Spoken from the Front

by Andy McNab

  Then we searched for the [three] dead Taliban. Two of the guys looked like they were foreign fighters. These were the guys dressed in black. They were maybe Iranian or Pakistani. We found grenades on their bodies and mobile phones. They had two grenades and a mobile phone each. And we took notebooks from them with phone numbers in. The third guy looked like he was local Afghan. He was wearing brown traditional Afghan dress. He had a red sash round his waist and a turban that was off at the time. He was the guy with the RPG beside him.

  I had killed people in battle before but never as close as this. You very rarely see the Taliban. They are usually at a distance and well hidden. I sat down at the end and said: 'Fucking hell, lads. You only normally read about this shit but we've actually done it.' Then we cleared things up and got the Afghan National Army. They did a search and took the weapons off them [the dead] and then it came over the radio that the fire-fight had died out at the other end.

  I had a face to face with the OC. It then came over the radio that a Harrier was coming in to do a bombing run. So we had to extract out of the area pretty quick and we went back to Inkerman. A couple of times I have shot at Taliban and seen them drop and said: 'That's a kill.' But I had never done anything like this where you can say 100 per cent they were killed at close range. We took no casualties. At least three Taliban were confirmed dead, but there were probably four dead – and there might have been others. There must have been at least ten Taliban involved in the initial ambush because of the amount of fire that was coming down.

  August 2007

  Private Tom Dawkes, The Mercian Regiment

  I flew to Kandahar on a Tristar. I just slept on the plane. I wasn't thinking about what would happen when I got there. Then after two days we went on to [Camp] Bastion. My first impression was that it was hot – very hot! Temperatures were in the forties [centigrade]. I was an infantry soldier in C Company, which had already been posted to Lashkar Gah. We did a few patrols here and there and then did a twelve-day op in the Green Zone in Gereshk. Our role was to try to take this area of high ground that had been controlled by the Taliban.

  I had my first contact on the first day of the op. It was eight or nine o'clock in the morning and we were going along on foot. I was armed with an LMG. Then we got ambushed by RPG and small-arms fire at a place called the Fan. We were in open ground and two people – I was one of them – had dropped off their day sacks. Then we took a couple of steps back just before an RPG came straight out of the cornfields. To start with I heard the whoosh. Then it went straight through our group – I was no more than six feet away from it. Straight away they [the Taliban] opened up with small-arms fire. So we just jumped into ditches where there was cover. I jumped into some water. We were firing back in the general direction from where they were. But then they fired another RPG, which hit the wall on the opposite side to us. I managed to get off almost 200 rounds. But we couldn't actually see what we were firing at because the cornfields were about eight feet tall. So I don't know whether we hit anyone. The contact must have lasted about five minutes and then we bugged out back to the compound. There were no casualties and everyone was laughing saying: 'RPG! RPG!'

  We found out that we had just about been surrounded by the Taliban. Others [from C Company] had taken shots from behind us. We stayed in the compound – an open building with no roof – and for a couple of hours we used a small bombardment of artillery and mortar fire. I was thinking: Am I going to get through this? It's more mental than physical once you're out there. I just wanted to do my duty to the best of my ability. It was a real eye-opener ...

  22 August 2007 [diary]

  Captain Adam Chapman, The Mercian Regiment

  The last three weeks have passed in a blur. I returned to Camp Bastion for a week before returning to the UK for two weeks' (well-deserved) leave. And now I'm back in Camp Bastion waiting to fly down to Garmsir again. I never imagined all those months ago that I'd be back in Garmsir in late August!

  Needless to say, leave was awesome. I managed to see a lot of friends and family and travelled all over the country. I saw Martin [his injured comrade] a couple of times in hospital: he's improving – he was very close to death – but he's strong in both body and mind, and I'm sure he'll bounce back. It wasn't very nice seeing him in treatment. There are lots of injured soldiers there; it's quite depressing. Hospitals aren't the best of places anyway, but there's something upsetting about seeing so many young people in visibly bad conditions. There was one soldier from my regiment who had lost both legs.

  The rest of the time was spent travelling, spending too much money, getting drunk, going to weddings and, perhaps most importantly, seeing Lisa and my family. It wasn't that bad being back. I got into the swing of things pretty quickly, but a lot of people were worried about the state I'd be in. I suppose they watch the news back home and hear about things – it's natural.

  While I was away some of my troop had a very lucky escape when an RPG exploded when it hit their room: only minor shrapnel wounds, very fortunate not to have lost anyone. And they also had some very big contacts.

  The BRF [Brigade Recce Force] have also taken 5 men off me because they are down on men, which is a bit of a sucker punch. The positive thing is I've only got two months to do!

  25 August

  For some reason, despite having very little to do these last few days, I've been very lazy in writing this journal. I don't know if it's my state of mind after having been on leave or what, but I need to be a bit more proactive.

