Battleworn (2 page)

Our Land Rover, the second vehicle in the packet, was taking sustained and heavy fire. Looking up through the hatch, I could see rounds pinging from left to right. I guessed they were from enemy fighters on my side of the vehicle. I heard someone shout, ‘Get some fucking rounds down!’

Popping back up through the hatch for a split second, I got eyes on an insurgent who was engaging us, thirty metres away and to the half right of me. Suddenly overwhelmed by the fear that I was about to be shot in the face, I experienced a rush of blood to the head and took in a mouthful of dust. Reminding myself to breathe, I engaged him instinctively and purposefully. I didn’t stop firing until he dropped.

The excitement that I felt before moving into Marjah had faded fast. Kev, covering our right side, engaged another fighter close by. The machine gunner in the vehicle behind us took on two insurgents who had positioned themselves on the roof of a compound.

Shouting out half of a fire control order, I alerted my team to other targets around us. A lull in the firefight commenced just then, soon followed by the dreaded cry ‘man down, man down!’ blasting across the radio net.

As I scanned for further threats, Maj. Harry Clark, our OC, shouted through to the back of our Land Rover, ‘Man down in the rear vehicle!’

He calmly jumped out of the front seat as I climbed through the back door to meet him. We started to run to the back of the patrol, stopping to take cover along the way, both of us vulnerable to enemy fire all the while. Fighting the unforgiving Afghan sun, we made light work of the distance we covered on foot. My medical pack felt like a lead weight on my back.

Midway there, the OC stopped and turned back towards our vehicle. Unconcerned, I followed him. It wasn’t through lack of interest that I said nothing; my lungs simply needed oxygen far more than I needed conversation. I jumped back into the wagon and struggled to breathe.

Kev laughed. ‘You okay, Channy?’

I wanted to share the joke that I was in and out of our vehicle like a yo-yo, but I was ‘hanging out’ – physically exhausted.

Shunting forward, the wagon hastily moved off. Back on top cover, covering my arcs again, I was desperate to cool down. I gulped water quickly, trying to avoid becoming nauseated. The heat radiating around my cumbersome and oversized helmet finally started to ease off. Slowly I regained my composure. Kev continued to laugh at my struggling to run in the midday heat.

Our minor break in contact allowed us time to get out of the initial kill zone, and we managed to limp to an area of open space: it was large enough to land a Chinook, making it the perfect choice for a casualty extraction.

The OC sent two of our company snipers up onto a compound roof. They gave us over watch as we prepared an all-round defence. As the men of B Company covered the outer cordon, our snipers’ body count began to rise. The Apache gunship was now on station; visually scanning the ground from the sky, the crew hunted the Taliban of Marjah.

Chuckie had taken a round to the abdomen; he was manning the .50-calibre machine gun in the rear vehicle. His Land Rover had screeched past our own when the OC shouted for our call sign to go firm in the open space. Chuckie was lying in the back of his vehicle with Commander Cpl Greg Gorman; Greg had administered the initial treatment which had earlier saved me from running a further half kilometre to the back of our patrol. Our OC’s decision to stop midway and turn back had prevented us both from becoming casualties. There’s a fine line between bravery and stupidity.

‘Channy, he’s been hit in the gut, I cannae see where it’s come out.’ Greg’s familiar Scottish accent carried a worried tone, and sweat dripped from his anxious-looking face.

When I eventually got hands on Chuckie, we were still in contact with enemy fire, so I had to assess his wounds quickly: I had about thirty seconds to surmise what was happening inside of him. His wound was fairly high up so I was inclined to think that he might have sustained a chest injury, which meant that his evacuation needed to be swift. Wounds to the abdomen are problematic at best of times, add to that a chest injury, and Chuckie’s day would end badly. His chances of survival were slim if we could not get him back to more-definitive care. Bleeding in the abdominal cavity is almost impossible to control, so we positioned him as best we could with the equipment that we had. We sat him up with his knees pulled against his chest, which would at least form some type of compression without restricting his breathing too much. Leaving further treatment to company medic Tom Rooke (‘Rookey’), I made my way back to brief the OC on our casualty’s condition.

