Ep 05 Martin Melia Fire Support Company Commander and a full career as an Infantry Officer

I really enjoyed this chat with Martin. Martin Melia commissioned into the Royal Anglian Regiment in 1999, serving initially with the Second Battalion as a Rifle Platoon Commander, Company 2IC, and Battalion Training Officer. Then later as a Company Commander in the First Battalion with D (Fire Support) Company. 

In addition to his time at Regimental Duty, Martin has served in a diverse number of roles and organisations including:

The Army Foundation College (Harrogate), 

HQ 16 Air Assualt Brigade, 

The Army Training Regiment (Bassingbourn), 

The Air Warfare Centre, 

The Permanent Joint Headquarters, 

Joint Forces Intelligence Group, 

and MOD Main Building.

During a career spanning 25 years, Martin deployed on several operational tours to:

Sierra Leone, 

Northern Ireland (twice), 

Afghanistan (three times),

Kosovo, 

and also served in other operational roles in East and West Africa, and Ukraine.

Since leaving the Army as a Lieutenant Colonel in 2023, Martin has worked exclusively in the UK drone industry, setting up his own defence and security consultancy company in late 2024.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:08

My name is Steve Arman, and I sit down to talk to those who chose to serve support and fight, followers and leaders, serving and veterans. We discuss not only the lessons they learned, but also to share advantage experience that we hope will help. Martin Media commissioned into the War Langling Regiment in 1999, serving initially with a 2nd Battalion as a rifle platoon commander, company to IC, and battalion training officer, then later as a company commander in the 1st Battalion with D Fire Support Company. In addition to his time at regimental duty, Martin has served in a diverse number of roles and organisations, including the following the Army Foundation College in Harrogate, HQ 16th Air Assault Brigade, the Army Training Regiment Bassinborn, the Air Warfare Centre, the Permanent Joint Headquarters, Joint Forces Intelligence Group, and MOD Main Building. During a career spanning 25 years, Martin deployed on several operational tours to Sierra Leone, two tours in Northern Ireland, three tours of Afghanistan, and he also served in Kosovo. He served in many other operational roles in the East and West Africa and the Ukraine. And since leaving the army as Lieutenant Colonel in 2023, Martin has worked exclusively in the UK drone industry, setting up his own defence and security consultancy company in late 2024. Martin, good to see you, mate. Thanks for turning up today and coming on to the Strength from Within podcast. I've been quite keen to get you on because obviously when we talk through your bio there, it says that you were OC fire support company of the Vikings. Yes. And I was lucky enough to be your company Sart Major.

SPEAKER_02 1:41

I think I was the lucky one there, to be fair. But likewise, it's great to see you. It's great to be here. Great to be back in RHQ and I'm really looking forward to this.

SPEAKER_00 1:49

Yeah, nice. I liked I've seemed to have gotten a bit of a habit where I make my guests uncomfortable from the start. So I'm going to do that now as well. And uh and I think when I went on the I think it was the Army Bloke podcast, I remember very vividly saying that um some of the people that I took a lot of my leadership traits from were people that cared about their people. And I think when I look back to our time in D Company, um I don't think I ever had a company commander that cared about the soldiers as much as you did, you know, and I and that really rubbed off on me. Um and the pace of life at the time and what we were doing might have been different to other places that I've been, but it just it's it fitted really well, you know, and I think we got the best out of our people.

SPEAKER_02 2:31

Yeah, I mean it's it's very kind of you to say that, obviously. Um I would say that, uh and I know we're going to get into this, that um my time in in company command with the Vikings and um uh with D Company in particular uh would have been a very, very different and maybe potentially quite lonely experience had I not had someone like you as part of my command team. You know, I I think you and I were very much from the outset on the the same key setting. Yeah, you know, um we were I think we vibed very quickly, and um what you brought to that as well, I helped I think helped balance my approach. And again, I know we're gonna get into that, and I don't want to start gushing about this right now, but um yeah, uh caring about your soldiers, um it is a it can be a little bit double-edged, definitely. And again, it's something I I think we definitely want to talk about. Um, you know, when you're giving a lot of yourself, you know, you've got to keep something in reserve, right? Good point. Um, and uh I think it maybe speaks a little bit to the you know the title of this podcast, actually, that um um you know you've got to dig deep for other people sometimes, and you've just got to make sure there's enough left for yourself, um otherwise you can burn out very quickly. And you know, I say that from hard won experience, I guess. Yeah, nice. Um, but yeah, no, very fondly remember our time together, and obviously we've been mates ever since. And um, yeah, I'm I'm really looking forward to talking about all of this and getting into it. Yeah, nice.

SPEAKER_00 4:04

So that's backfired on me a bit because now I feel uncomfortable. Uh so the opening question which everyone gets where relevant is why the army and why the infantry?

