by Andy McNab
I didn't feel bitter and twisted. Nobody had forced me to be a soldier. I had no fear of being killed – fuck it, when it happened, I just wanted it to be quick, like Bob, while doing my job.
I could hardly take the kudos of being in the Regiment and then moan about it when things went wrong. People got killed. That was what happened. If you didn't like it, there were plenty of guys who wanted to take your place.
I managed the odd smile sometimes. I imagined Bob watching me. He'd be taking the piss out of the crap hat huddled in the corner in a pile of his own shit.
To begin with, I'd taken capture personally. It was the first time I'd really failed at anything since joining up. But then the optimist in me said, 'It'll be all right. I'm not dead yet. Maybe I'll get to the next stage. I just need to get through the next interrogation, the next beating, the next day, the next hour . . .'
Again, the pilot was an inspiration. I remembered how he'd started off his talk. He'd held out his hands with his elbows tight against his sides, and he'd walked three and a half paces, turned, walked three and a half paces, turned again. I'd stared at him and wondered what the fuck he was on.
'This was my cell . . . this was my space . . . for six years . . .'
He went in there playing the big Marine, but all that shit was taken out of him. Get aggressive with two of them, and next time they brought in four.
'They have control of your life. There's nothing you have control of physically, they can do what they want. The only thing you can control is your mind. Let them have that, and you've lost.'
I sat in my cell and thought about his pain and fear. His family didn't even know he was still alive. I didn't know if anyone knew I was. There was nothing I had control over but my mind. I resolved to keep it mine.
I used the same thought process I had when I was a kid. However bad I thought I'd got it, there was somebody who had it worse. I was only on week three, week four . . . The American lad had had six years of it, and he'd survived. I'd been an infantry soldier and a Special Forces soldier for more than sixteen years. I was used to being wet, cold and hungry. I was used to fighting. I was even used to getting beaten up. I was in an infantry battalion, for fuck's sake. This guy was a pilot, flying from the cocoon of an aircraft-carrier, dropping a bomb from an air-conditioned office in the sky, then flying back for doughnuts, coffee and a spot of volleyball on deck.
Then, on his seventy-seventh mission, with just three to go before he got binned, he was shot down. The journey from cocoon to bamboo cage was short and sharp. At least I had a roof and a concrete floor.
I kept on and on, grasping at straws, trying to dredge the positive from the negative.
I was eventually released three days after the other three from the patrol, along with the remaining five or six American pilots who'd also been held in Abu Ghraib. There was some famous footage of General Norman Schwarzkopf, the Coalition's supreme commander, shaking hands with them as they came down the steps in Riyadh. The SAS prisoners were round the back of the aircraft, about to be whisked off to the British military hospital in Cyprus.
89
Hereford
May 1991
Back at the Lines, we had a couple of sessions with Dr Gordon Turnbull, the RAF psychiatrist. He'd treated the mountain-rescue teams at Lockerbie in 1988. The patrol's survivors sat in a comfortable room in the officers' mess as Gordon explained what post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) was all about.
For starters, it wasn't a disease but it was a clinical condition, a natural physical and emotional reaction to a deeply shocking or life-threatening event. It could and did affect anyone, and there was nothing unmanly about experiencing it.
One of the main symptoms of PTSD was an unwillingness to talk about the events that had brought it about – so one of the main challenges in helping sufferers was to engage with them and get them to accept treatment. Some still felt misunderstood by the medical establishment and society at large, and ended up suffering in silence. Others carried so much guilt with them – yet another symptom – that they felt unworthy of help.
PTSD could affect every aspect of a sufferer's life – not surprising when the symptoms included insomnia, recurring nightmares, persistent high anxiety levels, severe mood swings, hyper-alertness, violent and aggressive outbursts, lack of concentration, sexual dysfunction and depression, self-loathing for surviving when others had not, self-isolation, inability to readjust to normal life, inability to communicate with loved ones, or to reciprocate love, and the desire to remain solely with others in the same position, who therefore 'understood'.
PTSD sufferers might also experience alcohol- or drug-related problems, often caused by an attempt to self-medicate their symptoms away. Some just lost it completely and resorted to violence – ranging from spousal abuse to murder when the stakes were cranked up.
I knew quite a few lads who fitted the bill one way or another.
Flashbacks brought on by reminders of the trauma could be the most debilitating feature of PTSD. They occurred when the brain was unable to process the imagery it had received during a severe traumatic incident; our brains needed to make sense of it before they could store it, so they played it over and over again, like an old record, until they did.
