by Will Self
sodden – Let me take those off with my … teeth! is what his lover likes
to say … as we’re getting our sweds down. – Such passion! Such raw,
unadulterated passion – could it possibly have endured this long if
they’d been together, wandering the leafy aisles of some out-of-town
garden centre … bickering over begonias? All good, sir,
Bessemer had said – and then: Routine for our multiple is, Sarge
won’t count us out ‘less we’ve a full Camelbak an’ twenty more litres
on board … But his SeeOh had seen through Bessemer’s readiness
– seen through the reddish fuzz of the trooper’s number one, looked
past the streaky-red rinds of his ears. Gawain had eyedeed the weak
chin and the bony wrists of the … committed masturbator – also registered
his bemusement: Why am I getting all this fatherly attention?
— The orders group is reaching inconclusion: the Adjutant running
rapidly through the list, receiving snappy Rogers and batting back
still-snappier Roger Outs … the first shall be last. Anything further,
Gawain? – Well … speculative stuff, sir, but there’re indications of
some sort of link-up between these bad boys coming over the border
and our local, um, Ali Babas. – Response? – Prob’ly a good idea
to do a few hard knocks in town, see what the local notables
have stashed in their knicker-drawers … Well … the GeeOhSee’s
bass-baritone booms over the radio net … eucalyptus and honey –
keep those airways clear! … be seriously careful, Gawain – the sitch
in Baghdad is, as you know, problematic, and the insurgents are,
ah … exporting their tactics. And I wonder who’s fucking fault that
is! – Roger – Roger that – Rogering Missus Major-General on a big
old brass bedstead: Ooh-ooh! Roger … Her finely stitched lacy skin …
crawling … Ooh-ooh! Ro-oger… –out! But the idle-minded overlings,
who quibbled while they died … Shall they thrust for high-employment,
as of old? The noble cadences fade away into the hot and dusty
recesses of Gawain’s memory, and for a few moments he follows
them into a past in which … I had a brilliant career ahead of me.
Then he shakes his … knobbly knob-head, and before he can be
cut in two yanks off the cans, rises, takes two rocking paces and
yanks open the door: Camp Val, named for General Sir Valentine
Carmichael-Harrington, EmmSee, DeeEssOh and Bar … brilliant
tactician … unbeatable war record … abusive bully, is spread out
before him in all its aggressive simplicity: scabrous and tumbled-down
concrete walls on all four sides that’ve been Hesco-reinforced.
There’re sangars at each corner and flanking the main gate, while a
low jumble of flat-roofed and squalid structures occupies the north-west
corner. A helipad is marked out on the dusty maidan, and six
or seven Portakabins – of which the comms room is one – in the
south-east corner, and scattered just about everywhere else – but
mostly concentrated along the eastern wall – are … tents – fucking
tents! It’s just as well the local troublemakers haven’t taken to lobbing
mortars into the camp … ‘cause there’s barely any hard cover. Camp
Val is home to about a thousand men, boys, and one or two mannish
women. There’s no chogee shop for the men, so they’ve taken to
diverting patrols through the bazaar, where they can load up with
lollipops, toiletries, knocked-off fags … Marlborough, Pell-Mell
and biscuits of … the Nice type. Gawain could have put a stop to
these shopping expeditions altogether but … flexibility is the essence
of command, especially if you’re a … fucking bender. He could’ve
enforced the two-can rule rigidly as well, rather than turning a
myopic eye to its persistent infringement. Still … on his regular
trips down to Basra, what’d struck Gawain wasn’t the obvious
tension in the streets, the limbless beggars or the red-faced Brits
clumping through the vulgar marble halls of their Basra Palace
aitchqueue – but the obviousness with which they were … murdering
it. He’d seen squaddies flagrantly filling Camelbaks with cans of
Foster’s – and when he went to talk to some scaley about glitches
with the eye-net, the man’d had the nerve to pull a bottle of Bell’s
from his desk drawer and ask if Gawain fancied … a wee dram.
There was some tipsiness up at Camp Val – but no outright drunkenness,
despite the extra workload of having to support hundreds of
Kiwi sheep-shaggers – a considerable force that’d entered the
theatre with no defined role … no lines and no logistical support.
