Attack State Red

by Richard Kemp

  Then Salaam remembered that Bowadin’s plan was to mortar the base while the shura was running, to kill those in the base, including people attending the shura, and also to scare the elders and discourage them from coming to future meetings at the DC. Well, 1330 would certainly fit the shura timings. He hoped.

  So now he knew where, or he thought he knew where. And he knew when, or at least he had an idea of roughly when. So what was actually going to happen? Salaam had said a rocket attack. What did he mean by that?

  ‘Do these rockets go along through the air, or do they go up and then down?’

  ‘They go up and down.’

  Coleman figured out it must be mortars. Mortars would fit with what Bowadin had been involved in before. Good. Looking at the range, at least 8 kilometres, it had to be a heavy 120mm mortar – an 82mm would never travel that far.

  Salaam told him that with Bowadin there would be four other fighters to carry the mortar barrel and the bombs and to fire them at the base. The target was definitely Sangin DC.

  Now Coleman had the full picture – when, where, how, who, what. At least he hoped he had. Much of this was speculation and deduction. And it was all based on uncorroborated information from a man about whom he knew virtually nothing.

  Coleman escorted Salaam back to the place they had met a couple of hours earlier, outside the south gate. Then he went to find the CO. Although it was well after midnight, Carver was sitting in the smoking area next to the ops room, puffing on a Pine Light and working on a tedious-looking document. Several soldiers were sitting around smoking, so Coleman took Carver out of earshot. It was essential that as few people as possible knew about this, first to protect Salaam, and second because it was a military practice never to discuss future operations with anyone who doesn’t need to know – and Coleman definitely had a future operation in mind to deal with Bowadin and his mortar team.

  As he led the CO to a quiet spot, Coleman felt the pressure building on him. In reality he had only the sketchiest information, and absolutely nothing solid. He was going to ask the CO to authorize the use of scarce air assets that might be urgently needed on some life-or-death task elsewhere. And if his calculations were wrong, or if he failed to convince Carver to back him, there was always the very real risk that the mortar attack would go ahead, perhaps killing several Royal Anglian soldiers, and perhaps Afghan military, police and civilians in and around the base.

  With all the confidence he could muster, Coleman took Carver through the picture he had pieced together. Carver said, ‘Tom, we’ve had loads of this sort of stuff before, and how often has it come to anything? Why should we put our money on this one?’

  ‘Of course we can’t be certain, sir. But this guy did tell me some stuff about the local Taliban that I already know to be true. He’s obviously in the know, to some extent at least. And we have virtually never before had time, place and type of attack all together. We can’t pass up this opportunity. We have a complete target picture.’

  Carver said, ‘Yes, but maybe he’s misheard something, overheard the wrong thing, or maybe someone was just bragging about something that’s not going to happen.’

  Coleman paused and thought for a moment. Then he said, ‘All true, Colonel, but I just have a gut feeling that this guy is right. A lot of it adds up, it makes sense. Trust me.’

  Carver thought for a moment, then said, ‘OK. Go for it. See if Jamie can get you some air.’

  Coleman woke up Captain Jamie Lindsell, the CO’s JTAC. Within fifteen minutes Lindsell confirmed that a pair of American F15 Eagles would be allocated to the task. He had booked them to be on station for initial reconnaissance by midday. About ten hours away.

  Coleman went to bed, but had difficulty sleeping as he pondered all the holes in his intelligence. He had been open with the CO, but had he given the impression of being too certain about his facts? The timings in particular could be way off. Had Salaam misunderstood something he had overheard? He could well have done. Had he made the worst error that an IO could make and exaggerated the strength of the information he had gained to suit his own mindset or false expectation? He hoped he had not. He had effectively staked his reputation on this intelligence.

  9

  Coleman’s plan was to use the F15s to strike the mortar team the minute it could be identified. He first wanted the aircraft to look into the area, using camera pods, to confirm that the terrain was as he thought, and that it was at least feasible that the mortar position could be as shown on his map. Then he wanted the aircraft to scan the general area to try to identify the Taliban as they were moving into position. All the while the planes would be standing off at a height and a distance so as not to spook the Taliban – they would not be able to either see or hear the F15s.