I took a long, hard look at myself. Nothing to worry about so far. I didn't have nightmares. I didn't feel depressed. In fact, I felt lucky. I was alive. But Gordon left me very aware that I shouldn't take anything for granted. I'd have to watch myself, maybe keep a mental checklist of the symptoms. Just in case.
Until quite recently PTSD had been perceived in the military as a sign of weakness, and stigma was still attached to therapy of any sort. Guys often wouldn't admit they were suffering; apart from anything else, they didn't want those close to them to think they were mad. This was certainly the Regiment's first foray into this landscape, and only happened because we'd been taken prisoner and tortured.
I already knew of a place in Wales that many from the green army had gone to after the Falklands. These were rough, tough Paras and Marines, but they'd needed help. I'd also heard that a couple of guys from the Regiment had gone there secretly.
Delta Force actively embraced therapy. They even had their own doctor. Why pay so many millions to train someone, then watch them fall apart at the seams? Why not try to stop it before it happened, or try to help them through it if it did? For the time being, jumping in a car and heading secretly for Wales was the only real option for the rest of us.
We spent about six months mincing around doing debriefs to a range of intelligence and military organizations, and receiving continuous medical treatment. My teeth took a lot of sorting, and I had some nerve damage in my left hand. The doctors seemed to like sticking little steel probes into my skin and passing a current through them to see if it jumped up and down like a frog's legs in a scientific experiment.
I learnt a lot more about the Iraqi side of things. Information came back from the CIA and our own spooks that the Iraqis had thought we were an Israeli raiding party, and that they had taken more than two hundred casualties, dead and wounded, as we legged it towards Syria.
We discovered why the radios didn't work. We were given the wrong frequencies, which was down to Regimental HQ's move from Hereford to Saudi. If you had to communicate with Hereford from anywhere in the world, you didn't just press a button on your radio.
With our Regimental HQ held together with gaffer tape in the middle of the desert, we had been given the frequency ranges for the southern footprint, covering southern Iraq and part of Kuwait, instead of the northern footprint nearer Syria and Israel. We'd been carefully laying out our antenna wires so we could transmit coded and encrypted signals in very short bursts to prevent interception by radio scanners, but the signals that reached Riyadh had been corrupted.
It was nothing new. There had always been fuck-ups, and there always would be. You couldn't hold it against people who were doing their best in difficult circumstances. At Arnhem, in 1944, t
hey were given radios with a range of less than three miles even though the attack force was spread up to eight miles. With communication between units almost impossible, the battle had spiralled into isolated pockets of desperate action.
War isn't a science. Machines can go wrong. So can people.
90
Frank and I fixed to meet up at the Merton, a small hotel with a bar near the railway station. Frank was a curate now, whatever that meant. I'd heard he was wearing all the black and white kit and frocks and collars and all sorts, and I was looking forward to seeing him decked out.
I was disappointed. He was in the same old green checked shirt, blue Rohan trousers and red Gore-Tex jacket. The only thing different was an orange woolly tie. He looked like a deranged train-spotter.
'Frank! Where's the collar?'
'Working hours only.'
He saw me glance again at the tie.
'People really do treat me differently. I was called "sir" when I bought a train ticket yesterday.'
'That's because you look like a lunatic and he was scared you were going to smash the window and throttle him.'
He already had a pint of bitter in front of him and a pint of Stella for me. The bar was quiet; just a couple of old fellers in the corner. I pulled up a chair.
'What's it like, then, this curate business?'
'Great. My whole life has changed from physical to cerebral – what I believe in, what I do for a living, my friends—'
'Hey, I'm still your mate, aren't I?'
'It's different. I don't see you lot every day. Even my house is—'
'Fit for an ayatollah?'
He shook his head. 'Lodgings. Everything's changed. Even vocabulary.'
'Your accent has, for sure. You're not so Geordie.'
He chuckled into his beer. I obviously hadn't been the first to tell him that. 'They say every cell in the body renews itself, so the voice box probably does as well. I don't think there's a cell left in my body from my Regiment days.'
Yeah, I thought, and that's why you're dressed exactly the same as you were when you were in the troop – apart from the tie, of course. 'You're talking shit.'
He opened his mouth to answer but I pushed on: 'How long does it take to become an ayatollah?'
'Three years. I was just going to do the two-year diploma course, but I went for the degree in theology. It feels good having those letters after my name. I was ordained by the bishop in the cathedral. It was fantastic. Shame you missed it.'
'Now what?'
He paused. 'You know, at my ordination, I was helping administer wine at the service. There was this woman who kept looking at me. I thought, Do I know you? She wasn't smiling; she was looking daggers. I felt quite unhappy in her presence. And I thought, I wonder if she's a witch.'