Which is what you require to operate effectively any of the following:
laser-guided and computer-controlled anti-aircraft systems,
squadrons of advanced aypeesees, multiple-launch surface missiles
… and so-bloody-on. Gawain had explained to all the prospects he’d
canvassed during his nine months of flogging arms on behalf of
AitchEmmGee: Along with your bespoke suit of Chobham armour,
gentlemen, comes our dedicated after-sales service … a bunch of
dull, uniformed techies on hand to oil your war machine – plus Jonathan,
or some of his pals, pitching up at our embassy to keep an eye on
things and apply a little … hands-on parenting: Hold it like this,
aim it like that – this has a range of ex kilometres. Night-sight
capability? But of course: simply put on these goggles and at once
you’ll be plunged into another dimension, where your enemies’
heat-signatures worm through the greenish haze of my own …
toxic-fucking envy. That was the deal, wasn’t it? The furtive men,
with their unshaven sock-puppet faces veiled by cigarette smoke,
and their poor taste in … expensive suits. It was these cowards
who’d be the heroes – or at least provide them with logistical
support. They who’d take the salute, from the dais, beneath the
triumphal arch … they say the detail is impressive – right down to the
hairs on the backs of the hands that hold the scimitars. It’s they who’ll
stand in the hellish light of a burning government building, fending
off fuzzy-wuzzies with a fire-flobbing AyKay, while I sit back in
this Rolls-Royce of a military machine with my … foot off the bloody
accelerator. In New Delhi, in the toilet stall, all the shitty-Greeny-envy
had pissed out of me … into the filthy hole between the filthy
footings. Hovering over his own haunches, adopting a manoeuvrist
approach, he’d directed the jet and finally … hit the target: I see …
I see … I see … I’m the new fucking SeeOh! — Well, he’d said to
Bill, I’d better get back as soon as I can, then. He’d touched the
button and the most momentous phone call of his career was over.
He’d rocked on his haunches as he inserted the Nokia Seven-One-One-Oh
back into his bunched-up pocket. Surely, you were
never more … more … what was the word … ? Embodied – that
was it: embodied, than when you were doing a shit. Yet he’d
also felt smeared through space: a brownish stain, arcing high above
; the clear waters of the Indian Ocean, across the desert sands, the
Mediterranean and the liberal democracies of Western Europe
he was … sworn to defend, before finally falling back to the earth.
Soon enough, he’d ruminated, smearing shit around annaround
his chilli-stung arsehole, he’d be smearing behind it back to
Catterick – via Scotch Corner in the rain … and how triumphal
is that? A congratulatory greeting from Fiona – her tacky coral
lips … smearing my cheek, then a speedily scheduled meeting with
the full complement of officers in the briefing room. Gawain at the
lectern, burping sulphurously – the mega-antibiotic had started
working within twenty-four hours, just as the aitchqueue quack
said it would … and I burped along with the jetstream. While I’m
awaiting final confirmation of my promotion … he told the serried
faces … envious, envious, envious, indifferent, hung-over, envious –
possibly insane … I think the best we can do as a light cavalry unit
will be exactly what our Queen and country needs … jut of Patton
jaw, shoulders back – chest out. Gentlemen – and lady – Gawain nodded
in the direction of the Rams’ new medic, Lieutenant Gail
Petersen, whose blonde curls, snub nose, freckles and goo-goo-blue
eyes strongly suggested she’d be … another fucking liability – the
geopolitical situation, as I’m sure you’re aware, is in a period of rapid
transition. In terms of the armed forces’ remit, the question is no
longer whether we’ll see action – but when. Our task is to shear
our woolly troopers, for too long now we’ve been put out to graze –
it’s time we put the fighting back in the Fighting Rams. A and B
squadrons under my command will depart for the Naytoe exercise
in Canada at the end of next week. This presents an excellent
opportunity for us to begin transforming the regiment overall
into a completely manoeuvrist unit. From now on … chest out, eyes
front … our entire effort will be focused on the following priorities:
physical fitness, mental robustness – and, most important of all,
war-fighting spirit! – Afterwards came the sneering: Youngest
SeeOh in the Rams’ distinguished history is it, Greeny? Later –
much, much later – Gawain thought back to Major “Tizer”
Townshend’s iffy behaviour in the run-up to the deployment. By
then, after sitting for hours in an office at Shaibah, waiting for
the investigating red hat, he’d had plenty of time to also recall
these words from a training manual issued to his int’ cell by the
green slime who’d instructed them at Chicksands: Aim to provoke
humiliation, insecurity and disorientation. Wearily concluding this
must’ve been Tizer’s intention as well – one Gawain had sought to
frustrate immediately by putting an arm round his shoulders and
guiding him away from his brother officers … so much unforced
physical contact in the army – it’s scrumming down for … a lifetime:
So, Andy, I realise this is a blow for you … Tizer’s expression
was an exercise in studied indifference, while his small black eyes,
glittering with envy, had tracked back and forth across Gawain’s
chest … leading my fugitive heart. As the lecturer at Staff College
had said … Hup! Two, three … four times: The character of any
military unit is intimately connected to the character of its commander –
with Tizer as SeeOh the Rams would’ve had plenty of war-fighting
spirit, certainly, and become as fit as butcher’s dogs, yet they’d’ve also
been slapdash … quite possibly aggressive as well – too aggressive.