  Lindsell, the JTAC, set up the camera downlink terminal in the Sangin DC courtyard, near the monument to British troops killed in the town. Coleman looked at the brass cross, made of 30mm cartridge cases, and hoped there would be no more names to add to its roll of honour as a result of today’s activities.

  The terminal needed line of sight to the aircraft so had to be positioned outside. The cylindrical pod that received the signal from the camera sat on top of the courtyard wall. This was connected to a rectangular decoder box, also on the wall but covered with a plastic sheet to protect it from the sun. In turn the decoder was linked by a wire connector to a laptop, which was on the ground in the shade of a cam-net.

  Coleman and Carver squinted into the laptop monitor as the sometimes fuzzy, sometimes sharp colour picture came and went. Coleman followed the movements of the camera, marking off areas on his map. Lindsell was talking on his radio handset to the pilot, getting him to check into likely sectors the enemy might move through, and receiving information for Coleman about the picture on the ground.

  Everybody in the base had been warned about a possible mortar attack. Those who could be were behind hard cover, and the remainder were wearing helmets and body armour as they went about their duties.

  1330 hours came and went. The aircraft had not identified any suspicious activity in the area. Absolutely no sign of any Taliban in an attack position or moving towards one. Nothing. Ten minutes later Carver looked at his watch again and then at Coleman. Coleman pretended not to notice his glances and just kept staring at the screen.

  Oh well, it was worth a shot, he thought. I’ll just have to put up with the ragging I will definitely get from the officers who know about this – and one thing is certain in this battalion – every officer will know all about it within a day or so. And I won’t ask the CO to trust me again.

  Seconds later the ground in and around the DC shook with the tremors of a massive explosion. A 120mm mortar round had impacted in the shingle bank of the river 400 metres north of the DC.

  At that moment the downlink monitor crashed and the screen went blank. Inevitable, thought Coleman, absolutely inevitable.

  Out in the desert the Taliban fighter sat on his motorbike, looking across the north side of Sangin. He spoke calmly into his radio, in Pashtu. ‘Direction is good, direction is good. Distance increase two hundred metres. Increase two hundred metres.’

  He watched the next round explode seconds later, closer to the base but still falling short. ‘Distance increase another two hundred metres, two hundred.’

  The third round landed short too. ‘Increase one hundred, one hundred increase. Now it should hit.’

  Eight thousand metres away, Bowadin relayed the instructions to the fighter just in front of the mortar tube, his hand on the sight. The second the fighter made his final adjustment there was a loud whoosh, and they were all hurled off their feet by a massive, violent, deafening blast, followed immediately by a second.

  Bowadin struggled to his feet, dazed. He could barely stand, blood trickled down from his ears, and there was a gaping wound in his arm. He looked around. All but one of his men were dead, cut to ribbons. As he made his way towards the dislodged mortar barrel, the survivor stood up. Bowadi
n shouted, ‘Brother, we are finished, we are dead. Let us try to fire, let us try to kill some of them before we die.’

  They picked up the heavy mortar barrel and set it back on its baseplate and tripod, pointing it again in the direction of Sangin. Bowadin grasped a shell and dropped it into the barrel. It was the last thing he ever did. The bomb exploded inside the damaged mortar, killing both of the surviving fighters.

  Moments later their remains, and the 120mm mortar, were obliterated as two further massive explosions engulfed them.

  Coleman was staring at the blank computer screen. Despite the three mortar bombs creeping closer and closer to the base, he, Carver and Lindsell had not moved from their position beside the downlink monitor. Movement in the DC had frozen. Everyone else had taken cover.

  Lindsell was speaking urgently but calmly into his handset. Then he held it away from his ear. Turning to Coleman and Carver he said, ‘One times Taliban one hundred and twenty millimetre mortar and five times enemy fighters identified by the Dude callsign. The Dude has dropped four five-hundred-pound bombs. He reports all targets destroyed.’

