I passed easily enough, but not without the inevitable scare. I don’t know what my problem is, but every time I’m at Brecon I seem to end up fighting with other students and this time it was no different, except that I was caught red-handed by the company sergeant major and the officer commanding, Major Ken Hames. Ken is now a very well-known and familiar face on television. After 25 years in the army, serving in the Falklands, as one of the last guards of Rudolf Hess in Germany and then in the SAS, he became in civilian life an expedition leader, presenter of travel programmes and he even helped design one of the camps for the bizarre television series I’m a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here!. When I came across him at Brecon, the circumstances were not so light-hearted.
As part of the course, I was involved in an exercise in which we were carrying out a night attack on a building. I was role-playing the section commander and trying to tell the guy taking the part of platoon sergeant that the ‘enemy’ were just outside the window. However, we ended up arguing and he said to me he’d sort it out with me after the attack. As far as I was concerned, he had just told me he was going to have a fight with me later on.
Now my temper came into play. ‘It’s now or never,’ I thought and gave him a traditional Glasgow kiss, a head butt, and as he hit the ground, I finished him off with a few punches and kicks. Something brought me to my senses and I carried on with the exercise; however, when it was over Ken Hames and the CSM came over, tapped me on my helmet and asked who I was. They wanted to know what had happened inside the building. Both the guy I’d knocked down and myself gave the same version of events: that we ran into each other in the dark and fell down. There had been no scuffle or fight, we assured them. Unfortunately, both had been wearing passive night goggles and had seen everything as clearly as if it had happened in daylight. Since the other guy, who is now a commissioned officer, stuck to his story, however, they could take the matter no further. I owe him a massive favour, as both wanted to return me to my unit with an instruction that I was never to be allowed back.
Word of that got round. Before the course ended, I was having a conversation with an NCO when he asked me for a fight. ‘Come on, nobody is going to know. I’ll knock you down to size. Fancy yourself as a hard man, don’t you?’ I listened but ignored him, well aware it was a wind-up. He wanted to provoke me into a punch-up, but I was not falling for that one.
Shortly after passing the course, I was promoted to sergeant and sent from Charlie Company to 1 Platoon Alpha Company. Frankly, it was the worst platoon in the regiment, packed with men who had drink and drug problems. In other words, my kind of people. Not long after I took over, two of the guys found themselves under investigation for allegedly breaking into the office of the commanding officer and one of them for defecating on his desk. Military police ordered a DNA test on the offending pile, which proved it had not been left by my man. I got on with the platoon like a house on fire and, within a very short time, it was accepted as the best in the battalion, a fact we proved in many inter-company competitions. I stood up for my soldiers at every opportunity, always putting them first, and in return was given 100 per cent respect. I still keep in touch with a lot of these soldiers and my reputation in the battalion remains.
Once, I took the platoon on a visit to the Houses of Parliament then on to 10 Downing Street, followed by a tour of Buckingham Palace. At the time, the CSM and officer commanding warned me that in the event of trouble I would be severely reprimanded or even reduced in the ranks, as some senior officers just would not accept that my men had changed and could be trusted. On the journey back, two of my best men wanted to fight each other, so we pulled our minibus off the motorway and let them crack at it. After ten minutes, I opened the window and asked, ‘You finished yet?’ There was a shout of, ‘Yes.’ They got back into the motor, I made them shake hands and apologise to each other and they each opened a can of lager and said, ‘Cheers, now let’s forget this ever happened.’ I had a very strong relationship with the whole platoon. Some of the members are now sergeant majors or officers and take pride in telling me that they have modelled their management skills on my methods, truly a great compliment of which I feel very proud.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
William Lobban just would not go away. He had been transferred, at his own request, to the English prison system. Social workers had managed to trace his father to England and Lobban felt meeting him could represent the opportunity for a new start. But his reputation followed him south of the border and there were fears for his own safety and that of his fellow prisoners. However, he neither cared for nor feared others and was left within the mainstream system. So he completed his sentence in England and now he was back out of jail. I knew that meant trouble.
