Frontline, is the amazing story of one soldier out of the many thousands of soldiers fresh out of school or college who joined the British Army and found themselves within a few months of completing basic training. Being deployed to Afghanistan fighting for their lives. These modern-day heroes risked their lives on a daily basis to help bring peace to a troubled country.
Imagine being 18 and sent to a foreign country with 40-degree heat, an environment that is dusty and areas that are quite inhospitable with a primeval beauty. Every step on a dusty track could be your last as your eyes strain to catch a glimpse of an IED before it is too late, just before the rounds start impacting in the dirt all around you.
Three months into my tour and some days it was like a living hell. Our platoon had just been tasked to recce an area for a new Forward Operating Base (FOB). The rationale for looking at a new FOB was to try and protect the far side of our area, whilst at the same time protect the main road running through it, that served as an egress route used by the Taliban after placing Improvised Explosive Devices (IEDs) and ambushing conveys. Command wanted a FOB there because of the high enemy activity. We had the Marines for support if needed, but they were pretty tied up dealing with insurgents in their locality and were having much more contact than us.
We had some attachments including a mortar group and could call in air support if needed. Myself and two lads with an LSW (Light Support Weapon) which is an SA80 with a slightly longer barrel and a bipod made up the bulk of the firepower, along with a (GPMG) General Purpose Machine Gun. We finally made it to the new suggested FOB site. The area was quite flat with nothing but patches of long grass and sun-baked earth. Trees surround two sides of the field, which would offer us some protection if we were attacked, even if it did block our field of view and meant the flip flops could use the trees to sneak up on us.
Most of us went into all-round defence, whilst a couple of the lads did a Barma which is army speak for searching an area for IEDs. After well over an hour, the site was found to be clear, so we got ourselves dug in for the night. With our entrenching tools, we dug in the hard sun-baked soil, which turned to dust the moment you dug into it. The temperature was now in the 40s, but after three months of the heat, you grew acclimatised to it - even if for the first few weeks you were drinking virtually non-stop. The heat now felt no worse than a hot sunny day in Britain.
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French
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Translation in progress.
Translated by Romain Egio
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