Ross Kemp on Afghanistan Read online

  My first day back in the saddle, and I'd seen as intense a day's fighting as any I had yet experienced in Afghanistan. It seemed astonishing to me that we hadn't taken any casualties and I was glad it was nearing its end. But more than anything, I was acutely aware that for the soldiers around me, what had happened that afternoon was just a regular part of their everyday life.

  As night fell I joined a few of the guys and we chatted about what they were doing here. The sentiments I heard from the men of 5 Scots were very similar to those I'd heard with the Anglians: that they were here for their mates, not for the politics. That if anyone out here tells you that they are not, or have never been, scared, they're lying through their teeth. No bravado. Just the quiet reflection that being on the front line seems to bring. And as one of them succinctly put it, ‘I didn't expect Afghanistan to be as bad as this. I don't want to come back here ever again. It's just too damn dangerous.’

  Not unreasonable, I thought, under the circumstances.

  It was not the first night I had spent in an Afghan compound, but tonight was different in that the owners were still there, a couple of tough old boys if ever I've seen any. They were putting themselves in danger with the Taliban, letting British troops into their home; and of course being close to us meant they were in the line of fire. There are also certain indignities involved in having your compound occupied by a company of soldiers. Not to put too fine a point on it, a man's got to do what a man's got to do. It wasn't as if there were five-star toilet facilities in the vicinity, so playing host to the army means allowing them to take a dump in the corner of your compound. Clearly these fellas thought this was worth it for the payment they received from us for the use of their living quarters. But often our troops are commandeering deserted compounds. Everyone knows that the key to the war is winning the hearts and minds of the locals; and I wonder how well disposed I would be to thirty guys who broke into my house and took a shit in my garden.

  In the heat of summer, the Afghans tend to sleep outside, on rickety beds made from intertwined branches on which they lay thick roll-up mattresses. They raise these beds up from the ground on wooden stilts to keep cool air underneath them. I got on well with the forward operating officer, a real character named Axel. Between us we hit upon what we thought was a very good idea. One of the problems with sleeping outside is that the stars in the Afghan sky are so bright that they can keep you awake if you're not too tired. We decided to sleep in the space between the ground and the owners' beds.

  At first our plan seemed an excellent one. Blissful shade, and perhaps a good night's sleep. However, we had made just one tiny miscalculation. Our Afghan hosts clearly had a liking for lentils – or at least they'd eaten something for dinner that had a similar effect on the alimentary canal. I'd been under one of these beds for a matter of minutes when I heard a rumbling. It wasn't an artillery shell in the distance, but it was just as explosive in its way. What followed was a cacophony of trumping that had Axel and me surrounded by a fog of Afghan fart. There was no way we were going to get to sleep there, so we gathered our gear and started looking for a less fragrant place to rest our heads.

  If you've got a platoon of men around you, chances are there's going to be some snoring (and I'll freely admit that I'm the worst culprit of all). Stevie Rae had advised me that the secret of a good night, therefore, is to get to sleep first, because once the snoring starts, it ain't going to stop. There was no way I was able to do that now, so my only option was to sleep as far away from the others as possible. I ended up with my head in a doorway and what followed was hardly the most refreshing night's sleep of my life, especially as the guys that were on ‘stag’ – lookout duty – kept walking in and out of it. Still, you live and learn. I wouldn't try to sleep under an Afghan again.

  The temperature dropped dramatically overnight. It was terribly cold when we arose at 04.00 on day three of Operation Cap Fox. The men were already up and about, pulling water from the compound's well. The well is surrounded by an old oil drum; the ‘rope’ is a tyre that has been split and meticulously unwound. It's an ingenious piece of engineering. The only problem is that when it goes wrong, the elders send little girls down the narrow well to fix it. Why little girls and not little boys? Because girls are less valued in Afghan society than boys and it's a potentially dangerous job.