SPEAKER_02 4:15

Well, the why the army questions actually fairly easy. Um, I found the army very early on in life. Um, I I joined the Army Cadet Force uh when I was 13 years old, um, and I did that um I won't say out of necessity because that seems a bit odd, but basically I needed some escapism. Um, maybe a couple of weeks before I joined the ACF, um, my parents went through a really bad breakup. Um and my home life was was pretty rubbish, you know. And I was fortunate that at a time, at that time, my um my my best friend at school, um who was literally two weeks older than me, uh, had just joined the cadets, and he could see what a hard time I was I was having at home. And he said, like, mate, this is this is exactly what we're into. You should come and join me, come to the cadets, see what it's like. And you know, he was not wrong. And I think um over the next god, five years or whatever, up to the age of 18, um, when you have to sort of move on, um, I don't think I missed a single drill night, single cadet weekend or training exercise or camp or whatever. You know, I I was I was in it to the hilt. And um more importantly, I think I was I was so enthused about it because I uh I found my tribe, you know. Um I think uh like any any young teenage boy or girl, um you're always struggling a little bit with your identity and where you fit. And you know, when you add in, you know, a parental breakup, uh, that sort of key point in life as well, and your world gets sort of flipped upside down. Um I was very fortunate that I I quickly landed somewhere that I was made to feel so welcome and I was allowed to kind of be me, really. And I owe I owe a hell of a lot, I think, to that organization. I can't I can't speak highly enough of the army cadets, the combined cadet forces, and so on, and what they give to um young kids, you know, um in terms of confidence, in terms of well, skills um and community. And I I I absolutely fell in love with it. And the the keener you get the the you know, like attracts like, right? So you know you you gather people around you, and some of those guys, as you know, and some of them are your friends as well, um have been my friends ever since, you know. I mean, we're going back now 35 years plus, um, and they're still guys I talk to, you know, weekly as a minimum, if not daily. Um, and they've got me through some very tough times. And I I I I just fell in love with the idea of service and community and the camaraderie that came with that, and it was just a very natural progression for me to join the army. Um, but why the infantry? Um, that actually isn't quite as straightforward, and you know, it's confession time, really, here, mate. And I'm gonna say now uh publicly that um it's not that the infantry wasn't my first choice, it just wasn't my first thought. And largely I can I suppose point the finger at my father. My father had served in the Royal Air Force for a minute, you know, he was there for about five years or something as a junior NCO. He was a um he's the main reason we live in in East Anglia, actually. He was based at Honington as a um uh propulsion technician on uh Buccaneers and then on tornadoes um back when Honington had was a flying squadron. Um and so his idea of the army was you know, it's a bunch of pongos, you know, why would you want to go and join that? And you know, once he it became clear that I definitely wanted to join the army, it was like, well, if you're gonna join the army, then you need to get a trade, so you need to be an engineer, because he was an engineer, obviously. Um so I was pushed towards hard sciences, maths, physics, things like that at school and for A level, and I was pushed towards an engineering degree, and it just felt natural then to sort of look at the Royal Engineers. And I'll be honest with you, I never really looked at the REME. Um, you know, I went through that pipeline. I I did a fan visit when I was like 17 from school with the Royal Engineers at Chatham. They ran a great fan visit, by the way. You know, 17 years old, and you're building Dems charges and blowing shit up, it's you know, it doesn't get better than that. Um, and and I was kind of hooked in, and I I then went back for the um Reg uh regular commissions board briefing. Now I know um on uh a previous podcast Dan Russell was talking about AOSB and Army Officer Selection Board as it is now being in two parts. You've got the AOSB briefing, then you've got the main board. Well, it was very similar back in the day, and again, you know, for um people that are listening, uh we're talking the mid-90s now. Um and the regular commissions board, as was, was still at Westbury, the main board is still at Westbury, but prior to that, all of the um pre-boards, the the briefings were run regimentally. Um I'm guessing that the Queen's Division ran their RCB briefing at you know the depot at Baskenbourne. Um and I attended the very last one that was run at the Royal School of Military Engineering at Chatham, and they made a big deal out of it, and there's a dinner night and everything else, and and I passed that, and that meant that they were then going to sponsor me to RCB and on to Sandhurst and so on. Uh, and that was great, and that would have all been fine had I not realized, you know, a year into um my engineering degree um that I didn't really enjoy it and it wasn't for me, and you know, I was I was basically kidding myself, and I think it's only because I'd been away from home for a year and like living on my own and all that kind of thing, and I'd found my own feet that I kind of took a step back and went, actually, is this what I want? And the answer was definitely not. Um I then found myself back here in Suffolk and immediately transferring from, I was in the officer training corps at university, transferring straight into 6th Volunteer Battalion, Royal Anglian Regiment, based literally just up the road here. Um, and I remember walking in there and kind of presenting myself and saying, you know, here I am, you lucky people, you know, what what are you gonna do with me? And uh, you know, I was asked, okay, well, you know, if you're on this kind of trajectory towards going for a commission, um what do you want to get out of this? You know, what do you want to get out of your time with us? And I said, Well, I want to get as much core infantry training as possible before I go to Sandhurst. Um, in hindsight, I probably shouldn't have done any of that. I should have just gone to Sandhurst Fresh and just you know been a sponge and all the rest of it. Um, but uh I was I was very lucky that at that time there was a Reccey and Sniper platoon, um, actual badge snipers in the reserves as well, you know, which is uh was unusual.

