Hi,
Well, long story short, I recently bought Hidden & Dangerous 2, got a little inspired and began to think about doing a small diorama somewhere in the future, using Dragon's SAS figure set.
I was thinking about arming them a little differently, so I did a few searches about SAS equipment and armament. The little I did find were mostly about modern stuff, not WWII.
What weaponry did SAS use in WW2? Also, was their equipment simply British army issue, or something else?
I was thinking about upgrading the M1 carbines to Lee-Enfields, and the Bren gun too perhaps. And what about captured weaponry, how freely could I go around with German guns instead?

I have seen all the weapons that you mentioned used by WWII SAS. I would also add the Sten as well as the M1928A1 Thompson. I had read somewhere that they were a big fan of the Thompson.

Captured weapons could always be used but I would be careful about the context in which you would present them. SAS in Africa I would say is a safe bet. Just landing in France, not so much.

I great starting point in my opinion for some light reading and general info would be the Osprey titles The Special Air Service (Men-at-Arms 116) and they have one on British Commandos that included SAS but I don't see it listed on their site. But they do have several others.

I hope this helps.

They also used the m1 and M1a1 carbine quite a bit, probably some captured weapons, and, of course, for larger weapons bren guns, vickers, browning .30 MGs, etc.

Rob

There is a decent book on SAS operations in France during 1944: Fire From The Forest (by Roger Ford, Cassell Military). It's loaded with various info so it doesn't read smoothly like a thriller. It's worthy the time though, IMHO. It also sports good number of interesting photos...

The SAS in Africa definitely used the German MP40, and Tamiya's SAS jeep comes with one as part of the stowage.

Hey Emeritus,
See if you can find a copy of Peter Darman's "Weapons and Equipment of the SAS" (1993, Sidgwick & Jackson).
It has a fairly comprehensive list of the gear , kit, weapons and equipment used by the SAS, including captured weapons.
Cheers

jjumbo

If you want a copy of the book, here's a site with 3 available:

http://www.amazon.com/WEAPONS-EQUIPMENT-SAS/dp/0283061413

in n africa they used basically what they wanted as personal weapons but as the war progressed they came under more direct control of the army supply system so it was generally british/allied issue equipment because of the re-supply constraints.

SAS and LRDG personnel used as easily both allied and axis (german and italian) weaponery; In fact they were trained to use them in case of need! Some of their members even prefered to use axis weapons instead of allied ones!
As for equipment, they used whatever was more confortable or more practical to use at the time, or even what was better suited for this or that mission. So, if you use german, italian, british or american equipment it's ok! Just as long as it makes sense to you and, of course, it was used in the year you want to depict!
Cheers and happy modelling!
Prato

There may be some of the information you require in Ospreys new book

http://www.ospreypublishing.com/title_detail.php/title=T0064~per=2

Thanks to all who answered. I'll have a look for those books.
This project isn't at the very top of my to-do list, so if anyone has any more info, links etc, they'll be of great help.
Thanks.