by Jack Leavers
‘Things are tricky in the city. Apart from routes to Basra Palace, any military units going in have to be coordinated with the locals. Casualties are starting to rise and it’s getting worse. I’m glad we’re leaving. Right time I think.’
Not what I wanted to hear. I’d read reports alluding to increasing levels of violence, but this made me wonder if much of the news from Basra was being heavily polished with positive spin rather than reflecting the real situation.
As we entered via the ECP leading to the main base and the airport, I was conscious I didn’t have either a visa for Iraq or any permission to enter the British base. However, Ian seemed to take it all in his stride. He acted as though it was the most natural thing in the world for me to be with them. On reaching the single-storey containerised accommodation, Ian called his translator, Hassan, to the team office. It didn’t take long for me to veto the suggestion by Hassan to stay at a guarded farmhouse owned by one of his relatives.
Ian didn’t have an alternative to hand. ‘It’s difficult, John. Now we’re getting so close to handing over to our relief unit, we’re having to give up accommodation left, right, and centre to their advance party. Most of the guys have just been moved into group transit accommodation. I just don’t know if I have anywhere for you.’
‘Well mate, I’m not staying in a farmhouse and I’m not checking into any of the hotels. You know what happened to that journalist. There must be somewhere I can stay close by your lines.’ After a pause I added, ‘What about your cabin?’
If that thought had already occurred to Ian, he disguised it well.
‘Well, I do have a bunk bed to myself and as the platoon boss that shouldn’t change.’
I didn’t know if he was offering, but I wasn’t going to wait for a written invitation.
‘Great, that works for me. I’ll throw my stuff in your place.’
It might not have been quite what Ian had been planning, but he nodded and smiled. ‘Okay, I’ll show you to my humble abode.’
The arrangement suited me perfectly and I doubted we’d identify a better solution. As the platoon commander, Ian should keep hold of his room right up until they were due to leave for the UK a couple of weeks later. It provided enough time for me to get the job done and get dropped back over the border, although we’d need to be ready to adjust quickly if Ian’s situation changed.
Outside his cabin, Ian stopped and indicated down the row of accommodation to the right. ‘The CO lives about fifty metres away, up there and around the corner to the left. Let’s keep clear of that area and be careful not to arouse suspicion.’
He pointed to a cabin opposite, ‘It helps that a BBC crew is staying just there.’
Good. Plenty of new faces to blend in with. In the cookhouse (or galley for us bootnecks) I made sure to sit near the BBC team because they were the only others in civilian clothes for every meal. It was a good job I hadn’t used my press credentials and journalistic cover with Ian and his guys; the BBC team would probably have smelled something was off if we started talking shop and comparing notes.
Ian provided a discouraging security summary. My suspicions about the inaccuracy of the reporting from Basra were right on the money. The situation was deteriorating, even as the British high command were still crowing about British success in the south compared to the American failure to retain control in the rest of the country. Violence in Basra was steadily rising, with the Shi’a Islamist parties vying for control of the city. Targeted assassinations, kidnapping, sectarian violence, gun battles, and widespread criminality were common.
‘We’re containing the problems for now, but we’re undermanned and the tempo of attacks is rising. Without flooding the place with overwhelming force to impose security by sheer weight of numbers, this is going to turn into a real mess. In my opinion that is. The generals at the top seem to think differently, but everyone who comes here can see the writing on the wall.’
An influx of additional troops simply wasn’t going to happen. The British were pursuing an alternative strategy of trying to work with the various local religious and political factions, but it was a mess of competing groups. They all blamed the British for the problems in the region while being the root cause themselves. The soft-touch approach made the British appear weak, and the troops were growing increasingly frustrated with a strategy they didn’t believe was working.
Minimising the military presence in Basra city was an example: it allowed armed groups a free run to pursue their criminal intent. The strategy was meant to dictate that the police and other local security forces maintained control. An optimistic concept, given that Ian reckoned many of them were part of the criminal networks.
More worrying for Ian and other British troops was the emergence of Iranian technology in the hands of anti-British Shi’a militant groups, the strongest of which was controlled by Muqtada al-Sadr. Advanced IED attacks were now targeting British patrols, involving activation by new methods such as mobile phones, radio control, and Passive Infra-Red (PIR) sensors.
Iranian forces were suspected of training the militants in the region or across the nearby Iran-Iraq border. If the IEDs weren’t a big enough headache for the lightly armoured British patrols, there was an even more lethal form of IED able to defeat heavily armoured vehicles: Explosively Formed Penetrators (EFPs).
EFPs were generally cylindrical, commonly formed using a metal pipe with the forward end closed by a concave copper or steel liner. When detonated, explosives in the pipe behind the liner caused a lethal shaped charge to be formed, travelling at up to a mile per second and able to penetrate armoured vehicles. If placed at choke points like intersections and junctions, the slowed vehicles gave the attackers maximum time to judge when to fire the EFP. Use of PIR sensors could automate the detonation so it activated when the vehicle tripped the sensor beam. By facing the EFP back towards the vehicle at an angle, the attack would even succeed when vehicles tried to use countermeasures to activate the PIR beams a few metres ahead of them. Scary stuff.
