Eye of the Storm

by Peter Ratcliffe

  As it turned out, I was only 75 per cent right. When the morning’s sitreps came in I was at the CO’s side in the ops room, which was packed with electronic listening and transmitting devices, screens, satellite-communication decoders, and a dozen other humming, crackling bits of complicated machinery.

  One by one the half-squadron units reported in. Alpha Three Zero and Four Zero had crossed the border without incident. Both Delta call signs were also comfortably laid up in enemy territory. (Each half-squadron used one call sign for both sub-units; thus Delta One Zero and Two Zero would use the call sign Delta One Zero.) But Alpha One Zero and Two Zero were still in Saudi Arabia. The squadron OC reported that a large berm (man-made sandbank) was blocking their area of infiltration. Recce patrols were being sent out to look for a gap in the berm or a place where it was lower, and the half-squadron would probably try to cross further along the border that night.

  Knowing my own, and the CO’s, serious misgivings about A Squadron’s OC, commanding Alpha One Zero, I felt the first flutterings of anxiety tweak at my stomach. I glanced across at the Boss, and found him staring at me with a look on his face which told me that he wasn’t completely happy with the situation either. Nevertheless, at this stage he wasn’t ready to make any sort of comment or criticism. It was not unusual, particularly during the early stages of a mission, for one unit to experience greater difficulties than the others.

  Next to the ops room was the intelligence setup, where the duty I Corps officer and his staff collated, dissected and interpreted all the information coming in. At that time this came mainly from the Americans, and included which targets had been hit by air attacks, which were intended, and which identified, so that we could advise our units on the ground what to avoid and what to investigate. Known Iraqi locations were being plotted on a huge map on one wall of the intelligence room.

  From that day on our men in the field would be adding our own intelligence information to the mass of incoming data. This morning, though, the patrols were simply represented by four small stickers on the map. Three were behind enemy lines. A lone sticker still remained south of the border. I hoped for the best, but my gut feeling, which began to grow stronger as I stared at that little sticker on the map, was that Alpha One Zero was in no particular hurry to join the war.

  What was so special about the berm in his sector, I wondered. According to Intelligence the whole of the southern Iraqi border was protected by a berm except in a few isolated places, where there were border posts.

  A berm is a man-made sand dune, anything from 6 to 16 feet high and, in the case of the berm along the Iraqi-Saudi Arabian border, often extending for many miles. The sand had been pushed into place by bulldozers, and there was a wide trench dug out on the side from which an enemy might approach – in this case, the southern side – to prevent vehicles from taking a run at the slope. Yet even if digging away the berm itself was a major undertaking, filling in a section of the trench with hand shovels, though backbreaking work, was hardly difficult. What was more, in that weather it might even have been a welcome way of keeping warm. Once a length of the trench the width of a vehicle had been filled, the 110s could have taken enough of a run at the berm to carry them over the crest. Besides, three of the units had somehow made it across and into Iraq. Why not Alpha One Zero?

  At least there was one piece of good news that morning. The Israelis had agreed not to retaliate against Iraq – ‘for the time being’ – which meant that there was now nothing to stop our men streaming northwards across the desert to their designated areas – except the enemy. It was possible, too, that the next morning’s sitrep might bring us better news from Alpha One Zero, although something told me it wouldn’t. Meanwhile we received orders from headquarters in Riyadh that three eight-man patrols from B Squadron were to be sent in to Iraq to observe movements and installations along three of Iraq’s main supply routes (MSRs; the main east-west routes across Iraq passable to vehicles – some are tarmac) roughly two hundred miles west of Baghdad and report back information to our location.

  Only half of B Squadron had been transferred to Al Jouf. The other half had remained at Victor on counterterrorism duty, in case the Iraqis tried to bomb the British Embassy in Abu Dhabi. Those in Al Jouf were put on standby and told to check over their equipment. They could be going in on the following day, 22 January, or at the latest on the 23rd.

