by Kemp Ross
Keeping yourself and your gear clean when you're out in the desert is difficult, and important. It's vital that you keep clean and dry those parts of your body that are inclined to sweat, especially – look away now, ladies – the area around your groin. Ignore the basics of personal hygiene round there where your clothes are rubbing against the sweaty skin and you'll end up with a nasty case of ‘dobi itch’, a kind of thrush on the inside of your legs. You can also get it up the crack of your arse, and around your bollocks, so it's a good idea to use powder or Vaseline. Thank God I was spared a bout of embarrassing and uncomfortable scrot rot, but there were soldiers who suffered from it.
One of the biggest difficulties I had in Afghanistan was with my feet. I first started having problems with them during Operation Lastay Kulang and I wasn't the only one. When you're going in and out of the green zone, your feet get wet in the irrigation trenches. They also get very hot because of the climate and when you're on a long patrol or operation, they get no chance to breathe. Essentially, they boil. When you finally remove your boots and your feet dry out, the skin splits. My feet would crack on the underside where the toe meets the foot itself. Because they've been in hot, wet conditions, the feet start to get mildew and the fungus eats away at the split skin, making it even sorer. Flies love the raw, gooey skin, so it's a struggle to keep them away and once all this starts it's a vicious circle. Soldiers in Afghanistan are forever trying to dry their feet out; but if it's a choice between getting shot and having sore feet, you'll take the sore feet any time. On my first trip out there, I would try to dry my feet out with foot powder, but this was a mistake: the fungus can become attached to the powder and work its way deeper into your cracked feet, causing infection. In an environment where people's lives are at risk, it might sound a bit pathetic to complain about your feet, but it could be very, very painful. Soldiers become very pernickety about looking after their extremities.
When I went back home for the first time, I visited a chiropodist. Even she found the state of my feet disgusting. She said the dead skin she had spent 20 minutes scraping away looked like a bowl of pasta (Bolognese, anyone?) and she gave me plenty of advice on how to look after them when I returned. I learned to spray the skin with an alcohol spray to kill the fungus and to rub them with a fungicidal cream to keep the infection at bay. It made me reflect on the fact that certain aspects of being an infantryman at war have probably not changed all that much over the years. No doubt the invading forces in Afghanistan during the First Anglo-Afghan War had trouble with their feet; no doubt they too had dobi itch. It's one of the difficulties of fighting in such an inhospitable place and I couldn't help wondering if having to endure everything that goes with living in such an extreme climate is what has made the Afghans such tough people.
Whatever the truth, I had the impression that B Company's stay in Now Zad was going to present them with different challenges to those they had so far had to deal with.
9. Mr Now Zad
B Company were given only twenty-four hours to acclimatize to their new surroundings. The day after we arrived, they started to prepare for their first patrol, which would take them into the main town of Now Zad and up to the Fire Support Group's location on the top of ANP Hill. This was no walk in the park: A Company had been attacked by the Taliban just outside the compound of Now Zad DC on a number of occasions, so it was with a certain amount of foreboding that I prepared to accompany them.
We stepped warily out of the main gates to the DC and headed east, past RPG alley and into the town itself. B Company aside, there was not a soul to be seen – sort of a relief, but then it was unlikely that a Taliban sniper would be dancing in the streets in front of us. The soldiers around me gripped their weapons firmly; there was a sense of genuine apprehension, a sense that danger could be around any corner.
It was as we were climbing the exposed slope of ANP Hill that we heard the first rounds. They were fifty-cals from the FSG at the top of the hill, loud enough and unexpected enough to send a frightening shock through my body. I stopped walking and looked around to see if they were firing at anything in particular, but all I could see was a herd of nervy sheep scurrying away from the noise. The test firing of the fifty-cal carried on as we continued up the hill in the baking heat. I stopped to admire the view, which drew a few sharp words about not hanging around from James the sound man.
