Ed Macy - Hellfire

An unsettled feeling started to gnaw at my stomach. I stuck up my hand. The man from Whitehall peered at me over his glasses. The CO paused and gave me an encouraging smile.

‘Yes, Mr Macy.’

Lester W. Grau, a CIA analyst who’d studied the tactics of the Mujahideen against the Soviets, had been high on my reading list. As the Squadron Weapons Officer, I was expected to know everything about the Taliban’s capabilities, but I’d also wanted to get inside the heads of these bastards. What I’d learned was simple and frightening. We were up against an astute, resourceful enemy that would never give up. In the 1980s, a handful of armed resistance fighters had gathered the populace and had seen off the mightiest army in the world. And no Soviet general had had to pussyfoot around under a set of unworkable guidelines.

‘How do I demonstrate they have hostile intent?’

‘Very good question, Mr Macy.’ The CO reached for another cigarette. He was clearly in no hurry to answer it.

My hand stayed up. ‘And what happens if they’re still armed, but looking for cover? How do I know they’re not going to continue the fight after we’ve run low on fuel and buggered off? How do I know whether they’re farmers scared out of their wits looking for somewhere to hide, or Taliban looking for defensive positions from which to continue the fight?’

I paused and looked around the bird table at my fellow pilots before turning back to the CO. ‘What then, sir? What do I do?’

The CO lit his cigarette and took the smoke deep into his lungs. He shook his head. ‘Your call, Mr Macy.’

My call?

The existence of hostile intent would be judged on evidence presented via our TADS camera footage and the camera didn’t always see everything.

Jesus …

As I walked back to our billet I thought about the nightmare we now found ourselves in. It wasn’t the CO’s fault; he was just the messenger. This was down to the politicians. They were sending us to fight their war in a bird that cost £46 million a pop; a bird that was on trial every bit as much as we were. We were both expected to perform flawlessly – with our arms now tied behind our backs. And if I put so much as a foot wrong, because I didn’t have crystal balls and couldn’t read the enemy’s mind, I’d find myself court-martialled for not knowing whether the enemy had hostile intent.

No one else was subject to this level of scrutiny.

As they prepared to rain shells on a position ten kilometres away, the artillery boys weren’t asked to file a report stating that their enemy had hostile intent.

Nobody would ask 3 Para to explain themselves.

The fast-jet pilot who dropped a bomb on a grid wasn’t called to task if he made a mistake – his authority came from a guy on the ground.

But we were well and truly in the crosshairs.

If we got it wrong we’d find ourselves in a court of law and the first-ever deployment of the British Army’s Apache weapons system would be judged a complete failure. We’d be crucified by the media, the politicians and the Whitehall bean-counters. The Apache would be branded a white elephant – a £4.13 billion mistake.

The press hadn’t helped by spouting shite about the Apache programme since the outset. Every time the attack helicopter programme came across a hiccup they would wade in and blow it out of all proportion. It was just an excuse to have a go at the politicians for spending more money than ever before on a single piece of hardware, but Joe Public had swallowed it hook, line and sinker. Due to the bad press, it had already failed in their eyes.

When I’d joined the army twenty-two years earlier, this was not how I’d imagined it would be.

But fuck it, I’d come this far, and the people around the bird table were my mates. Some of them – Billy and Geordie, for example – had been with me damn near the whole time I’d been on the path.

One way or another, we had to find a way of making this work. Or else the Taliban, who didn’t know the meaning of the word ‘rules’, would shoot us out of the sky and decorate their caves with our entrails.

For the past seventeen years I’d bent the rules every which way to get to where I wanted: here, on Ops, with the greatest weapons system in the world, in the stinking heat of an Afghan summer.

Why the hell should I stop now?

Later that evening, as the sirens went silent after a rocket attack, the groundies came bursting into my room.

‘Sir, sir, you’ve got to come quickly.’

I dived from my bed thinking we’d lost a man or an aircraft. Then I was told they were about to start the Subway Challenge.

‘You and your big mouth.’ Billy smiled and grabbed his pistol.

‘Wait for me,’ Jon shouted.

Inside one of the huge US-built relaxation facilities was a gaming area, movie area, coffee bar, games area and a 150-feet-square music room jam-packed with instruments. We entered the music room to see the groundies gathered enthusiastically around three six-foot tables, arranged in a triangle.

Half a dozen foot-long Subway sandwiches had been laid end to end in front of each of the competitors.

Airtrooper Howson – Challenger Number One – was your typical prop forward and played rugby at club level for civilian teams as well as the army. He looked as if he could have swallowed every one of his Subways without pausing for breath.

Gifted looked at the contents of his table as if they were a series of incoming Hellfires.

Which just left Tiny, who looked as though he was about to try to eat several times his own body weight.

‘My money’s on Howson,’ Billy said before Jon or I could wage a bet.

I bagged Gifted.

‘Three, two, one, go,’ Taff called.

They all started at a nice slow pace. Facing each other; matching each other bite for bite. Tiny was being advised not to drink anything because he wouldn’t be able to fit a single Sub in.

They had an hour in which to eat their own height in Subs. The winner would be the first to finish, or the one to have consumed the most when the clock chimed. Anyone that barfed would be instantly disqualified, unless he ate what he’d just thrown up. I’d seen a Navy Seal eat seven feet of Subs in thirty minutes in Atlanta.

They were all finishing their third Sub with thirty minutes to go. Everyone had placed their bets. The music room had glass windows and curiosity got the better of everyone who passed them. The place was packed with Brits, Americans, Canadians, Italians, French; you name it, they were there. The banter was ear-splitting, but Gifted, Howson and Tiny continued to match each other munch for munch.

Forty-five minutes in, Gifted was fading, halfway through his fourth Sub.

‘Gifted’s going,’ the opposition shouted.

He grabbed the bucket from under the table and chundered explosively to a chorus of laughter and a flurry of fresh bets. Howson was now the favourite by a country mile.

The two remaining tables were pushed around to face each other as the noise got louder and the contest became ever more gladiatorial.

Five minutes away from the final bell, both reached for their sixth and final Sub. They’d clearly begun to tire.

Tiny threw down his Sub, folded his arms and looked Howson in the eye. Realising he too was unlikely to finish the whole two yards, Howson followed suit and took a slurp of Gatorade. There was uproar; both of them looked as sick as pigs.

‘Two minutes to go,’ Taff shouted.

A sprint finish was now a dead cert.

‘One minute.’

Howson moved his Sub, positioning it for the perfect draw, but Tiny kept his nerve and barely blinked.

‘Forty seconds to go.’

Howson picked up his Sub, almost in slow motion, and held it a foot from his mouth, directly in the path of Tiny’s steely gaze.