‘How many of these attacks are actually taking place? I know the casualties are increasing, but it’s not at Baghdad levels down here is it?’
The information about the security situation and the IED/EFP threat had taken the shine off my initial enthusiasm for the area.
Ian paused before he answered.
‘All I can tell you is the capability has been detected and the threat is growing. We’ve started to see more advanced IED technology deployed in attacks against us in recent days and it’s only going to get worse. Another problem for us down here is most of our fleet isn’t even armoured. Widespread EFPs would be disastrous.’
I chewed that over for a few seconds. ‘Okay, so that’s the bad news. How about the ports, are they secure?’
‘Yes, the ports are a success story although there’s still plenty of development needed, such as dredging Umm Qasr. I’ll give you the grand tour tomorrow. And don’t worry too much about the threat. It’s always doom and gloom from the green slime (Intelligence Corps), but it’s been a good tour for us and I’m sure it’s still a lot easier working down here than up in Baghdad.’
Ian’s responsibilities included the ports in the Basra area, so over the next few days I visited them all and made my assessments of capacities, processing times, security, and the other elements needed for my report. Because of the requirement for special authorisation to enter the city, I was picked up at the ports by local contacts Ian had made during his tour, usually with his translator Hassan alongside. This avoided arousing suspicion with his guys, who would have assumed I remained at the port until they collected me later in the day.
The locals took me into areas where Ian couldn’t justify going or which would have required special authorisation. I encouraged Ian to continue his daily patrol activities as if I wasn’t there. The only time we drove into the city together was for a task requiring a passenger drop-o
ff at the Basra Palace, an island of British military presence in the city centre. I wanted to fit into his schedule rather than cause additional work and extra exposure on the roads for him and his men.
I felt a lot less vulnerable to the IED/EFP threat when travelling low profile in local cars, but that was a small comfort because instead I faced a much higher threat of kidnap. The apprehension manifested itself physically at times, particularly in the hours before leaving the safety net of the British military. My heart would race as I tried to focus on the imminent task and not on the hollowness spreading in my gut. Like in Baghdad, the more times I went out, the more my anxiety grew that I might end up taking one chance too many.
However, the plan worked well and I visited all the locations needed to collect the information required for my report to Al-Nura without running into any issues. That was until travelling back towards the city from Umm Qasr port one day.
Our local car was stopped at an impromptu police checkpoint. When he saw me in the back of the vehicle, the policeman demanded my passport. As I handed it over I smiled and joked, mentioning the latest football results to try to distract him from checking for my non-existent visa. He flicked through the pages and handed it back with an Arabic comment to the driver. Either he didn’t care about the visa or hadn’t read the memo about the new requirement. After Ian’s warning about the relationship between many of the police and the armed gangs, I’d been ready to hit the panic alarm on the tracker if they’d tried to lift me.
After a week I was no closer to a meeting with Sheikh Mustafa. Although Hassan knew of him, he didn’t seem able to get it sorted and the contact details provided in Dubai didn’t lead anywhere either. If this guy was as influential as Essam at Al-Nura had indicated, then maybe Hassan felt overawed to some extent. I only got a firm lead when the CO’s translator mentioned he knew the Sheikh and informed me of his position as Deputy President of the Basra Trade Chamber. By focusing on the Trade Chamber rather than the Sheikh personally, we managed to get a meeting organised for the following day.
Ian’s schedule didn’t allow for a drop-off at one of the ports, so instead we agreed I would cross-deck from one of his vehicles to a local escort car down the road and out of sight of the base. With the involvement of the Trade Chamber, the unorthodox plan could be explained to the team as a necessity. It was far from usual practise, but they already thought I might be a spook, so it shouldn’t raise too many eyebrows.
If meeting with the Sheikh and giving him the message hadn’t been so important to Al-Nura, then I probably wouldn’t have bothered with it. Although on the flip side there was the extra thousand dollars available to courier a reply and the opportunity to meet with the Trade Chamber could prove useful on the business front.
The night before the meeting, me, Ian, Hassan, and ‘Ax’, the CO’s translator, convened in Ian’s room to confirm the arrangements.
Ian recapped the details. ‘As I mentioned earlier, we’ve got a full day tomorrow and the Trade Chamber offices are in central Basra, so we have to cross-deck you to an escort car outside the city. Hassan will bring the car and get them to park at the side of the road between two berms within a few minutes of the base. He’ll have some of the Trade Chamber guys with him who can give you some security for the drive into the city.’
‘Do we know what sort of car they’ll be in?’ I asked.
‘Yes, it’s a black BMW saloon, registration number 190100. In Arabic numerals of course.’
I nodded. ‘That’s fine, the numbers are the only things I can read.’
‘For the pickup, we’ve got a long day and you probably don’t know how long you’ll be, so I want us to RV at Khor Az Zubayr port by sixteen hundred hours at the very latest. That should give us, and you, plenty of time to get done what’s needed. It’s a safe haven – you’ve seen the detachment there – so if you’re early you can wait for us without any problem. But if you’re going to be late, then you need to let me know ASAP. I really need you to be there by sixteen hundred though. Is that all right?’
