Lethal Shot

by Robert Driscoll

  I was buzzing, too. But the last thing I remember before falling asleep that night is the sight of that man’s eyes as the life drained from him.

  It was an image that I knew I would see again.

  And again.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  DON’T YOU NEED AN OVEN TO COOK PIZZA?

  War isn’t always about winning. Sometimes surviving is a victory in itself. Watching the Afghan people go about their business was a source of some admiration. True, in many ways they didn’t live by our standards, but they found a way to achieve things that I couldn’t help but respect. I saw a few people riding pushbikes that had small motors welded on; I saw cars built entire from the shells of six or seven other cars. One guy we bumped into had found and repaired a dead television, then fashioned a satellite dish entirely out of tin cans, pointed it at the sky and was able to pick up TV from all around the region. And I saw entire compounds run by hydro-generators constructed from nothing more than cast-off bits and pieces from other people’s waste. If you got close you could make out parts of car engine, bikes, anything they could lay their hands on. And then the compound owner would pull out his new iPhone. It was mindboggling really, this contrast between resourcefulness born of deprivation and state-of-the-art technology.

  Much of the way in which the Afghans lived was anathema to us. But the lads were really inspired by this Blue Peter make-do-and-mend ethos. For the first few months at Mulladad our compound changed almost daily. Every time I came back from a patrol there was something new in play. They managed to build a decent, well-equipped gym out of bits of wood and stones; they fashioned hammocks, sofas, anything to make life a bit more comfortable. The level of invention was incredible. For my birthday, without my knowledge, they got one of the translators to buy and kill a goat, then bought vegetables. This was for a curry. But what is a curry without beer? It’s not something that marines in the field are supplied with, but in our food packs we did have quantities of yeast to make our own bread. Mac and a few of the others decided that this would be better employed fermenting some peaches growing at the back of the compound. When they ‘cheers-ed’ me that night it was with the most amazing fruit lager from our own micro-brewery. They must have planned it for weeks.

  Believe it or not, that wasn’t the most impressive culinary feat. On another night Mac said, ‘The lads are planning a beer and pizza party. Is that all right?’

  ‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘We need to unwind. But don’t you need an oven to cook pizza?’

  ‘Yeah, you do.’

  ‘Well, last time I looked we didn’t have one.’

  ‘No, we’re going to build one.’

  And they bloody did. It was the most incredible thing I’ve seen built. It was fully functioning. It had hotplates and everything. It must have taken hours to cut out the bits of steel alone. Then they had to get it working with the fire.

  Necessity can drive you to great achievements. There’s no rule to say they have to be positive ones. Very soon into our Afghan experience I learned the consequences of leaving anything behind. Whatever the item was, the insurgents would find a way to weaponise it, to use it against us. I remember coming across the remains of fires containing burned-out batteries. I asked Mac and Fergie why the locals would set fire to them.

  ‘For the explosion,’ Fergie explained. ‘When the battery blows up you’re left with the carbon rod, which is what they use to trigger the IEDs. Clever bastards, really.’

  * * *

  Something that PDT doesn’t teach you is how you maintain your enthusiasm for protecting a populace that at worst wants to kill you, or which, at best, you simply don’t respect. By mid-May I was already wrestling with this problem. The fact that our commanders at Bastion, or even further afield and higher up, in the UK, kept telling us that everything was under control didn’t help. The people of Afghan weren’t under anyone’s control but the insurgents’. Why wasn’t Command seeing that?

  This feeling of disconnect only got worse. With the increase in temperature came a noticeable stepping-up in insurgent activity. We were out on patrol one day when suddenly a distant part of the field we were walking alongside fizzed into life. It took a moment to register the sound.

  ‘Shells!’ I shouted. ‘Everyone – cover!’

  In that situation I have three immediate tasks: get the men and women under my command to safety; log a ‘bang rep’ – a report on enemy fire – with Command; and work out where the hell the threat is coming from and whether it’s ongoing.