  The next day dawned dull and cold – almost all of us had been misled by the supposed joys of a Middle East winter – and found the Boss in a foul mood. The OC A Squadron and his band were still fumbling their way along the border like nomads, with little promise of a crossing, and the sergeant in charge of one of B Squadron’s eight-man patrols, Bravo Two Zero, seemed to be playing silly buggers.

  The CO had just come back from a frustrating conference with this sergeant, who would go on to write an account of his abortive mission in Iraq under the pseudonym ‘Andy McNab’. I believed then – and I still do – that most, if not all, of Bravo Two Zero’s misfortunes resulted from ‘McNab’s’ refusal to take advice before he even left base. Some of that advice had come from the CO, and he was as mad as hell.

  ‘Get over there and try to knock some sense into him, Billy,’ he told me as soon as he came into the office. ‘I want them to take a vehicle and they are refusing. They say the ground will be too flat and they will be compromised. But it will give them a means of escape if they get into difficulties.’

  They proved to be prophetic words.

  Both the CO and I were aware that ‘McNab’ was only judging the ground by satellite pictures, which show height but not depressions. Once you’re on the ground, as I knew from experience, you can usually find depressions to hide a vehicle in. To be fair, the reliance on satellite photos was not his fault, since the maps we had of western Iraq were aerial charts showing very little ground detail.

  The most important reason for taking a Land Rover is that it provides a rapid means of escape from a contact, and the chance to return to the objective at a later date. Retreating on foot with full kit on your back is never fast, or easy. And that means that in a situation where your patrol is threatened the only way out is to ditch most of the gear and run, fighting a rearguard action as you go. Even if you manage to get clear, however, there is no way you can ever make another attempt to fulfil the mission because you have had to abandon your gear, as well as thoroughly alerting the enemy in that area. There is nothing for it but to call to be evacuated.

  It was also highly relevant to Bravo Two Zero, or should have been, that A and D Squadrons were operating in four half-squadron mobile fighting units within twenty to thirty miles of their North Road Watch operational area. With a vehicle at their disposal the possible solution to a multitude of problems was pretty obvious – and only a couple of hours’ drive away. But ‘McNab’, a London lad with an engaging Cockney accent and seven or eight years’ service with the Regiment, was having none of it, and his face showed it when I sauntered over to where his patrol was gathered round him.

  I didn’t bother with a preamble, simply telling him, ‘I’m strongly advising you to take a vehicle. If it comes to a firefight it could well save your arse. So take the Boss’s and my advice and don’t be a fool.’

  ‘No way,’ he retorted. ‘We don’t need it and we’re not taking it. It’s a sure-fire way of getting compromised.’

  ‘But at least you’ll have a means of escape,’ I said. ‘We’ve got our own guys working to your rear. And if you do get inserted successfully then you’ll know the ground has been cleared by the chopper and you’ll have plenty of time to select a decent LUP for yourselves and the vehicle.’

  But ‘McNab’ was adamant; indeed, I wondered if he was even hearing me. ‘You can forget it,’ he said. ‘I’m telling you what I’ve already told the CO. It’s not for us.’

  I looked around at the faces of the other members of his unit and saw only defiance there as they began to chip in in support of their patrol commander.


  ‘It’d be like dragging a bloody great albatross around with us,’ said one comedian.

  ‘We don’t want it because there’ll be nowhere to hide it,’ said another.

  One man who also supported ‘McNab’ was ‘Chris Ryan’. He had been a part-time soldier with the Territorial Army when he decided to try for Selection – and passed. Like ‘McNab’ he was destined to survive the war, and like ‘McNab’ he found success as an author, under the pseudonym ‘Chris Ryan’, with an account of his adventures in the Gulf entitled The One That Got Away. That book gives the impression that he disagreed with ‘McNab’ on a number of points, while ‘McNab’s’ own book also indicates that the two did not always see eye to eye. Nevertheless, ‘Ryan’ joined ‘McNab’ and the others that day in vetoing any suggestion of taking a Land Rover. I personally believe that after coming under fire in Iraq, and with three of the eight-man patrol dead and four captured, ‘McNab’ and the other survivors later deeply regretted not taking the advice of the Boss and myself. However, at the time I realized that they had obviously hammered this out between themselves and were set upon a course which I, like the CO, couldn’t comprehend. Nor was there anything I could do about it.

