Combat Camera

by Christian Hill

  “What’s been the best part of the tour?”

  “I like the contacts,” he said. “I like going out, looking for the Taliban. It gets the adrenaline going. And when you get into a fight with them, you feel great afterwards.”

  After the interviews, we went out again. I felt much less superstitious than I had done before: the fear of bad omens had worn off. Interviewing the soldiers had been a strangely calming experience, despite all their ramblings about combat. It brought a degree of comfort knowing a little bit more about the men alongside you. So often the Combat Camera Team was just an attachment, stuck onto the side of a patrol for a limited amount of time. Talking to the soldiers at least created a greater sense of belonging, which brought with it a greater sense of security.

  We drove in the same formation as before, heading along Highway 1 to another checkpoint. The plan was to interview one of the local ANA commanders, getting some all-important “Afghan face” for the East Midlands piece. After that – somewhat randomly – we were going to film a few of our guys eating rations for The One Show. The BBC producers were lining up an interview with the Ministry of Defence gastronome responsible for producing all the different menus in our ration boxes, and they wanted us to provide some footage of British soldiers tucking into their boil-in-the-bag food while out on the Afghan front line.

  It was only a fifteen-minute drive to the checkpoint, but halfway there we were brought to a halt by two Jackals parked across the road. They were part of a security cordon for an IED that had just been discovered by the roadside about a hundred metres up ahead. A team from the Royal Engineers was preparing to blow the device up and get the road open again.

  We wanted to film it, obviously. It was going to be a loud explosion. We had no footage of IED blasts on this tour, so it was something we felt we needed to capture. We gave no thought to the fact that this barbarous little device – undiscovered – would’ve blown us off the road. We just set up our video camera on a tripod and happily waited for the Royal Engineers to give us our money shot.

  We didn’t have to wait long. A lone engineer crouched over the device for a moment, before retreating back to the safety of his vehicle. We got a thirty-second warning over the radio, then the IED detonated with a ground-shaking bang, throwing up a mushroom cloud of smoke and dust thirty feet into the air. Russ watched the whole thing through his video camera, recording on his tripod, while Ali took her shots leaning against one of the Jackals for support. I captured the moment for posterity as well, taking a couple of hurried shots on my crappy Fuji camera. It had a dodgy lens and a slow shutter speed – it was probably worth about a thirtieth of Ali’s Nikon D3S – but it did at least come with some sentimental value, being a leaving gift from some of my nicer colleagues at Smooth Radio.

  By now the ANA commander had turned up on the scene, so we hurried through an interview with him, still standing in the middle of Highway 1 as the Royal Engineers packed up in the background. He’d seen it all before, and was more than a little jaded with the constant struggle to keep the roadside clear of IEDs. He had the same haunted brown eyes that you found on all Afghan men over the age of forty, and they obviously coloured his view of the war.

  “What it’s like working with the British forces?” I asked him.

  “It is good; you are good,” he said. “But when you go, then what happens?”

  He stared at me for a long moment, as though he actually expected me to give him an answer. I didn’t have one for him, of course, so all I could do was pretend he was being rhetorical and move on to the next question.

  Most of the interview was unusable (he wasn’t a great one for key messaging), but I knew the footage of the IED going up would guarantee the piece some decent airtime. There was precious little Afghan face, but at least we could show that the Lancers and the Royal Engineers were finding IEDs and destroying them, making the road safe, keeping it open for business. There was a slight risk of negative messaging, given that they’d found an IED at all, but I could live with that.

  With the sun beginning to set, we had just enough time to film the rations sequence for The One Show. We drove a little way out into the desert and parked up the vehicles in a hollow square. One of the younger guys got some water on the boil, heating up a selection of our meals, while the rest of us sat on the ground against the sides of the vehicles and chatted. We talked about all kinds of rubbish, all of it good-humoured banter, all of it a million miles away from the countless horrors that could befall any one of us in this country. None of us mentioned the fact that, had we been driving down Highway 1 about an hour earlier, we could now have been stuck inside Bastion hospital instead, either getting the trauma-bay treatment or waiting and praying in the corridor. Instead we just poked fun at each other and watched the sun sink into the horizon.

