by Damien Lewis
Unless the enemy were immortal, which Mat somehow doubted, they had to be reinforcing their positions from places where the air strikes couldn’t hit them. Mat had a sneaking suspicion that each time an air strike hit the enemy at the gateway, they were drawing fresh fighters from the cellars and passageways that ran beneath the fort. Even five-hundred-pound laser-guided bombs would have trouble taking out enemy fighters sheltered deep in those underground chambers – especially as Mat had no way of knowing where they were, or of directing the air strikes on to them. Mat racked his brain for some way of hitting the enemy below ground, but for the moment he was lost for ideas.
As the sun began drifting towards the distant horizon, it lit up the thick pall of smoke hanging above the ancient fortress an angry blood red. Fires were burning fiercely at the gateway in the fort’s central wall, where the air strikes had ignited ammunition supplies. Every now and then a magazine would cook off in the heat, throwing up a series of staccato rifle-crack explosions. And in the silence between the detonations, the cries of the wounded lifted eerily above the fort. There were dozens, perhaps hundreds, of corpses strewn across the northern end of the fort – scattered on the ground in the grotesque, twisted shapes that the human body only ever seems to assume in death. Some of the enemy soldiers lying there were yet to die. They had come here seeking Paradise, and had found instead a slow, agonising lingering death. No one was coming to help them.
For half an hour or more there had been no further suicide charges by the enemy at the gateway. But there were still sustained bursts of gunfire coming from the enemy positioned there. And one of the enemy fighters had now got a mortar zeroed in on the SBS’s position up on the tower roof. The accuracy of the rounds meant that he must have placed someone high up on one of the walls, spotting where his shells were falling and correcting his aim. But as much as Mat, Jamie and Ruff searched for that ‘spotter’, they still failed to locate him.
The enemy mortar operator had been seen firing from several positions in the southern compound. But he was very good and never allowed himself to fire from the same position twice – which prevented him from being targeted. He’d come running out of a building, plonk the mortar baseplate down, lob off a salvo of mortars and get back into cover again – doing it all so quickly that it was impossible to get him. And while the fire wasn’t exactly 100 per cent accurate it was good enough to cause the British forces some problems. With the mortar rounds creeping ever closer to their positions, Captain Lancer decided to act. He ordered his men to relocate to the tower on the north-eastern corner of the fort, some halfway across to the HQ building.
On the way up there, the SBS soldiers picked up a dozen Afghan fighters who had just arrived on the scene. They were the first re-inforcements and had been sent over by General Dostum. Once they had reached their new positions, Jamie and Ruff set up the GPMGs facing south towards the gateway in the fort dividing wall. Although the enemy seemed to have given up trying to break out en masse, they might still try to do so in smaller numbers as darkness began to fall. Jamie zeroed in his weapon on the killing box in front of the gateway, and settled down behind the cover of the battlements. As he did so, he felt someone dragging at the Diemaco assault rifle that he had slung across his shoulder. Turning round, he saw that it was one of the newly arrived Afghan soldiers.
‘Ta-li-ban,’ Jamie said, pointing at the enemy positions and grinning. Then he passed the Afghan fighter the assault rifle, and motioned that he should take a few potshots at the enemy.
‘Taliban,’ the Afghan soldier replied, bringing the weapon to his shoulder and aiming in the direction of the gateway. ‘Bang. Bang. Taliban.’
But as the Afghan went to pull the trigger, nothing happened, and try as he might he couldn’t get the weapon to fire. Finally, Jamie could help himself no longer and he cracked up laughing. From where he was standing he could see that the Diemaco’s safety catch was still on, and that was why the Afghan soldier couldn’t get it to fire. As he gave up trying to shoot and handed the weapon back to Jamie, the Afghan fighter must have recognised the humour of the moment. Suddenly, he too started pissing himself laughing, and the two men did a brotherly handclasp.
