Eye of the Storm (26 page)

My troop, Mobility, was commanded by Captain Paul and his number two was Bob, a staff sergeant; I was number three in the pecking order. Considering the ground and the darkness, we got off pretty quickly. It was not quickly enough, however, for the going was against us. The ground was mainly of peat, spongy stuff that made walking difficult, especially in the dark, and there were lots of fences and walls to cross. Just the kind of thing you’d expect around a sheep settlement.

Realizing that precious time had been lost, the squadron commander decided to speed-march in single file, one man behind the other. As a result, rather than observing patrol procedures, which would normally involve a stealthy approach, we often broke into a run. But when we came to a wall or a fence, we adopted ‘obstacle procedure’, which dictated that each man should be covered by others while he crossed, and this slowed us considerably.

When moving in an extended single file, the soldier in front is responsible for the soldier behind. So as long as he can see the man ahead of him and the man behind, then everything is fine. That’s the theory, anyway, but what we didn’t know was that while we were painstakingly crossing obstacles, the squadron OC and the other troops were leaping walls and fences and racing towards the target as though their boots were on fire.

Inevitably, we lost contact with the troop in front. They were travelling much faster than we were, and before long the man at the head of our troop could no longer see the last man of the troop ahead. Going over undulating ground at night, you can simply disappear into the darkness, and once the chain is broken you are as good as lost. In the pitch blackness we couldn’t see a thing, even through our night scopes, so our only means of contacting the leading troops was by the radio carried by the troop signaller. When Captain Paul realized our predicament he radioed the OC, who was somewhere up in front of us in the dark, and asked him for a steer. The squadron commander came back on the radio and said he didn’t have time to wait for us – if we didn’t catch up with him by the time we reached the rendezvous position, we were to stay in reserve by the mortar pit, the task originally given to Mountain Troop.

We didn’t catch up. However, a contingency plan had been agreed before we left
Hermes
. Under this, if anything happened to Mobility Troop prior to our reaching the target, then Mountain Troop was to pick up the baton and lead the attack. Its members were carrying enough explosives to complete the mission.

By the time we reached the mortar pit, we knew we had lost our starring role in the attack. Almost beside ourselves with anger and disappointment, we realized that we had been relegated to being just a bunch of extras.

Looking back on that night, the troop sergeant should have detailed someone to be in front as the lead scout. Captain Paul was a good officer and was trying to do things properly, and it was not his fault that a gap had developed, for on this particular night there was drifting mist that continually came and went. To make matters worse, we were the only troop that didn’t have a member of Boat Troop attached to us as a guide – a mistake, since by then they knew the way to and from the airstrip better than the backs of their hands.

Nevertheless, there can be no excuses. Mobility Troop’s delay in arriving at the target was the result of incompetence, and it should not have happened. The important thing to remember, however, is that the Regiment is not infallible. We do sometimes make mistakes. In this respect the SAS is like any other regiment, and its solders are not immune from sometimes getting things wrong, especially in the confusion of war.

The attack started at 0700 hours Zulu when, miles off-shore, the 4.5-inch guns of HMS
Glamorgan
opened up. Guided on to coordinates signalled by the naval-gunfire support team and based on information from Boat Troop, the destroyer’s gunners laid down a precision barrage, shelling the Argentinian positions but carefully avoiding the islanders’ houses. At once our mortar began firing, the phosphorus rounds whumping down, turning the night sky into near daylight. Then, led by John Hamilton, Mountain Troop went in to destroy the aircraft, which were spread out all over the lengthy runway.

Split into seven two-man teams and carrying their PE charges, they also used their machine-guns and LAW rockets to smash the grounded planes to bits. It wasn’t easy, for military aircraft are built to withstand bullets. Nor is it anything like the movies, where aircraft blow up when a bullet hits their fuel tanks. But then, there are a lot of things that aren’t like the movies – such as highly trained soldiers getting lost on a tiny island like a bunch of novice Boy Scouts.

It was a race against time. Not only was the raid late in starting, but we had to be back at the drop-off point bang on time for the Sea Kings to come in and pick up us. They couldn’t risk waiting for us because as soon as dawn broke they would either become sitting ducks for enemy fighter aircraft, or
Hermes
would by then be out of their range.

On the airstrip, meanwhile, it rapidly became apparent that the Argentinians had effectively abandoned any attempt to save the aircraft and were lying low, looking out for their own safety and hardly firing back at all. A single brave enemy officer and one of his soldiers did try to stop the raiding teams, opening fire on them, but they were quickly shot down. It was then that Mountain Troop began using the few explosive charges they had to wreck the rest of the aircraft. To reach the wings of some of the machines they had to stand on each other’s shoulders; once the first man had scrambled up he would reach down and pull the other guy up after him. The Pucaras – twin-turboprop ground-attack aircraft – were the tallest planes and caused the demolition teams the most trouble.

By this time the pre-dawn sky was glowing orange from fires raging in the Argentinians’ fuel store, which had been hit by
Glamorgan
’s guns. Then the destroyer’s gunners found the range for the enemy’s ammunition dump and blew it to smithereens. As the final charges shattered the last of the aircraft, the squadron began to withdraw.

Once the attack had finished, we all regrouped by the mortar pit in all-round defence. I was still pissed off by what had happened to my troop, but at least the squadron’s casualties were almost non-existent. One man had been concussed by the blast from a landmine, which had been triggered by the Argentinians just before we left the airstrip, and another had been hit by shrapnel; his wounds had not stopped him from doing his job, however.