  After ten minutes, the rations were ready. We had chicken-and-mushroom pasta, spaghetti bolognese and lamb curry. I moved from soldier to soldier, trying to get their opinions on the various dishes as Russ filmed, but it was hopeless. To a man, they all took the piss out of the food, spooning it into their mouths and making over-the-top groaning noises to signal their appreciation.

  “Seriously guys, just give me something I can use.”

  Only the squadron commander, a very well-spoken major known as Docs who had tagged along with the patrol, took the filming even vaguely seriously. I came to him last.

  “This tastes absolutely delicious,” he said, raising a spoonful of bolognese to his lips. “It really hits the spot.”

  He was probably taking the piss as well, but he had such a posh voice he could get away with it.

  We returned to Bastion later that evening, the Lancers offering us a lift in a small convoy of Huskies and Jackals that happened to be going that way. It took about two hours to get there, but it was better than hanging around for another twenty-four hours waiting for our scheduled flight. A long vehicle move at night was riskier than a short trip in a helicopter, but it meant we would have an extra day for editing (i.e. a day off), so we opted for the road.

  “There’s no point worrying about getting hit, boss,” said Russ. “If it’s going to happen, it’s going to happen. There’s nothing you can do about it.”

  I wasn’t entirely convinced by Russ’s logic, but I agreed to the change of plan anyway. Personally, I thought it was easier to go with the belief that bad things only ever happened to other people. It was now a favourite coping strategy of mine, a touch on the dubious side, but usable nonetheless. You had to think that way most days, otherwise you’d lose your nerve completely.

  Cameraman Down

  The following day – Sunday 19th June – was indeed a very easy day. We did do some editing, but we also went to the gym, drank a lot of coffee and sorted out some personal admin. Sundays were always quiet in the JMOC, and by mid-afternoon the office was usually empty, save for any volunteer willing to stay inside and man the phones. On this occasion, it was me, so I took a seat and went through the latest incidents on Ops Watch. Op Minimize had been called that morning, so I started with the Helmand feed.

  In Nahr-e Saraj, at 09.48, Royal Marines from 42 Commando had come under small-arms fire from insurgents at Checkpoint Sorab. They were unable to identify the insurgents’ position and did not return fire. One Marine had suffered a gunshot wound and was transported to Patrol Base 5, then flown to Bastion in forty-seven minutes.

  At 11.40 in Kajaki, 3 km south-west of FOB Zeebrugge, a foot patrol from 2nd Battalion 12th US Marines had struck an IED containing around 40 lbs of home-made explosive. One of the soldiers lost both his legs in the blast. He was flown to the medical facility at FOB Edi, but died of his wounds. Another IED – containing 10 lbs of home-made explosive – was later found in the same area, but safely detonated.

  Later, at 15.02, in Nahr-e Saraj, 2 km south-west of Salaang, a foot patrol from 1 Rifles had struck an IED in an irrigation ditch. Two of the soldiers had shrapnel wounds to the neck; one took shrapnel to the leg and one h
ad a possible dislocated shoulder. Their Afghan interpreter took shrapnel to the arm. All of them had been flown back to Bastion in thirty-two minutes.

  After the Helmand feed, I looked through the most significant acts across the rest of the country. It was the usual list of brutal calamities involving ISAF and Afghan forces, although a couple of incidents with civilians had also been flagged up. In Kunduz a mounted patrol carrying a Provincial Reconstruction Team had been hit by a car bomb. Two Afghan civilians had been killed and eleven were injured. Two German soldiers received minor injuries and were able to return to duty. The PRT Commander was not in the damaged vehicle and was able to reach his meeting as planned.

  Meanwhile in Kandahar, a combined mounted patrol from 3rd Afghan Border Police (ABP) Zone and 1st Squadron 38th US Cavalry Regiment was involved in a collision with an Afghan civilian vehicle in the Spin Boldak District. One of the vehicles in the convoy – complete with mine roller – struck the Afghan vehicle, seriously injuring four civilians, including two children. Three other civilians were also injured. They were flown to the hospital at Kandahar. An investigation had been launched.

