by Rob Maylor
The training team moved us from that area to a gravel track and lined us up along it. They knew who this poor bugger was but gave him the opportunity to confess to the crime, which he did. He had no choice; he was the only one standing there with hands empty. I can’t remember what they said to this bloke but it scared the shit out of me; my rifle was one item I was never going to forget. His punishment wasn’t over; he was told to sprint back to the harbour position and collect the Elson.
The Elson is a steel toilet. It has a half decent toilet seat but the inside is really nothing more than a steel bucket. Every troop takes one onto Woodbury Common. You have to–a new recruit troop is inducted into the marines every two to four weeks, so if the Elson isn’t used then you can imagine just how much human waste would be covering the common.
He returned minutes later with the steel dunny. The DS got him to hold it above his head while dressing him down once again. The poor bloke then dropped it, which spilled its contents onto the gravel. He panicked and in a flash dropped to his knees and began to scoop the shit and sweet corn back into the steel bucket. The training team were stunned! We were all stunned. They stopped him and told him to take the dunny to an admin area and wash his hands. This bloke did stay on with the troop and to his credit marched out with the rest of us at the end of training.
We continued to get punished for various infringements throughout the day and were all glad to hear that we were to speed march back to Lympstone once the field stores had been packed up and put on the Bedford 4-tonne trucks. Speed march is a run/walk activity based on a 10 minute per mile pace designed to get soldiers from A to B carrying equipment with a sense of urgency but without injury or totally flogging themselves and unable to fight at the end. The shortest distance back was 4 miles (6.4 kilometres) but we hardly ever took that route. At that moment we didn’t care how far it was–we were heading home!
Unfortunately we didn’t anticipate just how physically knackered we were; none of us had been pushed this hard before. This resulted in us dragging our feet on the speed march back, probably delaying the training team from getting home at a reasonable hour. The troop sergeant took offence at our sluggishness and when we reached base marched us straight down to the mudflats of the River Exe. Once lined out on the edge of the mud flats in full combat uniform, belt webbing, weapon and helmet, we began to leopard crawl through the mud towards the outgoing tide 20 metres away. It was quite a struggle battling through the gluey mud. It stank too.
When we reached the watermark we were told to conduct a series of low-profile movements until we were chest deep in the freezing murky water of the estuary. We were then to hold our breath and submerge ourselves underwater for the count of 10, which was very difficult due to the freezing water. If someone surfaced before the end of the DS’s count we all went under again. This happened several times and I was really starting to get pissed off. Finally the main culprit drew on his last energy reserve and passed the 10-second test.
At last it was over. With water still draining from our clothes and equipment we made our way back across the bottom field to the accommodation totally exhausted and feeling very sorry for ourselves. But every man knew there was still work to be done before we could knock off for the day–weapons as well as stores had to be cleaned and returned; weapons and webbing had to be completely free of mud and grime, as these items would be inspected and no-one wanted a repeat of that day’s treatment. We ended up taking our gear into the showers with us–probably not the best thing for the drainage system especially after you’ve squashed the build-up of mud and grass down the drain with your toes, but that was the most efficient way to get our kit cleaned.
Finally, work done, we got to knock off; I can’t remember what we did that weekend; probably slept for 48 hours straight, a great way to spend my 25th birthday.
On Monday there were a few empty places in the ranks and we were left with the guys who really wanted to be there. The DS reshuffled our three eight-man sections and appointed recruits as section commanders and 2ICs. Each section was then broken into two fire teams of four men, nominated Charlie and Delta fire teams. I was chosen to be a section commander–a daunting thought as I had never been put in such a position of responsibility before. However, I remained in that position throughout our time at the training centre. It was now week five and we were looking at more weapons training, harder physical training sessions and longer field exercises over the coming weeks.
Week 10 saw the exercise Hunter’s Moon, a survival exercise that started with a 14-kilometre pack walk (yomp) into the training area on Dartmoor. The weather was dismal for the yomp in and everyone got soaked to the skin, but it cleared up in the following days. Early that morning we were searched and stripped of any luxuries then instructed how to make shelters from the natural material found in the surrounding environment and from the contents of our survival gear.
Once they were convinced we had taken all this in, they divided us up into fire teams and showed us to an area where we could begin building our own rudimentary shelters. We organised work parties to gather materials for the construction, and every hour or so stopped work for more lessons on finding and purifying water, making and preserving fire, signalling for help, hunting and trapping, and celestial navigation.
They showed us what we could eat and how to prepare it. To call it ‘food’ was a bit of a stretch. There were dried worms to be crushed and made into a soup, nettle tea and boiled snails. If Napoleon was right and an army marches on its stomach, you wouldn’t get far on that menu. It might have been appetising back in the Dark Ages (if you were starving) but I prefer to forage for my tucker in a supermarket. However, we all had to take part in finding this ‘survival food’, make a fire to cook it, and then eat it.
Then came the rabbit. One of the corporals from the Mountain and Arctic Warfare training wing gave a demo on how to prepare a freshly caught rabbit. He showed us a very quick and clean way to kill the animal as humanely as possible but half the troop still managed to fuck it up. Some had three or four goes at it; some couldn’t do it at all.