SPEAKER_00 11:11

At the time, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 11:12

Yeah, absolutely. Um there was an ex um pompadour, I believe he was, um master sniper, who was one of the permanent staff instructors there, who uh um had done badge tests and things like that for guys. So they were actually quite a credible um bunch of guys, and so um I was very fortunate. I spent the next sort of 18 months with uh the Reccu platoon, and again, uh I think I was pretty fortunate that at that time there was a lot of money and resources being thrown at you know the the territorial army as was. Um, and I found myself doing you know, I was out almost every weekend, I was on you know, digging in OPs and you know, um doing patrol skills and uh lots of live firing as well. I mean, I remember we did our annual battle camp. I did so much LFTT on that. I can't believe how much we did. Um probably more than I'd done in battalion life, to be perfectly honest with you. It was fantastic. Um, and uh and some of that some of that was great, but really what what sold it for me is that that my time with the the uh the reserve culminated in um me volunteering to um join the Vikings on Exercise Grand Prix in Kenya in early 1998. And I remember I turned up as a rifleman augment tee from you know 6th Battalion, probably very very poorly packed Bergen grip and you know, Webbing and so on. Um, and you know, we flew out to Kenya and we we got to Nanuki Showground, NSG, and I remember putting down my kit in a probably a 30-man tent, you know, next to a cot bed, and um, you know, the rest of the guys in the platoon. In fact, I was I was with C Company actually, um, and uh Dennis Vincent was the OC. And uh I remember putting my kit down, and I think I'd only been stood there maybe two minutes, and someone came and tap me on the shoulder and said, You know, are you Amelia from 6th Battalion? I was like, Yeah, and he's like, Right, put your kit up and follow me. I was like, okay, what's going on? And all the other lads in the platoon are looking at me like, what's going on? Sort of shrugging and off I went. And next thing I know, um, I'm walking into like a 12 by 12 tent with six cot beds in it, and uh a young officer that was stood there, and he goes, Right, just just to confirm you've passed your RCB, right? I was like, Yeah, you're going to Sandhurst this year. I was like, Yeah, hope so. And he said, Good. This is Bev Allen, Bev Martin, you're gonna be shadowing Bev for the next six weeks. And I was like, Oh, okay. Um, and so I I ended up with probably the longest, most detailed potential officers visit in the history of the regiment that only one other guy I know of um has uh has also done, and that is um now Brigadier Guy Foden, because he was also there from the 7th Battalion as a PO, and so he and I met on that. And Bev um again, young platoon commander, C Company, um, and Ian Robinson, platoon sergeant. I couldn't have asked for two better guys to you know be working with and and learning from for for that uh for throughout that whole experience. And and don't get me wrong, um, they showed a hell of a lot of patience, you know, and understanding, and um uh both of them obviously you know still friends, and uh that that really sold it for me. You know, after that, I you know, just the enthusiasm that came from those guys, you know, from I mean, we know Bev, you know, he's so enthusiastic about being an infant here, yeah, you know, and Robo epitomizes the infantry soldier. Um and and you should definitely get him on, by the way. Um you should definitely bend his arm and get him on this podcast. Um those guys were an inspiration, and there's no other way of putting it. And I I I just felt like I belonged, and everything else was just going to be a consolation prize, and that was kind of my goal then attending Sandhurst, going through Sandhurst, and so yeah, uh, once again, I kind of I found my tribe, I guess. Um, and that's the best way I can put it. And I was very fortunate because I had such a detailed PO's visit, it made the regimental selection board a sandhurst kind of kind of easy. Yeah, that's great.

SPEAKER_00 15:29

I mean, um I was in the C Company for that Kenya tour in Templatoon as a GPMG gunner. Right, and that's crazy. I remember you both being there as well. I joined the battalion in '96, and uh that was our first, I think the first overseas exercise we done. But yeah, it was good really from memories that exercise hard, you know, really hard.

SPEAKER_02 15:47

It was hard, and brutal. And uh again, you know, as young and as fit as I was, I wasn't as fit as I thought I was, you know, working with uh an infantry platoon in in those conditions, and that environmental training that we did out there, as well as the you know, the patrol skills, that kind of core rifle platoon um uh honing of your your your craft, yeah. It's such a great place to do it, as we as we both know. And uh remember being up in you know Mount Kenya and the side of is it Cathendini, Githuri, that sort of area, doing a bit of jungle stuff as well. And honestly, just yeah, such great memories of that of that trip. Yeah, um, it cemented a lot for me, both in terms of you know what the regiment, I guess, but you know, certainly the battalion was was like, yeah, and uh it was something I definitely wanted to be a part of.

SPEAKER_00 16:39

Yeah, I think um I just want to build on your point about the cadets. So I um and Sixth World Angliin actually. So as you I think you know, I grew up in a terror, well, Cambridge University officers training corps was my my dad was a caretaker, and that's where D Company of Sixth World Anglian were. And Six Wall Anglian were my first exposure to the regiment as well. And I just remember this company of people that they would turn up every week, they all loved it, they all had like tailored smocks and stuff, they're all really keen, and and they used to win everything, I seem to remember, for the most part. So they're all but that always led to a piss-up in the mess and a celebration, just seemed like such a good organisation, and they were just nice people, yeah. You know, and I always remember that. But the uh the cadets, there was a former Viking called Chris uh Wurzel, Chris Worsley, he's now uh a cadet serp major, uh, who volunteers in his own time he invited me down to Peterborough to talk to the senior cadet platoon, and I don't know what I was expecting. This is only a couple of weeks back, but um, I was genuinely blown away. And in a world where things are a little bit odd at the minute, and you know everything's fairly negative. I just saw I was in a room full of about probably 50 cadets who had asked to run a dinner night without any adult instructor interference. It was fantastic, and they'd all prepared awards for the adults, and they all got up and give like little vignettes of things that they've been doing with the ACF, and it was incredible, you know, and it sort of just checked me, you know. I thought life isn't that bad actually, there's still some good people about and I too was a cadet, and uh the value that it gives you, you know, is and I think I said this a couple of podcasts ago, but even just you know, becoming an adult and having the ability to talk to people and talk to a group of people is incredible. You know, the amount of like family funerals and stuff I've been to where people just have a meltdown when they've got to talk, and you know, like all these little things that yeah, the ACF and the CCF, the worth of weight in gold, all cadet organizations, really. I'm glad you didn't join the RAF, by the way.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

But um, so so am I for so many reasons. But uh again, we can get into that.

SPEAKER_00 18:43

Um that's quality, and I think um we've had a good introduction to where you've been and what you've done in your bio, but I just want to pick out a few bits really. Um, so your time as at Platoon Command in the Poachers, what did that look like and where were you for that?