Casualty extraction under fire wasn’t without risk either; the inbound Chinook was escorted by two Apache gunships, which circled our position like birds of prey before the lone bird swept in. Airborne within thirty minutes of being hit, our team had gotten lucky. Reassured, I sorted my kit out before mounting up with Kev, Greg, and the rest of B Company. This was my first taste of close-quarter combat; little did I know that B Company would be under fire almost every day for the next two months.

CHAPTER 1

GAME ON

WELL ON OUR WAY INTO OUR TOUR OF HELMAND PROVINCE, B COMPANY receives orders to patrol into Nad-e Ali, just north of the main British operating base of Lashkar Gah.

Our convoy moves cautiously across the desert. We hear the thud of several explosions ahead, the noise carried on the dry air. As vehicles chunter along, every soldier nurses the uneasy thought as to what may lie ahead.

After leaving our base, we head north-west. In total we are a force of just sixty-two troops drawn from two platoons, travelling in ten heavily armed vehicles. Many of our soldiers are very young. We range in age from eighteen to late thirties, with the average age at around twenty-two. This is the first tour of Afghanistan for some. At thirty-two, it’s my second tour and would become my last as a serving British soldier. In this unbearable heat we are laden in heavy uncomfortable body armour and helmets, scanning the desert for anything that could pose a threat. Our company will carry out what is known as a ‘look see’ patrol to Nad-e Ali, just fifteen kilometres north-west of Lashkar Gah (capital of Helmand Province).

Our mission has come about as a direct result of a sharp increase in enemy activity. There has been speculation that a company from one of the parachute battalions would be committed to this area, but many are now assigned to a major operation which the brigade has been planning for some time, consuming much of its manpower.

It involves the delivery of a three-hundred-ton turbine by convoy from Kandahar across open desert to the hydroelectric dam at Kajaki. The dam was built in 1975 with funding from US Aid, an American development charity, but only two turbines were supplied before the Soviets invaded Afghanistan in 1979. Work then stalled, and the dam was unable to fully function. In 2006, when British troops arrived, one of the first projects identified to help the local populace was to complete the work at the dam.

In 2008, 16 Brigade took on this responsibility as a ‘main effort’, a huge undertaking requiring the majority of our assets. The mission was to complete the move of a third turbine and additional mechanical items to the dam. It was hoped that the task would allow contractors to commission the system and generate electricity for the entirety of Helmand Province.

Insurgents gathering in Nad-e Ali presented an unwelcome distraction: if they disrupted the convoy and forced the brigade commander to detach manpower from the Kajaki task, there was a risk that the operation as a whole would be compromised. Any commander wishing to progress recognises early that he must win the propaganda war, and getting the turbine in place would be a major coup. Success would mean ‘lighting up’ Helmand and therefore, a sizable boost for the hearts-and-minds campaign.

I lead a team of three medics, and I feel responsible for the young Jocks that we support. (Jock is the nickname given to the private soldiers of any Scottish infantry battalion.) I am also always mindful that every journey we make over the bomb-infested highways of Helmand might be the last for someone. Our job is to patrol in and around the area and report back on the mood of the town and its people. If you find children playing outside their homes and people in the markets, then ‘atmospherics’ are judged as good. If the streets are deserted and the locals are non-existent, then this paints a picture of uncertainty – an attack of some kind is often imminent.

The lead vehicles create a sand screen, which cuts our visibility to almost zero. I’m on top cover, along with Kev Coyle, our signaller. Our position gives the driver and commander a 360-degree visual scan of the ground we’re passing over and the road ahead, letting them gauge potential threats. We man the open turret on top of the vehicle; our interpreter sits quietly in the back, asleep if he has any sense. If there’s an insurgent out there looking to take us on, the top cover usually gets hit first. I can taste the grit in my mouth from the dirt and dust kicked up ahead of us.

Kev, B Company’s signaller, has an Italian look about him – jet-black hair, olive skin, and blue eyes – and his dry sense of humour is an acquired taste. I have finally warmed to it through the hours we spend together on the ground.

‘This is fucking shit!’ Kev grunts.

‘It doesn’t look like we are stopping any time soon, either,’ I reply.

