War Stories, Episode 6: A British Infantry Commander in Urban Combat, Iraq, 2007

Welcome to the War Studies Podcast. We bring you worldleading research from the School of Security Studies at King's College London, the largest community of scholars in the world, dedicated to the study of all aspects of security, defense, and international relations. We explore the complex realm of conflict because the study of war is fundamental to understanding the world we live in and the world we want to live in. Before we begin, a brief warning for this series content. We will be discussing the firsthand experiences of war and conflict, which may well include descriptions of traumatic events and scenarios involving severe injuries or death. These accounts are deeply personal and may be upsetting for some listeners, particularly veterans. If you find yourself becoming overwhelmed, we encourage you to pause the episode or step away entirely. For anyone impacted by these themes, support is available 24/7. In the UK, you can contact the combat stress helpline at 08001381619 or the NHS OP courage service. Additional resources are linked in our show notes. The opinions expressed on this podcast are those of the individual interviewed and do not reflect the official views of King's College London, the School of Security Studies, or the organizations for which the individuals speaking were working at the time of the incidents discussed. Hello and welcome to King's College London, War Studies, War Stories. This is a a podcast series where we interview um BA war studies graduates who have gone on after their degree to experience conflict um overseas as a as a service person um a a journalist, a member of an NGO, a government official or whichever other capacity we can imagine. Um this is uh one of 13 episodes that we currently have built and we're delighted to have so many. So, thank you to the war studies community for coming forward. And today, I'm delighted to say that our guest is Robert Lane. Good evening, Robert. How you doing? >> Good evening, Nick. Lovely to be uh on the show in the other seat. >> Well, thank you very much for coming. Um, of course, I'm Nick Denning. I'm a co-host of this podcast and our guest today, Rue, is the other host. And um, but today he is in the guest seat. So, we are delighted to have him here um to talk about his experiences um in Iraq um today. Um we've mentioned before um I was in the the guest seat um last time. Uh we mentioned then that Ru and I have quite a long relationship. We did BA war studies at the same time. We met in halls and went into the military together in far closer collision than we might have expected. Um and um and what we didn't mention last time is is is how we've stayed close to war studies since then. Um we've been invited back to Kings to give an experience of war lecture every year. Um on the um on that first year experience of war module um I can't remember which year we first came back. Was it 2010? >> Yeah. So we've been doing it for 15 years now. Um, I think we didn't even miss one in COVID. We we turned up for for one in COVID where the students had the option for it to be videoed and done remotely and I think there was one student who watched it remote whilst everyone else turned up. So, strange times, but delighted to say it didn't change the audience. >> Yeah. And it's always uh it's always a complete highlight. So, thank you to King's um war studies department for always having us back. Um so um to focus in on it um Ru was in uh Bazra um Iraq for Operation Telk 10 um uh at a critical point of the UK's involvement in the Iraq conflict. So let's get um right into it. We're going to start this um uh this talk by by Rue giving a a good introduction um all about himself and uh how he came to be where he was. Over to you, Ruth. >> Uh, in terms of my career, so as I said, obviously we commissioned from Sandhurst in uh late 2006 before moving to Breham for our final uh infantry specific battle school training. Um, we then joined our battalions in in very early January 2007. Um, as you'll have heard on Nick's episode, obviously the army sends you on appropriate preparation for your training um uh that is specific to the theater you're going. So I joined a regiment called fire four rifles which was a mechanized unit um by which that means we had armored personnel carriers. I'll come on to that more detail later. And so we obviously trained for that to go to Iraq where it was 50° C flat and urban. We trained for that on su plane in the snow in minus 5. Um beyond that though after our operational training um obviously went on tour had seven months in Iraq in Basin in 2007 a very challenging tour. um which resulted in a number of casualties but also the successful withdrawal of British forces from Bazra in order to let the um Iraqi police and army uh start to take more of a front seat. Then came back where we moved on to um essentially what was used to be called the the spearhead leader element. So the rapid readiness battalion um and as a result we were um after a period of training moved to support um the upsurge in Afghanistan in 2009 where we uh served as a battle group with the royal uh with the Welsh guards um in an area called Nadi Ali which is an area we'll come on to a number of times during this podcast with different speakers. uh subsequent to that I uh left the army. So after five years uh and went for a uh a nine-year career in a finance before moving into the startup community uh which was same sort of kicks and thrills as the army but without shooting u which is where I continue to operate. >> Thank you Rue. So that's a that's a good intro and we'll we'll dive more into the specific context for you and the the force element that you were in. um shortly. Um but um but I wanted to to get into the into the the why they all start with why as they say. So for you as Rue, why were you there? Why had you joined the military? What was your personal cause? Um and and in parallel to that, what was what what were the ambitions of the United Kingdom at the time and how did those factors tie together? >> Yeah. So I think you similar to you Nick, I was in an army family. So I I'd grown up basically born into the army. Uh moving around the world. Uh as a result a uh the usual sort of challenges with schooling. Um I think I worked out I'd lived in 18 houses by the age I was 18 if you include boarding school. Um so loved it but a very transient childhood. Um but was very much born into the army. Um that said, I was really keen to join the army for sort of a couple of really key reasons. Number one, it meant not sitting behind a desk at age 21. And I I couldn't really get my head around uh others who were desperate to go into law, the city, or any other kind of deskbound job. Um I just wanted to stay outside and run around and um yeah, abuse my body to the best of my ability for as long as possible. Uh secondly was the opportunity to really test yourself. Uh and obviously whether it was war or not, the opportunity to lead men um and women into battle or into extreme circumstances um was something I was really keen to do. And you don't get the chance to do that in many other careers where on on day one you are on point as the person who has to make key decisions. Um so I was really keen for that opportunity. But thirdly, and I think most people end up joining the military, sort of probably align with this, I had a real sense of doing the right thing. Um, and this is something that I felt very passionately about as as a growing up as a a teenager. Um, which probably played out in in how I behaved at school as well as um other factors, but doing the right thing was always very important to me. Probably bred in pretty hard by my parents, but also the surrounding community of school, etc. Um and for me that extended to national and the opportunity to give something back to the world and to my country. Um by yeah ideally providing peace so that people can live in a way that you would want to live and sometimes that means you making tough decisions about putting troops on the grounds to protect others and that to me was really important. um you aligned with doing a degree in war studies and history um a huge focus on international relations that to me was was really important. So yeah joining the army for two reasons really one is the experience which included obviously the outdoor life and two was the desire to do the right thing. Yeah, that that resonates with me as well. And I don't I don't think that was particularly uncommon at the time and it's it's um the world at the moment is a lot more um unpredictable. someone would say in, you know, by by dent of the the West having intervened in around the world the way that it did during our time in the forces. And >> you know, I I'd love to speak to a lot of people at at university now and see how many have have the same sort of um the same sort of attitudes and ambitions and all the rest of it. I imagine it's quite common, but it's just it's just you just don't hear about it so much. But um but no, thank you. It's it's it's fascinating to hear. Um and um so so let's zoom in on the on the operation itself. Um you know so you said four rifles battle group in Bazra. So so what were you guys as a collective? What was the organization as it deployed? How was it situated on the ground? How were you equipped? What were you there to do? Yeah. So I think we deployed as part of a brigade which was spread across the Bazra area and broadly speaking split into two core um fighting elements which was the Royal Welsh battle group and the four rifles battle group. We sort of mixed units to ensure that we had um a healthy mix of the right machinery, tools and weaponry of war. Um so part of four rifles actually stayed at the what was known as the Cobb which is now Bazra International Airport um along with the the Royal Welsh Battle Group and then um down at what was then known as Bazra Palace which was a former palace of Salam Hussein um which is down in the south of Bazra. Let's come a bit. So you can largely see it on this map if for those of us who got the visual. Um it's sort of the area