Lethal Shot

by Robert Driscoll

  ‘If we don’t go out we leave the north exposed,’ Steve said.

  Damo was more blunt. ‘Lads, if we don’t go out we may as well stop calling ourselves marines.’

  We went out in two teams. Matt Kenneally had outperformed himself, spotting the body parts and getting us into the compound, so his reward was to be asked to go again. The same with Jonesy. I asked him if he wanted to come and he had no hesitation. Robbie, of course, could not be stopped. There was another lad I’ll call ‘Ted’, plus a few others I won’t name. They all wanted what I wanted. Revenge.

  The other patrol was the Recce squad plus Steve’s own HQ team and the FAC, who, if any big toys were required up above, could order them in minutes.

  The plan was to take a very similar route to the previous day’s, with the objective being to gain a good understanding of the compound and main buildings involved in the carnage. This is called a ‘standing patrol’, and it’s as much an intelligence gathering exercise as anything. You go out and look around, and if you trigger an event then you can react.

  And we were desperate to react.

  In light of the hammering we’d taken, Steve said, ‘For the purposes of this patrol we are moving to more aggressive rules.’ He also revealed he would have air support on standby.

  For the first time since March the senior management were acknowledging that their boys were not equipped well enough for the terrain they – we – had been sent to subdue. The Taliban had no rules. We had rules about shaving and shitting. In a bloody fight to the death, who would you put your money on? The highly trained bloke with hi-tech weaponry who has one hand tied behind his back? Or the survivalist who will do anything to win?

  The amended rules of engagement didn’t mean we were going to walk around murdering civilians. But we didn’t have to wait until colleagues’ legs were flying off in the opposite direction to their bodies before we could take lethal action.

  I’ve got a good feeling about this …

  * * *

  Once again we were on the move before 6 a.m. I thought we’d have a clear run but the farmers were already up. The proper farmers, not the fake kids posing with tools while beaming their reports to insurgent leaders. These old guys didn’t look at us twice. They were driving their animals, following the sun as they had done for generations.

  We had fields to cross, little waterways to navigate. It was largely the same route, but by a different path. Retrace your own footsteps at your peril – IEDs were always planted where they guessed you would walk.

  Travelling parallel to the Recce team along the eastings but slightly more to the south, we got ourselves to within 200 metres from the group of compounds that had caused all the trouble. A small incline gave us natural cover. Ted and I climbed up onto a stack of hay bales for an unobstructed view. We lay for a couple of hours, watching, monitoring, checking in with Sunray to see what his group was observing. I remember the radio signal was poor. Steve kept breaking up. Then he’d move position along the tree line and suddenly sound clear as a bell. Neither of us had anything to report. It was hot and we were totally exposed as the temperatures crept up. Everything was quiet.

  This is not good … What are we missing?

  And then I heard it. We all did. The horrible, deafening crackle and blast of an IED.

  I rolled over on the hay to check the lads. It was none of us. I flicked the radio and contacted Steve.

  ‘Ten A? Sunray? IED explosion to the north of our position.’

  Unusually I got nothing back. For thirty seconds I kept trying all the frequencies for the Recce troop. Nothing. Then Captain G-side, Steve’s 2ic, came online.

  ‘Thank God,’ I said – and then I remembered. He hadn’t come out today. He was back at Toki.

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked.

  ‘You tell me. I can’t raise Sunray.’

  ‘Do you need me to investigate?’

  ‘Do you have a position?’

  ‘I will in two seconds.’

  We had started moving north when suddenly the radio crackled.

  ‘Sunray!’

  It was one of the Recce lads.

  ‘Sunray’s been hit,’ he said. ‘I repeat, Sunray’s been hit.’

  Oh, shit!

  I got off the line to let him co-ordinate directly with Toki to get a MERT.

  Just don’t send the fucking Americans this time …

  Listening to the nine-liner being despatched I knew things were rough. Even as it was being transmitted I got the guys ready to move. ‘Do you need help?’ I asked Steve’s man.