SPEAKER_02 18:57

Wow, um well I'll start by saying that um I had an embarrassment of riches as um a platoon commander, um certainly my time in platoon command with the poachers. Um, you know, if if again, just for for context, if you sort of think back to the the time I joined, like I say I commissioned in 99. I I I went out to the so the battalion was out in Cyprus, um Eastern Sovereign Base Area Resident Infantry Battalion in Decalia. And um and also again, just to clarify, because I've I've talked up, you know, my um affiliation with Sixth Royal Anglian and then one Royal Anglian, um, and then somehow I ended up joining the poachers. Um and and it wasn't really that I wanted to pivot away or anything like that. It was just there were so many of us from my intake that wanted to join the regiment, it was almost unheard of. There were like eight of us um at Sandhurst. Um, and for a regiment that only had two regular battalions, I think the only other organisation that had, or certainly infantry um organisation that had as as many people um joining on that intake were the paras. Um, you know, we we had so many that wanted to join the regiment, and I think they just kind of did a split and four went this way and four went that way, and I ended up in the poachers. And and I I'm not saying that uh in any way I regret that, quite the opposite. It was absolutely amazing. Um I I I joined the battalion in Cyprus after PCD. In fact, I went out just before PCD, met my platoon, then it was like, gotta go now, and went off to PCD for four months, and that was a bit rubbish, but obviously PCD is what it is. It's a you know, it's um it's there to turn you from um you know, well, frankly, uh an officer cadet, um, you know, brand new second lieutenant, but in into a credible infantry leader.

SPEAKER_00 20:52

Was that in Warminster at the time?

SPEAKER_02 20:53

It was in Warminster at the time, yes. Um, yeah. Um it moved to Brecon, I think, a few years after that. Um it was already on the cards then, but yeah, still still very much Warminster, albeit that a lot of our exercises, particularly the final exercise, Grim Warrior, that that was in Brecon. Um and I remember I just I just couldn't wait to get back. You know, I just needed to get through PCD because I wanted to get back to commanding the platoon, doing what I wanted to do. Um, and we were only in Cyprus for a bit. We were only I I caught the back end of that sort of two-year residential tour. Um, and yes, there were some commitments on the island, like force protection type commitments and patrolling, and I think we were all sworn in as special constables in the Eastern Sovereign Base area and all that kind of good stuff. Uh, but uh it was kind of a means to an end, and three months maybe I think I was there before we we came back to uh the UK did the arms plot move to Chepstow. Again, an interesting place to put an East Anglian regiment, but it is what it is. Um, and some of my fondest memories are clearly um of being in and around um Chepstow. And the training with the platoon, whether it was down at Kowent, which was very local to us, or rocket ranges, rocket more ranges, or up in Brecon, or indeed up in you know in the Beacons. And I would say that very quickly and unexpectedly, we were warned off for operations. You know, there wasn't a lot going on back then, as you can remember, there was obviously there was a bit of bulkan stuff going on. Northern Ireland was obviously still very much cyclical and ticking over. But I think the only other thing that had maybe happened probably just as I was I was getting to Sanders was Kosovo and Macedonia. So when Sierra Leone kicked off and uh you know, there was the I can't remember, was it the spearhead lead element or something basically deployed um again mostly parachute regiment on Pallasah to do the non-combatant evacuation operation and so on. You know, we all kind of stood there and looked and went, obviously, you know, why why not us? You know, why not a normal infantry battalion or whatever? Um, and again, be careful what you wish for because uh I think we were supposed to be doing a um week-long kind of LFTT battle camp or something down at Oakhampton on Dartmoor, and it pissed it down the entire time we were there, and the the weather was in, you know, so there wasn't enough visibility to do half of the ranges, so there was a lot of sitting around and trying to. We ended up doing lots of platoon admin and things like that. And um I'm spinning a dick now, but you know, I I remember I remember I I got the Lurgy or something, I I got some sort of throat infection, and I I went to see the the the med centre and they said, look, you know, you need to isolate yourself, bend yourself down for 24 hours. And you know, if we'd been doing any meaningful training, I would have probably resisted, but we weren't actually doing a lot. Um, everything was sort of on hold. And then I remember there was a knock on my door that evening, and it was our company sergeant major, a guy called Dale Robinson, very wiry, thousand-yard stare kind of guy, big droopy mustache, you know, um, hard guy. And uh he used to call me, he used to call me Mr. Meaner. Yeah, you know, you know, you know what it's like, yeah. You know it's like there's no young obviously Mr. Melia, you know, he used to call me Mr. Meaner, and I'll always remember that. And he knocked on the door and he was like, All right, Mr. Meaner. I was like, Star Major, are you right? He said, uh, how you feeling? I said, um, a bit rough. I feel like I've swallowed a grapefruit. And he goes, Uh, yeah, you feel like you swallowed a football ball at Tom if uh you've heard what I've got to say. And he flipped his notebook like something out of a cop show, you know, a TV. He went, warning order, Palata, Sierra Leone, B Company Group. And I just went, yeah, chit. And I rolled over, pulled the duvet back over because I just thought it was a wind up. And he like prodded me with his pay stick, went, I'm not fucking joking. And um, yeah, he then proceeded to tell me that you know we were stood to, and uh that I had to get in a vehicle with him and head back to to camp, back to Chepslow, um, because I was going to be pulled into the training team, and uh uh the rest of the B company were gonna form the force protection element and so on. And I I honestly I think for a for a battalion that wasn't on any, uh certainly to my knowledge, on any kind of um high readiness, you know, we went from being warned off for operations to being boots on the ground in Sierra Leone in like it was like a fortnight or something daft, you know. And I know we had some guys that come across from the Vikings as well. And my only regret in all of that was my platoon, my rifle platoon was also um the Corps of Drums. Again, we'd we'd kind of moved from Cyprus, and uh we were then going through that experiment of right, machine guns are now going to become organic to rifle companies, so we can't split up the drums, we're gonna re-roll the drums as a rifle platoon, and so on. So I ended up taking over the drums, and um uh and because of that, and because of the I guess that the manning cap, they took one look at the the overhead um for the deployment and said, right, well, something's got to give within B Company because we can only really take two platoons with us, um, and the drums can still be back here doing drumming. Um, so I was I was gutted because everything I I'd trained for in leading platoons, you know, on operations, leading men on operations, um, it felt like it was being taken away from me. So it was very bittersweet. Yeah. Um and I deployed, and don't get me wrong, um you know, some of my junior NCOs who weren't you know badge drummers, you know, I used to call them my green NCOs, um, did also deploy. So I wasn't completely sort of cut off from my my soldiers. But um yeah, for the uh two months or whatever it was that we were out there training the Sierra Leonean Army, um, which was a fascinating time, by the way. Honestly, really interesting environment, and not like a lot of S triple Ts that you get these days, dare I say it. We were very much in a conflict zone. Um there was always the danger something that was was going to go bang, and on a couple of occasions we were definitely stood two, um, thinking that it was going to go down, and the the con ops that we had um for those contingencies were were quite crazy, actually. You know, we were we were very much alone and unafraid, you know, uh as a unit in um in the jungle, effectively in Benguema. Um and you know, if it had all gone slightly pear-shaped, there would have been, you know, everyone bomb burst your fighting positions, cause as much attrition as possible, and then effectively wacky races back through a number of um control points to uh to Freetown and wait for the you know, wait for the cavalry to show up. Um so there was always that edge to what we were doing out there. And again, as a young 23-year-old, 24-year-old maybe um uh officer, you know, newly, newly commissioned officer, it was all very exciting. Yeah, but like I say, a little bit bittersweet because I didn't have my platoon with me. Um and I know we'll we might go back into talking about that that tour, but just to kind of follow through, um, because I talked about this embarrassment of riches. Um almost as soon as we got back from Sierra Leone, um, after a bit of post-op tour leave, uh, we were straight into Northern Ireland training. So the whole battalion threw night at uh as was down at Lyd. And again, within sort of six, seven months, I was I was out on the streets of Belfast with my platoon, which was mega. Um, and I I remember thinking um at the time, and again it was Good Friday agreement sort of era, yeah, things were definitely changing. The RUC were very kind of pissed off about you know what was happening to them, and the PS and I hadn't come in quite yet at that stage. Um, but we were we were yes, we were working in Belfast, and I think we were augmenting the uh the raw green jackets. Um and uh uh we we basically were pushing platoons out and raw monting platoons out you know for two month stints um while uh our D company um fulfilled the surveillance um surveillance tower um requirement, I think it was called uh opfaction. Um I I uh my my platoon, we were out there, we worked out of Girdwood, worked out of Musgrave Park Hospital for a bit as well, and and most of the patrol areas were um you know the likes of the Shankill and things like that. So they were they were more than sort of the loyalist areas rather than the sort of the old school hard Republican areas um that I know the Vikings had had had um patrolled a few years before. And uh at the same time, you guys were out in Londonderry as well. Because I remember I remember I remember escaping for a day um to come up and visit and see a few of the guys, a few of the guys were new in battalion. Yeah, and um you know that was my RR to go and have like one day of hanging out with the Vikings and having a pint or something. Um, but yeah, I remember again I remember there was just so much going on, it felt like there's much going on at the time. Um and by now, this is sort of early 2001, you know, came back from that tour, and uh I think we got straight into um training up your replacements. I think it was the cold stream guards that came out and took over from you guys. And yeah, that's right.