that's like a little island with a little bit sliding up with a few lakes and that's known as B palace which essentially consisted of about five palaces quite literally uh and obviously supporting buildings. Uh and within that we had the four rifles battle group which um included um two rifles companies with supporting assets um from four rifles and we were equipped with what was known as the bulldog which was a a strange uh beast which was essentially the FV432 from the 1960s up armored with some very cool um explosive reactive armor which actually was ideal as it turned out for this environment with the explosive ID threat. um but also with a company from the Royal Welsh and then from time to time depending on whether they're operating from the Cobb or from um Bazra Palace, a a mixed company of the Royal Tank Regiment with the Irish Guards, Mounted in Warriors. So I should have said the Royal Welsh were mounted in warriors, which is a a heavy armored vehicle. So essentially a a mini tank or a large armored personnel carrier with a turret. The Bulldogs um were essentially an armored personnel carrier. So attracted vehicles still with armor um but from a weaponry perspective, much lighter armed with more space in the back for troops. Um and predominantly with a sort of revolving turret out of which the commander would poke his head and then mortar decks. So on the on the back you'd have these mortar decks that opened up so that troops could stand and look at the surrounding area. Um, so that was what we're equipped with. In terms of my particular spot within that, um, the the two rifles companies, um, were B and R company. Uh, and I was in our company with Templatoon. Uh, our core sign as a company was was Romeo. Um, and the other Bravo. So I was Romeo 20 was Templatoon. Um, and we were a really tightlyknit unit in a very short space of time. Um there was a slight quirk to my platoon in that it had been kind of stuffed together at the last minute just before we started operational training between um one of the uh support platoon platoon an existing platoon and then quite a large group of of fresh recruits straight out of Katar. Um, but we bonded very quickly and one of the reasons that we bonded especially quickly on tour was due to this this battle that happened very early in our tour. Uh, which was unique to our platoon and therefore >> um a a a really strong >> builder of trust within the platoon. >> No, thank you. Um so um so yeah, an infantry unit in a dense urban environment with with heavy vehicles to to patrol in and um you know to to to prosecute your operations and and uh yeah Rue described the ground there a bit. um gentle listener, we will be providing link to the show notes some um some some mapping that you can look at so you can see um these locations and and and where the troops were um in Bazer at the time. Um but thank you for that. And sort of what what was um what was available to you in your support at that point? You know, you think of you think of Iraq, you think of a lot of aviation drones and that sort of thing. What did you have on standby? >> Yeah. Cool. Well, well, I mean, just to sort of build on the picture a bit, so within that platoon, we had four bulldogs. Um, and to give you a sense of size, they're about not quite twice as wide as a car, but not far off. Um, so one of the challenges, particularly in that urban environment, so it's very flat. You know, it is a typical um estie style um city, but we're very close here to the Gulf um on the Shatra Arab, which obviously the river passing through it. um ironically named the the Venice of of the Middle East. Uh it is full of like mini canals. Um so you have lots of very challenging points from a a vehicle perspective cuz they're bottlenecks, these little bridges over these mini canals and then the streets are either wide enough for a couple of cars or just too narrow to get a bulldog down. So your movement is quite restricted and you do obviously have to use your your dismounted rifleman quite a lot. Um, that obviously creates a challenge in the urban environment where you can be going down a street and quite frankly it's not just 360. It's it's kind of aerial plus 360 because they can be above you, they can be behind you, they can be to the side. It's very much you've got to be alert all the time looking in every direction. Um, staying in touch with each other is obviously very hard when you've got armored vehicles potentially over a distance maybe of only a couple hundred meters where you won't be able to see each other because you'll be round corners. Um, so it is a challenging environment to operate in and it's really heavily dependent on strong non-commissioned officers in particular who can read maps well and therefore are able to communicate their position relative to what you can see around you. Um, whilst also staying off the net. And I I remember a comment you made about keeping the net clear during a contact. Um you know, making sure that people know where you are, trust you know what you're doing, but can operate independently without having to explain every single movement because you just make the radio net impossible to to cover. >> Um in terms of the situation on the ground, uh obviously, yeah, it's a big city like we're talking a couple million people in Bazra. Um it is at the time it was moving from a state of very very quiet to the tour before us had been very noisy predominantly due to the Iranianfueled Shia militia. So, we're really close to the border with Iran here, and there was clearly a lot of support coming across the border for the Shia um sect, which obviously had not been aligned with Saddam Hussein. Um, and therefore there was quite a lot of discontent or seeking to break away and militias coming about that that weren't settled on on a good future for a unified Iraq. and they were making that felt through engaging with coalition forces as well as Iraqi uh police and army in that space. Um in terms of you you mentioned um what was available to us actually relatively limited at this point in the war. So there were assets available um there's a few of fighter jets flying over that give you some air intelligence um a couple of seeking helicopters have been armored with uh photography equipment. There were a couple of predators if you were lucky um giving sort of the capability of both visibility and uh munitions, but also because it was the city, there was a huge reluctance to deploy anything significant here. There was a very cool weapon that the the Royal Artillery had brought out with them, which was essentially a very precise um artillery shell, which is classified. But um you that offered some capability to target for example mortar teams that might attack the base if we had a very clear positive ID and location. So we were quite restricted in what we could do aside of small arms by which I mean uh our own rifles uh grenade launchers the machine guns on the the vehicles themselves. You know the most sort of the biggest thing we had was the the 30 mm cannon on the warriors. Um and then obviously out at the cob they did have some some heavy armor, some challenge challenger twos. Um that also you had an impact and so this is relevant when we talk about the PJC battle shortly, but we were under very regular rocket attack. Um by which I mean rockets that were Yeah, these things are sort of like a meter meter and a half long. Um I've got the base of one just behind me actually. Um but yeah, they're sort of as as wide as a football. Uh they make a big bang and are very dangerous as well as the usual um mortars etc. So we're on under pretty constant what we call IDF, indirect fire threat within our own base um which obviously is not great for the nerves. We spent pretty much our entire time in camp, still embody our own helmet. So even though you were technically safe from small arms fire, um if you were moving about outside of your uh your building, you were in body armor and helmet even going to Lou. And I've got a little story about that. Um so the main threat then from the enemy was really the J shalomi who were the um militia or insurgents on the ground at the time and they had been causing quite a lot of havoc um in particular targeting the resupply convoys to the the various bases. Um there was a growing improvised explosive device threat that was quite technically competent. Um so technologically it was very able and this was something obviously that was a major threat particularly to our armored vehicles. Um less so to to personnel in in the same way that you got in Afghanistan. Um although there was one one pretty horrific incident which we may come on to or not. Um and then yeah, so therefore the threat was mostly from from being shot at and in particular the the sort of the uniqueness of being predominantly but not always mounted in armored vehicles meant that um our battle group is probably quite unusual in having from a casualty perspective a very high and this is something that we obviously would talk about in the experience of war um a very high number of deaths relative to the number of injuries that we totally sustained and that's because essentially The only bit that was typically exposed if you were being shot at was your head and shoulders. >> So if you were hit, it was not going to be good news. >> Whereas the rest of you was protected really well. So we we broadly speaking had very low level of of minor injuries but a disproportionately high um killed in action due to the the level of protection provided and the environment in which we're operating in in vehicles in an urban environment. Okay. Yeah. No, that that that that gives a really good good sense of the the character of conflict, you know, vice equipment that you had. And I suppose what's really interesting would be to understand um you know, in this situation, you know, that there's a bit of a two-parter to this when we talk about the operations you you conducted because your main story for us is a is a bit different to what you were normally doing. Um so so let's let's talk first about what you were normally doing. You know what was a what was a typical uh week in week out