  Most of the water I drank when I was with 5 Scots was well water. It was important to sterilize it with chlorine tablets and although this made it taste like swimming-pool water, it was better than the alternatives: diarrhoea and vomiting or cooking from the inside through dehydration. Some of the guys would flavour their water with a powdered drink known as ‘screech’, or Lucozade powder. It made their drinks more palatable, but had the disadvantage of clogging the mouthpiece of their water pouches up with sugar – a magnet for bacteria in the heat.

  We left the compound while it was still dark. It gave us an advantage over the Taliban as they didn't have night vision and we did. But NV only gives you the upper hand at night; dawn came soon enough.

  We were pretty sure that the Taliban knew where we were, but the plan was to perform a flanking manoeuvre that allowed us to skirt around them. In addition, as the previous day's fighting was so tough, Nick Calder had decided to call in a bit of extra firepower. So it was that, a few klicks south, as we were leaving the compound and the call to prayer was heard above the rooftops of Musa Qala, a convoy of Mastiffs emerged from the DC and made their careful, threatening way along the wadi, along with their fifty-cals and GMGs.

  Delta Company started pushing north, towards Mount Doom. Their objective: to use air and ground assets to draw out the Taliban, force the enemy from their positions and eliminate them. It promised to be another very lively day.

  As we headed north, it became clear that the local compounds were deserted. Their inhabitants had moved out to the other side of the wadi. For us, that was a clear indication that the Taliban were there, ready and waiting for us. We walked with care, accompanied by the sound of the Mastiffs trundling up the wadi. It was as we were patrolling along the edge of a maize field that the firing started. Our boys had seen the enemy and engaged them first, but the Taliban's retaliation was swift. RPGs flew above us as we hid in the maize and the word came through that an Apache attack helicopter had just been despatched from Camp Bastion. This was cheering: brave as they are, the Taliban really don't like Apaches. We got to our feet and started heading along the edge of the maize field, but as soon as we moved, the cry went up: ‘IDF!’ We were being mortared, so we hit the ground again and waited for the firing to subside.

  But we couldn't stay still. We left the cover of the maize field to make faster progress. As we did so, the interpreters told us the Taliban had lined up another ambush.

  The vegetation in this part of the green zone was so thick that nobody could see through it. We knew the Taliban were close, but we didn't know just how close. Delta Company needed to be prepared for everything. The order came down to attach bayonets. That happens only when there is a risk of hand-to-hand contact.

  The air filled with the thumping sound of PKM fire. The PKM is the Taliban's version of the General Purpose Machine Gun, Russian-made and brutally effective. I buried myself in the thick vegetation that covered the ground of the green zone. The enemy was getting closer. We could hear it.

  Nick Calder decided to call in 2 Scots in their Mastiffs so that they could silence the Taliban with extra fire support and give Delta the opportunity to make it to safety. The vehicles moved up the wadi towards our position, mounted with fifty-cals, GPMGs and Javelins. As soon as they approached, the men of 2 Scots scoped out a Taliban position and decided to take it out with a Javelin. Just one problem: we were pinned down between the Taliban and the Mastiffs. I remembered the moment, so many months ago on Salisbury Plain, when the Royal Anglians had been practising with this weapon and one of the missiles fizzed, failed and landed 30 metres away from us. 2 Scots had to be on target. I steeled myself for the impa
ct and waited.

  The missile was launched. It sounded like an aircraft speeding overhead and exploded with a force that made my whole body jump off the ground it was hugging. And then I started to laugh. There was nothing funny, of course. But it's amazing how many times you find yourself giggling, and I wasn't the only one.

  The javelin had scored a direct hit, but it had taken out only one of the enemy positions. The thundering of PKM fire continued to fill the air and we were still pinned down. Time, therefore, for the British troops to play their ace card. An Apache had arrived and started circling overhead. It was out of the range of the Taliban's RPGs, but the enemy knew that its Hellfire missiles would make short work of them; even its thirty-cals, which could engage from 3,000 feet, would turn them to slush. The firing stopped. The Taliban were apparently saying, ‘Hold your fire till the fly goes away.’ We had to seize the moment. Under cover of the Apache, we found the nearest compound in order to regroup.