Then the Afghan soldier motioned skywards and performed a rotating movement with his finger in the air. While he did so he made the noise of a helicopter’s rotors, then ran his finger across his throat like a knife cut. ‘Taliban,’ he said, grinning. The meaning was clear – the air power would help them finish off the enemy forces in the fort. Suddenly all the British and Afghan fighters were grinning and backslapping each other at the thought of an end to all the fighting. It was the first, truly light moment that the soldiers had experienced since the siege of Qala-i-Janghi had begun. It was the first time that they had felt they could start to relax a little.
‘Take it easy, lads,’ Captain Lancer remarked, as he gazed over the battlements into the darkening fort. ‘If I were those fuckers, I’d see dusk as my chance to break out. Just keep your eyes peeled.’
‘What’s the score on the rescue party, boss?’ Mat asked.
‘I’ve no idea, Mat,’ said the Captain. ‘Since the last call about the air strikes, we’ve not heard from them.’
‘It’s gone pretty quiet in there. A bit worrying, ain’t it?’
‘I guess they’d call us if they needed us.’
Down in the fort next to General Dostum’s HQ building, Major Martin’s rescue party were just considering calling off the search. The US Major had finally received a radio call from Boxer Base, informing him that CIA Dave had escaped the fort of his own accord and been found safe and alive. Apparently he had made his way back to Mazar city in a local vehicle. CIA Dave had been able to confirm that things looked bad for his missing buddy, Mike Spann, who had been surrounded and attacked by the enemy at the start of the uprising. But as the intel on CIA Mike was all third-hand, it wasn’t totally convincing. Until someone found Mike Spann’s body, no one could be certain that the CIA officer had been killed. In which case there remained just a chance that he might be lying somewhere in that fort, badly injured but still alive.
Tom, CIA Steve and Major Martin gathered around in the cover beneath the HQ wall, and tried to decide what to do. Sam was still sniping at the enemy from the corner of the building. He’d put down more rounds than any of the rest of them, and just seemed hell-bent on spending his time fighting. Sam seemed to have an unshakeable conviction that their mission would succeed. With all the air strikes that had gone in on the enemy positions, Tom and Major Martin reckoned that the uprising had to be pretty much under control by now. And with the approach of dusk, it would soon become impossible to distinguish friend from foe. In addition to which, more Northern Alliance reinforcements were arriving on the scene to secure the fort.
But the men were also aware of their acute shortage of ammo. They were each down to three or four mags, and Sam had even less than that. And they knew how desperately the enemy wanted to get an American or British soldier. If they stayed at the fort for very much longer they would be the first to be targeted by the enemy in the darkness, that much was for sure. And none of them fancied fighting off any midnight suicide attacks. Eventually, Tom and Major Martin decided that they had to abandon the fort for the rest of the night to the care of the NA forces. It was time to return to Boxer Base for an ammo resupply, a debrief and some rest.
But Sam still appeared torn: on the one hand he knew the others were right, and that they should withdraw from the fort. On the other, he hated abandoning CIA Mike to his fate. As the rescue team carefully retraced their steps to the point where they’d first crossed over the wall into the fort, Sam was wrestling with his conscience. The men climbed back over and started getting their kit together in preparation for leaving. But then Sam came over to have a quiet word with Tom.
‘This just ain’t right, bro,’ Sam announced, quietly. ‘I can’t just leave him in there. I wanna go find Mike.’
‘What the fuck, Sam? It’s dark, m
ate, we got to get out of here and you don’t know where the fuck he is. Don’t be fucking crazy, mate.’
‘I’m headin’ for the western tower, bro,’ Sam replied. ‘That’s where I reckon I’ll find him.’
With that he turned round, scaled the parapet and climbed back on to the top of the wall. Without a backward glance he jumped down into the darkened fort and headed off into the unknown. Tom immediately felt compelled to follow his fellow SBS soldier, but at the same time he felt he had to inform Major Martin what the hell was happening. The US 5th SOF Major had just got off the radio to Boxer Base and he was unaware that Sam had gone back into the fort.
‘Right, we’re out of here guys, we’re leaving,’ the Major announced.
‘Sorry, mate, but we can’t,’ Tom replied. ‘Sam’s just gone off to find Mike.’
‘Jesus Christ! What the hell for, buddy? It’s gettin’ dark and we just gotta get the hell outta here.’