SPEAKER_00 30:48

Yeah, we took over the fuseliers and then yeah, the guards took over Russell. That's right, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 30:53

Yeah, and I remember um I remember going through some of the um the serials both down at Lyd and also up at Stanter as well, um, either running range packages for them or being Civpop or you know op four or whatever. And um uh straight after that I was offered the golden ticket. I was like real, you know, Willy Wonka, you know, look what you've won. Um uh, which was uh exercise long look, um, you know, four months attachments to the uh to the Australian Armed Forces, and I thought this is gonna be amazing. Um unfortunately, I had to turn it down. I was absolutely gutted because I I was I was in the middle of trying to buy a house with my then partner, now wife. Um, and so it was like we were gonna be completing around about the time I would have been going off to Australia. So I very reluctantly had to hand that off.

SPEAKER_00 31:52

Think of all them boomerangs you could have had the ball with.

SPEAKER_02 31:54

So many boomerangs. Um and uh um although a friend of ours has just come back from Australia and he didn't bring me back a boomerang, uh he did bring me back a uh a kangaroo scrote and bottle opener. Um I've been after one of them for a while. Have you? Tell you what, you know, sort me up with a pint and we'll probably quit. Um, but uh no, so no boomerangs, unfortunately for me. And I I handed that off, kind of handed that off, I guess, to uh to a mate, uh again, one of the guys that joined the battalion, same as me, um, from that intake. And um, I mean he must have had a good time because he he came back for a bit and then he quit and emigrated to Australia and he's been living there ever since.

SPEAKER_00 32:36

Um, so who knows what could have been. I think um for those listening, uh long look was as Martin said, an exchange between us and the Australian army. And my memories of it are they'd send a soldier over here, we'd send a soldier over there, either an officer or an NCR seems to remember. And our people would get out there, get given a credit card and a vehicle, loads of time off to go and explore Australia, and then we'd take them on exercise and have them digging in on soldiers' plane for get some work out of them.