  We quickly established that a missile of some description had landed about 50 metres away, wiping out a sizeable chunk of someone’s crop. Ten minutes later we saw another one, airborne this time, hissing through the sky. It’s never nice seeing a massive shell heading in your direction, but again it landed some way off. Before the morning was done there were three or four more. The closest landed 25 metres from our nearest man.

  If that was the worst thing that had happened to us in Helmand I’d have been terrified. The truth is, however, that those missiles were being launched from 6 to 7 kilometres away. The Afghans might be able to turn a toaster into a satellite dish but the finer aspects of missile guidance were still some way off. In short, their aim stank. Pinpoint artists like Fergie they were not.

  Which was great for us. But shit for the villagers, whose livelihoods and, sometimes, homes they hit.

  As soon as I was confident that the attack was over, I gave the order to head for the missiles’ landing sites. The field was closest. Like the IEDs, it wasn’t the blast of the explosion that did the damage, it was the amount of shrapnel expelled on impact. The crop had been shredded by bits of metal, stones, any old crap that the insurgents knew would cause damage at 300 kph.

  It shakes you up thinking what would have happened to us if we’d been in the way.

  When we tracked down the next missile, we got a clearer picture. It had landed in a compound where a couple of families were just going about their day. I won’t go so far as to say the kids were outside playing because with some of these families you never know, but they’d definitely been exposed to the blast. I counted four children, all under the age of ten, with missing limbs, blinded eyes or debris embedded in them.

  Jenny the medic was straight over to them, yelling to me, ‘These kids need medevac.’

  I knew they did. I also knew it wouldn’t be sanctioned. Unless it was one of our munitions that had caused the damage we were not permitted to call in any military assets to help. That included helicopters for medical evacuation – ‘medevac’. There was so much we were prepared to do for the Afghans, but helping injured kids went against ‘policy’.

  ‘I’m sorry, Jenny, we just have to patch them up as best we can here.’

  We left a couple of men on guard and the rest of us dived in to help the wounded. I’m pretty sure we saved a couple of lives. Even so, the parents could offer no information on who might have launched the missiles. John couldn’t even get them to speculate about possible local insurgent figures.

  ‘No one will know you’ve told us,’ he assured them. ‘Write it down if you want to. Just give us a clue. Don’t you want the people who did this to your children brought to justice?’

  We got nothing.

  Not only that, but a couple of days later, when we crossed with another patrol, I heard that all of those kids we’d treated had been marched to Taalander.

  ‘Rob, they wanted compensation for the injuries your men caused.’

  ‘Tell me you’re joking.’

  ‘Deadly serious, mate.’

  ‘And these are the people we’re trying to protect?’

  ‘Tell me about it. But who wants to listen to us?’

  * * *

  As well as aspects of what we called Blue Shirt day, I’d raised reservations with Mac and Fergie about our man Space Cadet, and his being so wrapped up in looking at friendlies that he’d missed the real snake in the grass. Nobody likes to hang a fellow marine out to dry, so we agre
ed we’d keep an eye on him, help him where we could, and work out how to get the best from a kid so enthusiastic and, according to his test results, so clever.

  We were readying ourselves to go on patrol. Since my meltdown earlier in the tour – when I’d discovered not all the guys were preparing themselves in the manner I expected – the multiple were drilled in having everything ready before we took a step outside. That meant goggles, gloves, full safety kit in place. It also meant weapons ready.

  Space Cadet took that too literally.

  I was a metre away, but that would not have mattered if the round from his Sharpshooter rifle had had my name on it. For reasons known only to him, he cocked the rifle as a test and instead of clearing the weapon he pulled the trigger.

  The bullet hit the compound wall, missing seven men on its way.

  Two seconds later, those same seven men had Space Cadet pinned to the ground and the blows were flying.