um operational scheme for for for our company on the ground in Bazer at the time? What what what what were the operations that put you in this danger? What were you out to do? >> Yeah. So the the operations broadly took two major um uh formats. It was what we call GDA, ground defense of the area patrols. So that's essentially putting yourself forward out into local population, always changing our routes. And this is there's two purposes really of that. One is obviously to ensure safety of the base. And the second is to gather intelligence and to posture in such a way that the locals feel confident that the insurgency won't uh infiltrate in that area by illustrating the fact that you're there through presence and and arms. That would typically involve bulldog patrol. So going out in your armored vehicles from the base um and you patrolling in that area wherever you were sent uh usually within a few miles of the base um and then going and doing patrols dismounted out of the back of those. We might do things like little vehicle uh vehicle checkpoints. Um and we might occasionally do uh what we call eagle patrols. So go out in helicopters in which case we did that usually out of the cobb in uh Basra airport um and do essentially the same thing or the the other major one was around um strike ops. So based on intelligence where we typically during the night but not always would mount a strike op on a known person of interest uh which would obviously involve uh striking out typically about company strength. are usually at least two platoon of bulldogs with the associated troops. So that's about 60 soldiers, 30 between each and typically a platoon of sorry platoon of uh Royal Welsh and their warriors. Might have been a bit more than that. We we would usually get the whole company out if we could. And more often than not, my platoon was um tasked with the strike on the actual house itself. Um for the the main reason being because we had a high number of search qualified people with uh riflemen within my platoon and so they were ideal for for getting in in the ground and searching um for any uh you money, weapons, um contraband um in the uh person of interest house. The other two platoon would provide inner and outer security. And then typically you have the warriors on the core junctions. And when I talk about you going out and protecting your roots, because it's such an urban environment, because the vehicles are so big, you're thereby constrained to very specific routes. And this is really important when we talk about it in the big battle coming up. If one route has an ID on it which is identified and takes time to either deal with or potentially explodes and causes a casualty, that route is closed. So, you need to find another one and there might not be many others to choose from. And so, if particular if you're going out and strike up, you need to be quick. You don't want them letting the uh anyone know that you're out of the gates. So, the faster you can get there, the better. Um, but also once you're out there, they know you've got to come back and so they have the time potentially to go and set devices on the route home. So, you've obviously got to choose different routes. You can't always go the same way. So, it's really sort of complex almost second guessing the enemy. Like, how can we surprise them even though they know we're going to go down one of three routes? Um and obviously it comes back down to yeah the classic um drills that you use and learn around trying to identify explosive devices in the verges. Um obviously the techniques get handed down. We've obviously got um equipment on the vehicles that helps reduce the chance of those IEDs going off. So counter IED devices which are electronic warfare. Um but it's a pretty risky business. um just getting to and from >> uh the target house and obviously the gates. >> Oh, thanks. If I was listening to this and I was completely uninitiated on the on on the conflict, I'd be like, you know, so you're going out running these operations, you're protecting yourselves, you're clearing routes, you're you're you're you're targeting people, and you're defending the the overall disposition of your force. And I guess the the answer, you know, if someone's asked the question, why were you doing any of that at all? I guess the answer would be to to uphold the the the the new sort of free Iraqi government and um and and work with its own security forces um and provide security in the area. Just so linking back to to my own experience in Afghanistan, you know, the the people we would meet on the ground, the the locals um did want security from >> enemy forces such that they could safely get behind the government. Um, so they so they wanted our presence so long as we were going to be successful. Um, did did you get a similar vibe from the locals where you were? >> Um, I'd say a bit of a mix in the sense that people wanted to get on with their lives. Yes. But these are all Shia. They are closely aligned with Shia and therefore the militants. Whilst they might not not agree with their methods, they might have agreed with the concept of more independence from the uh the Shiite government. So I I wouldn't call it a a very I'd call it a passive relationship. And one of the core reasons for that is just the scale. It's a city of 2 million people. The ability to get intelligence on the ground from two battle groups numbering a thousand each, give or take. I mean, you just can't have the effect you need. And at this point, to your point about really sort of filling the void left by the Iraqi army and the Iraqi police and a post Saddam Hussein world, we were essentially there to fill that void until such point as the Iraqi army and the Iraqi police were trained to a point and recruited to a point. Bear in mind, most of them had left their post and disappeared. Um, it was essentially built again from scratch. And so we did see towards the end of our time there and that was all part of the handover Iraqi army and Iraqi police units starting to appear. Um but we were essentially filling that void until they could. Um it's a pretty big void to fill in a city of 2 million people. So I'd say in terms of like the day-to-day life, I suspect most of them barely noticed we were there. Um yeah, those nearer the base would have had a pretty good sense we were there. those that were on the main routes would have known we were there. Uh but it was very hard to to really infiltrate from an intelligence perspective. That said, we did get some good intelligence. So certainly some people probably in the sneaky peaky world were were busy getting us some good stuff. Um I'll never forget doing a uh a strike up on on uh the nickname of our former flatmate at university was the target had that name. um which was slightly bizarre because it's a very non-Arabic name um but it did make me giggle. >> No, thank you. So, okay. So, that that gives us a really good impression of of of what it was to operate in the area and and and the sort of the the um the the atmospherics around it, I suppose. Um I suppose the the the main the main story I think you want to share about your time in Bazra. You um you had a very different mission um for for the day. Um so could you could you break down the the challenge for us? This was at the the the PJCC, right? >> Yeah. So I'll just scroll up to um the PJCC on this map here. Um, so you can see bottom right still we're keeping the Bazra Palace. Um, so I'm still going. There we go. If uh we zoom in up here. >> So I seem to remember we're so from Bazra Palace. Anyone who who is looking at a map, we're looking at a couple of kilometers northwest up the chatarab. And this was the the is it the permanent joint cooperation center or provincial joint cooperation center? What did it stand for? >> Yeah, the the provincial joint coordination center. sometimes short PJ provisional joint operation center. >> Um so it's it's actually so it's up here. So it's I'd say it's about 4 km through a city. So it's a reasonably long distance. You imagine 4 km uh running through London traffic. It's obviously not London, but it could be pretty hectic. Um and it's a very small base there. And essentially what that was, I'm just going to zoom in now. was as you say the provincial joint coordination center. So it was where there was both Iraqi army and Iraqi police mostly police um together with British mentors some of those from the British army there were some British police there um but essentially a bit of a uh a mly crew of people coordinating the response of the Iraqis to incidents within Bazra. Um, it was a relatively high high-rise building, so about six six stories. And around it, we' built our usual Hesco defenses. And there were a couple of small buildings within that space. Um, sort of a large garage complex, uh, and a couple others. Um, and the main reason we were there was, you as you do, when you do all these big changes, you one brigade comes in, another brigade goes out, and the idea it's perfectly synchronized so that units arrive to take over from someone, you just can't move everyone at the same time. And so the main reason we were sent there was because the particular um platoon that was being fielded interestingly from the Royal Artillery, more on that in a second, um hadn't arrived in theater. And so we were sent up there basically to fill the gap between the guys moving out from the brigade that was coming off tour uh until the the new guys could come in. >> Mhm. >> Um interestingly, so this has been a very safe place. you know, Bowser actually had been a pretty safe place for the last few years. It was only really the last 6 months prior to our tour, which ironically our sister regiment two rifles had been on um where it had started to get quite a lot more um complex. And as a result though, this place had never really been particularly heavily fortified for the main reason that it had Iraqis in it. So, it was viewed as a lowrisk location. Um, so the most that had really happened apart from a hesco wall around the side, they'd positioned some sers on top of each corner of the roof. Um, but aside of that on the roof there