SPEAKER_02 33:03

Yeah, um, but I I I I I I only bring it up, uh, not to sort of lament that missed opportunity, um, but to to make the point that these opportunities are out there, you know. Um you know, when you join when you join the army in general, you know, officer or soldier, there's there's so many things that you're just not expecting that just kind of come up. Yeah, yeah, so many opportunities, it's it's kind of crazy. Um, my consolation prize for not going out to Australia was um uh I was asked to then go out to North Carolina, out to the US um with a very small training team, a couple of Vikings, a couple of poachers, um, to go and support the Bermuda Regiment, who we've obviously had a very long-standing affiliation. Um unfortunately, now we don't have the uh um the warrant officer and the officer um PIDs in in that uh um crying shape in that regiment, but it is what it is. Um but at that time that that still existed, and uh I remember you know we went out there and um there was a there was a handover going on between the um the the sergeant majors so it was um it was Mickey Marsh. Nobby Marsh. Nobby Marsh, sorry, Nobby Marshall top blank. Yeah, Nobby Marsh um was taking over, and uh we spent three weeks or something like that working with the Bermuda Regiment, being their sort of permanent range team, but also working with US Marine Corps as well, you know, in Camp Lejeune. Um and it it was again, it was just a snapshot, really. Like three weeks out of my life, it was almost like my sort of swan song was my time in um you know in B company to Royal Anglian. Um, because when I came back from that, we were very much right, you're going off now on a posting. Yeah, and I sort of handed off my platoon and so on. Um, you know, again, a little bit bittersweet. There were so many things I still wanted to achieve with that platoon. Yeah. Um, and I had, you know, I I talk about them that being you know core of drums as well. Uh they they were such a good bunch of guys, and I've still got so much um, you know, so many fond memories of those guys. And I had a fantastic platoon sergeant, you know, who was obviously also the drum major. Um, and again, dare I say it's slightly unusual, a senior Brecon-trained drum major, um, Sean Huggins. And he and I again, you know, just I was very fortunate, we just got on so well, and we achieved a lot. We brought that platoon, you know, between the series, we brought that platoon a long way back to being a very credible rifle platoon. Um, and then I moved off and I went to to Harrogate um as a platoon commander. And the first week I was at Harrogat, um, I think I was teaching the very my very first lesson to the junior soldiers, and for those that don't know, uh, who may be listening, um, you're getting school leavers, they're coming out straight after their GCSE, 16 and a half, and they've got to spend a bit of time in training. Uh, and I know you know because you you were there very soon after I was. Um, it's a very detailed, long course, it isn't just core soldiering skills, there's a lot of um education, adventurous training, there's the sports and the skills that they get them to do and all that kind of good stuff. Um, but I remember this was my first week and the very first lesson, which was probably values and standards of the British Army, classic, you know, army officer um, you know, lesson to teach. And I I maybe got 10 or 15 minutes into teaching that lesson when I got a phone call, and uh it was my company commander, and he said, Uh, where are you? I said, Um, I'm in the classroom. Where do you think I am? He said, Um, is there a TV? Uh yeah, yeah, there's a TV. Why? He said, Um, just turn it on. Uh okay, what channel? I'm going, no, it doesn't matter. And 9-11 um unfolded in front of us, and I turned on the TV just in time to watch the the second uh plane go into um you know the second tower. And uh, you know, without sounding dramatic, um after we sort of let it sink in, and I'd got all these, I'd got like 52, 16 and a half year old lads sitting in this classroom with me. And um I I muted the volume or something, and I stood up and I said, Um, okay, it's time to get real. I said, because uh I hope you join the army to go on operations because that's war. Yeah, that's a declaration of war right there. And um yeah, uh a year and a bit later, I was back in battalion, and one of those lads that had been in that classroom was my machine gunner in Kabul. Um again goes on to that point about embarrassment embarrassment of riches, you know. I'd yeah year and a bit away from regimental duty, and I was straight back in, and I was straight back out out to Afghanistan. Yeah, you know, Kabul, Op Fingle, Cabal Patrols Company, 2003. Um, and that was a hell of a tour. That was probably I've got to say that was probably the my favourite operational tour. You can have favourite operational tours, but yeah, that was probably my favourite tour.

SPEAKER_00 38:07

Yeah, I think um it's it's amazing that people of our generation that that day was such a defining moment, and I've said this before, but I uh that's when I really started taking the army seriously because I knew that around the world people were gonna be getting a shoe in and we'd be involved in it, you know, and it was so clear. And I remember being in uh Purbright, I can't was it a Tuesday? It was a Tuesday, I think.

SPEAKER_02 38:29

I'm not that good. I can't remember. I'm sure I'm sure.

SPEAKER_00 38:31

And uh we were coming up a sniper Land Rover uh outside D Company offices, and Simo um bless him, he was our platoon sergeant, the fantastic bloke, put his out the window and said, Here, look at this. He had a little black and white telly in the office, and uh the first plane had hit, and then the second plane hit, and I just remember Simo looking around and going, That's no accident. We were like, You reckon it? But um, and then from then, like you said, I mean, I think it must have been what it weren't long after that, and like you said, we were given very short amount of notice, and we were on the ground in Afghanistan, yeah, patrolling the streets, no body armor, no helmets, yeah. That's crazy, wasn't it? Assault vests on, thinking, you know, why L96, it's so surreal, you know, and we we wouldn't have had a clue what how the next sort of 20 years would unfold. Um just going back a bit as well. So your instructional posts were AFC Harrogate as a platoon commander, and what did you do at ATR Bassingborn?

