by Geoff Wolak
‘Steady...’ I called. ‘Swifty get ready, Moran hold ... steady.’ The first APC was ten yards in from the edge of the runway, now large as life and hissing out fumes. ‘Steady ... fire!’
A flash, a blast, a brighter flash, sparks flying off in all directions, and the APC halted, orange flame seen in one area on its side.
‘Moran, aim at the flames. Fire!’
A flash, a blast, and the APC spewed orange flames out of forward hatches and its rear doors, its crew roasted. A distant blast, a flash, a bigger blast, and sparks flew high across the runway and west fifty yards. A second blast, and I saw flames as I scrambled up the bank.
Kneeling, I could see the second APC in the orange glow from the first fire, one of its wheels blazing. The rear doors opened, men jumped out, all doing a little dance as they were shredded, each man hit twenty times.
Another flash, and the APC blew out orange flames, men on fire and screaming being thrown out the back, their screams cut short as they were hit a dozen times each.
‘Get on the wire!’ I shouted. ‘Get some eyes out here!’ I ran across the trench and reclaimed my fire position, staring out into the dark as the APCs burnt fiercely behind me. If there was someone out there, they would see the APCs, and hopefully be deterred.
But I was wrong, hundreds of fifty cal rounds peppering the trenches, men shouting at others to take cover.
‘Man down!’
I could not get to the man, not if I wanted to reach him alive. ‘Report the wounded.’
An American voice reported, ‘This British guy got a toe shot off.’
‘Get inside the drain if you can!’
‘It’s Robby. One of mine has a scrape, not bleeding.’
The incoming fire eased, but it did not stop altogether, and that made moving around a game of Russian roulette. I lifted my head and peered south, seeing the burning APC in the distance, but not seeing any movement nearby. A flash, glistening lights, and I pegged the fifty cal.
‘Wilco for Haines. Get your GPMG aimed at the burning APC south, go right a hundred yards, then long two hundred yards. Give them hell! Wilco for 1st Battalion, any mortar rounds left?’
‘Three left!’
‘Aim at the burning APC, going right a click, go longer two hundred yards. Fire one.’
The GPMGs started to fire, and I could clearly see the tracer arcing over and seeking out flesh, and it was landing in roughly the right area. A pop, and a mortar flew out, so I lifted up, catching the flash, and catching a glimpse of a line of jeeps with mounted fifty cal.
‘Mortar team, go longer!’
A few seconds later the pop registered. A flash, and a jeep was tossed upwards and back, soon on fire.
‘Mortar team, on target, fire last mortar! Haines, aim at that small fire. Go left and right, give it everything for five minutes!’
The pop registered behind me, the mortar landing between two jeeps, both set alight, tracer rounds arcing over and tearing into the jeeps like manic suicidal fireflies.
Finally calling a ceasefire, it fell quiet, no rounds incoming, the APC burning behind me and crackling now and then.
‘Get some men on the wire, eyes everywhere!’
Men rushed past, and when the movement eased I walked down into the tunnel, several fires lit. I found the two American journalists, faces lit by torch light. I stopped, and laughed. ‘Guys, it’s OK if you let out a big sigh and say ... it seemed like a good idea at the time.’
The drain reverberated with laughter as the two journalists sat looking tired, lost, and worried.
I checked in on the French, they were in high spirits and cracking jokes about “cooked Nigerians”, and I plodded through the sand to the medics’ surgery, the goat bleating. Down the steps I found the room busy. ‘Report the wounded.’
Morten lifted his face from a patient. ‘Got a man hit in the toe, plus a scrape, in fact two, a piece of ricochet to get out, and an eye injury from high speed sand. Nothing requiring a plane.’
‘Doctor, medics, I’m very fucking disappointed in you lot!’
They exchanged puzzled looks, the wounded men puzzling my words as well.
I added, ‘All through the conflict, the incoming, you bunch of bastards left the goat tethered up top!’
The wounded men laughed, the medics shaking heads, the lady nursing looking guilty.
‘Poor thing,’ she offered. ‘Must be terrified.’
‘Mister Morten, there’s a kid up top with Post Traumatic Stress,’ I told him before I climbed the steps. Finding the goat, I ran a hand over it, no injuries apparent, the little fella soon wolfing down some chocolate.