The original fortification at the top of ANP Hill was built by the Russians during their occupation of Afghanistan in the 1980s – a testament to the location's tactical importance. Corporal Pete Toynton told me that when he had arrived there, he had scraped away part of the wall to find some vintage examples of high-quality Soviet porn – not exactly cash in the attic, but the nearest you'd get out there. He'd also found an old Soviet General Purpose Machine Gun. It had clearly been used by the Taliban at some point in history because it had little bits of coloured tape and tassels on it which they use to decorate their weapons. For some reason the gun had been buried in the wall. Pete had dug it out and cleaned it up, a monument to a time when ANP Hill was home to a very different force of soldiers.
Now, though, ANP Hill was home to B Company's Fire Support Group. The FSG generally occupies the high ground. It means they can shoot down on enemy positions, but it also means that they attract a lot of fire themselves. Hence the fact that the location was well protected with high walls of sandbags. From the top of this hill, though, with its spectacular 360-degree views, you can appreciate why it's such an important location, and also why it is that forts have been built on hilltops since time immemorial.
Colour Sergeant Ivan Snow was in charge of the FSG. He was uncompromising, fearless and one of the best soldiers I've ever met. He hailed from Wisbech, one of the toughest parts of East Anglia, and his aim when he finished the army was to return there and become a social worker. I couldn't think of anybody better suited to do so. Nor could I think of anybody better to run the FSG from ANP Hill. He had the most unbelievable eyesight: he was able to spot Taliban movement in the distance that most people would need a pair of binoculars to view.
Snowy gave the patrol a quick briefing, pointing out the various areas of Now Zad that could be seen from this vantage point and explaining which bits of the sprawling town tended to be frequented by Taliban. The areas had mostly Afghan-sounding names – Changulak, Hojamal – with the exception of one that had been dubbed ‘Plymouth’ by previous incumbents of the hill. Snowy wasn't impressed. ‘Fuck that,’ he announced. ‘That will now be known as Wisbech.’
The FSG would be living on ANP Hill for the next six weeks and I was given a tour of their living quarters by Corporal Pete Toynton. I felt almost as if I were being taken around a museum exhibition of First World War trenches. Almost, but not quite, because these trenches were very obviously lived in. Originally constructed by the Russians, they're dug deep into the ground for safety, but space is very tight indeed – you have to crouch down extremely low if you want to move around, and the fact that all the lads' ammo and weapons systems have to be stashed down here as well makes it even more cramped. It's hot, of course, and the air is incredibly muggy. This is better than the alternative, however. It's easy to forget in the blistering heat of an Afghan summer that during the winter ANP Hill could well be covered in snow. At the very least it will be rained upon and these trenches will turn into underground rivers of mud. They still have to be occupied, though, and under those conditions I'm sure the First World War analogy becomes a bit more pertinent. Now, the air was full of dust that fell away from the clay walls every time someone brushed against it.
The lads sleep in metal bunks set into the walls, but they also have lookout posts surveying the surrounding area with weapons permanently set up and pointing out. So these bunkers are not just living quarters: they are firing points too. For the FSG on ANP Hill, there isn't much scope for relaxing and their quarters make Pirbright Barracks look like the Connaught.
It was as I was being ushered around this cramped warr
en that the guys on guard outside raised the alarm. One of them was looking out towards the green zone through a military telescope. This is a crucial piece of kit. It has a great lens, but also a range-finder that will tell you exactly how far away an object on which you are focusing is. This distance can then be programmed into a weapons system to give you very accurate fire. Ivan Snow announced what was going on. Movement had been spotted down on the ground and intelligence had come through that twelve Taliban had left the area of Changulak and were heading towards what had been identified as Taliban HQ. Snowy's orders came thick and fast: within seconds various members of the FSG knew which part of the town they were keeping watch over. A sniper took charge of a General Purpose Machine Gun and waited for orders while the spotters kept track of what was happening on the ground.