  I sat in the office, making a note of these incidents, because I felt that someone should. It felt like the right thing to do. The war wasn’t just about statistics – it wasn’t just about a graph that showed “significant acts” going up or down. You had to have the details – you had to put some flesh on the figures – otherwise you just had numbers on a page.

  The office filled up again for the brief that evening. Faulkner gave us all his usual comments and updates, along with some of the latest figures churned out by the Intelligence cell.

  “There were 342 IED events across the whole of Afghanistan over the last month,” he said. “And 846 security incidents. That’s about the same as previous months and years.”

  It was all just carnage, the entire country. I went to bed feeling depressed. I couldn’t see how on earth this place was ever going to turn itself around.

  I fell asleep reading Chickenhawk. I was near the end now and, strangely, I found it quite relaxing. The Vietnam described by the author was truly ravaged and hopeless. But if that country could drag itself out of such horrors, then maybe there was some hope for Afghanistan.

  I was woken up by the voice of Russ. It was 11.45 p.m. His head was poking around the side of the camouflage sheet that was effectively my bedroom door.

  “Boss.”

  “Hi, Russ.” I sat up, feeling a little self-conscious. “What’s up?”

  “I’ve just spoken to my wife. We’ve got a medical emergency at home. She’s been in touch with the compassionate cell in the UK, and I could be going back.”

  “Is your wife OK?”

  “She is, she’s OK,” he said. “She’s just speaking to the compassionate cell now.”

  It transpired that a close relative of Russ’s wife had fallen seriously ill. A nurse from the compassionate cell was going to speak to the doctors in the morning. Following her take on the situation, we’d know what was happening with Russ.

  The following day was spent pretty much in limbo, as we waited to hear back from the UK. Russ didn’t know whether he’d be staying in Afghanistan or going back to the UK for good. There wasn’t a great deal he could do other than stay in touch with his wife and pack some of his kit.

  We got the phone call in the evening. It had been decreed that Russ was a “Compassionate B”. That meant two weeks’ leave back in the UK, with immediate effect.

  The next Tristar was leaving within the hour. Having spent the day in a fog of uncertainty, Russ was suddenly in a rush. He had about twenty minutes to get the rest of his kit together and get over to the flight line. There was virtually no time for proper goodbyes. He gave everyone in the JMOC a quick round of handshakes, then Ali gave him a big hug.

  “Take care of yourself,” she said, as though she was never going to see him again.

  “He’ll be back in two weeks, Ali,” I said, although her reaction did give me pause for thought. Compassionate cases were a moveable feast, and once a soldier was back in the UK, any number of circumstances could change.

  “Have a safe journey,” I said to Russ finally, shaking his hand. “I’ll see you soon.”

  “See you, boss,” he said, a big grin on his face.

  And then he picked up his bags, climbed into the minibus with Mick behind the wheel, and was gone.

  Wear Your Uniform to Work

  Russ’s departure meant our shooting schedule for the next two weeks had to be thrown out. Without a cameraman I was something of a spare part. Ali at least was able to perform a few localized jobs, photographing VIP visits by the likes of the Defence Secretary Liam Fox, but there was little for me to do short of cutting audio from previous interviews and pushing it out to radio stations back in the UK.

  This meant spending a lot of time in the JMOC, editing on my laptop. Which in turn meant spending some quality time with Faulkner, Dougie and Harriet. Once again I had the opportunity to see the minutiae of their daily office grind at first hand. It was not a pretty sight.

  The day after Russ’s departure – 22nd June – was “Wear Your Uniform to Work Day" back in the UK. It was an annual initiative designed to promote the reserve forces to employers. It wasn’t compulsory for reservists to participate, but it was encouraged. The MoD always ran a big publicity campaign – tied in with Armed Forces Day – to make sure everyone knew about it.