  We had reached an impasse, and we all knew it. I could easily have ordered them to take a vehicle, as could the CO, because what the Colonel or the RSM says will be obeyed, reluctantly or otherwise. But I also knew, from my long experience in the Regiment, what would happen as a result. They would have gone on the ground – with a vehicle, admittedly – and almost certainly got themselves compromised in some way. They would then have come back and said, ‘Up yours! If you hadn’t made us take the vehicle we wouldn’t have failed. It’s all your fault.’

  That may appear incredibly childish, but it’s what could happen. These tough-as-nails, highly trained soldiers, who would go to hell and back if their CO asked them to, could also act very stubbornly if they felt that they had been slighted in any way, or that their professionalism had been questioned, however lightly. Objectivity would fly out the window, to be replaced by a macho pride. It is in order to avoid such self-defeating, even damaging displays, therefore, that the SAS has for many years had a rule that the man in command on the ground is always right, whatever his rank. In the end you do not question his decisions before he goes into the field because it is his patrol, and he has got to live with it – and with the consequences.

  Having lost that discussion, I then tried to get Bravo Two Zero at least to reduce the amount of kit they were taking. Everything was spread or piled around them: weapons, ammunition, bergens, rations, water containers, sandbags, communications equipment, lay everywhere.

  ‘What’s all this, Andy?’ I asked.

  Deadpan, he replied, ‘It’s the kit we think is essential to the mission.’ From the look on his face, I could tell that he wasn’t going to take any advice about reducing the amount they would have to carry. Still, I had to try, so I asked how long they were going for. I admit to being the traditional kind of practical soldier who believes that you don’t need much equipment to operate efficiently and that you should go in as light as possible. But they were taking twenty or thirty bulging sandbags in addition to the rest of their gear.

  ‘Tell me, Andy, what’s with the sandbags?’ I asked.

  ‘They’re full of kit. We’ve got water, ammunition, batteries, rations. They’re going to be cached.’

  Their bergens were already stuffed almost to bursting point, as were their belt kits, with rations, water, radios and spare batteries, ammunition, personal equipment, sleeping bags, waterproofs, medical packs, survival kits, and much more. On top of all that, of course, they had their weapons, as well as grenades and, for each man, a single-shot LAW 66 anti-tank rocket-launcher weighing nearly 10 pounds.

  I knew to a certainty that they were taking far too much. I couldn’t accurately guess the weight load for each man, but when they pulled out the next night ‘McNab’ estimated that each of Bravo Two Zero’s men was carrying 150 pounds. That’s the same as hefting a 10½-stone man around with you. I gave them a dozen paces – maximum – yet ‘McNab’ expected them to move freely, as circumstances demanded. An SAS unit, to misquote Muhammad Ali, should be capable of floating like a butterfly and stinging like a swarm of killer bees. The guys in ‘McNab”s patrol were carrying far too much equipment, and far too much weight, to be able to operate effectively.

  They were not going to reduce their load, however, either on my say-so or the commanding officer’s. So I returned to the CO’s office in about the same foul mood as he had been in when he sent me to talk to Bravo Two Zero – and for much the same reasons.

  ‘He won’t take a vehicle and that’s the end of it,’ I reported back. ‘He gave me the same cock-eyed justification he gave you.

  ‘And he won’t cut back on kit either. Short of ordering him to do it, I don’t think anything either of us says now is going to change his mind.’ I paused before adding, ‘And in my opinion it’s best not to force him.’

  The Boss nodded. ‘I agree, Billy. But thank you for trying.’

  I left the CO’s office hoping that my conclusions about Bravo Two Zero were wrong. Because, given the way the patrol was being mounted, I didn’t think it was going to work.