After a good feed of rabbit washed down with nettle tea, we got our gear ready for the night’s activities, but first we checked the snares we had strategically placed to catch an unsuspecting rabbit as it ran under a fence or into some bushes. Empty! At night we conducted navigation to a rendezvous (RV), where we were met by one of the training team who gave us coordinates (map grid references) to another point, small amounts of food or information to be taken back to our shelter area.
The rabbits must have sensed we were in the area because night after night the snares were empty and the worm soup was no substitute. Then one morning to our surprise and delight one of the snares had caught a rabbit. This was great for morale, but one rabbit didn’t go far between four. Our bodies were now starting to break down through lack of nutrition and we were getting lethargic. A small bowl of worm soup and a morsel of rabbit just wasn’t enough fuel to cover the energy we were expending.
As the final task of the exercise, they gave us the scenario that we had been compromised and a large enemy force was on its way. With no time to waste we had to dismantle our shelters and cover up signs of our presence as best we could, once again not leaving anything behind. Everything in training was done with a sense of urgency, so when we were organised we got together as sections again and were quickly led with packs onto the base of a very large and very steep hill. Quick instructions followed and we were off racing the others to the top of the hill. During the ascent everyone dug deep and managed to find an energy reserve from somewhere, God knows where, but we found it. With arms pumping diagonally across our bodies trying to aid with momentum, and snot and saliva tracking horizontally along the sides of our faces like a crusty snail trail, we encouraged each member on and helped the lads who found it more of a struggle.
There was no time to rest once we reached the top. A very vocal and fit staff member who ran with us was urging us to keep going
. It was a welcome relief to be on the descent, but we still had to watch our footing; a twisted or broken ankle would result in removal from the troop and weeks or even months of rehab to become fully fit again. At the base of the hill we refilled our water bottles from our webbing, sucked in as much oxygen as possible and prepared ourselves for the walk out. We all struggled over the following hours but we put mind over matter and made it to the finish line.
Our bodies were going through a radical change. Not only were we looking different, but we were also becoming fitter and stronger by the day. The physical training was relentless and the PTIs always pushed us to the limit. We had all reached a similar level of fitness, but as human nature dictates, you will always get people who are naturally stronger than others, and some who will always struggle. The training program at Lympstone has been purposely designed over many years of experience not only to give you the best chance of success to finish training, but to turn you into a very strong willed and physically fit Royal Marine capable of great feats of endurance.
It didn’t seem like it at the time; it felt more like a physical beasting, and I remember feeling quite nauseous before every phys session, as the PTIs just seemed to punish your body lesson by lesson. We feared the PTIs, as they were beholders of mega amounts of pain that could be forced upon you at the drop of a hat. And if you were a ‘slug’, you got extra treatment!
Unbeknown to us, this was a great team-building tool, and slowly we began to work together more efficiently by helping each other and conducting our own mini-inspections, also rechecking the training program to see if there was any extra kit we needed for the next lesson. God help you if you turned up to the lesson unprepared.
In the minutes before we had to be formed up in three ranks outside the grots, fear and anxiety began to creep in and there was a mad rush to the heads that resembled more like blind panic to evacuate the bowels. This became the norm before every session, and some of the noises and grunting that echoed the concrete and tiled ablutions will haunt me forever. Arguments sometimes developed as some poor sod desperate to drop his load was waiting to get into an overused cubical. Time was critical!
Week 15 was Baptist Run, yet another test exercise, but this was more like an exam on what the recruit had learnt up to that mark–testing all the basic skills but with special emphasis on field craft and the ability to live in the field. These included skills like stalking, giving target indications, and navigation. All recruits had to pass Baptist Run before they could advance onto the next stage.
An award called the Craig Medal was given at the end of this testing phase in acknowledgement of a recruit’s all-round performance during this exercise. I was surprised–and pleased–to be the recipient of this award. That was the first of a number of awards I would be presented with during my time at Lympstone.
That weekend they granted us a well-earned long weekend leave, so a handful of us took the short train ride to Torquay on the southern coast and let our hair down for the couple of days.
I also tried to patch things up with Carla over the next few months but it just didn’t work out, and the divorce went through without any fuss as we mutually agreed that the relationship was not working.
4
Out in the Cold
Now that we had the basics, it was time to really step up to the specialised areas of our trade. We conducted more advanced live fire activities, worked with Sea King helicopters and conducted amphibious operations. This meant we were ready to conduct ship boarding parties from either the sea or air.
A core section of the UK’s Joint Rapid Reaction Force are the Royal Marines of 3 Commando Brigade. They are on permanent readiness to deploy across the globe. Royal Marines are experts at mounting amphibious operations from either helicopters or boats. This is a unique capability amongst the British armed services.
Our training included time at the Royal Naval Air Station (RNAS) Yeovilton in a mock helicopter simulating a crash into water. We were strapped inside a basic helicopter frame that plunged into a swimming pool. In the first step a crane lowered the frame into the pool slowly and when fully submerged we did the drills to exit the helicopter and swim to the surface. Once the instructors deemed us competent the final simulation was done in complete darkness and the frame turned upside down when it plunged into the pool. Divers were circling the frame in case anyone had a panic attack or had difficulty getting out. These skills would be put the test by me years later in a life-or-death situation off the coast of Fiji.