  The locals in Sangin continued to provide valuable intelligence to the Royal Anglians, right through to the end of the tour, symbolizing a changed attitude towards the troops. The Taliban’s plan to use a twelve-year-old boy to attack the police and the market had backfired, and this represented a significant turning point in the level of consent for the activities of British troops in the town.

  The Battle of Inkerman: 17 July–16 August 2007

  1

  Towards the end of July, Lieutenant Colonel Carver decided to move B Company out of Inkerman to replace C Company at COP Zeebrugge in Kajaki. B Company’s tour so far had been very tough. While it would be just as busy for them in Kajaki, and the fighting would be hard, Carver felt that they would benefit from the more settled routine that was possible there. C Company were to move south. 9 Platoon, under Lieutenant Tom Clarke, would occupy the base at Nowzad together with the company’s fire support group, FSG Charlie. Company Headquarters along with 10 Platoon, under Lieutenant Sam Perrin, and 11 Platoon, under Lieutenant Hermanus Olivier, would replace B Company at Inkerman. Meanwhile A Company were to remain based at Sangin DC, where they were establishing effective relationships with the local people and community leaders.

  Carver briefed Major Messenger, C Company commander, on the situation at Inkerman. He told him that there had been a total lack of any Taliban activity in the area since Operation Ghartse Ghar had ended and that he was surprised there hadn’t been an attack on Inkerman yet.

  FOB Inkerman had been occupied by the ANA up until the later stages of Operation Ghartse Ghar, the epic march of A and B Companies through the Green Zone. B Company had moved into the FOB straight after Ghartse Ghar, two weeks earlier, and had set about patrolling the surrounding area to maintain long-term dominance north-east of Sangin in an effort to reduce the Taliban’s ability to attack the town’s community and security forces.

  The bases constructed by the Royal Engineers at the end of the Royal Anglian Battle Group’s first major battle, Operation Silicon, had become a massive thorn in the Taliban’s flesh, disrupting their attempts to continue an attack campaign against the town of Gereshk. The Taliban had commenced a series of attacks against the bases, which suited

  Map 9. Battle of Inkerman

  Brigadier Lorimer, the commander of Task Force Helmand, whose objective was to keep the enemy away from Gereshk to allow reconstruction and increasing prosperity.

  There had been a similar experience after Operation Lastay Kulang, which ended with the establishment of FOB Fox. Angered at the effect Fox had on their freedom of manoeuvre, the Taliban had launched attack after attack against the base, one of which killed two soldiers from the Estonian armoured infantry company that was grouped with the Royal Anglians. Carver had expected a similar reaction at Inkerman, but the FOB had received no attention at all from the Taliban. He knew they would not simply accept this permanent challenge to their own heartland.

  Carver reckoned the Taliban were reeling after Kulang and Ghartse Ghar. The survivors would be up at Musa Qalah, licking their wounds. They would obviously need to get hold of some weapons and ammo to replace what they had lost, but that wouldn’t be a problem or take very long. Their biggest challenge would be replacing the men who had been killed or wounded. They would have to bring in fighters from Pakistan, especially to replace the leaders who had been taken out. Carver did not know how long that might take, but he told Messenger they must assume that the Taliban could be poised to attack Inkerman, or C Company’s patrols in the area, at any time.

  The B and C Company moves between Kajaki, Nowzad and Inkerman were completed between 17 and 20 July.

  C Company had been fighting the Taliban almost every day in Kajaki, in their efforts to keep the insurgents away from the vital hydroelectricity installation which was destined to supply power to the whole of Helmand and much of Kandahar province. They had inflicted heavy losses on the Taliban and pushed them further and further back, denying them their goal of disrupting the development of the energy project.

  C Company had seized the initiative as soon as they arrived at Kajaki on 3 April and they had held on to it, dictating the terms of engagement to the Taliban and using overwhelming air power to back up their constant offensive against the enemy strongholds. None of their men had been killed during the fighting, although Corporal Lee Gayler had been shot soon after they arrived, Private Matt Woollard had lost his leg on a landmine and five soldiers had been wounded during a ferocious raid against the Taliban stronghold of Mazdurak.