  Having heard the official debriefing of the survivors of Bravo Two Zero back in Hereford after the war had ended, I was surprised by several of ‘McNab’s’ anecdotes as he recounted them in his book. What I found most surprising, however, was that, in the book, he made no mention at all of the two meetings he and his men had had with the Colonel and myself, meetings during which we tried our damnedest to persuade him to take a vehicle and to cut down on the amount of kit they would be carrying. His sole reference says that I came over to them, wished them luck, told them to get the job done and to come back safely. Considering what were, I’m convinced, the results of not following our advice, I find it odd that he didn’t feel the meetings worth mentioning. After all, the failure of that mission ultimately cost the lives of three men, and led to four others being captured and tortured. That’s a casualty rate of nearly 90 per cent.

  To add to our problems, Alpha One Zero checked in next morning with what was rapidly becoming the ‘usual’ progress report: they were still on our side of the border.

  ‘This is ridiculous,’ the CO said. ‘I’m going to have to do something pretty damned drastic to get them sorted out.’

  First, though, we had to get our three B Squadron units away. Bravo Two Zero and two other eight-man patrols – Bravo Three Zero, which, like Bravo Two Zero, declined to take a vehicle, and Bravo One Nine (which did take a Land Rover), which were to observe the southern and central MSRs from Jordan to Baghdad while ‘McNab’s’ patrol watched the northern one – were going in on separate helicopters.

  Bravo Three Zero’s mission was of extremely short duration. When the helicopter landed the patrol commander jumped off, looked at the ground, which was flat and featureless in every direction, and said, ‘It’s not good enough.’ The chopper took them off again and put down a few miles from the original site, where exactly the same scene was re-enacted. The patrol commander inspected the immediate area and decided that it was untenable to set up an observation post on a flat gravel plain, and that to do so was asking to be compromised. He aborted the mission there and then, as was his prerogative, and he and his men returned to Al Jouf in the same helicopter. His report read simply that there had been nowhere to hide.

  All credit to ‘McNab’, at least when the helicopter carrying Bravo Two Zero arrived at their landing site he deployed, which was what I would have done myself. I would not have come back and said that my patrol could not deploy because the terrain was unsuitable. Nevertheless, no shame attaches to the patrol commander who pulled Bravo Three Zero out. That was his decision, and he believed that his reasons for making it were perfectly valid. The commander of Bravo One Nine took his team in as planned.

  The following morning, I had just showered
and shaved and was heading for the ops room with a mug of hot water in one hand and a sachet of hot chocolate in the other when I was almost run down by the CO. His mouth was clenched tight shut, and his eyes were glaring. The Boss was furious. I guessed, even before he spoke, what had got him so het up.

  ‘I was coming to look for you,’ he said. ‘Alpha One Zero still hasn’t crossed the border.’

  I said nothing.

  ‘I have two options,’ the CO continued. ‘I can bring up Jeremy from Riyadh, which would take two days, or I can send you in.’

  The last part of the remark really did grab all my attention. He had not dropped the slightest hint over the previous few days that his mind was working in this direction. To join one of the fighting patrols behind enemy lines was more than I could have hoped for in my wildest dreams, and to say that I was surprised would be a huge understatement. All I could think of as a reply was, ‘What time am I going in?’ meanwhile trying to stop the grin spreading across my face.

  ‘Ten hundred hours,’ said the Boss. It was then 0830.

  Leaving the ops office for my tent, I quickly gathered up my kit, and then took time out to write a letter to a girl I had been seeing. I wanted to explain that I would not be able to write for a while, and that she was not to worry if she didn’t hear from me for a bit. With the letter finished – it’s curious how long letters like that take to write – I handed it in, unsealed, to the censor’s office, where all outgoing mail was read by an officer. Because I was the RSM, however, I was told to seal it myself and place it directly in the mailbox. By then it was time to rendezvous with the CO, who was also flying forward with me in order to talk to the commander of our reluctant patrol. He had a signaller in tow, who would in addition act as his driver for the return journey, which they would make by road and track in the short-wheelbase Land Rover 90 that was also being flown in with us.