  ‘Absolutely,’ he said. ‘We’ve got a load of ICOM active near us. We think people are positioning themselves. This could get nasty.’

  They were around the other side of the compound, about 400 metres from us. There was a straight-line route but as soon as we set off I heard machine guns. They weren’t targeting us – yet. If we went the direct route, though, we’d be totally exposed for five or six minutes. Instead I kept the lads to the low ground to try to sneak up from behind.

  As we neared the treeline the firing intensified. The Recce lads were under enormous pressure. At the rate we were moving I wasn’t convinced we’d get there in time to be of any help.

  Luckily, we didn’t have to.

  If the detonation of an IED is loud and unexpected, the sudden appearance of a Mirage directly overhead is ten times worse. I thought a bomb had gone off next to my head. The jet could only have been a few metres above the tallest tree. The noise was immense and the sight terrifying.

  And I was on the same side.

  The Mirage slowed almost to stalling point, then the nose lifted and its engines roared as the afterburners engaged. With the aircraft’s tail pointed downwards, the heat where we were was like a furnace. What the compound must have felt would have been like a volcano. This was the modern equivalent of a dragon swooping down and threatening to torch a village, and I reckon it had the same effect. The shooting stopped, absolutely. The Mirage did one more circuit as a show of force before disappearing as suddenly as it had arrived. I was surprised it hadn’t opened fire. I think maybe the insurgents were, too. They knew they’d had their warning though. Next time the Mirage wouldn’t just bare its teeth.

  We were still 200 metres south. A stream on our left was heading in the direction we needed to follow so I ordered everyone in. On top of cooling us down it was the safest way for us to travel. The streambed is below ground level and it doesn’t have IEDs. But moving through the water can be hard work. The stream was 3 metres wide and came up to waist level at its deepest, so the going was slow. We were moving against the flow. I was also checking GPS co-ordinates all the way, as we were too low for visual contact. The last thing I needed was to overshoot the Recces.

  Eventually we made it.

  ‘Lads, we’re here.’

  We started climbing the bank.

  Click-click-click.

  Click-click-click.

  Click-click-click.

  ‘Break contact!’

  We all fell back in the stream, guns at the ready. Someone was waiting for us to emerge. The giveaway triple clicks of sniper rounds aimed at our heads drew cover fire from the Recces.

  Click-click-click.

  Click-click-click.

  I could hear the exchange of rounds, placing the two sides.

  I summoned my team. ‘I’m going out. I’ll take two volunteers. The rest wait for the all-clear then get on with the casevac.’

  I’m not losing any more men today.

  In the next lull in the firing, I and two others leapt out of the stream – as much as you can leap carrying near your own weight in soaked equipment – and pelted towards the GPS reference I’d been given. Within a couple strides we got visuals on the Recce guys lined up. Two more strides and the shots began raining down again. The ground in front of me exploded in puffs of dust. The tree behind me splintered. The Recces opened fire to the max and silenced the attack. But I knew we’d cut it fine.<
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  I ran straight over to Steve. This was my friend, my boss and my mentor. The nine-liner told you only so much. I had no real idea how seriously he was injured. I prayed he wasn’t another Ollie or Sam.

  He was lying on one of our black roll-up stretchers. They look a bit like an industrial bin bag and weigh about as much. The bag was as wet as I was, but not with stream water. He was lying in an inch of his own blood, and it was getting higher.

  With the bullets pinging around it’s hard to focus but all I could see was holes. His armour was pitted like a crumpet, his flesh looked like a pin cushion. But he had his legs.

  The men working on him were doing a fantastic job.

  ‘What did he step on?’ I asked.

  Without looking up, one of them said, ‘He didn’t step on anything. It was detonated when he walked past.’ He pointed towards the trees. The remains of an oil drum were strewn around a scorched patch of earth. Its contents would have been blasted out of it at thousands of metres per second. The trees around it bore the proof. So did three of Steve’s men being treated by comrades. The man himself had taken the lion’s share.

  ‘Shit luck,’ I said.