was just a probably about a foot and a half high parapit and then we' created a screen that went up to about 6T literally just a cloth uh to provide some privacy cuz one of the challenges in the middle of the city is we weren't the tallest building in the area. So just less than a kilometer, probably about 500 meters to our west was what we call the grain factory, which you can see on this map here. That was a 10 to 12 story building. Um you've then got a couple of city blocks to our north that were were notably taller. Uh and then over to the east towards the docks, um there was a school that was significantly taller as well. Um, and so we were actually pretty open um with not much defensive capability, but the threat risk was deemed as incredibly low because of the combination of Iraqis um being within the base that they wouldn't want to strike their own, but also because um there had historically not been a significant uh enemy activity within that area. that all changed. So I think it was the the day after maybe two days after we we got up there. Um and and bear in mind so in the background obviously the the battle group doesn't stop and they had a massive resupply operation um I think the day before this maybe maybe the same day where uh from you doing a huge convoy of trucks 50 60 trucks carrying food oil all sorts through Bazer which is always a very hazardous operation because obviously those vehicles are very vulnerable and it's very hard to protect everywhere along a a multicometer route and there was a a couple of particularly uh nasty battles and um our company lost it his first casualty, Corporal Jezbrooks um who was you one of the company champions um highly regarded riflemen and so unbeknown to us and this is what was quite weird later and there's a slight play yeah our company as in our company was on a bit of a downer. Like they'd had a really tough day. They had fought brilliantly, but they had lost an absolute talisman. Um, and that had happened kind of without us. And that point, we were kind of like, "Oh god, we've we've missed out." And by which I mean like from a from a a battle perspective. Um we didn't have like a a mini battle honor that on our on our platoon you imaginary flag and we weren't there when when someone went down and yeah I think that actually you know the platoon were obviously very sad firstly about Jezbrooks a lot of them knew him very well but also kind of felt like we had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Um and then the next day as a result of a a special forces operation the leader of the Jishelle Mardi which was the militia if you put it in Northern Ireland terms it was basically like taking out the head of the IRA and then over the road so diagonally opposite over that bridge roundabout um over the canal is the Jelle Mardi's equivalent of Shinfane headquarters. So there was a huge funeral um about 100 miles north and over the course of that next day, vehicles just kept appearing. People just kept appearing to the point whereby the whole area, particularly south of that uh canal that you can see there, um I think I can remember what we we called that roundabout. I think it was Red T, but I might have got it wrong. Um I've got the map on the wall. Check. Um, but that area was was heaving with people. Um, and a lot of those people were armed, which was very unusual. No one was shooting at anyone, but there were a lot of armed men of fighting age in and around that roundabout and to the south of of the river or the canal. The it was calm, but we definitely obviously increased the number of people who were on on stag who were manning those sers. Um, but there was definitely a strange wind of change in the air and that continued through the day to the point whereby the Iraqi police sent a convoy of police cars to try and remove those people. They didn't get close. They stopped at the edge of the city. So essentially that the city was loosely in um quite mutiny is not the right word but they were very aggressive towards everyone whether you were Iraqi police, Iraqi army or British forces. Now clearly during that day there were a lot of people who were from out of town who would have been looking at a nice easy target that was close by they could do something about and the one that was front and center was the PJCC. Any so the day sort of passed peaceibly but with a heightened sense of tension and um you know it was you manning a guarding a base is not exciting. We rotated between the platoon, you know, vice sections. There'll be a section sort of switching on the sang on the roof. There was four sangers on the roof. Would man half of them. We'd actually stepped up to all of them at that point given the the tension. We had a couple of gates to man, but it wasn't overly taxing. And you half the guys were in the gym in their downtime. Um, so it was pretty calm, but definitely like the tension was rising. Um, and then I forget the time now, but I think it was about 10 p.m. U, the lights across pretty much the whole of Bazra went out, pitched black, and you could only see lights on the edge of the city. So, there was obviously something coordinated happening. And almost in that exact same moment, um, six mortar rounds landed on the roof of the PJCC. And to give you a sense, that roof is and that's some pretty good shooting for your first rounds on the ground. That's it. It's it's probably no more than 15 20 m long by 5 to 10 m wide. Um and we knew we were now under assault. Literally, they'd landed the the mortars. All the machine guns, the rocket the RPGs started firing at the same time. It was incredibly coordinated. Um and it was from a 360 degree um approach. So in terms of the firing points um they were all around us. Um some heavier weaponry um there was a doucheka sort of 12.7 mil uh heavy machine gun down at the girls school I mentioned further south uh and to the uh east you see just over here on the right. And then um these alleyways just south of us were ironically they already had nicknames as RPG alley 1 2 and three. Um and they were you full of troops with small arms and RPGs which were reigning in on the building. And then obviously uh people from other angles particularly the uh the grain factory um to the west. We had less contact from the north and I'm I'm not quite sure why that was specifically but it was less of a concern. There was a few shooting points but not many. Um but to say well probably I'm probably jumping ahead a little bit. It was a very coordinated assault and it came out of the blue. Um, my platoon sergeant and I, Son Williams, were were down in the, uh, sort of command room for for the guard squad, which was at the base of the the the tower block uh, with a couple of our riflemen obviously hit the deck. I think we were sort of undressed as in didn't have a body armor and helmet on. Um, hit the deck uh, and then I think weirdly started giggling cuz it was finally happening. It was that weird sort of adrenaline rush. We knew it hadn't hit us, but we knew it was very close, as in we knew it had hit the the top of the building. Um, and so we got this sort of initial reports from from the centuries on Sanger who were now being engaged from all sides and obviously returning fire. So S will and I knew we obviously had to get up there to get eyes on. I think that's I think you and I have talked a lot about this in our experience of war lecture was one of the weirdest 60 seconds. I'm going to give myself the the benefit of the doubt of six floors in body armor. It was pretty quick, but it was pretty weird. Um, yeah, six floors. We got up there and at the top there's, as you see on all these uh tall buildings, there's that little hut out of which the stairs come out of. So, coming up those stairs, obviously, I had a little bit of time to think. Um, and obviously all that was going through my head was basically like this is your moment by which I mean not this is your glory moment. It's like this is the moment you are judged. All that training, all that time you spent learning to become an officer, this is the moment you get judged and have to perform. >> Yeah. >> There's no coming back from this. Now, within all my rights and reason, I could have probably safely stayed in the stairwell and commanded the battle very poorly from a safe place. It wouldn't have been unreasonable. It wouldn't have been good. Um, but it was very clear to me that there was a a moment, a decision to make where I was going out onto that roof and I knew that the other side of that door, all hell was breaking loose. Um, and that sort of that moral courage as well as that leadership was absolutely running through my head in I think a way that it wouldn't have if I was already on the roof. >> I had this weird sixtory thought process. Um, yeah. So not quite everything you've done in your life is is built to this moment, but um this is the moment you're you're judging yourself, but also people are going to look back on how you reacted, particularly obviously my men. Um anyway, being young and foolish and enthusiastic obviously steam straight out the door. Um as we all were, age 23, utterly bulletproof like teflon. Um, and yeah, assess the situation. Um, and I think probably my endearing memory of that is it was like walking onto a set of Star Wars. Um, and by which I mean for those of you who aren't familiar with is fighting at night. Um, there's something called Tracer. Uh, which basically looks like makes all the bullets look like fireworks. Um, so that was going off in every single direction all around us. the the few satellite um discs on the roof were utterly shredded by the mortar rounds and obviously there was the the whip and crack which actually is interesting. I didn't really notice the whip and crack until later because it was just the noise. Um, and so first did obviously just look around, work out what's going on, went to each of my sangers first. First first thing first was just to yeah get a quick sit rep from each of the individuals in those sangers and then sort of get eyes on where the enemy might be. Um, so went around the roof, obviously got that. um and then start to report back both to