I put my glass down. 'You administering the wine or drinking it, mate?'
'No, really, a witch. I felt unhappy in her presence. There is evil in the world, Andy. That's what I wanted to talk to you about. Are you OK?' He looked at me intently.
'You trying to do your spiritual healing bit here?'
He leaned across conspiratorially. 'It would help. Don't be embarrassed. I've had quite a few ex-Regiment guys come to me since I've been back. Whether you were the victim or the torturer, it's never going to go away.' He sat back.
'Maybe I can help. That's what I do now, remember?'
I shook my head. 'Listen, mate, when I start barking at the moon I'll give you a call.'
He smiled sadly. 'Remember over the water when we dropped all the wood off at the target sheds? Remember what I said? The door is always open. It still is, Andy.' He reached for his beer.
'I'd get yourself a wedge, mate. It might be like that for quite a while . . .'
Frank was connected to two churches. I knew St Peter's. It was slap-bang in the middle of town, with a huge spire you could see from miles around. I didn't get to find out where St James's was until one of the squadron lads got married there. I turned up at the wedding, and there was Frank in all the black and white gear. I felt proud of him. I was hoping to see him at the reception but he didn't turn up. I thought I knew why. Sinking the odd pint with me was one thing. Surrounding himself with the Regiment was quite another.
Frank did a lot more weddings and baptized a pile of babies for Regiment guys. He had also got himself involved in a lot of kids' support groups. He would take them canoeing or walking in the hills, anything to show them there was more to life than nicking cars or frightening old ladies. I admired him for that and wished there had been a Frank about when, as a kid, I'd needed one.
Towards the end of the year, the patrol was decorated with three Military Medals, for Vince, Steve and Chris, and a Distinguished Conduct Medal (DCM) for me. This made Bravo Two Zero the most highly decorated patrol since the Boer War, and me the most highly decorated soldier in the British Army. I'd have preferred it if everyone had stayed alive.
As the camp tailor was measuring me up and kitting me out in No. 2s, best dress uniform, I thought about Nish. He'd taken the piss out of me big-time the night before. 'Going to see her again, eh? Garden party this time?'
I couldn't even find my medals, and there was a bit of a flap on because none of us knew if you had to wear them. I couldn't remember what I'd done last time. We eventually discovered I didn't need them, which was just as well.
This investiture was totally different from the one I'd gone to when I was twenty. It included another group of people who wouldn't be given their awards in public – the Det.
We all arrived in a covered coach, curtains drawn, accompanied by wives, girlfriends, kids and all sorts. We went into Buckingham Palace and about twenty of us, plus companions, were led to a private room overlooking the garden. We hung around for quite a while. The Queen was having private meetings with the families of the lads who had died, and she wasn't rationing her time. I watched the kids run amok and jump all over the fancy furniture.
The Queen came in and asked us to sit down. We were called up one at a time to get our medals. There was an eccentric mixture of uniforms on display. The Jocks were in tartan trousers or skirts, and the CO had holes in his lapels from his previous rank. There was nobody there to tell us the correct protocol, so we each followed the guy ahead. The first one up had clicked his heels as he did a little bow, so we all followed suit. She must have thought she was decorating an SS brigade.
When my turn came, she smiled. 'Congratulations. We hear you were the commander of Bravo Two Zero patrol?'
'Yes, ma'am.'
'Well, you must feel very proud.'
'Of the men in my patrol, yes, I am, very much so.'
And that was that. Ceremony over, the Queen left for a cup of tea and a sticky bun. The big french windows were opened and we were invited into the garden. The kids ran riot and nobody complained.
One of my mates had a five-year-old, dressed up like a pageboy. He pointed up. 'Look!'
We all turned to see the Queen leaning on the banister halfway up the staircase, watching us fucking about in her garden. She was smiling.
The D Squadron lad picked up his boy, and he waved at her. 'That's the lady who gave you your new badge.'
The Queen waved back.
91
Snapper had written a book in November 1989 called Soldier I, after the letter designation he was given during the inquest on the embassy siege. He'd said he was going to write it when he was bouncing around just before he went on the Circuit, but none of us really took any notice. It was Snapper talking, after all.
The head shed had asked to read the manuscript, and so did the MoD, to make sure it didn't compromise national security. Everything was fine, until the book became a bestseller. All of a sudden gums were being bumped and it seemed Snapper had done a bad thing. The head shed waffled endlessly about how outrageous it was to profit financially from your Regimental experiences, but our reply was: 'Hang about, you're the ones who said it was all right and, anyway, he went through the process.'