Despite my fury that we had missed the main action, I still felt a sense of pride and elation in knowing that the boys had carried out a successful mission. The squadron commander and Captain Ted had planned the raid to perfection. Nothing had been left to chance or over-looked, and the result had been a triumphant success.

As we waited, suddenly, out of nowhere, four Sea King helicopters appeared, flying in formation and hugging the ground. It was a remarkable sight. They touched down simultaneously. We all knew by the formation in which they had landed which helicopter to get on, and we were airborne within thirty seconds. Two and a half hours after the first shot had been fired, we were again aboard the Sea Kings and heading back out to sea.

Behind us on the airstrip lay the wreckage of six Pucaras, a Short Skyvan light transport and four Mentor trainer aircraft. Naval gunfire had taken care of the rest of the enemy installations with such effect that the whole of Pebble Island appeared to be on fire. It must have been the warmest it had been for several million years.

It was still dark just ten minutes before we reached
Hermes
, but by the time we landed first light had broken – the timing had been that critical. Our Sea Kings landed us back on the flagship’s flight deck nicely in time for breakfast. News of the raid’s success, with virtually no casualties, had arrived before us and the sailors, who had shown us nothing but kindness from the moment we had come aboard, couldn’t do enough for us. That night, in the Chief Petty Officers’ Mess, they congratulated us over a drink. Now they realized what the SAS really did for a living, when we weren’t laughing and joking and drinking beer. More than that, however, everyone from the most senior naval officer all the way down to the most junior rating also knew that, working together, the sailors, soldiers, marines and airmen of the Task Force could knock seven kinds of hell out of any enemy. As for us, we had had a great night out, and it had been wonderful to get our feet on dry land once again, if only for a few hours.

On Pebble Island, there was now nothing left to interfere with the British landings in San Carlos Bay. The mission had been an enormous success. Apart from the recapture of South Georgia nearly three weeks earlier, it was the first major operation against the enemy on land, and one that triumphantly showed what the Regiment could do.

Above all, we had delivered a huge blow to the Argentinians’ morale, while at the same time massively boosting the Task Force’s. Even if some of us had got misplaced…

Chapter Twelve

I
T
has often seemed to me that Fate puts a price on moments of triumph. Sometimes this can mean men paying with their lives in the final minutes before victory; at others, Fate’s charge for having earlier smiled upon some venture comes a few days later. But whether it comes within hours or days, there is always a payback time.

We didn’t have to wait long before Fate delivered her bill after our highly successful raid on Pebble Island. On 18 May, three days after the raid, the ships carrying the main British invasion group – known as the amphibious force – linked up with the aircraft carriers and their escorts. It became clear that the attempt to land in the Falklands was imminent. What emerged from the planning directives was that the SAS was tasked with four separate attacks designed to make the Argentinians believe that a much bigger force had landed, and to draw them away from San Carlos, where the real landings were to go in.

The role of my squadron, D, was to be offensive action, while G Squadron, which had arrived with the Task Force, via Ascension, some time after us, was to report information on enemy positions, strengths and movements from observation posts set up behind, and even in, the enemy lines. In preparation for these operations, the two squadrons were ordered later that day to cross-deck from
Hermes
to HMS
Intrepid
, an assault ship specifically equipped for amphibious warfare.

Cross-decking a squadron involves shifting a vast amount of kit. Cross-decking two is like moving a circus.
Hermes
and
Intrepid
were steaming about a mile apart, so we initially sent a lot of the guys over to the assault ship to act as movers for all the equipment as it arrived. The rest of the men were to stay on the carrier and load the gear into nets, which were then slung beneath the bellies of Sea King helicopters and ferried across.

There was the usual howling wind, and the sea was fairly choppy. When there were only two helicopter loads left on
Hermes
, I leapt aboard one of the aircraft as it completed loading. I figured that the last helicopter would be very crowded, and that there would be more elbow room in the one I had chosen.

As we hovered above
Intrepid
with the cargo net slung beneath us, I could see our equipment piled high on the deck. There seemed to be a miniature mountain of the stuff. I jumped on to the deck after the helicopter had dropped its pallet, and walked from the flight deck into the ship through open landing doors rather like those on cross-Channel ferries. I looked at my watch. It was 2130 hours Zulu, just after last light.

There was so much stuff aboard the last Sea King that the remaining men simply piled their gear in and sat on top of it. None of them were wearing survival suits because they wanted to get the job over with as soon as possible; besides, the flight between the ships only took about five minutes.

Waiting to come in, the last chopper was hovering about seventy-five metres away from
Intrepid
when one of our guys on deck suddenly shouted, ‘She’s gone down!’ In the gathering dark he saw the Sea King plunge into the sea. Immediately klaxons began to blare all through the ship, and from the Tannoy came the shouted order, ‘Crash teams, action stations! … Crash teams, actions stations!’

The Sea King hit the waves and capsized. Damaged from the impact, it rapidly filled with water, but for a few moments it stayed on the surface with the sea pouring in on the men inside. The pilot and his co-pilot punched their doors clear and climbed straight into their rubber dinghy, which had automatically inflated when the machine hit the sea. One of our guys inside the downed helicopter was wearing a lifejacket, but he couldn’t find his way out. Finally, in sheer desperation, he pulled the tags on his self-inflating lifejacket. Suddenly buoyant, it shot him straight out of the hole where the Sea King’s tail had snapped off on impact. He got out alive to find men clinging to the sides of the pilots’ rubber dinghy. As the stricken helicopter slowly slipped beneath the waves, the survivors could only think of their mates on the inside of the aircraft. It was a horrible way to die, and it affected us all pretty deeply.