  11.13. The temperature was soaring. It was a relief to get into the compound, find some shade and drink some water. During the middle of the day, when the sun is at its hottest, we had learned to expect an unofficial ceasefire: the Taliban didn't want to fight in the heat any more than we did. It was a relief that we could expect a few hours of downtime after our thrill-a-minute morning. Nick Calder crouched in the shade of wall and smoked a well-earned cigarette. His alternative family had put a lot of trust in him over the past two days, and followed him into some dangerous contacts. The pressure he was under, with the safety of so many men his direct responsibility, was unimaginable.

  ‘Shitty’ compound, as the troops started calling it, had a well. We pulled up a bucketful of water: Evian it was not. There was a thick scum on the top, home to a colony of fly larvae. Clearly it hadn't been used for a long time – at least I hope it hadn't. In one corner of the compound was a sprawling pile of dried-out poppy stalks. One look at them told us that whoever had processed them had been thorough: they had leached the sap out of the head and removed the seeds, ready for next year's crop. What remained would be used as kindling in the winter.

  The compound belonged to an old woman. She had fled, leaving her belongings and a rather mangy dog that lolled in the midday heat. Among her belongings was a letter, which our interpreters translated for us. The letter was from her son, who had decided that he wanted to devote his life to Islam and become a mullah. He had travelled to a religious school in northern Pakistan in order to train for his religious calling. He didn't know that this school was a training ground for suicide bombers, extremists and religious soldiers. His ‘teachers’ told him that if he wanted to become a religious leader, it was his duty to defend his country from the infidel. He tried to leave but he was soon found, beaten up and forced to stay. What followed, we might imagine, was a process of indoctrination and brainwashing; the letter itself stated that the son was, at the time of writing, training to become a religious soldier.

  A young man who wanted to devote his life to doing good had been turned and it didn't sound like he'd had much choice. It was a sad story, and an enlightening one.

  We would normally expect hostilities to start again at around 16.00; but just a couple of hours after our arrival at Shitty compound, our sentries spotted movement in an area where the Taliban were known to be. So much for the unofficial ceasefire. Intelligence confirmed what the sentries' eyes had suggested. The Taliban were advancing. Worse still, they had sent a special commander from the town of Qats to organize a battle against us. And even worse than that, they were surrounding us on three sides: to the north, the west and the east. There were a lot of them. They meant business.

  Nick Calder had a difficult call to make. We were compromised on three sides; and we didn't know for sure that we weren't compromised to the south. There was no air cover, since all our air assets were in use elsewhere. The base at Musa Qala DC was 4 klicks away. If we moved south, we risked running into an ambush; if we stayed still, we risked being overrun on all sides. Nick remained improbably calm – on the outside, at least – as he made his decision. We couldn't stay where we were. We had to head south.

  There wasn't a man among us who didn't leave that compound on tenterhooks and in total silence. I practically tiptoed out of the compound; even my breath seemed too loud as we crept south, hoping desperately that we weren't walking into a trap. The next ten minutes passed very, very slowly.

  So far, so good. Nick Calder had made the right call, though I still found myself holding my breath.

  And then we found out that the Taliban had entered the compound. They'd just realized we'd escaped. From what Delta Company were hearing, it seemed they were extremely upset that their plan had been scuppered.

  As you can imagine, we all felt terribly sorry for them.

  We spent one more night in the green zone. As the next day dawned – day four of Operation Cap Fox – we started to see more Afghan nationals returning to their compounds. This was a good sign: it meant the Taliban had retreated from the area. We chatted to an Afghan man. He was welcoming to the troops and told us that his family felt safe when the ISAF forces were in the vicinity. He came across as friendly and genuine enough, but I didn't know if he'd say the same thing if the Taliban were around. Somehow I doubted it. His two children – a boy and a girl – looked on as we spoke. I took the opportunity to give each of them a sweet, and then watched as the boy openly stole the girl's. She didn't complain.

