Issued also as dissertation, Bonn.

This study examines William H. McRaven's theory of why special operations succeed. The theory is tested on Operation Nimrod which took place after the theory was published and carried out against a non-state actor. Operation Nimrod was a special operation in which the British special forces SAS conducted a hostage rescue operation against six terrorists on the Iranian embassy in London 1980. McRaven's theory contains six principles that need to be utilized to achieve relative superiority. The theory is one of few used in research at the tactical level of special operations and the principles can also be found in the Swedish doctrine. The study aims to test the generalizability of the theory to modern cases since few studies have tried this before. The result of this case study shows that all six principles in McRaven's theory of special operations have been used in Operation Nimrod where relative superiority arose. This shows a connection between the theory and a successful special operation which results in the generalizability of the theory being strengthened through this study.