On the outbreak of World War II in 1939 he volunteered for the Royal Air Force, but was not called for service until 1941.
He did pilot training in Southern Rhodesia; on his way back to Britain in SS Oronsay his ship was torpedoed and he spent nine days in a lifeboat before being rescued.
[2] He flew combat missions in Hurricanes and Typhoons and was awarded the Distinguished Flying Cross (DFC) in January 1945.
He then studied Arabic at the Middle East Centre for Arabic Studies 1955–57 and subsequently served in Bahrain, as consul in Kuwait[4] and as political agent in Abu Dhabi in 1965-68, during which time he oversaw the 1966 Abu Dhabi coup d'etat.
[6] Lamb found the Norwegian political establishment insular and unsympathetic to their NATO partners, who at the height of the Cold War, were concerned about Norway's vulnerable border with the Soviet Union.