The Smack Track Inside the Navy's war chasing down drug smugglers pirates and terrorists

The Smack Track : Inside the Navy's war: chasing down drug smugglers, pirates and terrorists
ISBN: 9781460752920
Publication Date: 21 August 2017

From Ian McPhedran, best-selling author of The Amazing SAS, Soldiers Without Borders and Too Bold to Die, comes the untold and largely unknown story of how the Royal Australian Navy battles pirates, gun runners and drug smugglers in the seas of the Arabian Gulf and the Horn of Africa along the infamous route known as the 'smack track'.

For more than twenty years, Australian sailors have been risking their lives, conducting often fraught and dangerous operations in war and in the battle against terrorism. From braving rough seas to boarding rickety dhows or clambering up the sheer steel sides of modern day supertankers looking for contraband, The Smack Track tells a thrilling, eye-witness story of grit, courage, ingenuity and sacrifice.

About the Author

Ian McPhedran is a Sydney based journalist and the former national defence writer for News Corp. He has been a journalist all his working life and has covered conflicts in Burma, Somalia, Cambodia, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, East Timor, Afghanistan and Iraq. In 1993 he won a United Nations Association peace media award and in 1999 the Walkley award for best news report for his expose of the navy's Collins class submarine fiasco. His first book, The Amazing SAS: the inside story of Australia's special forces, is a national best seller.

McPhedran lives in Balmain with his wife Verona and daughter Lucy.