There was the incident when Trooper Sweeney ended up in the
infirmary – high jinks that’d got a little out of hand, or so all parties
concerned … agreed to say, although Gawain wasn’t so sure. One
thing he was certain of, though, by the time the balloon finally
went up – the massive, silk and ornately brocaded balloon, with its
vast gondola, big enough to house geese, ducks, guinea pigs and
plenty of Fighting Rams – the regiment was indeed taking on
the character of its commander … secretive, divided, insecure and
humiliated. The Saskatchewan jaunt had turned out to be the Rams’
best exercise ever, and the absolute confirmation of Gawain’s skills
as a panzer commander – not only providing excellent long-range
recon’, but also demonstrating how a manoeuvrist doctrine,
properly understood and flawlessly executed, could result in the
elimination of a far larger lumpa-lumpa-lumpa force … Lumpa-lumpa,
lumpa-lumpa, lumpa-lumpa … the rows of alien spacecraft
sank inexorably down the screen … shitting out bombs:
cheeuwww-cheeuwww-cheeuwww! Gawain, aged n-n-n-nineteen, jabbed the
button with his thumb while expertly taking a swig of his pint with
his other lumpa-lumpa, lumpa-lumpa, lumpa-lumpa … hand. It’d
been that easy – as easy as playing Space Invaders in the student
union bar. By the time dusk rolled over the wide expanse of dirt and
shrubbery, so many Blue Force outfits had been put out of action
it was long after dark before the support crews dragged them all
back to base. Handshakes all round – and a YouEssEmm four-star
general … Phelps? Phillips? made a special point of complimenting
Gawain within hearing-range of his own GeeOhSee, which was
thoughtful, and afforded the Rams’ new SeeOh with the pretext to
come out with some like shooting fish in a barrel self-deprecation.
P’raps this is what being successful feels like, Gawain had mused
… a fucking cliché. After that there’d been an awful lot more beers,
and a night of rising from and falling back to his bed … a human
water-feature. In the morning Gawain rose for good and headed to
the deefac, where he drank dreadful Canadian coffee, ate … eggy
medals and blearied over the Rams’ shorn heads at a wall-mounted
teevee. They’d all seen it live: a new world of possibilities rise up as
the second of the towers collapsed in a cloud of toxic speculation.
Is this the habit of command? he’d thought, because the news
thread running across the bottom of the screen looked uncannily
like … baa-baa-baa braid: a two-up promotion, that’s what the
deadliest terrorist attack ever on American soil made Gawain
Thomas think about … even as it was happening. It wasn’t a snow
globe that’d been shaken up, but a … sand one – bought on a day trip
to Ventnor and more or less immediately … broken. The pretty colours
trickled through my … fingers. There was no possibility of the Rams
getting a ‘Stan deployment – if anyone were to go, it’d be EssEff
bods or the Paras. The months passed, the diplomats shuttled –
while Gawain shuffled about the establishment, trying to engender
war-fighting spirit. By the time Blix was … buggering about in the
desert he was close to despair. I don’t believe I’m speaking out of
turn, Jonathan had said, turning Gawain’s face to his own, but I can
assure you of this much: TeeBee is gonna do everything necessary
to get thi
s vote – I’ve seen the light of destiny in the man’s eyes,
seen it up close and personal. If he could, he’d have us and the
plods grubbing up dirt on every single vacillating EmPee …
A fool’s errand, that’s what they’d all been on – even as Jonathan’s
cigarette smoke was warming his neck, Gawain had seen the
painted frieze of parliamentarians unroll around the dado of Room
Three-Nineteen in the Sudbury Days Inn – which can be easily
accessed via the EmmTwentyfive. Brightly painted into their suits,
they marched into the division lobbies. A fool’s errand, indeed –
not that Gawain thinks of it as such until two more years have …
bimbled by, and he finds himself, the orders group conference call
fading from his mind, standing with the sun drilling through
the camo’ netting slung over the Wimmiks. Standing with his
Adjutant, the dependable, unflashy, unflappable Major Kevin Armstrong,
and haggling – Yes! Haggling! – over who should go. It’s
a fool’s errand, Boss, Armstrong says, the Kiwis’ve gone a little
off-piste, that’s all. Get the Mayor on the blower, Gawain snaps,
we need to start damage-limitation right away – what the bloody
hell did those sheep-shaggers think they were doing? Anderson
touches one tip of his neat moustache with his index finger, the
other with his thumb … feel the width, he swallows the Fox’s Glacier
Mint he’s been sucking, and Gawain watches his Adam’s apple
rise and fall … time to bite the bullet. – It’s the garden chair thing,
Boss – Kiwis’ idea is every spectator – all the men, that is – should
have one for the Six Nations. They heard about this chap over on
the east bank, ‘parently he’s a big stash of the things … Armstrong
even wears his aviators studiously – while his desert camos appear,
if not pressed, at least … dry-folded. The Mayor of Ali al-Garbi
isn’t some marrow-judging worthy, but a wheedling Sheik who
wears heavy, gold-plated watches on either wrist and smiles a lot,
though … he’s fuck-all to smile about. Gawain has only encountered
him twice – once when doing the handover with the Coldstreamers’
SeeOh, “Trimmer” Trimmingham. Watch out for that one, he’d
said – indicating the third dish-dash along in the room full of …