the command center lower down in the building uh where you had that combined command center of British army, Afghan police uh sorry Afghan uh Iraqi police and Iraqi army and there was an incredibly fortunate well moment for me um is unbeknown to me there was a a four rifles legend was in that building Paul Harding and he hadn't done any of his pre-op training with us because he had been secundered essentially to brigade. Um, and this is a man who'd risen up through the ranks, was known by every man in his dog, but I'd never met him. Uh, and so I got to meet him a day or two before obviously he was there just a a huge presence of a man. Um, and that becomes relevant as we as we go on through the battle. Um so I was obviously initially reporting to the command center immediately below me who were then reporting to brigade and to four rifles battle group down in Bazra Palace. Um but I was essentially focused on fighting the battle at hand. Um which essentially was focused on getting um ensuring the centis were obviously manned with more than one man. Uh we had uh a GPMG person machine gun in each of those sangers. ensure they were supplied with ammunition. And obviously that was what Sant Will S Williams was doing a super job at. Um once I got him off the uh the machine guns um and I spent I think probably quite a lot of time. It's weird time kind of fades away. It to sort of you bit of a sneak preview but the engagement lasted for 4 hours. Uh it could have been 10 minutes in my head. It was absolutely flying by. Um but we were incredibly lucky. So yeah, probably about 2 hours into that we sustained our first casualty. Um which I'm delighted to say is has a happy ending. Um it was Reichman Sawyer. The the Sangers didn't have a back. They only had a front and they had a big door at the back. So he was actually shot through the hand and then the bullet landed in Rifman Lun's buttocks. Um and that had come in from the rear. So to reiterate that 360° contact, it was actually a round that come from the grain factory. >> They were in a sanger facing east >> and it come in through the back. U I should have mentioned we also had a small team of BRF brigade wrecky force with us um who were really good um you know troops on the ground. Uh so we had a small platoon of about 25 guys at that point. Uh we were still waiting for a couple of our guys to come out for out to theater cuz they hadn't turned 18 yet. Um so we were a small platoon and having I think it was six guys from the BRF who were you top quality guys uh attached to us was really helpful. And then I mentioned the Royal Artillery. There were also a few Royal artillery men around who there was a lower roof where there was a little sang on there where we put them. Um, which was essentially a safer point. Um, but mainly cuz the the enemy the focus was very much on on the capital building, the big one. Um, yeah. Yeah. So I mean actually that as a as a casualty evacuation the I still have fine memories of S Williams dragging Rifman Sawyer across the floor. Frankly Rman Sawyer could have walked. Um but S Williams wasn't going to let him. Um and S Williams is a bit of a beast of a man. Um he was formerly one of the regiment's physical training instructors. Uh he was probably slightly uh I'm going to say more mature uh and wiser than your average sergeant. um and affectionately called bogeyed will. Um and just a fantastic man and this was you know for him like what a man. Um and you dealt with that obviously that casual evacuation very swiftly. We took Rifman Sawyer and Rifman L down to the uh the command center where they were dressed up pretty quickly. Um Rifman Sawyer's hand was definitely not functional. Um but Rifman Lun uh who was later rewarded the military cross um yeah we we couldn't hold him back. So yes he had been shot and it wasn't life-threatening but he he could have very comfortably stayed out that battle and he was very made it very clear that he was absolutely not going to cuz we needed him. Um and so we let him do a little bit of ammunition running until such point as um we found him in a sanger being cheeky. Um but you weren't going to start rif um who I'm delighted to say went on to be um commissant major before sadly being medically discharged. Yeah. I don't know. I mean it was a long night of Star Wars and bullets and there was I suppose one yeah talking about experience of war and we mentioned you the crack of the weapon. Um, I never really thought about my own safety. And there was a point, I suppose, I spent a lot of time in the middle of the roof, which was frankly really stupid. Um, cuz it was probably the most exposed. And there were there were a couple of reasons for that, but made some sense, at least in my, you know, 23-y old head. One was I could then see all the Sangers and all the troops deployed around that low wall. So, I knew what was going on and I could to some degree see what was going on in the city around me. So, I had better situational awareness. Um, and I wasn't sat there the whole time to be really clear. It was just I remember being there quite a lot or running across that open space in between the Sangers and chatting to my guys. Um, but there's one particular moment where the satellite disc were held by wires, you know, to keep them standing up. and one as I was on the radio kneeling down um the one that was literally next to my head about there just suddenly went bang um because a bullet had gone through it um and that was I think probably the only moment where I was like shit's for real like okay and this is bear in mind that bullets are hitting all the um the ramp parts RPG are smashing out the sangers. Um, it kind of didn't feel real until that particular moment for me. >> Um, which was quite weird and then suddenly it did feel real and I became a bit more conscious about crossing the roof. Um, and being a bit more sensible about where I was positioned. Um, I think one other thing going back to sort of experience of war that really stood out to me at that time was I always remember talking about morale and how different people react um and how training really helps. And so very clearly as I was walking around um my troops in this battle um could see how different people were reacting. You could see those who were kind of um literally doing as the the doctrine told them. They had been trained. They were being incredibly calm and professional, taking cover, shooting at targets. Um positively identifying them very clearly. Um and you know being the ultimate soldier, exactly what you'd want, calm under pressure, directing, supporting the guys next to them. And this wasn't, and I think this is key, is you rank definitely helped in terms of experience, but you definitely had a few riflemen that surprised you with that, like really strong riflemen. Uh, and actually from that perspective is a really good point of identifying future riflemen to to go up the command chain in due course to be promoted. Then had some who were openly, I think, getting a little bit carried away um and needed to be restrained. Uh, and I don't mean like restrained from running away. I mean just we were under a lot of fire but we needed to conserve our ammunition. We didn't know how long we would be there for. There were an awful lot of them and we needed to be yes we wanted to keep the enemy's heads down but we also needed to ensure we control the amount of ammunition we were spending. And so there are a few that where you needed a very careful eye, a strong NCO might be moved to go and be next to them um just to ensure that we were yes keeping the enemy's heads down but also keeping an eye on on how long we might be in this battle for. >> Mhm. >> So you might call that battle happy or something like that. Um and then there were one or two and there's one in particular I remember who frankly was she scared quite right. nothing wrong with that and was at his post um but wasn't really being effective and essentially um yeah I spent quite a bit of time with him and one of my senior NCOs's to kind of get him to re-engage. He was kind of funk's not the right word but he was there but he wasn't there. Um and so we spent quite a lot of time just keeping him calm and getting him to focus so that we could rely and and know that he would hold his position. Um and hence you posted a good senior NCO with him. Um but he was of as I was you spent the four hours going around the rooftop he was probably one of the most frequently visited guys apart from the the slightly battlehappy ones to ensure that he was still in the game. We obviously rotated the the rifleman through the battle. Um so I kept a reserve um in the stairwell and we had a couple of other points to to monitor um such as the gates for example and and there was a genuine concern at one point that the enemy were moving forward and obviously that canal wouldn't protect us forever. Um and so we were considering options about potentially you sort of mounting a bit of a for to push areas back. Did we have enough troops? No, not really. Um, so what else could we do? Where else could we man within the base? Could we use the bulldogs as essentially fighting fortresses um over certain areas of the base that didn't have good cover? So, weighing up all sorts of options. And one of the reasons we're thinking about this is because we were knew we were going to be there for a long time. Why did we know we're going to be there for a long time? Well, as I said, it was a few kilometers to Bazra Palace, which was the nearest armored units that could come and help us. Yeah. At this point, we're being engaged by two to 300 enemy fighters. We have effectively approximately 40 fighting troops and maybe 20 to 40 attached arms uh or foreign nationals, i.e. a uh Iraqi police, army, and obviously the British police. That was just two guys, but they were absolutely brilliant. Um, so we we definitely didn't have enough if the enemy really wanted to do a sustained assault and we didn't have enough ammunition to support us for a long period. But we knew that it would take the battle group a long time to get to us. So first of all, your brigade had to decide whether the situation was serious enough to send someone to help us. That obviously takes time. Then you've got to get all those troops ready out of the gate from Bazra Palace. So even if you got a QRF, a QRF is not going to go on its own through the heart of the city. Sorry, a QF quick reaction force, which is typically a platoon on rapid readiness to move maybe four armored vehicles. Uh in this case, we typically used um my friend Bertie Basset's platoon, which was the wrecky platoon. Um but they weren't going to go on their own through Bazra City in the middle of the night in what was essentially an uprising. And so you needed a armored company that takes time to organize. Add to that that obviously there are only certain routes that in particular the larger warriors can go down to get to the the uh the PJCC. We knew it was going to be probably at best a couple of hours before they could get to us. >> Inevitably, at least one of the routes was uh had an ID on it. I think it actually ended up being two routes that had an ID on it. Those took time to be dealt with. So that took in the end uh and obviously there's other stuff going on in the background. 