  ‘Nah.’ The guy shook his head. ‘This was organised. Three of the patrol walked past before Sunray. They knew who he was. He was targeted.’

  Shit! How the fuck were they doing this? Steve was dressed identically to the rest of us. With the helmet he was indistinguishable from any of the others. This time he’d been fourth in the line. Another day he’d be sixth or eighth or third. Could it have been luck?

  ‘They saw me.’

  I did a double take. The voice sounded like a kid’s who had sucked helium from a balloon. But it was coming from Steve. Somehow he was awake and he was following the conversation.

  I dropped to my knees.

  ‘Don’t speak. We’re going to get you out of here.’

  He ignored me. He’s the boss.

  ‘I couldn’t get a signal,’ he squeaked. ‘I had to stand up when everyone was lying down. They were watching. They had to be.’

  For Christ’s sake!

  How were they doing it? We were part of the biggest military machine in history. They were a jumble sale of an opposition yet they were running rings round us. They saw us when we didn’t see them. And they consistently racked up big points when we were scoring ducks.

  The more I studied Steve the more holes in him I saw. The guys were cutting away clothes everywhere there was damage and finding more wounds each time. I think his eardrums must have perforated as well. He didn’t always hear us and his answers were shouted. The high-pitched voice was explained by the cavern where his back used to be. Obviously the blast had caught his lungs.

  ‘What’s wrong with me?’ he asked.

  It was like listening to the voice of Mickey Mouse. To me, after everything I’d seen, it was just funny – at the darkest moments the blackest humour is what works. He kept saying his leg hurt. I checked. He had everything he needed, including both feet. The upper right side of his body had taken the full brunt of the blast. His mind, I think, was covering up the true pain.

  Every cut we made in his clothing revealed a new horror. Under Steve’s right armpit there was a huge hole, and it was pulsating. Jonesy was busy elsewhere. The rest of us knew just basic triage. This was out of our comfort zone.

  ‘Where’s that fucking helicopter?’

  One of the lads called over.

  ‘It’s here but it won’t land till we can guarantee safety.’

  I wasn’t doing anything useful with Steve, so I ran over to co-ordinate the HLS – helicopter landing site. With the rest of us providing cover by continuous fire, I got Robbie and three of the Recce lads to go out with mine detectors to clear a space. Downdraught from the rotors is enough to set off an IED so we needed a clearing measuring at least 15 x 30 metres.

  Click-click-click.

  Click-click-click.

  Everything the insurgents fired at us we doubled in our reply. Still they kept pecking away and still our four boys kept sweeping that space. When Robbie gave me the thumbs-up I was straight on the comms.

  ‘We’ve cleared the HLS. Get that bird down. Now.’

  I was standing among the trees on the higher ground to the east of the stream. Toki was on the other side, to the west. The stream ran north to south. Between us and the water was a sloping field. That’s where the lads were sweeping for IEDs. It could have been better; it could have been worse. It was the best we had.

  Out of nowhere I heard rotor blades. A voice on the radio: ‘Pop some smoke.’

  ‘Roger that,’ Damo said. ‘Purple.’

  Textbook procedure at a time of crisis. We throw out a grenade which streams out smoke. The smoke directs a helicopter to a precise spot and indicates wind direction. The colour of the smoke confirms it’s a friendly. Use the same colour each time and the Taliban quickly start doing the same in order to encourage false landings. My choice of purple on that occasion was random – and safer.

  Choppers always land into the wind. Watching from the ground is like watching an eerie X-Factor intro as this magnificent machine slowly emerges from the haze. But there was no time to be impressed. The second the Chinook touched earth four of us were sprinting towards it with Steve, each of us holding a corner of the stretcher. We had 15 metres to cover and we probably broke the record getting there. In a handicap race, anyway. The threat of enemy bullets at any moment added extra zip.

  Just as we reached the Chinook its back door lowered and a medic dashed out directing us up the ramp and inside. Then he ran out to make sure the other casualties were being shipped in as well. Medevac is chaotic, it’s noisy, it’s dangerous and it’s a little bit brilliant. All these tiny cogs in a well-oiled machine working without fault. And, I have to admit, without any regard to their own lives. A stray bullet could have taken down any one of us. It didn’t enter our minds. We had to get our mates on board that bird at any cost.