After being attacked in Perth, then taking an officer hostage, he had gone on the English circuit. At one stage, he was in Hull nick during a major riot. Trouble seemed to follow him around.
Tam had wanted to kill him for sticking a gun to Pawny’s head. Then there had been an incident where Tam was sent to murder Lobban near the Forth and Clyde Canal that runs through part of Glasgow. It was my fault Lobban even got wind of that. I had foolishly opened my mouth to someone Angie knew and who used to go out with Lobban. We’d been having a chat one night over a drink and Gibby’s name cropped up. I was saying that he was an animal and was lucky to still be around, and when I was asked what I meant by that I said Tam had been going to kill him at the canal. It was a comment made among people who we thought of as family and I did not expect it to go any further. I forgot about it at the time, but a couple of years later a woman who had been present during the chat mentioned it to Gibby.
He tried a few times to trap Tam, once ringing him up and inviting him to a meeting at Glasgow airport. ‘Come by yourself, there’s no need to bring anybody else,’ he’d told Tam, who knew what he was up to and so didn’t show up.
Now he was back on the scene and I could do nothing about it because I had been posted back to South Armagh, to Forkhill, where there had been so much tragedy. It was all very different now, the talk almost exclusively of preserving peace, but the last thing I needed to hear was Angie telling me Gibby had turned up at our married quarters in Colchester. He had arrived with a Spanish girlfriend and camped himself in our home, pleading with Angie that he had nowhere else to stay. He was not welcome. He had even tried to persuade Angie that it was OK for her to hand over to him my bank books and cards, saying I would be OK with that because we had always helped him out when he was broke. I knew that was just a ploy to allow him to clean out my accounts. Angie was not having it. She didn’t like Lobban. She was aware he had a reputation as a dangerous person, but she wasn’t scared of him.
Eventually, I telephoned him one night and we had a blazing row. There was no way I was going to be intimidated by him. There were strong words and threats, but I ordered him to get out and he left. Angie and the kids were glad to see the back of him, but his presence had put a lot of pressure on them, especially as they continued to worry about me being in bandit country. Lobban made his way back to Glasgow.
Before going to South Armagh, I had dropped a clanger career-wise. A former platoon commander of mine had asked if I wanted to join the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst in Surrey, the very prestigious training centre for all British Army officers, as an instructor. I decided against the move, as I had my own career plan worked out to move up the ranks, but in retrospect it was a mistake on my part because by going to Sandhurst I would have been guaranteed further promotion. However, I believed my own strategy was the right one.
As a result of my vast experience in South Armagh, I was given the position of company operations Senior NCO. It meant that basically I would plan all operations that the company and platoons would have to do on a daily basis. In addition, I was to act as liaison with the local community, news reporters, elders, gatekeepers and councillors, mainly members of the Social Democratic and Labour Party, as Sinn Fein refused to deal with us. SDLP
representatives would come to me with local concerns and complaints, such as helicopter movement after ten at night. It was my job to try to sort out these problems and appease local people.
We had all grasped the fact that the way to get the community onside was not through bombs and bullets, but by winning over their hearts and minds. I was very good at assessing individuals and situations and was seen as someone the people of Forkhill could talk to without compromising the lives and security of our soldiers.
It was a much changed area from when I had been there before. On patrols we used to see signs on poles showing drawings of big guns with long barrels and warnings such as Sniper Team in Action, or Sniper. Beware! In fact, the snipers had had their day. They were no longer the worry they had once been. It was to be an event at home at the beginning of July 1999 that would cause me the most grief.
