Spoken from the Front Read Online Free PDF Page A

It's no
secret: we're most vulnerable to RPGs and small-arms fire
when we're on our approach and when we're on the ground.
    Once everyone was out, we took off. It was tense – maybe
we're just pansies – but we were up again after just a few
seconds. We went airborne and we held in pattern waiting for
a pick-up call, or if there was any injury we'd go and get
them. We listened on the nets for the call to come and get the
injured but it never came. Once we were clear, the two
Apaches went in and covered the boys [on the ground]. It was
the first real helicopter assault on the enemy. We also had
stacks of fast jet up above us too ...
    Once all was quiet – after maybe twelve hours – and everyone
[the estimated thirty Taliban] was dead, we went to pick
up the boys. And that's the way it should be. It was a really
good day. Nobody got so much as a paper cut that day and
they killed a lot of their boys [Taliban], so spirits were up.
There had been a couple of really close calls, though. One of
the troops took a round through his chest plate – through the
magazines that were on his chest – and out the other side.
Another guy took an RPG through his Land Rover – they
weren't armoured then. And another guy got kicked by a cow
– they killed the cow obviously! The dits [stories] afterwards
were pretty fucking hilarious. It was great. There had been a
large scope for things to go wrong, but it was great. We felt
very good about things. It was a good eye-opener.
May 2006
    Captain Nick Barton, DFC, Army Air Corps
    My first ever contact was during Op Mutay. I was the wing
aircraft [of two Apache helicopters] on my first tour. I was
still a captain but only the flight 2IC [second in command].
For the first six weeks it seemed that, operating as a pair, one
of the flights had been in the right place at the right time, had
fired quite a lot, and had had all of the contacts. Not that you
ever want to engage but that's what you're trained to do. For
Op Mutay, we were the high-readiness pair and were only
due to support the op if there was a problem with the
deliberate tasking flight or if it endured past their crew duty.
    As was customary we had read into the op: in outline a
daytime op for a 3 Para air assault into Now Zad to target
Taliban forces in a few known compounds. We launched 250
[men] in two waves of Chinooks, a fire-support group and all
the rest of it into the badlands of Now Zad. At the time, we
didn't know how bad they were. The op was starting to
sound quite busy with reports of quite a few contacts and the
supporting Apaches had been firing again. Since we were not
dedicated to support specifically, it was likely that the same
flight was going to have another busy day. We got stepped
up. One of the aircraft had taken a couple of rounds and had
to be shut down for servicing. Our pair complete, we
replaced them and went up making best speed departing
from the gravel pad at Bastion at approximately 10 a.m. There
were various platoons on the ground in two rough groups
and we split our pair up accordingly, one aircraft working to
each of the two forward platoons. Ideally you are speaking
directly to the JTAC [joint terminal air controller] of the lead
company that wants your support.
    As they [the Paras] were pushing up to this particular
building, I thought: Shit, that's someone firing at them – just
as they called, 'Contact' [over the radio]. I was seeing the
muzzle flash from the guys [Taliban] behind a wall.
Fortunately, I was visual with the firing point, something I
now realize is a luxury as the firing point is often very hard
to see. We were a bit too close to engage straight away and, it
being my first contact, I took a bit of time to get in position,
get clearance from the JTAC to fire 30mm and get accurate
rounds on. We would have been at between two and two and
half thousand feet, about one K from the target. Without a
shadow of a doubt, there were two of them firing over a wall.
They were firing an AK-47