Walking back, I called Libintov and asked for two hundred mortars, plenty of starshell and airburst, and Russian standard fifty call chain ammo plus fifty call for a Duska, a few hundred rounds at least.
In the drain I found Max sat with a cuppa, so I sat next to him, sand pushed up behind us as pillows. ‘Those two American journalists look like hell.’
‘I’m a veteran,’ he boasted.
‘You got some stories out?’
‘Daily journal. Started small, then the camels were of interest, then the attacks, then that plane, and today’s was a two-page spread. Circulation is up,’ he proudly added. ‘And we got it syndicated, even sold it to the States.’
‘Yeah, well I hope they report it right.’ I sighed. ‘I best call in.’ Out the north side of the drain I took out my phone and hit numbers as I stood in the dark, getting through to Colonel Mathews as I stared up at a million bright stars.
‘How’s it going?’ he asked.
‘The Wolves have had 24hrs of continuous rockets, incoming fifty cal, attacked by APCs, and little sleep.’
‘Jesus, they’ll be dog tired after that lot. When you said training in live conditions I figured on the odd shot fired, not Apocalypse Now.’
‘They’re holding up well, sir. We just had three APC attack us, one destroyed with a mortar -’
‘A mortar!’
‘Yes, sir, we hit it on the head. The other two were hit from the sides with RPGs and are now blocking the runway.’
‘Can they be moved?’
‘Yes, sir, job for the morning.’
‘Any wounded?’
‘Two men sent back with minor wounds, another five minor wounds, one man with a toe shot off.’
‘How many wounded on their side?’
‘Over a hundred killed, thirty jeeps destroyed, three APC. Have a clearer picture in the morning, sir.’
Back in the southeast trench I patrolled the line, chatting to a few men. Stood with Crab and Duffy, we discussed the day’s events, the APCs still burning, the occasional small blast causing men to turn and look.
‘Vehicle approaching,’ an American recruit shouted.
‘Where is it?’ I asked.
‘Coming right at me, sir.’
We heard the growl, puzzled it, had a look, then stood wide-eyed as another APC powered up and charged right for us from the east.
‘Get the RPGs down here!’ I shouted, and I transmitted the same order in a hurry, turning back around to hear the growl intensifying, soon diving right as it came over the top and crashed nose-down with a load thud, not having seen the trench.
With its rear wheels spinning a recruit ran in, Valmet poked into the driver’s side slot, ten rounds fired, the oddly distorted echo of the discharge reaching us.
‘Mister, I think he’s dead already,’ I shouted.
‘Yes, sir. Sorry, sir.’
‘Anyone hurt?’ I called, getting no reply.
I banged on the rear of the stricken APC as the engines died. ‘Come out now and we won’t hurt you.’ We waited. ‘Crab, Duffy, get up top, watch the rear doors.’
Swifty and Moran appeared with RPGs.
‘Don’t fire at it,’ I told them as we stood next to the large immobile beast. ‘It’s not going anywhere.’
The rear door was unlocked with a clank, and opened a few inches.
‘Grenade!’ was shouted by a few men, all of us diving back and down, the blast just throwing up sand.
A dark figure up top ran in, a clank, the door squeaking, ten pistol rounds fired, dull screams emanating from deep within the dark beast. Another dark shadow, words, and another ten rapid shots cracked out, further screams.
‘I think we got them,’ Crab shouted. ‘Anyone got CS gas?’
A Greenie ran in. ‘I got smoke.’ He scrambled up the sand to Crab and Duffy, pins pulled on red and green, and in they went, the door closed.
Banging registered, but Crab held the door firm, and we waited. Two minutes passed.
I shouted up, ‘Grab rifles ready, open the doors and move well back and down.’
They whispered instructions to each other, creaked open the doors and dived away as the doors clanked open. No shots rang out, no grenades were thrown at us, smoke billowing from the rear.
A torch flicked on, and it closed in on the rear. ‘They’re all dead, or unconscious,’ Crab shouted.
‘Very carefully grab wrists and drag them, watch for grenades. Some of you get up there and assist.’