We trained with the Royal Marines Assault Squadron at RM Poole and learnt how to conduct night operations using Rigid Raiders. These are small boats powered by an outboard engine that can travel up to 40 knots in all sea conditions and carry eight lightly equipped troops or five fully equipped. Using the ‘raiders’ we were taught how to infiltrate enemy lines from the sea and conduct clandestine night raids on key installations such as communications centres. Since the Royal Marines were also the UK’s mountain troops we had to learn climbing and abseiling, including how to get marines off a cliff top quickly after completing a raid. To do this you abseil facing downwards and literally run down the cliff face.
We also learnt fighting in built-up areas (FIBUA) as it was called then, and as far as I could tell it didn’t seem like tactics had changed much at all since World War II. But I guess as the old saying goes, ‘If it’s not broken, don’t fix it.’ As always, we were constantly being tested through every physically demanding exercise.
At this stage we had to pass a 6-mile speed march to enter the commando phase of training; if successful we replaced our navy blue training berets for the khaki caps originally worn by World War II commandos. While wearing the cap we weren’t allowed to walk and had to run everywhere while in the training centre, but to conserve energy and reduce the risk of injury we reduced the run to a shuffle.
Exercise Holdfast came around all too quickly for us. We had heard through the ‘Nod’ grapevine, or ‘Gen buzz’ that this was extremely hard going. It is a defensive exercise that places a lot of emphasis on nuclear, biological and chemical warfare (NBC) and the threat from air attack.
Each section needed to carry a very heavy load of stores into the field to help in the construction of the position: shovels, picks, materials for construction of the overhead protection (OHP) and as many sandbags as you could carry. We split the stores up within the section and packed them into our already overweight bergens (large back packs).
The contents of a bergen for this particular exercise included seven days rations, warm and wet-weather clothing, a dry set of combat trousers and jacket, spare socks, undies and T-shirt, gloves, spare water, spare 5.56 mm and 7.62 mm ammunition, binoculars, poncho, radio equipment, spare batteries, sleeping gear, helmet, foot powder, toothbrush and toothpaste, baby wipes for personal hygiene and to conserve water, shaving kit, first aid kit, and full NBC gear, which consisted of rubber overboots, NBC suit, gas mask, inner and outer gloves and the testing kit.
Each section also had to carry a general purpose machine gun (GPMG), which weighed 25 pounds and the sustained fire (SF) kit which included tripod, C2 sight and other ancillaries. I am unsure of the total weight, but believe me, it was bloody heavy! So after a rather painful and exhausting 12-mile (19-kilometre) yomp to Woodbury Common we stopped short of our proposed defensive location late that afternoon.
It was raining, as usual. We positioned ourselves into all-round defence, which gave us 360-degree security in case we were unexpectedly attacked from any direction. In the prone position, weapons pointing forward, we loosened both shoulder straps and rolled the bergens off our backs, leaving the master arm through one strap. This was to expedite any extraction from the hasty harbour we had just developed. A four-man recce was designated with the aid of the DS. They left their bergens with us and patrolled the five hundred metres or so forward to get eyes on the area before giving the all clear for the proposed site.
The recce team led us in and placed us into the p
ositions where the trenches were to be dug. Once secure, we placed sentries and began our work routine. With blister upon blister, and pins and needles in the wrists and elbows, we jarred our way through the rocky topsoil. It had stopped raining for the night so sparks flew up from the flint as we struck it with shovel and pick. Soon we hit extremely hard clay, which almost brought the digging to a halt, and after a day and night of hard work removing it lump by lump through the intermittent downpours, we reached a silt layer. What a relief.
Things started to move a lot quicker from that point, and we were able to complete the OHP and concealment by day three. We still had the outer defences to finish off, which were the razor wire fences, minefields and trip flares. We also linked each pit with D10 wire and a dynamo-powered field phone, and heavily sandbagged our machine-gun positions.
The rain was starting to get heavier now and one of the lads had noticed the floor of the trench was starting to look like a shallow flowing stream. We had dug in some rudimentary drainage, but obviously not enough to get rid of the rainwater that was finding its way through the silt layer and into our pit.
Every defensive exercise I have done throughout my career it has pissed down with rain. We were now pretty knackered, and trying to sleep in freezing cold water and mud in the bottom of the sleeping pits at the end of the trench didn’t help matters. So when the sun finally did break through the gloom, lethargy began to sweep through the troop and you found yourself nodding off in the direct sunlight.
It wasn’t long before the training staff noticed this and decided to do something about it. As soon as I saw these bastards storming over and shouting at everyone to stop what they were doing I felt sick in the stomach. I could tell by their demeanour that we were going to get hammered again. I was warm for the first time in days and just starting to dry off nicely. I was quite comfortable with the routine we had slipped into. So I was less than impressed as we set off at a blistering pace down a nearby track to look for a steep yet open hill–open so the DS could watch everyone complete their punishment and could pick on the stragglers.