  Despite their almost daily battles fought over rugged terrain and in unbearable heat, C Company had always considered themselves fortunate in being based at COP Zeebrugge. Every soldier compared it favourably with the run-down accommodation they occupied back at their base in Elizabeth Barracks, Pirbright. It was far from luxurious, but Zeebrugge was a purpose-built camp, with stone accommodation blocks, air conditioning, a cook-house and showers. There was also the welcome opportunity to cool off in the reservoir after sweating their way back from a battle. It was therefore with horror that the men of C Company eyed up their new home at Inkerman when the dust cleared after they ran off the tail-gate of the Royal Air Force CH47 Chinook that had brought them the 25 kilometres from Kajaki.

  2

  Inkerman was a large Afghan farming compound, built on a desert hillside beside Route 611, which runs through Sangin and up to Kajaki. A resident ANA platoon occupied the section of Inkerman that fronted on to the 611 and they manned a permanent vehicle checkpoint on the road. To the west, beyond the highway, was a poppy field, now harvested. Across the 200-metre stretch of baked earth and dried-out poppy stalks was the jungle-like Green Zone. To the east the desert rose up, overlooking Inkerman, and in the far distance there was a mountain range, about 10 kilometres away.

  The FOB was surrounded by high walls of baked mud, broken down in places by shelling. Inkerman was 150 metres by 150 metres, a bleak, open dust-bowl, and the troops’ living quarters consisted of a camp-bed under camouflaged nylon sheets stretched across to stakes in the ground by elastic bungees or string. Known as a ‘basha’, this was a familiar arrangement for the infantry and was used to provide patrol shelters in woods, forests and jungles the world over.

  An extra layer of protection from the sun was provided by large camouflage nets suspended from the compound walls, about 3 metres off the ground. These also provided a shaded area to sit about preparing equipment, cooking, eating or just chewing the fat. In the rare moments they had any time off some soldiers sat under the cam-nets playing battle games on their hand-held Nintendos and PlayStations; others read war books or novels sent out from home.

  There were only improvised showers and there was no cook-house. Everybody had to prepare their own food from compo ration packs, either cold or heated by half an hour of exposure to the sun or a burner. What there was, though, was dust, and plenty of it.
The fine grains of dust and sand got everywhere – into clothing, boots, weapons, sleeping bags, hair, food, everything. That was when there wasn’t any wind. When there was it got into everything and a lot more besides. And of course there was the heat, the almost undendurable 50 degrees by day that barely seemed to diminish at night, when the troops would lie sweating on their camp-beds, often unable to sleep for long despite their almost constant state of exhaustion.

  Of course, C Company, like all Royal Anglians, were used to working, living, training and fighting in such harsh conditions. It was part of the deal of being an infantry soldier, and they would very soon get used to their new home. They had been fighting hard at Kajaki, and so far had experienced more frequent and intensive contacts than the other companies. But the one advantage they had was the austere yet comparatively comfortable conditions of COP Zeebrugge, with its purpose-built barracks. The change in C Company’s domestic circumstances was an inevitable source of amusement for the men of Fire Support Group Delta, commanded by Captain Ollie Ormiston, who had now been at Inkerman for two weeks. With C Company’s own FSG based at Nowzad alongside 9 Platoon, FSG Delta would initially be supporting Messenger’s troops at Inkerman.

  The fact that many of the FSG soldiers were good friends with the lads in C Company increased the warmth of C Company’s welcome as they were greeted with endless comments like, ‘Hope this won’t be too rough for you after your vacation at Club Zeebrugge,’ and ‘Just keep walking that way, mate, the outdoor pool is up on the left, just the other side of that cam-net.’

  The worst ragging was reserved for Corporal Matthew Willan, one of the section commanders in 11 Platoon. Willan had joined C Company after they deployed to Afghanistan, and had previously been in the Royal Anglians’ Drums Platoon. The Drums Platoon, dual-roled as machine-gunners, is a part of D Company, which is the parent company of the FSG members, so most of Willan’s close mates in the battalion were in the FSGs – including FSG Delta.