Dirty Deeds Done Cheap by Peter Mercer

Author:Peter Mercer [Peter Mercer]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781843582274
Publisher: John Blake
Published: 2011-07-28T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 8

Weapons Training and

Life Around the Camp

The American camp where we were based was a big place and had once been Saddam’s northern HQ. There were some pretty impressive buildings on the camp and, while Saddam’s people had suffered in poverty, he had lived a life of luxury, a typical tyrant. We had heard that in Baghdad they found a gold, workable, full-sized replica of Queen Elizabeth II’s royal coach! We’d all actually seen it when it had been put on the back of a flatbed truck and I managed to get a picture of it. They had also seized a load of gold-plated Heckler & Koch MP5 machine guns. The massive complex contained two huge palaces surrounded by palatial buildings for Saddam’s staff. Of course, since he had been overthrown, during a violent attack by the US Special Forces, the surrounding compounds had been trashed, but the buildings were remarkably undamaged. The camp was surrounded by brick walls topped with razor wire. It was very well fortified.

There was now a full complement of American troops on camp plus four private security companies. Although this place, being up north, was a lot more dangerous than the south, you had a lot more leeway. It was a nice place to be based, with a great gym, unlimited free Internet access and food that was very good. The little time off we had (when we weren’t doing convoys, the mass graves, elections and route reconnaissance for the American military) was spent training – weapons-testing, first aid and tactics, mainly. It was hard to practise tactics sometimes because no two situations we encountered were ever the same. But anti-ambush drills were a big part of our training, and we also honed our weapon skills and vehicle drills the best we could until they became second nature. My main job was training the guys with the M240 and M249 light and heavy machine guns. Some of the new guys had never worked with these weapons before or even picked one up. All weapons are potentially deadly in the right hands but these weapons are especially so; they will blow clean through brick walls and steel plates, in fact almost anything.

We also practised vehicle drills a lot of the time. For instance, in the event of getting stuck in traffic, getting caught in an ambush or losing a vehicle due to breakdown or gunfire, everything had to be second nature to everyone. We had to try to leave nothing to chance. Every eventuality had to be considered and, if possible, catered for, so the drills had to be practised on a regular basis. After all, practice makes perfect.

Working up in the north was an amazing difference from working in Baghdad for reasons other than those I’ve already mentioned: in Baghdad our vehicles had to be kept immaculate and were armoured, but in the north they just had to be kept running and in one piece, if possible.

The welded steel plates along the length of the

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