  We continued tacking back down to the DC as the temperature soared. Sweat poured from me: the villagers looked at us in bemusement. One local spoke to me in Pashtun. I could well believe that he was saying, ‘Why are you moving about in this heat with all that equipment and with a tin can on your head?’ It was a pertinent question. Both Nick Calder and I started to experience the symptoms of heat exhaustion that day. I felt sick, my mouth became unquenchably dry and my head started to throb. It was like being drunk, but without the good bits. I knew the dangers of heat exhaustion. Before I had arrived in Musa Qala, another journalist had gone for a walk around the DC. Her core body temperature had soared to fatal levels – levels at which the internal organs start to cook – and a Chinook had had to be called in to medivac her back to Bastion. She died on the chopper and had to be brought back to life by the MERT.

  I wasn't the only one to feel the effects of the heat. As the day progressed, one of Delta Company's men went down with heat exhaustion. The Mastiffs were called up the wadi to collect him; but the rest of us had to continue down to the DC on foot. By now it was getting dark and we still had 2.5 klicks to go. Nick had to make another major decision: should we stay out another night or should we make for home? He decided that we should push on down to the DC.

  We needed to get back to base as quickly as possible, but we couldn't go through the green zone at night, as we'd be stumbling in the dark. Moreover, there was a chance of IEDs, which didn't bear thinking about in the dark. So we headed for the wadi. That way we could be sure of heading in the right direction despite the darkness. Nick didn't want his company to walk in the middle of the wadi because we would be too exposed, so we stayed to the side. This had its own problems, however. One minute the edge is on a level with the riverbed, the next it is 9 metres high. The ground was as treacherous as it was undulating, especially in the darkness. We couldn't see where our feet were going; we couldn't see the huge cracks on the edge of the wadi that went down into water pools. I could hear blokes stumbling and every time I heard a splash I knew there was water ahead.

  In the darkness, my other senses became acute. An eerie sound drifted across the wadi: the baying of jackals in the desert. It made my blood run cold. From another direction came the lone voice of a holy man chanting the call to prayer. A creepy, echoing wail. All around me the soldiers were stumbling blindly, and so was I.

  We couldn't stay on the edge of the wadi for long. It was too treacherous, and sooner or later someone was going to fall and break their ankle. Trying to medivac someone out from that po
sition in the darkness was more than anyone could face. So we walked down into the wadi proper. The going was easier here, but my heart was in my throat. Bunched up, unprotected and illuminated by the rising moon, we were an easy target. My body temperature started to drop dramatically; at one point John the cameraman and I had to wade up to our chests in cold water as we carried the camera over our heads to keep it dry. The jackals and holy men continued to wail. I felt as if I was walking in a surreal dream and I couldn't wait for it to end.

  It was a moment of bliss when we walked back into the gates of Musa Qala DC. Even now the soldiers couldn't just kick back and relax, however: they immediately had to clean their weapons, knowing that the base was vulnerable to attack at any time. Then everyone did what they had been waiting to do for the past four days, during which time they had eaten nothing but cold ration packs. The kitchen had stayed open and there was even a treat in store: steak, as opposed to the omnipresent tinned spam. It was the only time during my whole stay that we were given fresh meat. The men fell on the hot food like famished vultures. I did the same.

  It was good to be back, but the howling of the jackals and the wailing of the call to prayer would stay with me for a long time to come. Goody turned to me and said, ‘Did you enjoy that, mucker?’ as he slurped his soup.

  An unrecognisable me turned round and said, ‘Yeah, let's do it again. Same time next year.’

  But I knew we'd be going out again much sooner than that.

  15. The Musa Qala Shuffle

  Delta Company's next operation was scheduled for two days later. In the meantime the troops were given time to recuperate from Operation Cap Fox. We hung around the DC, playing ball and washing out of our gear the dirt that had accumulated during our recent foray into the green zone. A delivery of mail was made to the camp: the surge in morale was noticeable as the lads opened packages containing such delights as smoked sausage and tins of fruit. These packages are a chore for the people in charge of the army's mail, as they slow down the system; but the benefit they give the troops is immeasurable. I was given a coconut biscuit the morning the mail arrived. After the stresses of the green zone, it put a big smile on my big face. A taste of home.