Australian SAS Operator | Mark Direen | Ep. 348

The Team House

dee takos

History, Documentary, Society & Culture, Government

4.7 • 929 Ratings

🗓️ 24 May 2025

⏱️ 117 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Mark Direen is a former Australian Special Forces (SASR) soldier with a 20-year military career, including five deployments to Afghanistan. Wounded in an IED attack in 2007, he returned to duty just six months later. After leaving the Army in 2009, he worked in security at the Australian Embassy in Kabul before moving into expedition guiding across remote regions including Mongolia, Papua New Guinea, and Tasmania. His post-service life reflects his operational mindset: adapt, improve, and keep moving forward.
Find Mark here:
https://markdireen.com/
https://pointassist.com.au/
Mark's book:
https://pointassist.com.au/product/whats-the-point/
Bravery and Betrayal documentary :
https://wanderingwarriors.org/bravery-betrayal-the-documentary/entary
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3rS0h-pjqc
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Transcript

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0:00.0	Special Operations
0:05.0	Covert Ops, espionage, the Team House, with your hosts, Jack Murphy, and David Park.
0:24.6	Hi folks, I'm Jack Murphy.
0:27.7	This is the Team House, episode 348. And our guest on tonight's show is Mark Doreen.
0:31.2	He served in the Australian military, including the Australian Special Air Service,
0:36.4	multiple deployments to Afghanistan and a couple
0:39.3	other places. A lot to talk about here, actually, from his time in the conventional infantry
0:45.3	all the way to today, where he is a expedition and adventure travel guide. So, Mark, welcome to the
0:51.9	show. Thank you for joining us. Yeah, thanks for having me. It's a huge
0:56.0	honor and pleasure. You've had some phenomenal guests on this podcast. But I don't think we have
1:01.5	had an Australian SAS guy on the show, unfortunately, until now. So I'm glad we can make up for that.
1:08.6	Cheers. So, Mark, tell us a little bit about, you know, your upbringing and how you grew up and sort of
1:15.5	how that eventually took you towards military service.
1:19.2	Yeah, I grew up in Tasmania, the little island right down the bottom of Australia.
1:25.9	And I've moved back to live here now.
1:27.3	But, yeah, Tazzi was a pretty small place growing up. and right down the bottom of Australia. And I've moved back to live here now.
1:33.5	But, yeah, Tassie was a pretty small place growing up here in the 80s.
1:36.5	And I didn't leave.
1:41.5	Dad was a truck driver and sort of mum worked night shifts stacking supermarket shelves. And we didn't, I didn't leave tazzie at all I don't think until
1:46.6	I was almost ready to join the army I think I went to Melbourne one weekend to watch the footy
1:52.1	but yeah growing up dad was a big fisherman we used to go hunting a fair bit you know a lot of time
2:00.5	our bush going camping and and things like that so I think Dad was a big fisherman. We used to go hunting a fair bit, you know, a lot of time,
	...

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