  That didn’t mean we got it right.

  The CH-47 is massive, but it’s also designed to be flown in combat areas. The ramp is where the gunner would normally sit with a mounted machine gun. As this was a medevac he wasn’t there – but the weapon was. We ran full pelt blindly up the ramp and straight into the machine gun.

  ‘Ow!’ Steve squealed. ‘My leg!’

  Him and his fucking leg. You couldn’t make it up.

  ‘Sorry, mate!’ and on we went.

  We dumped him down and sprinted back out for the next casualty, managing to avoid the gun this time. As I turned to leave, I took a look at Steve and hoped it wouldn’t be my last.

  His back was missing.

  In the time it took for the next man to be delivered, the Chinook doctors had anaesthetised Sunray, rolled him onto his front and cut his back wide open from the neck downwards. Right before my eyes they were massaging his heart from behind.

  Absolutely incredible. While the rest of us had our heads in the sky, high on adrenalin, these surgeons were cooler than ice. I knew Steve and the others were in the best hands. All around them were guns, grenades, ammo, armour and the sound of bullets mere feet away. And there they were, oblivious to the dangers, doing what they were trained to do.

  With the last wounded man on, we jumped off and literally dived on top of one another. The second we were off the ramp, the Chinook started to rise as the rotors whirred. Seconds later the dust storm they kicked up made vision impossible. The real threat, though, was the downward pressure. Only the fact we were clinging onto each other stopped us from being blown away, possibly onto IEDs.

  It took a minute or so for the dust to settle. Literally and figuratively. We looked like desert rats. Everyone else was still firing at the compound. When would it end?

  * * *

  Getting Steve and the others to safety felt like the threat was over, but for those on the ground it was just beginning. Not just for the day, but the rest of the tour.

  The march back home was eventf
ul. I had twenty-two men from the combined patrols, all moving with 5 metres between each of them in this giant snake configuration. What the front guys saw the back guys didn’t. Sometimes the rear encountered threats not in place when Robbie et al., at the head, had gone through. We fired at every conceivable target as we went. The gloves were well and truly off.

  Enemy fire came often when we least expected it. We would all drop to our knees and respond. At the penultimate treeline before Toki one compound got particularly spicy. Shots were falling mere metres from me. I gave the order to unleash an RPG.

  The rocket shot into the house and the firing ended – and along with it several lives, I imagine.

  But the rocket-launch system’s backblast kicks up a hell of a lot of dust. Throw in the loud explosion as the grenade detonated and all those men not listening to their radio messages freaked out. A second after the blast, Jonesy came flying past me with the same vigour with which he’d leapt to tend to Ollie and Sam.

  ‘Where’s the bomb? Where’s the bomb?’ He thought we were the ones under attack.

  It wasn’t just the medic. All our nerves were on edge. Some of the men I barely recognised. They were twitching at crop stems like Space Cadet used to, seeing enemy eyes in a gust of wind. I couldn’t blame them. Most of the time they were wrong. Then suddenly a tree would appear to fire at us and you’d realise there was a moped parked in the track behind it. The shooter would let off a few rounds then disappear. There wasn’t a moment’s grace. A moment’s peace. Our nerves were being worn down.

  For two kilometres we moved with bullets rattling past us every hundred steps. The danger was everywhere and ever-present. And that was without the threat of IEDs. Your instinct when shot at is to dive for low ground. If that low ground hasn’t been cleared by the Vallon man you could be leaping into more trouble.

  Click-click-click.

  Click-click-click.

  I dropped to my knees and attempted to establish the origin of fire. Then I returned it with interest. It came from a compound 40 metres to our left. Just one position above the wall, so not an army. Just one person who recognised an enemy on his uppers. A week earlier we would have changed course and ripped that perp out of his eyrie. Right then, we just wanted to get home.