One of my closest mates, Robert Simpson, originally from Hamilton and a member of the First Battalion of the Royal Scots, had just risen to the rank of captain, but was having marital problems. Angie and I were extremely close to him. Every day while I was in Northern Ireland he would telephone and we would talk through his difficulties. Now, he was saying he seriously wanted to commit suicide. I had so far managed to talk him out of this, but the difficulty was affecting him not just mentally but physically. From being over six feet tall and weighing fifteen stone, and being extremely fit and recognised throughout the infantry as a top-notch soldier, he told me how he had lost three stone in a matter of weeks and was looking grey and gaunt. Even when he persisted with his threats to kill himself I still didn’t believe him. Then one day came a terse announcement that he had hanged himself.
I couldn’t believe it. He had a brilliant record, having done four tours in South Armagh and being among the first ground troops to liberate Kuwait in the first Gulf War. His promotion had come only three months earlier, yet he had evidently been involved in a scuffle in the mess and the next day was found dead. Only that night Rab had telephoned me to say he and his second wife, Lorna, were going to a function.
‘Don’t get stupid and screw things up. You’ve just been promoted. Watch what you’re doing,’ I had told him.
‘Aye, it’ll be sorted,’ he had replied.
At the function, he and Lorna had talked to Angie.
The next day Angie, who had found work in the NAAFI, was returning from a day out with the family and Rab’s stepdaughter. The military police were waiting. Somebody shouted that they were looking for Angie, that there had been trouble. She said her heart sank because she immediately thought it was me, that I must have been killed. The police told her they were there because Rab and Lorna were our friends and he had committed suicide. It was almost a relief to her that it wasn’t me, but she was so sad for Lorna.
Rab had gone home, where he got the dog’s chain. But the strange part about it was that he opened one of the big old creaking garage doors, pulled it half down after him and then put the dog’s chain around his neck and basically fell asleep and choked himself standing up.
At an inquest in August, the coroner recorded an open verdict, but those who knew Rab thought he hadn’t wanted to kill himself – his action had been a plea for help. I flew back from Ireland to be one of the pall-bearers at his funeral, but for years his death left bad blood between some of his other mates and Angie and me. They assumed we’d known more than we had about the reasons for the tragedy. Feeling was strong and sometimes we felt like lepers. The truth was we had only tried to be a good friend to someone who needed us. There wasn’t a lot I could do from where I was in South Armagh, as Rab did not want me to speak to anyone else about his problems. He and I knew that for others to think he had mental problems – or, even worse, for him to show signs – could have become a career-stopper.
One night after I had eventually completed my tour in South Armagh and had returned to Colchester, Angie and I were in the mess enjoying ourselves. I’d had quite a bit to drink and we were kissing and cuddling in a corner for half a minute or so. Next day one of the officers had me in his office to tell me about his displeasure over what we’d been doing. He did not realise that after Rab’s death I really didn’t care much about people like him. I remember standing in front of him as he sat at his desk and looking over the top of him and out of his window. This irritated him and he was shouting, ‘Look at me,’ so I would look down at him for a few moments until I found what he was saying irritating and then just look over his head again, setting him off once more. In his rage, he was turning beetroot red. I was asking him, ‘What are you going to do? All I’ve done is kiss my wife.’ Finally, he came out from behind his desk and stood right beside me. He was about six foot two, thin, and he put his nose on my cheek. I just burst out laughing. In my mind, I was saying to myself, ‘Make a move,’ because he had shut the door and there were guys waiting outside. ‘Make a move because I’ll fucking kick you up and down this office.’ I knew it would have been my word against his. When he put his nose on my left cheek again, I burst out laughing once more. At that he told me to get out of his office.
I think word of that incident spread because my career, which had been flying, went on to hit a brick wall. In fact, I know of one guy who put down an entry in the Mess Wagers Book to the effect that I would never rise higher than colour sergeant. I had been glad when that tour ended, as by then I had realised that the higher up the ranks you went, or the more experienced you became, the further back from the front line you moved. That was destroying me. I was a soldier and needed to be out patrolling rather than tied up in the planning side. Probably this lack of excitement was the cause of my short temper and my need to be constantly challenging authority. Almost every day I was openly, within hearing of other soldiers, challenging a man whose rank was higher than mine to fight.
