Chris Ryan - The One That Got Away - Junior edition

Then the vehicle with the .50 machine gun came up onto a crest and started cracking rounds over us again from a range of 400 or 500 metres. Luckily for us, though, the light was dying and the rounds were going far too high.

So we set off, and walked for our lives into the gathering night.

Until we cleared the second long valley, a few anti-aircraft rounds were still falling in. Some burst in the air with a puff of black smoke and a crack, and others hit the ground. Then we were in the clear, out on the barren gravel plains, and we headed due south, marching as fast as we could in single file. Mark guided us with his GPS.

It was a great shock to us that we seemed to have been abandoned by our own people. It’s an unwritten rule of the Regiment that if guys need help, their mates come and get them. Now we’d yelled ourselves hoarse on radios and TACBEs, and there had been no result. We could not have known at the time that the nearest aircraft that could have detected the TACBE was 500 kilometres to the east — about four times the maximum range of the machines — and that we had been given the wrong radio frequencies, so that none of our calls on the 319 had gone through unscrambled.

After half an hour someone shouted, ‘We’re being followed!’

Looking back, we saw the lights of a vehicle. At first we couldn’t tell whether or not it was moving, but then through Vince’s night-sight we made out that it was definitely coming after us. In some places the desert was completely flat, with no features of any kind. The vehicle could make good speed across those areas. But luckily for us there were also a lot of wadis, in which the going was rough and the driver had to go slowly. There was no way he could see us — the night was too dark for that — but he knew the line we’d taken down the first wadi. He was driving in the direction he’d seen us go.

Our boots crunched on the ground. We could have been quieter if we’d gone slowly, but we needed speed. I went as fast as I could in spite of the noise, with the other guys close behind, at intervals of no more than two metres between each man. We knew that although the desert seemed empty, there were outposts dotted all over it. We could have walked onto a position at any moment. There was also the risk of stumbling into an encampment of the desert-dwelling Bedouin.

After an hour, and maybe eight or nine kilometres, we stopped and came together in a group. Dinger took off his jacket and started covering it with rocks.

‘What are you doing?’ I asked.

‘I’m ditching my jacket. It’s far too hot.’

‘Keep it,’ I told him. ‘Tie it round your waist. You’re going to need it.’

Later he thanked me, and said I’d saved his life. But for the moment he cursed as we got going again. I kept thinking of all the stuff I’d left behind. I hated the idea of the Iraqis stealing our kit. With a flicker of satisfaction I remembered that we’d left the claymores and anti-personnel mines buried in the floor of the wadi, and wondered whether they’d taken any of the enemy out. I also wished I’d kept more food in my pouches, and less ammunition. As it was, I had nothing to eat but two packets of hard, biscuits, five in each packet. At the very least we were in for forty-eight hours of hard going, on little food and water.

When you’re moving in a straight line, and have a contact, it’s usually the Number One who gets hit. Even if he isn’t shot, it’s Numbers Two and Three who have to get him out of trouble. On that march our standard operating procedure (SOP) — which everyone knew by heart — was that if we hit trouble the lead scout would put a 203 round towards the enemy and empty a magazine in their direction. By that time Two and Three should already have gone to ground, and be putting rounds down. Number One would then spring back, zigzagging, and go to ground himself, to cover the other two, while the rest of the guys fanned out. It was important, though, not to panic and start firing at phantoms, as shots would immediately give our position away.

I was Number One. Vince, who was Number Two, kept dropping back, as if he didn’t want to be near me. ‘If we get a contact in front,’ he said, ‘whatever you do, don’t fire back. You’re better off sticking your hands up.’

I said, ‘Hey — if we get a contact, I’m shooting. Because if we get captured, we’ll get done.’

‘Don’t. If you shoot one of them, they’ll kill the lot of us.’

By that time the patrol had closed up again, and there was a bit of an argument. Nobody agreed with Vince so I just said, ‘Stick behind me,’ and led off again.

A few minutes later a message came up the line, to slow down and stop. Somebody shouted, ‘Stan’s gone down!’

Stan was one of the strongest guys in the patrol. I ran back and asked what was wrong, but he was on the deck and seemed to be nearly unconscious.

‘Stan!’ I said. ‘What’s wrong?’

He just went ‘Urrrhhh!’

One of the guys said, ‘I reckon it’s heat exhaustion. He’s sweating really badly.’

‘But it’s freezing,’ I said.

I’d been sweating a bit myself, but not that much. What we didn’t know was that Stan was still wearing his thermal underclothes under his DPMs. He’d been caught out with them on when the contact started, and hadn’t had a chance to take them off. The result was that he’d become seriously overheated and had sweated himself dry.

We got out our water bottles. I tipped sachets of white rehydrate powder into four of them and started pouring the water down his neck. He drank six pints at least. That should have pulled him round, but he was still dizzy and exhausted, not making much sense.

Somebody said, ‘We should look for a safe spot and leave him. Find a hole in the ground, somewhere we can find him again when we get reinforcements.’

There was no way I’d do that. We couldn’t leave one guy by himself — not when there were seven more of us, all strong and still fresh. But if he thought we’d ditch him, maybe it would spur him on. I bent over Stan and said in a menacing voice, ‘Listen: if you don’t start walking, we’re going to leave you. Understand?’

He nodded and gave a grunt.

‘Get up, then,’ I told him. ‘Just fix your eyes on my webbing, and keep that in sight.’

Andy took Stan’s Minimi, then said to me, ‘Chris, take this,’ and gave me the night-sight Stan had been carrying slung round his neck.

‘I don’t want that,’ I protested. The sight weighed about two kilograms, and I thought it would be a pain to have it dangling on my chest. But I took it — and thank God I did, because without doubt it saved my life. I also took a box of 200 rounds for the Minimi and slung it over my shoulder.

We couldn’t hang around any longer, because the vehicle lights were still bobbing about in the darkness behind us. I got hold of Stan again and repeated, ‘Just walk behind me — and whatever you do, keep going.’

Once more I led, with Stan at my back now, Vince behind him, and the rest of the patrol following. Lead scout is a tiring job, because you have to be looking ahead all the time; but, being quite observant, I reckoned that if there was something in front of us, I would see it as quickly as anyone else. As before, Andy took the patrol commander’s middle slot.

Every time we stopped for Mark to do a GPS check, I’d say, ‘Stan, get your head down for a minute,’ and he’d lie down without a word. When we were ready to start again I’d give him a kick and say, ‘OK, Stan, let’s go,’ and he’d get up again and start walking right behind me — only to fall back, farther and farther.