  I had to intervene. Once I realised what the hell was going on, that is. My men had nearly taken friendly fire from a guy meant to be covering their arses. Everyone is entitled to one mistake, but there wasn’t a person in Mulladad who believed that this was Space Cadet’s first. Not everyone was aware of the incident with the Schermuly flare, but they all knew about his trying to take out the friendlies on one patrol and missing Blue Shirt on another. I like to think that I pulled the guys off before their fists caused any significant damage but I can’t guarantee that. He was shaken, shocked and bloodied.

  And he was on the next Mastiff out of there. It was out of my hands.

  ‘You’ll have a mutiny on your hands, Rob, if you don’t ship him out,’ Fergie said.

  So that’s what happened. Steve McCulley agreed to reposition him somewhere else and send a replacement.

  I joked, ‘If you send us no one it will be an improvement.’

  It’s funny how quickly words can come back to bite you.

  * * *

  I never thought I’d miss the Green Zone – our current area of operations – until I was flying somewhere worse.

  The area ISAF covered was huge: 10,000 square kilometres at least. That still left plenty of areas beyond its purview. Steve McCulley decided to do something about this. There were entire desert regions to the north of us, he said, that we needed to process. They’d either prove to be inert or essential to the Taliban cause. It was worth a week of our time to find out which.

  I always knew the poppy fields were big, but only from above do you grasp how vast they are. And how many. We flew for an hour over nothing but the base ingredient for heroin. Even when we landed, opium poppies were still among the green stuff, and the second we moved out of the poppy field we were on desert soil. On sand. It was like being in another country.

  We were dropped in a poppy field. Three helicopters, sixty men. Quite the circus. No wonder dozens of locals appeared from nowhere. Actually, closer to hundreds. They were all curious, all acting as though they’d never seen people. Other people.

  Steve McCulley headed the party. He’d identified, via satellite imagery, the perfect compound to house sixty marines and set off with an advance party to negotiate its rental. Negotiation was one of those quirks of ‘helping’ the locals that meant he was always going to get his way. It was purely a matter of price. I think, in the end, $500 covered it. Then it was time to move the troops in to occupy and reinforce this little mud property.

  While this was going on, a convoy of Mastiffs was heading north to join us. I didn’t know all the driving team but I’d trained with one lad, ‘Damo’, and had nothing but respect for him. If the rest of his men were as skilled we’d be okay. He and his team were carrying supplies and, crucially for a desert mission, water. You can easily drink five or six litres a day in the Green Zone. In the desert it’s more.

  The mission was twofold: to gain intel about the region, and to demonstrate that the ISAF’s reach extended further than the Taliban realised. For the first couple of days it worked. We definitely had the upper hand. We patrolled, fifty of us and more, into territories never before touched by the allies. What we learned was inconsequential other than the fact that we weren’t expected. In a sixty-hour period we didn’t come across even a hint of an IED. At that time, in that region, in that country, that was unusual.

  On day 3 things changed. We were on patrol and I noticed John was busier than usual. A translator is always by his commander’s side so more often than not I knew what was troubling him. This time was different. This time, he said, there was no obvious message.

  ‘Just a lot of noise, Rob. It’s like they’ve just noticed we are here.’

  One faction of the insurgency was shouting at another. Plans were being drafted, in code of course, and codenames were bandied about like emojis on a teenager’s phone. Barely an hour into our patrol John said, ‘I think I’m getting something.’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘They want Jenny. They’re talking about “female infidels”.’

  Women, to the Taliban, are second-class citizens. They are not permitted to study or drive. They certainly wouldn’t be tolerated if they were to touch men other than a husband – even if they were medical staff saving lives. Apart from Jenny we had other FETs – ‘female engagement teams’ – among our number. For the reason of gender alone they were near the top of the Taliban target list.

  But there was a higher target.

  ‘Sir, they keep talking about the “Big Chief”: “Big Chief” is doing this, “Big Chief” is moving there.’

  ‘What do you think it means?’

  ‘I think they want to kill Major McCulley.’

  * * *

  The compound had very little shade. On patrol there was less. We needed to break for water every five minutes but that was all we could afford. Despite the surprise factor we had gained from our unexpected arrival in the area, I didn’t dare let my men rest in the shadows.