  As part of that publicity campaign, representatives from all three services were interviewed on BBC Breakfast, sitting on the famous red couch alongside the nation’s favourites Bill Turnbull and Sian Williams. The television in the JMOC was always turned to BBC Breakfast in the morning, supposedly to provide some light relief from the usual slurry of rolling news.

  First up was a spokeswoman from the RAF. She looked presentable enough to me, sitting on the red couch in her dark-blue uniform, but others disagreed.

  “The first thing you need to do is get a haircut,” Faulkner said. “Look at that fringe.”

  “You can barely see her eyes,” Harriet said.

  “She’s not even supposed to be wearing those badges on her lapels.” Faulkner shook his head. He was trying to get on with his work, but the lure of imperfect military representatives on the television was too great. “She just looks wrong.”

  Next up came the army, represented by a female colonel with blond hair. She took to the couch in her standard camouflage combats.

  “Another haircut,” Faulkner said. “Unbelievable.”

  “It’s too long,” confirmed Harriet.

  The colonel’s hair was a little unruly, but it was barely touching her collar.

  “She’s got no badges on her arm,” Faulkner said.

  I tried to make out what the colonel was actually saying, but it was difficult, given the running commentary alongside me.

  “What’s with these answers?” Faulkner said. “They should be twenty- to thirty-second soundbites.”

  I gave up and went outside for a coffee. It was another improbably hot day, the highs now reaching 44°C. Ali was standing over by the journalists’ tent, carrying out some routine checks on her kit before going to cover another VIP visit. The Foreign Secretary William Hague was in town.

  “All sorted?”

  “Yes, boss.”

  “Another day, another picture in a national newspaper.”

  Ali smiled and headed off. She wasn’t even supposed to cover VIP visits – it was considered an inappropriate use of resources sending a Combat Camera Team photographer to cover a meet-and-greet – but she was available, and it got her away from the JMOC. She found the office even more stultifying than I did.

  She would soon be back, however, to cover the sunset vigil. It was a weekly event at Bastion, held every Wednesday at 5.30 p.m. Every British serviceman and woman on camp was expected to attend, unless on duty. Hundreds of us would gather on the makeshift desert square just a short walk from the JMOC. We’d form long r
anks, dozens deep, and listen to the prayers and eulogies offered up by the chaplain and the colleagues of the fallen. Ali would take photographs of the service, which were sent to the bereaved families.

  If no one had died during the previous seven days, then obviously there was no vigil, but this week three soldiers had been killed in action. Six days earlier, Craftsman Andrew Found from the REME was trying to recover a damaged Warthog during an operation to detain an insurgent in Nahr-e Saraj when he was fatally wounded by an IED. On the same day, Corporal Lloyd Newell, originally of the Parachute Regiment, was killed by small-arms fire during a firefight. The third fatality – Private Gareth Bellingham from 3 Mercian – was shot dead while on patrol in Nahr-e Saraj two days later.

  Only the deaths of Craftsman Found and Private Bellingham were marked at that evening’s vigil. Corporal Newell was not mentioned, on account of the fact that he was actually a serving member of the SAS. Even at Bastion, the Special Forces liked to take every precaution to ensure their identities remained a secret. Their desire for anonymity was reflected in the MoD’s statement on Corporal Newell’s death, which listed his unit as the Parachute Regiment (it described him as “the personification of a great British paratrooper”). It added that no details about his age or where he was from would be released “because of the nature of his work”.

  The MoD maintained this line in the days that followed, despite the fact that Corporal Newell’s membership of the SAS had been widely reported in the British press, most prominently by Virginia Wheeler in the Sun.

  The vigil was always followed in the early hours of the morning by the “ramp ceremony”, attended by members of the losing units. This was the start of the repatriation process, whereby colleagues of the deceased loaded the coffins into the back of a Hercules. Ali took the pictures, which again went to the family.

  In the case of this particular ramp ceremony, which took place as usual at around 3.30 a.m., Ali only took pictures of the coffins of Craftsman Found and Private Bellingham.