died during an endurance exercise in the Brecon Beacons in 1979. Describing Fiennes' claims as "disgraceful", she stated that her mother had confronted the author at the Hay Festival, and he had admitted to her that the story was a work of fiction.[2]

Fiennes responded in a statement issued to the Daily Mail through his publisher: he did provide copies of the manuscript for family members of the deceased men to review, and the SAS was also provided with a copy prior to the book being published. There were no complaints on the manuscript being published.[4]

In 2011, Fiennes stated in an interview with The Daily Beast that the book was "all fiction", and reaffirmed that he had the signed permission of the soldiers' families, including Kealy's wife, to mention them in the book.[5]

The last sentence misrepresents the Daily Beast interview of Sir Ranulph Fiennes.

Note that the book was first published in 1991, and the interview is in 2011.

The pertinent quote from Fiennes is: "I had chose to change my mind from time-to-time in terms of answering people, and at the moment, I choose to say that the book, and therefore the film, are total fiction. In 20 years time, I might change my mind."

Here is a fuller extract.

Q: So why did you end up transferring to Oman, where much of The Feather Men is set?

Fiennes: When I was thrown out of the SAS for misuse of explosives on civilian property [for the dam incident], I was thrown back to Germany and the tanks. I tried to escape after a year, and one of the people in that regiment that had been to the then-secret war in Oman, let me know that it was a wonderful place to be and so, having been taught Arabic, I went out there.

Q: What inspired you to write The Feather Men?

Fiennes: Now that you've started to ask me about the book, my answers to your questions will become evasive.

Q: Do the best you can.

Fiennes: When the book came out 20 years ago, on the cover in big letters it said, "Fact or Fiction?" It left it to the reader to decide whether it was fact or fiction, but it complicated the issue by putting photographs of people with a lot of real names in the book. It was probably confusing to readers as to what was fact and what was fiction. I had chose to change my mind from time-to-time in terms of answering people, and at the moment, I choose to say that the book, and therefore the film, are total fiction. In 20 years time, I might change my mind.

The idea was to sell more books and at the time, the person who was going to put new books in the bookshop was told to put it in the "fiction" side of the shop or the "non-fiction" side of the shop, and at the time people only read one or the other, so if you put it on both sides of the shop you got both sets of book buyers.

Q: You had previously claimed in interviews around the time of the book's release that this shadow organization called "The Feather Men," which protected ex-SAS operatives, did exist.

Fiennes: If I did, that's what I did. Yes. But I'm telling you now that it was all fiction.

Q: How do you feel about the film Killer Elite being marketed as "based on a true story?"

Fiennes: The publishers and literary agents have written to them and said it was quite clear that they shouldn't have done that, and that they should change it to words like "inspired by" instead of "based on." Maybe they'll change it, but I don't know.

There was also an incident where you were confronted by the angry mother of one of the real-life men in the book who you claimed was murdered, when he wasn't.

There was a guy who I said was killed in the U.K. in very bad weather in Wales on the mountains during an SAS selection course, and I'm saying that he wasn't killed. He died of hypothermia up there, and that is what the inquest said. At the time I wrote the book, I went to the lady in question and showed her the text of the book because Bloomsbury, who later published the Harry Potter books, would not publish the book unless the next of kin of the dead officers signed every page of what I was saying about their late relatives. I still possess the signatures in question. That lady signed every page, and when this film came out recently and a newspaper asked her about it, she said that I never correlated the text with her. I've found her signature and showed it to her, and she apologized and said it was a long time ago and she had forgotten about it.