  Three soldiers died on Thursday when an American jet dropped a bomb on them. They call it 'friendly fire'. I call it a tragedy. It's not the first time it's happened, just usually it happens to innocent Afghan women and children who were in the wrong place at the wrong time: extremely saddening. The soldiers were from the Royal Anglian Regiment who have now lost 9 men on this tour. And I think it's over 20 in total. That's just over one soldier dying every week. How long can they keep this up? It's the same thing in Iraq: the Army is undermanned as it is, but men won't be staying in much longer at this rate. I know a lot of men are leaving after going to Afghanistan. I suppose people want a taste of war and then leave it at that. I don't blame them. Especially if they're married with children.

  I picked up a new beret and badge today. On 1 September my regiment [the Worcestershire and Sherwood Foresters] is amalgamating with the Staffords and Cheshires to become the Mercian Regiment; a sad day, really. I'm quite proud of where I come from and my regiment – it's part of my identity, and some of that will be lost. But you have to move forward constantly and I think it will be good in the long run. After all, my regiment was formed from the merger of 2 others.

  September 2007

  Private Tom Dawkes, The Mercian Regiment

  We got to meet quite a lot of the local Afghan people. We spoke to them through interpreters. Their culture is very different from ours and in a way I felt ashamed to be there. Although all the Taliban want to do is kill people, the Afghans are essentially a friendly people. They just want to get on with their lives. But we were – through collateral damage – sometimes destroying their lives. It was a great shame. Innocent people were having their lives messed up. But most of the people were on our side – they told us where the Taliban had been and locations of IEDs. Sometimes they had even seen the Taliban plant them so they told us to go this way rather than that way. Most Afghans know that we are trying to push the Taliban out of their villages so they can get on with their everyday lives. So I think they do trust us. I don't respect the Taliban for what they do, but I do respect them as fighters. They are strong fighters. They will fight to the death, and because it is their terrain and their home ground, it is very hard to beat them. They don't carry heavy kit like us so they are able to manoeuvre quickly. Some of them who have been trained have good soldier skills, but others have just been handed a weapon and told to go out. They can't shoot straight – fortunately!

  September 2007

  Colour Sergeant Si
mon Panter, The Royal Anglian Regiment

  It was the last battle-group op of our tour: to clear the Green Zone. We had cleared the Taliban out and they had crept back in so we were going to clear them out again.

  We were going to be out for one week. We marched from Sangin – about eighteen Ks. We left at 1 a.m. to get there for first light. Throughout the day, we had several skirmishes with the Taliban all the way up and then at the end of the day we had got to our limit of exploitation (LOE). We were not paying a great deal of attention because we were fucked, fighting the Taliban all day in the heat. We had been on our feet for eighteen hours – the whole A Company group, about 120 men. We just settled down: the OC got in the three platoon commanders so that we could organize an all-round defence. We got briefed up and I was on my way back to brief up the rest of our platoon when, suddenly, all hell broke loose. It all kicked off.

  It was an RPG-initiated contact from the Taliban. But I had never heard so many RPGs coming our way. It was followed by a hell of a lot of automatic gunfire. We were caught on the hop. Luckily, we had a section pushed out to a compound at the river's edge but it was pinned down. They couldn't move in this compound, getting sprayed with everything the Taliban had, and we were getting exactly the same. But I was in the open: I was caught as I was going back over to my men. My platoon was in a ditch at my left flank – about fifty metres away. I was on my belt buckle – about 150 metres from the enemy – and I saw tracer fire going past in the corner of my eyes. I could hear the whizz of it. The lads were saying: 'Sarge, you want to get over here in cover.' And I was like: 'Fuck, I'm not moving. If I move I'll get shot. There's no fucking way I'm moving.' It was about six o'clock at night. I was caught in the middle of it. There must have been about twenty Taliban. We, the Brits, were very fortunate that day, but the ANA took three casualties from fragmentation – RPGs. One was killed and two seriously injured.

  The fire-fight lasted about twenty minutes. But I stayed on my belt buckle the whole time. I daren't move and I didn't even return a single round because I knew that if I moved I was going to get it. Afterwards, I was laughing nervously with the lads but I had several moments when I was thinking: How the fuck did I get away with that?

  5 September 2007 [diary]

  Captain Adam Chapman, The Mercian Regiment

  Since returning from the check-points, we've been back into the same old routine. However, a few significant events have occurred.

  We're now definitely leaving Garmsir on 8 September. Finally, after so long (it will be 4 months), we're going, our future as yet uncertain. At the moment, we will be going back to Bastion with A Company, before another large operation up north, then on to FOB Arnhem. Arnhem is even worse than here, by all accounts: lots of mortar attacks as well as IED threat. So, I'm in two minds about leaving. In favour is working with A Coy [Company] again, as well as doing something new. Against is the more apparent danger and learning the ground all over again. But overall I'm glad to be leaving here, and risk is part of my job.