Early in January 2000, I deployed to Alberta, Canada, for an eight-week-long Winter Warfare Instructors Course and when we returned, the family and I went off to Ballykelly in County Londonderry on an eighteen-month tour. The village had seen one of the worst atrocities of all those during the troubles.
On 6 December 1982, the Irish National Liberation Army planted a bomb in a disco at the Droppin Well inn, a bar frequented by off-duty soldiers. Eleven troops and six civilian patrons died. Among them were three teenage girls just out for a night’s dancing.
Now, the area was peaceful. I was promoted to colour sergeant and took over as signal company quartermaster sergeant, another step up the career ladder, but I still felt the fallout from Rab’s death and believed some individuals wanted to ensure my path up the ranks would be as rough as possible.
* * *
Things might have been quiet in Northern Ireland, but not in Glasgow. Jamie Stevenson and Tony McGovern, once the best of friends, had fallen out and in September, outside a family-run bar in Springburn, Tony had been gunned down. He had been wearing a bullet-proof vest supplied by Tam McGraw. The killer had known and shots to the head and body ended the life of the man who had been looking forward to a drink with Alex.
Jamie Stevenson would ultimately be charged with Tony’s murder but after spending time in prison on remand he would be released and the charge dropped. But more shootings would follow.
The following year, also in Springburn, someone tried to shoot Duncan McIntyre in the head. He survived, but there would be at least one further attempt on his life. Tommy McGovern, too, found himself a target after being lured to the car park of Blink McDonald’s old pub, the Talisman. A hit man tried pumping three bullets into Tommy, who fired back. Neither man was hit.
* * *
We were enjoying being together in Ballykelly, but then Angie’s mum Margaret was diagnosed with cancer and we knew she was dying. Angie, not unnaturally, was taking it badly. She had a special bond with her mother and at every opportunity travelled to Glasgow to be with her. There were days when Angie found it difficult to cope, but she managed to see herself through; however, when the inevitable came, what made it all the more diffi
cult was that her mum and Nicole, our youngest daughter, shared the same birthday and so each year a day of celebration was also one that reminded them of great sadness.
It was during this period that I learned not to trust anyone. Not even so-called friends with whom I had joined the army and grown up. Some had learned to play the game better than others, climbing the ranks faster by brown nosing or, as it is termed in the army, ‘pole sucking’. Sometimes their desperation to get ahead of one another, even at the expense of close friends, was too evident and even ridiculous. Normal people ask, ‘Where are you from?’ In the army, it is ‘What school did you go to?’ Where you begin in the ranking chain depends on your answer. And even once you are on the ladder, until you can show that you know how to think, speak, act, dress and which knife and fork to use at dinner, then you’ll remain standing in the corner with no mates. I look back and see how class can make or ruin a career. It’s sad when snobbery kicks in. At least I can say that throughout my time I have never brown nosed; I have achieved what I have through ability.
The regiment was posted back to Dreghorn Barracks, Edinburgh, in April 2002. It would turn out to be the most important stage of my life. I believed I had only five years left in the forces before I would concentrate on my family and future. I was promoted to warrant officer class 2 and sent to the training wing as regimental training officer. This suited me to a tee, because if I wasn’t on actual operations then I was thrilled to be able to pass on my knowledge and experience to the up-and-coming stars of the regiment.
In August 2002, we were posted to Bosnia for a six-month tour. As brigade training officer, I was based near the infamous complex outside Banja Luka, which had been used as a prisoner of war camp during the Balkan War. It meant I was responsible for the personal development, assessment and selection of all soldiers attending regimental career courses and would provide general support, advice and direction on all regimental training issues. I loved this job, but the posting would almost finish my career.
The Underworld Captain: From Gangland Goodfella To Army Officer Page 26