‘Yeah, I know, mate, but it’s Sam,’ Tom replied. ‘Hang on – I’ll try raise him on the radio.’
As Tom tried to reach Sam on his PRM radio, the commander of the recently arrived Afghan forces started remonstrating with Major Martin that he needed all of his men out of the fort. With darkness descending, the Afghan commander wanted to shut the fort complex down and make any no man’s land a killing ground. Which meant that anyone seen there after dark would be shot on sight. Clearly, he’d be unable to do so if there were any SBS soldiers still wandering around the fort. Finally, Tom gave up trying to raise Sam on the radio. Either he was out of range or he wasn’t answering his calls.
‘Look, buddy, we gotta get out of here,’ said Major Martin, as soon as Tom got off the radio.
‘What about Sam?’ Tom asked.
‘We’re out of here,’ CIA Steve interjected. ‘There’s no way we can wait for Sam, or anyone else, buddy.’
Tom knew that he couldn’t openly try to overrule a CIA officer and a US 5th SOF major. In any case, he doubted that they’d listen to him, even if he tried. But he couldn’t leave Sam behind.
‘Well I’m going back to look for Sam,’ Tom replied. ‘He’s a fellow SBS operator, which makes him my responsibility. And I ain’t fuckin’ leavin’ without him.’
‘What’s that gonna achieve?’ CIA Steve countered.
‘Look, wherever Sam is I’m going to find him and bring him in,’ Tom explained. ‘I’m not fuckin’ leavin’ him behind.’
‘Goddammit,’ Major Martin snapped, dropping his grab bag on the ground. ‘If you’re goin’ in to find your buddy, you ain’t goin’ in alone. We may as well go with ya, search for the other CIA officer, Dave.’
‘I thought he was already outta here?’ CIA Steve queried.
‘Yeah, but the comms are all to fuck,’ Major Martin replied. ‘And if we’re fuckin’ around looking for Mike, then may as well double-check that Dave ain’t still in there while we’re at it.’
Together, the three men vaulted back over the wall and began to retrace their steps towards the HQ buildings, hugging the shadows of the wall and any cover that they could find. There were still sporadic bursts of gunfire ringing out in the fort, but for now at least none of it seemed directed at them. As soon as they reached the HQ building, CIA Steve and Major Martin dived in through the doorway and disappeared into the shadows to search for CIA Dave. Tom was left alone on the outside.
The rescue team was now split up into three groups, and it suddenly dawned on Tom just how badly things were going. Sam had disappeared alone into completely uncharted enemy territory, looking for a CIA officer already believed dead, and with no idea where to find him. Major Martin and CIA Steve had disappeared into the fort HQ – again, potentially hostile territory – looking for Dave, the other CIA officer. But he was believed to be back at Boxer Base already, shocked and shaken but pretty much all right. And as for Tom, he couldn’t see either party, had no comms with Sam and didn’t know what to do next. It crossed his mind that if he stayed where he was he could at least act as a rendezvous point for all elements of the rescue team. But his instincts told him to press on and look for Sam.
Tom set off at a crouching run for the western side of the fort, disappearing into the dark unknown. Hugging the fort’s outer wall he headed for the north-western tower. There, the wall would turn south, Tom told himself, and he should be able to follow it all the way to the western tower, which was where Sam had said he was heading. As he hurried forward Tom couldn’t help but admire the bravery of his fellow special forces soldier. But at the same time he wondered why on earth he had decided to head for the western side of the fort – which was completely unknown territory.
The western tower was the furthest point possible from friendly forces, from the SBS and 5th SOF positions on the eastern side of the fort. And then it suddenly dawned on Tom that that was probably the very reason that Sam had chosen this route in. As there were no British or American troops positioned on this side of the fort, the enemy were more likely to have left it undefended. If there was one vantage point from where Sam might be able to locate Mike Spann without being detected by the enemy, then his intended destination, the western tower, might just be it.