Several torches came on, bodies dragged - many having been shot, the rear hold of the APC cleared, eight bodies dragged away onto the sand as I used a torch to check the driver, finding him a bloody pulp.
‘Blocked the damn trench,’ Swifty noted.
‘We can dig it out in the morning, dig the rear, use the bulldozers to pull it clear,’ I suggested.
Calm returned to the trench, Crab and Duffy cracking jokes, and I threatened to bill the recruit for wasting ammo. But the calm did not last long. I was sat chatting to Castille in the dark when someone fired out.
‘Contact front!’ came an American accent.
A second man fired.
‘Guess who’s coming to dinner,’ Castille lilted.
I eased up as high as I could, and transmitted, ‘All teams headcount your men, get down, no one walking around up top. In your pairs, in your teams, stay close, and no one goes outside for a shit, they shit in the trench, we have movement on the wire. 1st Battalion, protect the medics. Slider, you read me?’
‘Go ahead.’
‘Get active, aim south, but watch your rear.’
‘Stop making jokes about my arse!’
Men near me laughed.
‘That was no joke, Staff Sergeant, get some all-around defence going – or you’ll get shot in the arse. Mister Haines, you there?’
‘Hang on.’ We waited, hearing outgoing fire. ‘We have company!’
‘Shoot the fuckers then! All teams, stand-to, stand-to!’
Cracks sounded out from the Wolves, soon 1Para men shouting contact reports and firing out.
‘Moran, Mitch, go find the Valmet grenade launchers,’ I suggested to their dark outlines.
‘Oh, I saw them in a box in the drain,’ Moran said as he turned, rounds cracking overhead now, automatic fire.
I turned to Swifty’s black outline. ‘Where’d you put those RPG?’
‘Just there, next to the box.’
‘Fire one up at sixty degrees then.’
He grabbed the launcher, torch on, checking for sand, head examined, clicked in, torch off and he was ready. ‘Stand clear! RPG!’
I moved back a few steps. He aimed high, took a moment, and blasted out a head. I could just make out the rocket tail sailing away towards the heavens.
We waited, rounds cracking overhead, a good twenty seconds, finally a blast, perhaps two hundred yards away. A volley of fire cracked outwards.
Castille shouted, ‘That flash highlighted the fighters moving in.’
‘How many?’
‘Thirty I could see in that one area.’
‘Did the RPG get any?’ I asked.
‘Got two!’ came a British accent.
Moran and Mitch appeared with the grenade launchers. They carefully checked their weapons as I observed, aimed up over the lip of the trench and began blasting away, men nearby asking what the heck it was.
The ripple of distant blasts began, and I peeked out to see flashes moving left to right, fighters highlighted, but each of those fighters was getting a small piece of red-hot metal somewhere painful. I could hear screams all the way from back here.
Mitch fired, again left to right, the flashes illustrating the poor bastards out there on the receiving end, and when the fighters were not getting a piece of hot metal they were getting quickly picked off, fifty of the men here aiming south.
‘Go help the French,’ I told Moran and Mitch.
‘No need,’ Moran insisted. Fresh magazine clicked in, he aimed northeast, a little lower in the angle, and fired away, a full magazine, Mitch firing due east.
‘“B” Squadron for Wilco, receiving,’ came badly distorted.
I got as high as I dared, fire outgoing, rounds whizzing past and thudding into the sand. ‘Go ahead.’
‘We have movement between us.’
‘Shoot the fuckers! It’s none of our men!’
‘Roger that.’
‘Slider, get your head down, contact north!’
‘Got contact south as well!’ came back.
I could hear the GPMGs hammering out rounds. ‘Wilco for Haines, report the firing.’
‘Had a patrol coming in, say ten of them bunched up.’
‘Roger that.’
An RPG head flew over the top of us, faces lifting, and it hit the smouldering APC, an almighty blast shaking us.
‘What the heck are them boys aiming at? Castille shouted.
‘They can see a dark outline on the horizon,’ I shouted back.
Five minutes later the whistling came, three mortars landing two hundred yards out, and killing approaching fighters, laughter heard along the dark trench, rude comments shouted south.