4 hours to go 4 km for an armored company through a city and they were fighting their way through that as well. They weren't just walking. Um >> yeah. How far into the contact did you did you hear that they were sort of on their way? What were you hearing? Yeah, that's a good question. So, honestly, there was a pretty steady passage of information between myself and in particular the um the command center downstairs. Um I could listen into the brigade net as well, but it was best for me to keep that clear and just use the uh PJC direct coms for that. Um, so I'd regularly sort of nip down and have a chat with um, so it was an Royal Artillery Colonel and uh, Paul Harding about what was going on and they were pretty good at telling me like, "Yeah, they've been stood to, they've left the gates." Um, but in terms of time, it definitely kept slipping. And I I can't remember, but I'm thinking the original estimate was they'll be here by this time. By which time we thought, ah, this will be done by then. Um, you know, several hours later, it was very much still going and was not done, which led to the teeing up of some other assets. So, you know, because it was a city, we've mentioned about not having many air assets, there was a deliberate reason for that. What we didn't want to do is drop bombs in the middle of a city. So um there were our assets. We definitely had a seeking up there that was um looking at stuff. We had Predator deployed looking at um the various goings on. And actually the first thing that they deployed was it was very common to use fighter jets as a show of force >> which was essentially a very low run by a fighter jet. Essentially saying to the enemy, I'm here don't try anything. but obviously without actually firing any bullets or missiles to encourage the enemy to move away. Um, often very effective. Uh, and in this case actually it was a French mirage. Um, and the first SH force was utterly ineffective. It was very clear that um the the Jani had a very clear enemy in their sights and they weren't going to let go. Um, so this then escalated to um, so particularly, you heard me mention the RPG alleys and they had a pretty good clear line of sight on um, particularly that that first big parallel route you can see south of the canal. Um, >> had a pretty good visibility on that area of troops massing in that sector and they were able to get approval. I think this was the first time that they had deployed um air assets uh kinetically within the city um to get a strafe in down that alleyway um which was effective. Um it was a huge morale boost up on the top of that roof seeing first of all that the SH force although caviated by the disappointment that the Jamardi didn't care less about the SH force um but the the the first strafe was was a huge morale boost because it just meant we felt like we weren't alone. M um because up until that point we had felt yeah after by this point we're probably talking about 3 hours in starting to feel a bit lonely definitely starting to count the ammunition. Um I think around this point we'd run out of oil for the barrels. So we had got uh Sant Williams had got downstairs to the the cooking gall and started get some cooking oil so we could keep the guns firing because they were getting too hot. Uh, and when I say too hot, like white hot, you can see bullets going through them kind of level. Um, and yeah, so the the second straf was relatively effective, but after a few minutes, the Josh Marti cracked on. And obviously, I assume there was some some chatter in in the the background at senior levels about what else they could do. They knew they had the predator in the sky, but I think it was probably about finding the right target. Um, yeah, we had, you know, two to 300 enemy within that space. I don't know what conversations went on. I'd love to meet the person who had those conversations and who was present. And actually, I think one of the guys we've got coming on in this podcast was in that brigade HQ. Whether he was there at the time, I don't know. Um but eventually Predator was cleared to engage a a target which was believed to be the command unit in a um essentially a jeep. >> Mhm. >> Uh and that was taken out around and about the 4hour point. Um which was very effective. Uh after that point it it was literally not quite instantaneous but it sort of peted out to some fairly gentle sort of pot shots rather than a sustained attack which it had been for the past 4 hours of all sorts of ammunition, mortar rounds, RPGs and uh various gauges of small arms. Um and then pretty much you maybe 10 15 minutes after that was about when the um the cavalry arrived. Um so it was our company with uh uh the Royal Welsh. Um actually it was mostly Royal Welsh I think from memory. Uh, I definitely remember chaps with accents I can understand and some nice big armored vehicles. >> Um, who who came to look after us and actually we were we were exhausted. Um, yeah, you would have seen it in in Afghanistan, but where you're drinking water that the star of the patrol was frozen and by the end it's like drinking tea. Um, you our bodies were just, you bear in mind it's incredibly humid. It's about 50° C. It cools down a little bit at night, but the humidity is 100%. So, we were absolutely dripping, but there was also a huge sense of elation because, you know, we'd fought, survived, beaten off the enemy. We'd had two very minor casualties. It should have been a lot worse. It's a miracle it wasn't. Um, and that's through no fault of our own in terms of um, you tactical behaviors. It's just the weight of fire. We should have been hit more so than we were. And and sadly, uh, this goes on. Um, yeah, the it wasn't the last attack on the PJCC. Within a couple of weeks, there have been, I think, two particularly bad attacks, particularly with mortars. Um and you the immense man that is was uh Paul Harding was very sadly killed by a mortal round. Um you know being out there being the legend he is out on the ground with the troops. He was on on that particular day out um uh checking the positions and uh sadly was was hit by a motor in the the vehicle park and then and I I I can't remember if it was the same attack but a a attack around the same time rif was hit by a motor round which literally landed on his head and you saved by his helmet but um yeah Stephen V is delighted to say he's alive and with us and can communicate but he's had a life-changing injury. Um, we got ridiculously lucky. Um, we knew it. Um, but in that moment, we were absolutely elated and some of the the best pictures I've got of the platoon are in that moment after the battle where half of them have come literally from the gym. So, they're in their gym gear, body armor, helmet, rifle, and flip-flops. Um the other half obviously you fully kitted out because they had been on stag. Um but the one thing you can see in all those photos you stood next to holes in the wall from RPGs is young men grinning with the adrenaline rush of a successful battle one. Um but because we were lucky. It's um yeah, it's a it's a certainly a sort of defensive battle that the the nature of which I've I've never experienced. Um uh and it's um you know, an awful lot of enemy taking you on there. And this was not the only instant of your tour. Obviously, you've outlined some of the the the things that came that came afterwards and there were things before as well. Um and you've spoken a lot about um the the attitudes and and and morale of your troops. What was it for you to um to keep that the sort of the moral component of the the platoon um together um for the for the duration of the tour? You know, what what were the words you live by? What what held you together as a team? Um you know, what were what was your code? You know, what was what was it to be in Templatoon, our company at the time? Yeah, I I have to say that that battle did have a very defining um effect on on the platoon uh because it was unique to us. It was it was our buck on it that no one else had. Um and so, you know, from that moment forth, it was a pretty unbreakable um platoon. Um but not without it challenges cuz war is funny. Uh and in particular you broadly speaking you I think platoon function really well. We had some really strong NCOs. Um we had some absolute characters. Um and we had a couple of Romans. Um and in particular interesting like you're talking about morale. So yeah the platoon was in a great mood after that. It was really interesting coming back to the company when we finished that rotation up at the PJCC because yeah, we had had that which had ended successfully with two very minor casualties. Obviously, Rifman Sawyer was taken out of theater to fix. Uh Rifen L stayed in theater after he was dressed up. Um whereas we returned to a company that you know we as a company had lost Jez Brooks but there was an element of the initial feeling for the first few days was well you guys weren't there >> and we almost felt guilty for not being there. Um and it took it took a few days to to