‘Eight more weeks, and that’s us.’

Our conversation is interrupted by an explosion, closer than the others were. A spiral of smoke rises into the air in the middle distance. My first thought is that it is a drop short mortar round, but it appears that we aren’t the intended target. The explosion is closer to the town centre than it is to us.

Kev turns to me with a grin. ‘Game on, mucker,’ he shouts, barely audible over the noise of the engine. I read his lips in order to make out what he’s just said as we hit what seems like every pothole on this track. Kev and I have been battle buddies for a fair time, patrolling the district centres of Lash and Nawa, more recently involved in a gnarly ambush in the notorious area of Marjah.

Our convoy consists of ten lightly armoured Land Rovers, consisting of the snatch version and the open-top weapons mounted installation kit (WMIK). The WMIK is a stripped-down Land Rover that comes with a series of roll bars and special weapons mounts. It was designed primarily as a reconnaissance (recce for short) and fire support vehicle. The rear roll bar cage features a well in which a gunner can stand and swing his weapon in a 360-degree arc of fire from a rail-mounted system.

The rear station can be fitted with a .50-calibre heavy machine gun, a 40 mm grenade launcher, or a 7.62 mm general purpose machine gun (GPMG). American troops thought that we were crazy to drive about in open-top vehicles, until I explained that our guys survived improvised explosive device (IED) attacks because they were blown out of the vehicle as opposed to getting thrown against the heavy armour inside.

That much is true; however, the variant that’s housing Kev and me is not so clever. It’s the ‘snatch’ Land Rover. It was designed for tasks in Northern Ireland and deployed disastrously to Basra, in southern Iraq, after the initial invasion. It was later shipped to Helmand, and it became the focus of media controversy after numerous incidents which resulted in fatalities in both Iraq and Afghanistan.

It was nothing more than a money-saving choice for Helmand, and I was unlucky enough to become very familiar with the machine (and grateful not to be the interpreter sitting in the back). Its box body was not fit for the purpose: anyone sitting in the rear would often boil, even with the later addition of air conditioning. Limited armour also ensured that it would not withstand small arms for prolonged periods, let alone any type of high-energy explosive.

Spending hours in any vehicle will give you an intimate look at all the good and bad points, and this knowledge is priceless to those buying such equipment. Trialling a military kit could be done far more effectively if the terrain on which it is trialled is similar to the place where it ends up operationally. Testing the snatch Land Rover in Lashkar Gah is a lot like throwing a child into the deep end of a swimming pool and expecting him to immediately start swimming like Michael Phelps.

Lash is where the provincial reconstruction team (PRT) is based. They are a joint team comprised of Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) staff and civilian advisors from the Ministry of Defence (MOD). With military support, they plan the strategic development and reconstruction of the region. Based on this information, I figured we’d be out of the base for forty-eight hours maximum, and I packed my kit and equipment accordingly.

Meanwhile, our vehicles continue to progress through the desert, the drivers peering through the thick sandstorm our convoy has whipped up. I breathe in diesel fumes mixed with the dry, musky scent of the desert. The smell of diesel and hot air instantly reminds me of time spent in Iraq in the summer of 2003. In the stifling heat, I am thirsty and my back is soaking wet. My skull bakes like pie crust inside my helmet.

Afghanistan is landlocked in the bowl of the Hindu Kush, with mountains that go on forever. The landscape is severe but beautiful, and the place has a biblical feel to it. I served in Iraq, Kosovo, and Sierra Leone, but nowhere else is like Afghanistan – it isn’t just another country … it’s another mindset.

Winters are bleak, and summers are marked by cloudless blue skies, with temperatures topping 140 degrees. The dry climate and harsh environment have the ability to deliver beauty in the springtime as the fields of Helmand blossom with red-pink flowers. The ‘death crop’ of southern Afghanistan is harvested from these fields. While in full flower, the opium poppies present a picture-perfect look, but for many years they have funded war and criminality.

More than 90 per cent of the world’s heroin supply comes from poppies cultivated here. The country’s illegal drug business generates $4 billion a year – half the nation’s gross domestic product.
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A big slice of this money buys the Taliban the guns that we are driving towards.