Moran and Mitch were back with more of the heavy round magazines, clicked in, launchers cocked, and they let rip over a wide area, going longer, out to 300yards for the air-burst effect.
‘Man down!’ came from the east, and I ran in, my first aid kit clipped onto my rear webbing already. Torches on, we found a British Wolf recruit, a scrape on his scalp, bleeding badly – as all scalp wounds did.
I could not stitch it, so simply pressed a pad on it, having spare men walk our wounded Wolf to Morten, the man’s kit left behind.
‘Wilco,’ Sergeant Crab called. ‘Got a minor wound here.’
Torches on, an American Wolf recruit showed me the back of his hand. I dug out a small bit of rock to no complaining but a loud hiss, cleaned it, cream in, five stitches. Studying it, the wound was not pushing blood out. More cream on, covered over, I told him to keep shooting.
Lifting up, I noticed that the firing had eased, and over ten minutes the firing quietened right down.
I pushed my head up, had a look, not seeing much detail, and transmitted, ‘Every second man, get a brew on, some food, going to be a long night. Haines, got any wounded?’
‘Got a scrape, and a man with dirt in his eye.’
‘Slider, any wounded?’
‘Fuzz got a scrape, not bad, and Henri has blood on his big bald head.’
‘Anyone else?’
‘It’s Trapper, and we have a guy with some shrapnel under the skin, not serious.’
‘It’s Crab, we got a few guys with dirt in their eyes. They’ll live.’
Easing down, I dispatched Moran to the French to check on them, men now sat heating their water, Swifty sat cross-legged next to me in the dark and boiling our water.
‘What comes next?’’ he idly asked.
‘Hard to tell, since they’ve tried everything already. I’d say they try fifty cal at max range in daylight, try and wear us down.’
‘They lost four APC, and they don’t come cheap down the local market. And there’s got to be a shit load of dead and wounded out there. Be a bit ripe tomorrow in this heat.’
‘Need to finish off the wounded without those journalists seeing it; I don’t want to be treatin
g prisoners here. And how the fuck do we get them back?’
‘Stick them in a jeep, send them off.’
‘Actually ... that could work,’ I agreed. ‘No, they’d give away the layout of this place.’
‘Well ... yeah, but they’ll figure it out sooner or later, and that plane came over. Keep the wounded well away from the drain, bind them and send them off.’
‘That’s about as much as we can do,’ I said with a sigh. ‘And many will bleed out by morning.’
‘The grenade launchers worked well.’
‘I’ll get some more, great for firing in the dark and in a wide open space like this; the fighters out there - they all get some hot metal.’
Morten came and found me half an hour later, no rounds incoming or outgoing. ‘Got three men that could probably do with a ride out, skin grafts needed. If they go too long the skin starts to grow again and that hampers the skin graft a little.’
‘I’ll ask about a plane at dawn,’ I offered him. ‘Can’t risk it now, men with rifles inside of 300yards of the runway.’
‘Dawn is OK,’ he agreed.
‘How’s the goat?’ Swifty asked.
‘Still alive,’ Morten reported before he traipsed off, as if that was a surprising fact.
I called London, gave a detailed report, and asked for the small plane, the Cheyenne, at dawn.
For the next few hours just the odd shot cracked out, men firing at wounded when the wounded got up and walked, no way to tell if the fighter was intent on attacking us or intent on walking off home. I made sure that teams stood down in rotation, and that they cooked, and that they all had plenty of water.
As the sky turned dark grey we all keenly peered out, faces dusty and tired, most everyone unshaven. Cracks still sounded out, wounded men fired at by mistake, but I was not holding the men back.
With the light improving, and the condition of the wounded being slowly reveal, I transmitted, ‘Don’t shoot wounded men or men surrendering, but look for weapons. See a rifle, shoot the man.’
My phone trilled as I emerged from the drain on the north side, heading to the medics. ‘It’s the Duty Officer, and that small plane should be with you in fifteen minutes.’
‘OK, got that.’
I rallied the tired medics, and tired wounded men, some having been asleep. Kit was left behind, men getting ready behind the sandbag wall. I transmitted, ‘Everyone get ready, casevac plane coming in, watch every angle, look for anyone pointing a rifle this way.’