go. Um but such was the way of war that um yeah in a couple of days it was all forgotten. We had other things to do. Um we were all straight back out on patrol or whatever it might be. There wasn't time for that. And actually >> yeah there were so many strong relationships across the company. Uh you people have been together for years that just didn't didn't last long. But I'm very conscious and we were very conscious that there was a slight schism is not the right word but a slight sort of wedge there for a few days. >> Um but as you know the incident I was going to talk about was yeah the platoon functioned really well. Um and actually as a company like the the three platoon commanders we're still really close now. Uh the the company 2 IC I absolutely love. Um and you very much like one of my closest friends still and he put up with a a very challenging command scenario. Um we had a very competent uh company commander and um you an incredibly affectionate company's art major. So we were in good hands but uh a particular rifleman in my platoon. And it's really hard not to feel the blame for this to a degree. I' I've always felt like was there something that I or Sant Williams or the platoon environment we set up did wrong but actually I think the way it played out I feel quite less worried but I think it's always something I think about is particular Ren who was a caught asleep on stag in uh the palace and essentially the military is pretty brutal on that if you're caught sleeping on stag because you're there to protect your colleagues your comrades Um, the first punishment is an immediate months fine. So, you're essentially fighting for free because you are not taking the safety of your comrades seriously. And what was interesting is there have been a lot of yeah sort of chips. I'm not quite sure the word is but this guy wasn't popular because he was all about himself. He didn't care about anyone else. He was yeah a capable rifeman when he was on form but he did not play the game. He didn't hold to the same attributes that we held important. He was then caught sleeping on stag I think less than two weeks later and you caught marshall in com in theater by the colonel and kicked out the army that day. He was literally flown back to uh Bazra airport and flown out of the country and kicked out the army. I was really worried initially that the rifleman might feel this was like the law clamping down on them. The platoon could not have been happier. Uh it was actually you realize and you see this in corporate world sometimes when someone is not um playing the game who's who's not towing the line who's not part of the platoon effort or the team effort it actually distracts from your team morale hugely. It's the distraction that it causes. It's like a cancer that you need to exercise. M >> and so when we excised that that cancer, the platoon performed better even though we were down a driver. So that put more stress on the drivers because yes, you've got four drivers, but it's quite stressful driving all the time when you're doing long operations that might be 12 hours at a time. So you obviously try and rotate, but to be qualified to be a driver for a bulldog, a heavy armored vehicle, takes a long time. So I think we only deployed with six per platoon. Typically, you'd have at least one on rest and recuperation at some point during the middle of that tour. So, there were points of tour we were probably down to four. And so, RI this particular rifleman was a driver. So, we were losing a driver. So, that was technically putting more stress on the platoon. And in particular, one of my my favorite rifman rifman's never quite forgiven me cuz he was an outstanding rifleman, but he was also a qualified driver and the more senior rifleman. He didn't want to drive, but he had to drive. M >> um and so whenever we could, we'd let him out on the ground and so on, but he wasn't happy about that. Um but the platoon was a much happier platoon for not having this particular cancer in it. >> It's a massive part of the of the of the British Army's >> ethos. You know, it's it's better to be incompetent than sort of professionally selfish. We have the there's the word there's the word jack which means professionally selfish and you know it's better to be it's better to be average than to be than to be jack and and you know yeah people would rather accept the strain than have someone jack on their on on their team as is very powerful force in in in the um >> in the British army and I'm sure all armies. You just need to know you've got everyone's back and if there's someone there that you can't trust then that obviously is going to play a unhelpful dynamic on platoon behaviors. Um and so actually you the best thing that happened to us was probably that he left. Um but at the time I remember thinking o have I been is have I not done my job well because he felt it was okay to sleep. Um, so that played on me a bit, but I think frankly we're fortunately too busy to worry about it too much. >> Um, but no, I think broadly speaking, really really tight platoon. Um, yeah, obviously the usual platoon characters. Um, but we are really tightly knit. I think what's lovely now is that I think from from that particular company, which is a very tightlyk knit company because we had a tough tour. Um the battle group is really tight because we lost quite a lot of people across the battle group. Um but that platoon is really tight and we probably meet up more than the majority I would say. Um which is really lovely. Yeah. To this day almost 20 years later. >> No, that's fantastic. And you know that and sort of how you how you see yourselves as a platoon and a company is is hugely is hugely powerful. that sense of identity and everything is is is is part of your your combat effectiveness. I wanted to ask some some different questions about about some of the external relationships and um you know we've spoken in in preparation for this conversation about um about the press um you know um how were you how were you seen externally or how did you feel perceived externally during this part in the Iraq campaign? Yeah, it's really easy to forget. Um, yeah, there was a time where there were kind of two episodes to Iraq. There was the well, three actually. There was the first bit where everyone was delighted that we'd gone and knocked this chap Salam off his chair and that we were going to rebuild the country. Harrah. And then as it went on and as there became increasing number of casualties, the the press became very negative. And I'm talking about before we went there. Um, and so at the time we were deploying, the press was not positive about Britain's efforts in Iraq, but also included within that what the British military was doing. Even though the British military was had been sent there to do a job by the government, they were like the media was very hard on on the military. And we saw this very clearly. Um, we had a couple of journalists embedded with us in that first half of the tour. Um, I say the first half, probably the first month or two and one was from the New York Times. One is now a very famous Sky News presenter. And I've sat in on every chat they had um, and as in with my platoon and the time they spent with us. And I remember reading in particular the New York Times one and it couldn't have been more of a fabrication if it tried it. You know whether that was the editor changing their text. Um there were sentences where I could see yes those words had been said but not in the same sentence like it was literally like this is so fabricated. M >> um and if you then take a step back, these guys all have families that are watching what they do from afar. They can't really communicate with them. We had um some satellite phones in in the the palaces, but you were lucky if you got to one for a couple of reasons. Number one was there's a lot of people that go through those phones. Number two is you're often out on operations. And number three is um we had this thing called um blackout. So if anyone was injured, no one was able to make a call until they had informed all the family of the person injured. Absolutely the right thing to do. But if you had four or five people injured and it took them a week to inform all those families and then someone else was injured, it would be off blackout again. And so sometimes you would go, I certainly remember weeks not being able to make a call. Then particularly as the officer, you would always let your men go first. And yeah, I remember having a couple of conversations with my my now wife, then girlfriend where I called and honestly in my head I thought it'd been like, yeah, m maybe a week or two since I'd last spoken to her. It was just so fast and furious. He's like, oh my god, you live? I was like, yeah. Like, well, the news isn't great. I'm like, all right, yeah. She's like, and you haven't called me for two months. like oh I just completely lost sense of time but also all those op blackouts all this it's really hard to stay in touch so if you don't imagine the media spinning stories that were not what you were experiencing or suddenly not aligned with what you and your men thought you were achieving there there's a really negative influence and yeah some of the guys were definitely starting to feel that that negative trade we saw it the One thing we did get was lots of mail. Um the usual magazines, but yeah, um also newspapers. We did get a pretty good upto-ate version of those. So, we kind of knew what what was being said, and it wasn't exactly inspiring if you were the troops on the ground. And suddenly it all changed. Um about a couple months into the tour. I don't know what happened. I can't remember what triggered it, but the media suddenly went, "Hang on a sec. We've we've got this all wrong." Yes, we might disagree with why the British government are there, but that doesn't mean the boys on the ground are doing a bad job. It doesn't mean that they're not trying to do the right thing based on what they've been sent there to do. And then we had a couple other embedded journalists and one in particular, I remember cuz he had actually he was an ex