Maurice Tugwell is a career paratroop officer who has made a name for himself as an author on military subjects. He was born in the Isle of Wight in June 1925, the son of an Indian Army officer, He was educated at Bedford School and was fourteen when the Second World War began. At seventeen, he enlisted in the army and before his nineteenth birthday had become a second lieutenant in the Parachute Regiment. He jumped with the 6th Airborne Division, in operations beyond the Rhine, as a platoon commander.

Post-war soldiering has taken him to Palestine, Malaya, Cyprus, Arabia, Kenya, arid Germany. In most of these countries he was involved in military action against insurgents, experiences which led to his first book, THE UNQUIET PEACE, published in 1957. Subsequently, he returned to Israel as the guest of the Israel Defence Force's Parachute Brigade. Most of his career has been with parachute troops, and as a Lt. Colonel he commanded the Parachute Regiment's depot at Aldershot. He is a graduate of the Joint Services Staff College.

In 1971 his second book, AIRBORNE TO BATTLE, was published by William Kimber. This was the result of his studies of the development of airborne warfare.

In 1962 Maurice Tugwell was promoted to full colonel and sent to Northern Ireland, being subsequently appointed a CBE for his work there. Most recently he has been in Teheran, but was due to return to a new post in the rank of Brigadier about the time of the publication of this book.