Suddenly, Tom’s attention snapped back to the present. One hundred yards up ahead of him there was a fierce outbreak of gunfire. It sounded like a heavy machine gun of some sort, and he could hear the sharp reports of an AK47 returning fire. Instantly, Tom knew for certain that Sam was involved and that he had hit trouble. He hurried ahead. As the dark bulk of the north-western tower loomed ahead of him he could just make out a figure hunched behind the corner of a nearby wall. It was Sam all right, and he was putting down fire on to the enemy to his front.
‘Sam, you crazy bastard,’ Tom said, speaking softly into his radio. ‘I’m right behind you, mate.’
Tom figured that Sam had ignored the earlier radio calls when he’d first set off on his lone mission of madness, but that he might react differently now. Sure enough, there was a faint crackle of radio static and then Sam replied.
‘I hear you, bro. Come on in.’
At that, Tom scurried across to join him in the cover of the wall. It was one in a long row of single-storey buildings that clustered at the base of the fort’s outer wall.
‘Say, bro, you just couldn’t keep away?’ Sam said, as soon as he caught sight of Tom.
‘You crazy fucker … Where d’you get the weapon from, mate?’ Tom asked, pointing to the battered AK47 that Sam was using.
‘Picked it up from a dead Afghan on the way over,’ Sam replied. ‘Figured he didn’t need it and as I was all out of ammo …’
‘So, you got a plan, mate?’ Tom asked, as he stole a glance around the corner of the building. It was getting dark now, and the north-western tower was some 150 yards further down the wall from them.
‘Up ahead on the tower, reckon there’s three or four of ’em, bro. They got somethin’ large calibre up there, maybe a Dushka, plus they got some small stuff. But I reckon in this light they can barely see us. So if we can just get around this corner without bein’ spotted … I reckon we could make it to the tower if we stick close to the base of the wall. What d’you think, bro?’
‘Sounds good to me, mate – specially if we belly-crawl it. Once we’re round the corner, we can do the rest at a run.’
‘OK, bro, let’s do it,’ Sam said, dropping on to his hands and knees.
‘Say, mate, those doves,’ Tom began, just as they were about to set off at a crawl, ‘they were real, weren’t they?’
‘Sure they were, bro,’ Sam replied. ‘You doubtin’? Don’t ever doubt the power of bein’ on the side of right.’
With that the two special forces soldiers began edging their way around the corner of the building. As they inched forwards, Tom found himself wondering what the hell they were risking their lives for in such a crazed venture as this – searching a darkened fort infested by a fanatical enemy for a US officer that they’d never met before and who was more than likel
y dead. But as he did so, he remembered the calm and the sense of peace that had descended upon him as he’d seen those two white doves flying into the air above the battlefield. With it had come the overwhelming conviction that somehow they were being protected. They had already fought their way through more danger and bloodshed than ever seemed humanly possible. And if they had cheated death so far, there was no reason why they shouldn’t make it through this final battle.
They had barely advanced fifteen yards at a crawl, when all hell broke loose. The heavy machine gun up ahead opened up again, large-calibre rounds chewing into the wall behind them. Glancing back, Tom could see that the incoming fire was tearing into the corner of the building where he and Sam had just been standing. Perhaps the enemy gunner hadn’t spotted them and was just laying down some suppressing fire. In which case, they needed to get the hell out of there. Jumping to his feet Tom set off at a crouching run along the base of the wall, with Sam close on his heels. The taller American was faster than Tom and soon overtook him. As they approached the tower, they could hear the enemy gunner laying down further, probing, bursts of fire. Any second now they feared that they were going to be hit.
At last they made the cover of the tower itself. Flattening themselves against the wall, they stood there in the shadows gasping for breath. Up above them was the enemy machine-gun nest. Each man knew what he had to do next, as they had rehearsed and prepared for it so many times during training. They exchanged a few brief hand signals, and then they moved in through the tower entranceway, their weapons held at the ready. Taking it in turns to cover each other, they advanced towards the stairway and began to mount the steps leading up on to the roof. The interior of the tower appeared deserted. But up above there was the intermittent roar of the heavy machine gun, as the enemy kept squirting off bursts of fire into the semi-darkness.