Fire Strike 7/9

The blinding flash of the explosion burned away the lateafternoon shadows, leaving a fuzzy white blob on my retina. The sound and blast wave hit, rolling and thundering across the valley in a deafening tidal wave of noise, rocking the wagon backwards and forwards on its suspension.

Sticky and I gazed in open-mouthed amazement at the impact point. The boiling cloud of dust and debris tore ever upwards and outwards, dwarfing the bush and the compounds that lay below it. Chunks of masonry and trees flew high into the air, each trailing its own dark and angry finger of smoke. From the centre of the explosion an ink- black pillar of burning barrelled into the air, pooling into a mushroom cloud high above the strike point. Unsurprisingly, the battlefield had fallen echoingly silent.

I turned to Sticky to get a sitrep from the lead platoon. As I did so rounds started coughing out of the treeline, one hundred metres to the north of the JDAM’s impact point. I could barely believe that anyone was left alive in there — but they were, and they were still fighting.

The OC was up on the net immediately: ‘Bommer, we need that target sorting! Get the air in again now!’

‘City Desk Four One, Widow Seven Nine,’ I yelled into the TACSAT. ‘I want immediate re-attack on the same target, but one hundred metres north. Put a five-hundred-pound airburst over that position.’

‘Roger that. Banking round.’ A beat. ‘Tipping in now.’

The pilot brought the F-18 around in a spanking turn, streaks of cloud-like vapour trail clinging to the twin, v- shaped fins of its tail. Forty seconds later I cleared him in hot. He put the airburst exactly where I’d asked, and the northern end of the treeline was torn to shreds in the blast that rained down from the air.

The pilot was low on fuel, and he got ripped by Devo Two One and Devo Two Two, the pair of F-18s that I’d had earlier. It was 1800 by now, and three platoons were on their objectives. They were a thousand metres away across the Green Zone, and in the gathering dusk I couldn’t see much with the naked eye.

I got the pair of F-18s flying recces over the objectives, but no further enemy fighters were seen. By 1830 Objectives Silver, Gold and Platinum had been taken. Whether it was the air power or whatever had done it, the enemy’s will to fight seemed to have been broken.

They’d bugged out leaving behind three huge, mud-walled compounds stuffed full of ammo, weapons and big bales of opium. There were also stacks of maps, notebooks and other useful Intel. The platoons went firm and set about destroying all the weaponry they could find.

As darkness fell across the valley, the men of 2 MERCIAN began their withdrawal. The mission brief called for all friendly forces to be out of the Green Zone by nightfall, and laagered up in the comparative safety of the open desert.

But as the men fell back through the silent territory they’d just been fighting across, the rear platoon got hit. All of a sudden I could see the fiery trails of RPGs and tracer rounds sparking red through the thickening Afghan night.

I got the F-18s overhead the contact point. Almost immediately Devo Two One picked up two glowing, pipe-like objects — the heat signatures of RPG launchers that had just fired. I asked the pilot to hit them with a GBU-12 in non-airburst mode.

As the eight-hundred-pound smart bomb smashed into the position, there was a burst of white-hot fire that lit up the entire night sky, fading to a darker orange at the edges. Walls and trees and rooftops were silhouetted in the heat of the explosion, which fired the valley a ghostly volcanic red.

The OC’s voice came up on the net. ‘Cheers, Bommer. Thanks for that.’

I asked for an immediate BDA, and the pilot reported that the heat spots had gone. Finally, all had fallen utterly silent across the night-dark battlefield.

The platoons withdrew past the ridge line and pushed into the desert, and we prepared to leave our position on the high ground. As Throp gunned the Vector’s motor and turned the wagon away from the battlefield, I presumed I’d seen the last of Adin Zai. But in fact, this very stretch of terrain was to become our permanent battleground. We would be back. Today was just one day, and we would spend the next hundred days fighting here.

And when we returned, the enemy would be waiting for us with a bloody vengeance.

Five TAKE US TO THE BODIES

Our convoy of vehicles was parked in the open desert, with a skeleton crew as security. We rejoined them, and laagered up in all-round defence. I checked with the platoon commanders, and not a single man had been injured. It was an incredible result, after thirteen hours of intense combat at close quarters.

The lads gathered in the safe harbour created by the circle of armoured vehicles, and started throwing around an American football. We got a brew on using an empty 7.62mm ammo tin and some hexy solid-fuel blocks. You could get six good Jack flasks (Armyissue metal cups with screw-on lid) out of one ammo tin, so there was more than enough for the four of us in our FST.

Like every proper north-east of England lad, I can drink tea until it comes out of my ears. I’d been dying for a good brew all day long. But I’d barely taken my first sip when a call came through on the TACSAT. I had an F-18 inbound, call sign Voodoo Five Two. No rest for the wicked, I told myself, as I briefed the pilot on what I wanted doing.

I got him flying recces around the perimeter of our laager, and he reported the terrain as deserted. Then I tasked him to fly some recces over the battlefield. All he could see were a couple of tractors and trailers pottering about in the Green Zone. I asked him to take a close look. A few moments later the pilot was back on the air.

‘Widow Seven Nine, Voodoo Five Two. Those trailers are stacked high with bodies. I guess that’s the enemy haulin’ out their dead and injured.’

Keeping one ear on the pilot’s commentary, I reached for the ratpack that Sticky was holding out to me. Over the past few weeks Sticky had taken it upon himself to be the FST’s honorary chef. He’d chucked four of the silver foil-clad heat-in-the-bag meals into the ammo tin, and boiled up some scoff.

I ripped off the top and stuck my nose into the steaming bag. Ah — lovely! Meatballs and pasta. I grabbed my spoon, which I kept jammed in the top of my radio pack, and dug in. When I’d finished eating I cleaned the spoon by giving my brew a good stir, then jammed it back in my pack.

I was fed and watered and dying for some kip, but I still had that F-18 on station. Keeping a listen on the pilot’s commentary, I pulled out my JTAC log, and did the next vital task. At the end of every battle the JTAC is supposed to submit a mission report (‘missrep’) on every live drop — a JTAC-controlled attack using an air asset.

One of the main reasons for doing those missreps is in case of friendly fire or civilian casualties. As every JTAC knows only too well, if we dropped a bomb or did a strafe and killed some of our own men, we would be held legally responsible. Likewise if we killed some Afghan civilians who had somehow wandered on to the battlefield.

Since leaving FOB Price at the start of the operation I’d done 115 air controls, so there were a good few missreps to write up. I scribbled away, my head torch casting a faint halo over my notebook — black pen for non- use of munitions; red for live-fire missions.

I ran through the missrep headings that I’d learned back in JTAC school: bearing; distance; target location (lat & long); target elevation; target description; attack heading; friendly forces; hazards; weather (if significant)… I tried to stifle a yawn.

Major Butt came over for a chat, which was a good excuse to break off what I was doing. He was a gruff, tough kind of commander, and not the sort of guy who gave praise lightly. The word was that the OC had been a professional rugby player in his youth, and he certainly had the size and the physique for it. I reckoned the guy could give Throp a good run for his money.

‘Bloody cracking op,’ remarked Butsy. He seemed in an unusually talkative mood. ‘Couldn’t have gone better. Everything went as planned. How about from your end?’