There was more movement: a motorcyclist dressed in a black headdress and white dishdash heading into the green zone towards Taliban HQ. The FSG kept their eyes peeled, attempting to identify the remainder of the twelve Taliban whose presence had been reported. It was difficult to see what was going on in the thick vegetation of the green zone, even with all their technology. A positive ID was crucial, though, before they started to launch an attack. Nobody wanted to drop a fifty-cal round on an innocent father heading home for his dinner.
In the absence of a definite, identifiable target, Mick Aston ordered a test fire of the guns. This would let the Taliban know that B Company's FSG were now up and running; it would also establish that the weapons systems were in place and properly zeroed; and it might even tempt them into a contact. At the time I compared it to thrusting a stick into a hornet's nest and seeing what came out. Very poetic, Ross – but not far from the truth. The fifty-cals and mortars thundered out across Now Zad and to start with there was increased movement in the green zone. It was an impressive display that kicked up huge dust explosions at the edge of the tree line towards which they were aiming. Less successfully, B Company managed to set fire to a cornfield. I wasn't sure that this would signal a great advance in the battle for hearts and minds.
In the end, it was little more than a show of force, a flexing of muscles. The Taliban movement stopped and the lads with whom I had walked up the hill returned down to the town to continue their patrol. The FSG were ordered to stand by their weapons and be ready to supply covering support to the patrol should they need it.
I continued my guided tour of ANP Hill. Cleanliness is as important up here as it is down in Now Zad DC; it's just a little harder to achieve. There's no well, for a start, which means water is that bit more scarce. Pete showed me the shower area. It was little more than a makeshift enclosure with a big blue water tank on one side. Unfortunately, however, the water tank was bone dry. Nobody in the FSG was going to be having a shower any time soon. A little further down the hill were the toilets.
‘Obviously,’ Pete told me, ‘they're nothing glamorous.’
I'd say that was the understatement of the year, Pete.
The desert urinals – known as ‘desert roses’ – were simply tubes that burrowed down into the ground to drain the piss away. If the urge took you to perform a number two, then you needed to stroll over to what is referred to as the thunderbox. I was to see my fair share of these during my various stays in Afghanistan. Generally speaking, the thunderbox is a small cubicle made of plywood, sandbags and canvas. Inside there is a hole in the plywood with a plastic loo seat on the top. It opens up into a removable metal drum. Perched next to the toilet seat is the essential tube of alcohol cleaning gel used in an attempt to stop outbreaks of D and V – diarrhoea and vomiting. As Pete explained, once one person gets that, everyone else will most likely succumb. And trust me, the top of ANP Hill is not a great place to have the runs.
You shit into the drum. It's rancid beyond belief and the process of evacuating one's bowels in an army thunderbox is something I'd happily never undergo again. When the drum gets full, it is removed and the contents are dealt with by whoever's on ‘shit detail’. Petrol is poured into the drum and then set alight. Once the turds have been burned, the remaining residue is buried. The lucky squaddie who gets to do all this is awarded an extra few pounds a day. Frankly, having smelled what those things turn into in the heat of the Afghan sun, I think I'd rather go without the dosh. Sometimes the air is so thick with the stench of burning shit that you can't escape it: it's in your throat, in your eyes, everywhere.
The Afghans, of course, have a similar problem. There's no infrastructure for sewage in the middle of the desert. As I would find out in a later trip to Afghanistan, they don't burn theirs, but rather pile it up into large pyramids, allow it to rot down and then use it as compost for their crops. Makes sense, I suppose; but personally I think I'd prefer a bag of multi-purpose from the garden centre.
The thunderbox on ANP Hill was as basic as they all were. One thing I will say for it, though: it had an amazing view. I think Pete must have thought I was a bit barmy when I commented on it. ‘Some of the toilets in the world haven't got as much danger out there either,’ he politely reminded me.
Fair point, Pete. Fair point.
