Eye of the Storm (62 page)
Authors: Peter Ratcliffe
The escape map with which the SAS were issued while still at Al Jouf. Being silk, the map could be folded very small, and wouldn’t turn to pulp if it got wet; as a tool for navigation, however, it was far from ideal. The red arrow indicates Victor Two.
A sketch map showing the Iraqi communications installation at Victor Two, annotated to show the various enemy positions and those of Alpha One Zero during the latter’s attack.
A USAF A-10 Thunderbolt – more usually known as the ‘Warthog’ – in action over Iraq. It was an A-10 that confirmed that the author’s patrol had destroyed the 250-foot communications mast at Victor Two.
The ‘Wadi-Bottom Wanderers’: an SAS Bedford 4-tonner, part of the supply convoy that drove from Saudi Arabia into Iraq to resupply the Regiment’s mobile patrols.
The Sergeants’ Mess meeting convened by the author in the Wadi Tubal during the resupply, 1224 hours local time, 16 February 1991. The author is seated in the front row, with the RQMS on his left.
A rather different view: a cartoon by JAK of the same subject. The author and the famous cartoonist were later to become firm friends.
Mess Meeting at Wadi Tubal, Western Iraq
, by David Rowlands, the painting commissioned by the author after the Gulf campaign.
The minutes of the Sergeants’ Mess meeting held behind enemy lines, signed by the RQMS, the author, the CO, the Deputy Director of Special Forces, and Generals de la Billière and Schwarzkopf.
Resupply at Wadi Tubal, 11–17 February 1991. The RQMS, Gary, is reclining at centre, with Major Bill, the officer who led the supply convoy into Iraq, second from left.
The author with the Prince of Wales during the latter’s visit to Stirling Lines, the SAS barracks in Hereford, in April 1991.
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