SPEAKER_02 39:26

Well, Bassingborn's very different. Um, I was the uh I was the adjutant actually. Um yeah, and yeah, we can talk about that if you like. Uh it's probably one of the rather low points in my career. Um not because I was the adjutant per se, but because I was the adjutant in a training regiment. And um I'd I'd just come off the back of well, just to sort of rewind slightly, um, because uh there was still quite a bit uh regimental duty that again I'd been so fortunate to do because you know we did Afghanistan. Again, I'd I'd had a great bunch of guys um that I was working with, again, great, great sergeant as well. I had um uh Bob Perry um and uh and then Steve King. It was like a mid-tour uh swap over.

SPEAKER_00 40:12

So you were singing commander in Afghanistan.

SPEAKER_02 40:14

Yeah, again, it was a funny one. Um when I was at Harriga, I'd I'd been promised um I'd only do about 15 months at Harrogat, um because just because of some of the opt tours I'd done, and uh we'd been away for things, um, uh and and obviously the the time at Harrogate as well, is that I'd missed out on a lot of jungle warfare stuff. Because on paper, at the very least, we were a jungle warfare battalion, and so there were guys going through J Wick, you know, the jungle warfare instructors course, um, probably also the tracker's course and things like this. Um, and we were we're doing a lot of training in Belize, so they'd done Mayan Warrior, I think it was, uh, in Belize, and there was another Mayan Warrior coming up, and I said, Look, pretty please, can I come back in time to do Mayan Warrior in um 2003? Um, because I've missed out, and so they they they agreed and said, Yeah, we'll we'll bring you back. However, uh that I think there'd been a there'd been a uh a change in CO during the time I was away, and uh I think Roland Ladley had come in as the commanding officer, and he came up and I hosted him for a visit at Harrogut. Um and I somehow I managed to sort of impress on him that as much as I enjoyed what I was doing at Harrogut, and don't get me wrong, being a Putin Commander or any kind of the directing staff at Harrogate is fantastic, you know, um it really is. Um, I just with everything that was going on in the world, with the Vikings being downrange and things like that in Kabul and all the rest of it, I just felt like I wanted to get back to a fighting unit um and and not miss out or potentially miss out. And I certainly didn't want to miss out on that exercise. So he said, Well, you know, we can bring you back, but there's going to be a quid pro quo because we don't have a like that natural progression of company 2IC or uh support weapons. We we don't have that going right now. You'd have to come in and um basically be a platoon commander again, potentially for another six months. And I thought, well, I could stay at AFC uh as a platoon commander, or I could go back to battalion as a platoon commander and take a platoon out to a jungle warfare exercise. It was kind of a no-brainer, wasn't it? Yeah, um, so I immediately agreed to that. Um, I think the guy who replaced me at Harrogut, because we kind of did a one-for-one swap, probably didn't feel the same way. Um, and I always feel bad because when I when I did get back to battalion, and this time I was um posted into A Company, A Lincoln Company, um they uh they said bad news, uh Belize isn't happening, and I was just like you know, rolling the eyes as usual. Uh said, good news is um warned off uh cabal uh mopfingle in the summer. And just win win. And again, so fortunate in a lot of ways, maybe not in career terms, but in practical will I join the army to do terms, you know. Having uh I think probably by this stage I'd I'd I'd I'd been in three years, you know, which is not a lot of time now. I look back over you know a quarter of a century. Um, but three years in, having done my time as a platoon commander, two operational tours at that point, um, bit of instruction as well, where all I'd been doing constantly is core infantry skills, you know, core basic skills, um, with uh younger soldiers, junior soldiers. Um to then be told to get you're gonna go back and you're gonna take a rifle platoon out on operations in a fairly punchy environment was just it felt like the the culmination, yeah, you know, and and this is why I say it's kind of one of my favourite tours, one of the best tours I did. Probably because I I had a better handle on my my craft, I guess, you know. Um, and again, I had a great bunch of guys, uh, great platoon sergeant, great junior NCOs, um, and you know, we worked well together, you know, we were definitely on the same frequency. Um, and while it wasn't the highly kinetic um environment that it became, you know, obviously, certainly, you know, as we we moved down south um a few years later, there was still a lot going on, and it it it was ramping up while we were there, definitely. And um, one of the things I would also say is again, just for context, um telek one, you know, the invasion of Iraq in 2003 happened while I was on that tour. So we watched the invasion of Iraq on CNN from the ops room in um Camp Souter in Kabul, you know, and we were out on the streets the next day, and there was obviously you know a lot of young, slightly angry um you know, young men, students, um, who had something to say about it. And um, we definitely uh I think we definitely felt that shift, um, you know, that shift in the uh atmospherics when that had happened. Um and there were a number of incidents while we were there, you know, um, there were definitely some pretty nasty incidents, and we uh we we were quite fortunate that we didn't get anyone seriously injured or or um or killed. The Germans that were there, um they were heading up ISAF at the time, um, had a very had a very bad day. Um and it happened just outside our camp. Uh and I remember that day very, very vividly. Um, you know, we had had one sort of slightly half-hearted attack on the camp, I think someone like lobbed a grenade over the over the wall, and luckily didn't you know kill or injure anybody, very nearly did. Um and we we grabbed him. Uh we managed to get out the QRF, went out the door, and we we nabbed him. Oh nice, yeah. Um but it was from that kind of point we knew there was something that was different that was changing, and I'm uh I'm not pointing the uh finger in the direction of the Taliban either, because the Taliban had kind of been militarily defeated at that point and were off licking their wounds down south or in the tribal areas. Um there were a lot of the old Mujahideen warlord type groups, you know. I think it was one called uh HIG, Hesbi Islami Gulbaddin or something that um were responsible for a lot of the attacks that were going on in the city, and more and more we were getting intel that was coming in, you know, there's possible VBI EDs coming in, and there were these guys doing these grenade attacks and and stuff, and uh and then on a very fateful day, um the Germans who were doing a um uh an airport run, they were literally going from I think it was Camp Warehouse up on the Jalalabad Road down to uh Kabul International Airport via the sort of back gate, which was near Souter, if you remember. Yeah, yeah. Um and they were they were going in like a it was almost like an old yellow school bus, like the kind you would see in an American film, you know. Um almost no force protection. And they were doing that and setting patterns and it it came back to bite them. And uh yeah, they they lost a lot of guys that day. And because of where it happened, um A Company were first on the scene, pretty much, and that was it was a pretty it was a pretty rough day. I remember it was a pretty rough day for everybody, um, but it absolutely um drove home the reality of where we were, you know, and it wasn't this benign, slightly um I won't say boring, it was never boring, but slightly um safe, yeah, you know, because as you say, uh even in 2003 there was still a bit of patrolling with berets, and yeah, I think we did have body armour, but it was like the old style, you know, the ECBA uh I was surprised how long it took for the water to simmer, to be honest.