rifleman. Um, and they were just amazing. Um and then you saw the change not just in us hosting them. Their attitude was so much more positive in the way they engaged with us but also what we then saw written or spoken about and the news was you could see the shift and that meant that actually the impact on the men in terms of how they felt about what they were doing improved. So it was a really interesting literally night and day shift in the space of less than a month between a very negative influence and one to which I look forward to holding some people to account for and a very positive experience which actually reflected what was actually happening on the ground. M I wonder if um so around I was in Afghanistan at the same time and didn't really cover this um on my on my interview but um it was around that time that the the charity landscape shifted. I think Help for Heroes came into being and that sort of thing. >> We got the sense in Afghanistan that we were in the more popular conflict. It was newer >> um and um and and hadn't started uh um you know um running around in any way, shape or form yet. and um and and I wonder if there was a sort of a you know wi with that in particular the charities help the heroes walking with wounded and that sort of thing I think that changed public perception to a degree and and and the media went with it. I don't know if you have any similar reflections. Yeah, I mean certainly we we noticed like by by the time we got back to so when we did the big withdraw out of Bazra city to the airport obviously we were still doing active operations from the airport but less and less into uh Bazra city and more and more into the surrounding area. Um but uh we I think we had you and McGregor come to visit us um which was like a highlight for all the guys. Um yeah, certainly the the sense of um the sense of a mood change was very different. So I'm not sure that answer the question, but >> yeah. No, just just just a reflection on the time. Um and um yeah, I mean before we before we wrap up, um tell me what it was for for our company to come home at the end of this tour. Yeah, I mean we'd had a rough tour in terms of Yeah, we lost as a battle group. Um it was 10 or 11 people. Um yeah, and some of them pretty horrifically. Um but fortunately not too many wounded. Um and I think probably you were obviously delighted to be home. Um it' been a tough tour. We'd had a slightly weird end to the tour. It was calmed down quite a bit as we moved back to um the airport. So I think that probably given people a bit of a chance to to reflect a bit on the the earlier high intensity part of it. Um but yeah, it the war didn't stop affecting us there. Um yeah, two two points here. on you. As soon as you you get back to camp, um the idea is that you essentially you pack everything up as quick as you can, everyone gets a long weekend pass and then you come back into camp on on on the Monday and you start properly sort of going through everything, making sure the kit is properly stowed and you getting into a bit of a postour routine. But obviously we were all trying to get away as quick as possible, go and see girlfriends or the like, uh, get a few beers down us. And it was raining pretty heavily. It was autumn. And literally, I think probably a few cars behind me, um, literally like 100 yards from the gate, um, uh, a carrying two corporals called Knight and Cor Long. Um, skidded on a on a patch of water. It was a very flooded road and hit an oncoming car. Uh I don't know which way around it was, but we lost two guys within moments of being back home. And so it kind of felt like yeah, the war hadn't really finished. And to some for many it hasn't. Um, yeah, despite all the help that's out there and all the support and the fact that we are a very tight-knit unit, we we particularly the rifles as a whole, but I think four rifles have a a very poor track record, depending how you count records on um PTSD in terms of leading to suicide. Um, we've got a phenomenal team led by Basmelia doing everything they can to try and um, track down anyone who might be in the wrong headsp space. Um, but it's it's still affecting us right up to now. Um, and I don't know the answer to that. Um, >> because it's very hard to put your finger in. And for the majority of the people that have decided that the alternative life is no longer here, there are no indicators. Um, you seemingly happy going about their life. Often it's it's the the the brightest jokers. It's the the ones you never think are going to be the problem. Um, and and I don't have an answer to that. um it's it hasn't gone away. >> I think this is certainly something I've experienced from my regiment, you know, there's there's lots of uh WhatsApp groups, Facebook groups, and that sort of thing where key characters within the within the regiment are are sort of um keeping an eye out. We're we're reporting to each other when people go missing. Um and uh and and sadly, you know, it's very well reported, very well documented, some do go missing and and and don't come back. Um so the the after effects do stay with with people and um and and and in that sense the the the conflict does continue for these teams well beyond the tour. Um and I think that this is a story that that continues to unfold and um and no doubt will be will be wrapped up in some story that we can all digest and relate to at this point. But it just feels like something that's live and still happening and still being conceptualized by the by the um by the body of soldiers that that that fought in the the war on terror essentially. And that's a that's a fascinating thing. Um >> actually I think I think we've been lucky as in you and I because we do that annual lecture at Kings. I think we've because we talk about it frequently um in a safe environment. I it's always chass rules. I think we we've probably potentially dealt with demons that we may not know we have. Um but not everyone gets that opportunity. So I think yeah, we've been lucky. >> Yeah, agreed. Um so thank you Rude for all of that. That was quite the share and and gives a real sense of what it was to be um in our company on tour. um in Tempun and to be at the the PJ um that night in Bazra. Um and what a story it is. Uh there's a there's a question we ask at the end of all of these podcasts to all of our guests that sort of ties it all together. After all, every single um guest on this podcast is a BA war studies graduate for the most part, some from from link courses. Um so question to you, Rue. um during your personal experience of war, did the war studies course resonate with you? What did you take from the course that you used um in action? >> Yeah, actually I think it's it's ironically it's the experience of war that really sticks with me around in particular that battle and going around and looking at how the riflemen were responding to being in contact. It was a weird rare opportunity to see almost all of them in a small space. Yeah, because you think about in particular your your big fight, everyone's kind of dotted around different buildings. You actually get to see everyone throughout that contact. It was a really weird position where I could literally go from rifleman to beak in one corner to call Hazel in another, call Haywood in another, um, you know, rifman Healey in the next, and see exactly how they were reacting and behaving riing to go and just trying to make themselves available. And that was weird, but it was definitely literally as I was going around, I was like, "Oh, this is like that experience of war. Not quite the lecture, but I can resonate this. I can see the behaviors are different people's reaction to the same events of bullets flying past their ears. >> Mhm. Um, and and what about in your in in your career since, what have you taken with you from war studies that's kept you kept you on the front? >> Number one, it's just a great interview topic. Um, everyone always asks war studies. Um, but actually because it's therefore quite famous, because it's quite unique, it is always a conversation starter in interviews. Um, so it's always worth doing just just to sort of get yourself a bit of a a soft start to an interview. Um, because people are fascinated by it. It's a really unique degree. field is very well known and therefore um yeah I think that really sets it apart and therefore hopefully you as an individual but it's definitely a really great way of getting a nice soft start to an interview. >> Thank you and that really that really concludes the the the questioning. Um Ru and I obviously is very close friends as best friends. We we we've discussed these incidents covered in our talks on this podcast series many times and and all of the other ones around it. Um, there's always something new that I hear whenever I talk to you about this and there are certainly some new things today. So, as ever, thanks for sharing. I'm sure it's um I'm sure it'll be deemed a very worthwhile um addition to the series. Um, so um um so well played and uh thank you very much. And to our listeners, thank you for joining and uh join us next time for another war studies, war stories. Thank you. >> Thank you. We'd like to thank Kings College London, specifically the war studies department and professors James Gal, Jack McDonald, Juliet Patinson, Dr. David Betts, and the School of Security Studies communications team. Without their support and encouragement, this podcast would remain just another idea that never came to fruition. Furthermore, the tremendous war studies community, especially its alumni, in bringing together such a wonderful collection of unique experiences to share with the world to better understand the experience of war and the lessons learned from conflict. You've been listening to the War Studies podcast produced and edited by the School of Security Studies Communications team. For more information on our work, visit our website, which you'll find in the podcast description. If you've enjoyed this episode, we'd really appreciate it if you could rate and review us on your preferred podcast provider. Thanks for listening and we'll see you next time on the War Studies Podcast.