  ‘That’s the one place the insurgency will have planted IEDs.’

  It was the same rule for everyone. Steve McCulley came on some patrols but not all. I told him about the ICOM threat but he just shrugged.

  ‘They’ve got to find me first. And even if they do, there’ll be another major taking my place. I’m not irreplaceable.’

  Like everyone else, he was more interested in getting his ration of water.

  I thought I was protecting my people by keeping them away from the obvious IED sites, and I’d make the same call today. But the truth is, there were casualties as a result. It came on so fast. A lad called Adam suddenly started acting completely delirious. One minute he was walking in our snake, then he was wandering about all over the place. It was like watching my mate Paul A. high on mystery painkillers during the final task of the Commando Test years ago. Like Paul, no one could talk to Adam. He was muttering to himself. When I was called over it was too late.

  ‘Sunstroke,’ I said. ‘We need water and shade.’

  Jenny appeared a second later.

  ‘We need more than that.’ She turned to the guy walking behind Adam. ‘How long’s he been in trouble?’

  ‘Since the last stop. But this is the worst.’

  ‘Shit.’

  ‘Jenny,’ I said. ‘Tell me straight. What’s going on with him?’

  ‘Honestly, unless we get him back to the compound he’s not going to survive out here much longer.’

  We were a good hour’s march from the compound. The route Robbie had cleared on the way out wasn’t marked so he’d have to start again. I radioed Steve an update. He was as concerned as I was. More so.

  ‘Rob, you need to be aware that ICOM chatter is off the charts. The usual call signs and then some. I don’t know where the insurgents are but they know you’re a man down. They’re mobilising. We can hear them. You need to hurry on full alert.’

  I didn’t fancy our chances and I told Steve that. But the next voice on the comms wasn’t his. It was one of the Mastiff drivers, Damo.

  ‘Four Mastiffs head
ing to your position for medevac,’ he said. ‘Secure your position and hold. Confirm.’

  And that was it. I don’t think Command would have sanctioned the move, but we were all grateful he was doing it. The routes he’d taken had not been cleared by minesweepers. There was a viable threat to his life, his men’s lives and the machines in his care. But he knew that. He also knew one of his fellow marines was in a critical condition and that the vultures were circling. So he acted.

  After ten minutes he still hadn’t reached us. During that time I heard for myself, via John, the toxic radio posts about us sent between the locals. The Taliban were definitely on the move. The question was: would they discover our position before Damo reached us?

  John was approaching meltdown.

  ‘Rob! Rob! I hear them. I hear the insurgents. They’re almost here.’

  I ordered the men to stand to. The crops around us provided cover, but only from the enemy’s sight. Against bullets they’d be useless.

  We were all on high alert. Only Adam was out of it, and keeping him still was the hardest job of all. Then suddenly we heard the growl of engines.

  ‘Vehicles!’ Mac called out. ‘Coming at speed.’

  I squinted through my rifle’s optics.

  ‘Mastiffs,’ I said. ‘Ours. It’s Damo.’

  ‘Thank Christ.’

  We got back safely. After a good six hours of care Adam was restored to something close to his old self. He wasn’t the only one affected. Several other people went down with heatstroke that day. Nothing serious.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  THE AMERICANS HAVE LANDED

  Even in a war zone, some things are almost more important than life and death. For example, it doesn’t pay to forget your wife’s birthday. Carly’s happened to be on 23 May, a couple of weeks after mine, and so I rang her from the ops room. She wasn’t celebrating with a slaughtered goat on a spit. She was taking the boys for a well-earned break to Spain. It was a bizarre conversation, if I’m honest. I was happy for her, I really was, although I’m not sure I showed it. I’m not sure I could have. The world she was describing seemed a million miles from where I’d been over the last weeks. The things I’d seen, the things I’d done. There was no way to share them down a dodgy phone line. Not in a way she’d understand. In fact, I wasn’t sure she’d ever understand.