That night I slept in the open on ANP Hill. It was stunning. There was a warm, gentle breeze and it was mild enough to wear just shorts, a T-shirt and a pair of flip-flops as I prepared to go to bed. I slept against a protective wall of sandbags on which some green ammo boxes were perched – a constant reminder of where I was, and that despite the pleasantness of the evening and the astonishingly beautiful ceiling of stars overhead, this was still one of the most perilous places in the world. There was a risk of being mortared on the top of the hill, but it was a small risk. The Taliban tended not to fight at night. In addition, throughout the hours of darkness the FSG would be sending up ‘lumes’ – flares that are shot up a considerable distance by 81mm mortars. They light up the surrounding ground, using either fluorescent light or UV light, which requires night-vision goggles. This enables the FSG to spot any approaching threat. Despite the small risk, and the occasional firework-like noise of the lumes going up, I slept well.
I woke with the sun. Members of the Fire Support Group were already up, taking advantage of the relative cool of the dawn to catch up on their exercise. The place looked like an open-air gym. Some lads cycled on exercise bikes that looked somewhat out of place here; others performed stomach crunches and elaborate contortions hanging upside-down from a pole. There were a lot of tanned pecs and biceps on display, but this wasn't mere vanity. The guys understood that they would be expected to go out on patrol at some stage and as I well knew, carrying 35 kilos of kit in 50-degree heat could take it out of you. They needed to be fit.
While they attended to their physiques, I took the opportunity to admire the breathtaking surroundings. The mountains were lit up against the rising sun. It was an awe-inspiring sight. The town of Now Zad and the desert that surrounded it were unspeakably beautiful and there was a stillness all around. A real sense of peace. Never was such a sense more misplaced, of course.
Once the camera team and I were up and moving, we headed back down the hill and returned to Now Zad DC. A shura was scheduled to take place between Mick Aston and some of the village elders. I had seen David Robinson conduct the shura at the end of Operation Lastay Kulang when the villagers of Jucaylay had asked if they could visit the caves the Anglians had just bombed in order to check there were no dead civilians, but this was different. Bigger. Its purpose was twofold: to start up friendships with the significant locals and to gather intelligence. As far as the villagers themselves were concerned, their motives were simpler: they just wanted to get on with their lives without being caught in the crossfire between us and the Taliban.
There were smiles all round as the villagers – four or five of them – were allowed through the gates of Now Zad DC. The Afghans had deeply lined, almost biblical faces. They were robed and bearded, but it was clear to everyone that the smiles and cordiality masked other emotions. And the smiles fell away somewhat as they were politely but
firmly asked to remove their headdresses and the rest of their bodies were searched meticulously for explosives. It was a humiliation for them. There is a strict pecking order in Afghan society and for these elders to come into the DC and be felt up by young British soldiers no doubt constituted a big disrespect for them. But B Company knew there was a small risk of suicide bombers, so the body search wasn't up for negotiation.
It was also hard to determine exactly what the politics were between the two parties in this shura. As far as the Afghans were concerned, we were an invading force that was stopping them from returning to their homes; Mick and his men, on the other hand, could not be sure just where these people's loyalties lay. Were they edging towards us or to the Taliban, and could we accept what they told us during the course of the shura as the truth? More importantly, were they dickers for the enemy? There were rumours that anyone seen fraternizing with ISAF forces could have their legs broken. They could even be killed. Either these men had come here in secret (and certainly they appeared less than thrilled that we had a camera rolling on them), or the Taliban knew they were with us and would be posing their own questions when they returned to the green zone. It was impossible to say quite what the situation was and the chances were that we'd never know.
Mick and the Afghans sat around a long, low table. He greeted them with great politeness. ‘I understand you're busy with your tribes and the work and harvest that's going on at the moment and I very much appreciate you taking the time out to come and speak to me today.’
A translator – one of the Afghans – converted his words into Pashtun. He was in a particularly precarious position: the rumours were that if anyone was caught translating for the British forces, the enemy would blind them, torture them and cut out their tongues before killing them.
One of the elders returned Mick's greeting. ‘We are very pleased that you have come here. May God protect your stay.’ I wondered if his words concealed his true feelings.