  Prior to leaving, there is the little matter of a large op we're doing down here first. We're doing a deliberate company attack to clear a large area of enemy territory. It should be good and a nice, positive way to finish our time here. At the same time, the Gren Guards are taking over again so it will be very busy.

  Today started very well but ended badly, in that all-too familiar way. We celebrated/commemorated our amalgamation into the Mercian Regiment. We had a little parade, the padre said a few words, we then had a volleyball competition, followed by some hot dogs – a bonus. It was just a nice day.

  However, the OC then informed us that C Company had two men killed and one badly injured; B Company also had two seriously injured in a separate incident. At the moment, we don't know who they are but it's likely I will know them. Another very sad day, and to what end? A lot of people are wondering: is it worth it?

  9 September

  The op ended in disaster, and became the worst day yet in many ways. All was going to plan until a large contact kicked off. It was almost like an ambush. Fortunately for us, my troop was a few hundred metres to the east of the main body.

  Over the next few hours, the company tried to extract out of the contact. There were a lot of casualties and Pte Botha was missing in no man's land, and couldn't be extracted because of the enemy. My group engaged one compound with an anti-tank missile, killing enemy in there. But, other than that, we weren't involved in the main fight. It was so frustrating and so terrible listening on the radio to the events unfolding. I could hear the screaming and anguish in people's voices. It was horrible. We eventually caught up and moved forward to provide extra ammo and become the reserve, but we were needed to secure the extraction route. Eventually, jets dropped 4 500lb bombs on to enemy positions only 50 metres away from us. It was surreal; it felt like the world was blowing up. That caused a lot of damage and knocked unconscious Pte Stacey, when part of the wall he was hiding behind landed on him.

  I could write about this for pages, but it was hard enough opening the journal. Sgt Brelsford and Pte [Johan] Botha were dead and seven others injured, some very seriously. I'll write more when I can but, to be honest, I don't think I want to just yet. Seeing all the young soldiers and even sgts and the OC after led me to tears with them. It was such a blow for every-one and it will take some getting over. What a waste of life.

  September 2007

  McNab: I know only too well from experience how sad it is to lose a friend and comrade, and the effect it has on the other men so I wasn't surprised that Captain Adam Chapman was reluctant to write in his diary about the events of 7/8 September. Operation Pechtaw had involved A (Grenadier) Company Group, 2 Battalion The Mercian Regiment. On the night of 7 September, Captain Simon Cupples, the officer commanding of 1 Platoon, had been ordered to clear two key objectives. On reaching the second, the lead section was engaged simultaneously from three enemy machine-gun positions, the closest being no more than twenty-five metres away. It was a massive and well-planned ambush believed to involve some thirty Taliban. There were immediate casualties. Cupples, his men and everyone on the op had to take life-or-death decisions quickly and show their mettle time and time again. Warrant Officer Class 2 Pete Lewis takes up the story.

  7/8 September 2007

  Warrant Officer Class 2 Pete Lewis, The Mercian Regiment

  The big one was in Garmsir. This was the day before we handed back to the Grenadier Guards. If you added the contacts up, the boys had probably been in 200-plus contacts by this stage [on the single tour]. And that was deploying every weapon system we had. Casualty-wise, until then we had had a few shrapnel wounds from RPGs, but that was it: nothing worse.

  September 7 was the last company op we did down in Garmsir. We were pushing further south than anyone had been on that tour. I left at 1800 hours to put the first checkpoints in for the blokes to come through me. The boys started coming at last light, which was about 1930 hours. It was a funny day as well because it was quiet around camp. Everybody knew that we were going to get some action that night. Even though we had not pushed that far south, we had recced a lot of places we were going. We were probably going no more than 1,800 metres south and then we were going to swing along and go down to CP [Command Post] Balaclava and clear some of the compounds that we got counterattacked from on a daily basis.

  I counted the company through at JTAC Hill. Less my tac [tactical support group], there were ninety-four on the ground that night. I was in a Viking as my casevac vehicle. At about 2320 the first contact came. That basically was [an attack on] a point section going around. They got hit by small-arms fire. That's where we took casualties. That night we had two dead, six gunshot wounds, and a lot of minor casualties. I was with the doc: he was in one Viking and I was in the other. I can remember going forward in the Vikings. It just seemed to take for ever to get there. I picked up the first casualty who had a gunshot to the leg. He must have got that in the volley of fire that came through on the back of the init
ial contact so I chucked him in the back where there was a medic team.

  One of the platoon sergeants on the ground was Sergeant [Craig] Brelsford. That was the last time I spoke to him because he got shot that night. I said: 'Brels, are you all right?'