‘Thanks, that’s great.’ I turned to Ax. ‘Is Sheikh Mustafa definitely going to be there? He’s my primary reason for the meeting and I really need to meet with him.’
‘Yes, he’ll be there. The president is away, so as the deputy president he’s hosting you.’
‘Good. Any idea how many others will be there?’
‘I don’t know, Mr John. There hasn’t been much time. Maybe not so many.’
‘Right. And these guys coming to pick me up with Hassan, you know them?’
‘No. I had a contact to the Sheikh, but I don’t know who else will be there or who they will send.’
‘But you’re sure everything’s ready? The arrangements are definitely agreed?’
Ax assured me everything was ready and agreed, but then sauntered out the door at the end with the warning that most of the Trade Chamber members were responsible for the upsurge in violence. I assumed that didn’t include the Sheikh, considering Ax said he knew the guy and had helped set the meeting up, but either way it wasn’t a confidence builder. Despite the warning, everything was now set. I just needed to keep my wits about me while I got this done and then thought about heading home.
*
After returning the next day from the Trade Chamber meeting, my encounter with the Sheikh, and the incident with the balaclava gang down near Khor Az Zubayr, I lay on the top bunk in Ian’s cabin and mulled over the afternoon’s events. I’d scored a full house in the excitement stakes: interrogation, gunman, pissing off the local dignitaries, rescued from local goons. As days went, it was about as seat of the pants as I wanted to get.
I’d delivered the letter to complete my instructions in Basra and made sure my fees were earned, but the Sheikh’s reaction to its contents and the warning about the client in Dubai troubled me. I would be careful in my dealings with those guys in future. But for now, my focus needed to be on the journey back to the UK, starting with the drive to the border in the morning.
Chapter 28
EPSOM — LATE NOVEMBER 2004
While I thought it was a job well done in Basra, the impression I was getting from Faris in Baghdad hinted at a very different assessment. After submitting my Basra report by encrypted email, I’d received a curt reply from Faris the following day asking about the meeting with Sheikh Mustafa. The tone of his email annoyed me, but I made allowances for the fact English wasn’t his first language, plus emails can come across ruder than intended.
By the time I’d received the third shirty email, it was clear everyone in Baghdad and at Al-Nura was unhappy I’d left Basra so soon after meeting with the Sheikh and without taking back a reply to Dubai. I hadn’t included details of the Sheikh’s negative response in my report, so they weren’t aware it hadn’t been quite so straightforward. Anger began to build as I read the email questioning why it took me a week to arrange the meeting when they had specifically and pointedly stressed the message was my priority. I had to walk away from the computer to avoid sending a reply I might regret.
‘Fuck you,’ I shared with Taz lying at my feet as I closed the laptop. Time for a run on the Downs to blow away some of this rage and the cobwebs from sitting in planes and vehicles for the last couple of weeks.
I was still fuming as I ran hard with the dog in the cold morning air, breath spilling out of both of us like a pair of steam trains. The only difference being that Taz looked like she could carry on all day, but I was blowing out of my arse. Even though it had only been two weeks without running, this would hurt later. As my blossoming relationship with Faris and the Al-Nura boys appeared to have hit a roadblock, I turned my attention away from the stiffness in my legs and back to the looming shadow of the customs prosecution.
It was a case of waiting in limbo for the next court date or, preferably, receiving a letter from Customs and Excise telling me to forget the whole thing. Pete was still ra
ging about losing all his equipment during my occasional visits to his office. I went in the hope he’d have inside information about the case, but all I left with was empty words.
*
Pete started up the moment I entered the office, and John and Sam glowered daggers at me for setting him off again.
‘Mate, this isn’t on. Dryden told me the office computers, my laptops, the photocopier – it’s all evidence that’s being studied and he can’t say when it might be returned. How am I supposed to run my business for Christ’s sake? Even the laminator has gone. The fucking laminator! I mean I ask you? As for the cabinets and the files – strewth.’
‘So, what about the cases you had running?’
His eyes took on a wild look. ‘Nothing, mate. We’ve got nothing. None of the records apart from the information in the original enquiries and whatever interim reports Sam has recovered from the emails. They’ve gutted my business.’
‘But you’ve still got the new business coming in the same. From the Internet and existing clients?’
Pete wasn’t looking for rationality and his eyes narrowed as he spat out, ‘That’s not the point, mate. They’ve taken everything and they didn’t even give a manifest or a receipt for what they took. What sort of country is this?’
I smiled weakly towards Sam on the other side of the room, sat in front of a ‘new’ PC bought out of the local FreeAds. John appeared through the doorway of his small side office and added, ‘That’s where they’ve made a mistake though. They didn’t log what they were taking or give us a chance to record it all. Just snaffled it away into the van they brought along.’
He was talking as much to Pete as to me, and I doubt it was the first time he’d tried to explain this to his boss. ‘You’ve got them over a barrel,’ he said as he pointed at Pete. ‘They’ve screwed up and they’ll know it.’