Painting the Sand by Kim Hughes

Author:Kim Hughes [Hughes GC, Kim]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK

11

Losing a Mate

An early flight on an empty Chinook took us into FOB Shawqat, the main British base in the district of Nad e’Ali. The usual banter that filled those idle, empty minutes was absent. No one smiled. Dan was dead. And we were going to try to find out what killed him. Nothing good would come from this day and we all knew it.

As we dragged our kit from the Chinook I was met by the Operations Warrant Officer (OPSWO) from Bastion and Major Danny Rae, who was OC of Weapons Intelligence Section (WIS, pronounced WIZ), a mixed unit of Royal Military Police, Intelligence Corps and Ammunition Technicians or ATOs, whose role, among other things, was to conduct post-blast investigations. The WIS unit would attempt to find out what happened through interviews with eye-witnesses and examining the evidence. It was often an unpleasant, difficult job.

Stilted pleasantries were exchanged but there was no real attempt at small talk. Then out of the blue the Operations Warrant Officer announced, ‘Right I’m going to be running this operation.’

I gave him a look that said: ‘What are you on about?’

‘Yeah, I’m going be using your team. You won’t be doing this task.’

‘You what?’

The OPSWO continued but I wasn’t really listening. I had spent the previous evening wondering how I was going to feel being confronted by the scene of Dan’s death. Now he was telling me I wasn’t needed and he was taking over my team.

‘You know what, that’s not happening. If you want to use my team then I’m going to be there as well. You don’t know them. They don’t know you. If you have to be there then we’ll do it together.’

The OPSWO immediately sensed my anger and despite outranking me rightly assumed that this was a battle he wasn’t going to win.

‘Yeah, sure, Kim, whatever you want. I just thought you might want to sit this one out.’

Chappy, who’d been listening to the conversation, was almost as angry as me and said, ‘Is he for real?’

‘Look, Chappy. It is what it is. We’re just going to have to deal with it. We need to really focus on the task, no distractions, and do what’s best for Dan.’

We had barely been in Shawqat ten minutes and already emotions were running high. Fortunately a runner from the Ops Room appeared and announced that everyone taking part in the recovery operation was immediately required to attend a briefing.

The Shawqat Ops Room was a huge wooden-framed room, reinforced with steel girders and designed to withstand a direct hit from either a mortar or rocket. Inside, the air was hot and stale. Clerks and officers tapped away on computers as we gathered around a large planning table covered with maps and aerial photographs of the surrounding area. My eyes were immediately drawn to a large red pin placed on a track about three kilometres south of the FOB. The location where Dan was killed. A surge of anger rose up inside me. ‘He had a name,’ I wanted to shout.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.