SPEAKER_00 48:09

I mean, we um like I said, we were out there, we took over two para about maybe three, four months after 9-11. Yeah, um, I mean, people might not know, but the Royal Anglian Regiment had the first British Army casualty killed in action out there, which was young last couple Darren George, who unfortunately died. They were doing uh advanced contacts, and uh it was a friendly fire incident with uh an accidental discharge from a GPMG within the platoon. But um, yeah, and like you said, it becomes very real. You know, this isn't a because then I I think the threat was as fascinating as it was, complacency is always the threat when not a lot's happening. Yeah, there's a lot happening, but not a lot's happening. You know, there's not a lot of the we didn't get in into many gunfights on that tour. We were just learning and sort of unmasking what what the place is all about, learning about the Taliban, learning about the country, its culture. It was a you know the biggest sort of cultural learning curve curve I've ever been on. You know, um, yeah, really interesting times, and I think and it's just yeah, and like I said, it took a long time for the water to simmer and then to boil, but then for the next 15-18 years, it it was boring, you know, yeah, continuously, and it was a it was all very kinetic, but yeah, they really interesting tours, and I'll get your point about it being one of your favourite tours. Favourite being a is a bit of a weird word, but it's I found it fascinating. I just remember everything I looked at in Kabul had bullet holes in it. Yeah, the Russians had torn the place up and been defeated, but ultimately, you know, everything just the curbs, the buildings, the walls, the lampposts were just riddled, you know.

SPEAKER_02 49:45

I I'll I'll tell you why I'll I'll qualify my statement about why it was my favourite tour. Um, and and also why I made the point about Optelic happening when it did, and we were already out there, you know, doing what we were doing, and that's because in the build-up to that deployment, um, there was still very little in the way of um dedicated bespoke Afghan training with Optag. We were doing, I think, what was essentially a bastardized um Bosnia type package, you know, um, with a bit of cultural stuff thrown in. Um, but we knew what we were getting into, you know. We'd obviously talk to the Vikings as well. We'd also talked to a couple of guys from you know UKSF that had been out there. Um and uh I I remember, I think I still have the book. I I I went to uh Waterstones or something and I bought a it's like a journalist guide to Afghanistan. Oh okay. Not so imagine like a lonely planet guide, but for you know, really quite you know, the kind of places that you don't want to be a tourist. And I got you know, we did a lot of cultural um training, and I remember also recognising that maybe the mapping that we had for that town wasn't gonna be 100%, you know, and you know, we might be have to work off aerial thoughts, but then you know, things change, people build stuff all the time, and so we were gonna have to think a little bit differently. You know, it wasn't gonna be like back in the streets in Belfast where you know you've got your tribal maps as we used to call them, and you know, everything's pretty accurate and zoomed right in, and you've almost got sort of meter by meter um detail that we were gonna have to think a little bit differently. Um, we were gonna have to um embrace what I would call classic counterinsurgency, classic coin, you know, um, whereby um when you're patrolling, you are trying to understand the environment, you're trying to talk to people, you're trying to observe, pick up the atmospherics, um, presence of the normal, you know, sorry, presence presence of the abnormal, you know, absence of the normal, that kind of thing. Um, and and we, you know, I I I definitely pressed on certainly the soldiers in my platoon. Um, every man's a sensor. You know, you you're out on the ground, you're all absorbing information, you're all looking at things. If you see something you're not sure about, you let us know. And we'd always debrief after the patrol as well, and we'd always put in a patrol report, and we would always make sure that we'd done some sort of G2 tasking, some sort of int tasking. Um, you know, we had a patrol camera, you know, that kind of stuff. I would always try and make a point of um either linking up with the police and doing a joint patrol with the police, um, or paying a visit to the like the village elder, the Malik, you know, um, and listening to what they had to say. And and and part of that isn't just about getting into intelligence, part of that is about um building a bit of a rapport and showing respect. And you know, for anyone that spent any time doing any kind of cultural um study for that part of the world, respect goes a very long way. And I I I maybe maybe I'm being a bit of a cynic here, but I feel like um we were doing all of that, and we were, you know, we we had a couple of police districts, I think it was police district eight and police district nine, huge areas with hundreds of thousands of people, I mean, you know, living in these areas. Um, and yeah, we were just trying to get to know our patch, a bit like a police officer, right? You know, you're trying to understand the the um the patch you're working, and I think that that maybe slightly softer approach, um, you know, rather than sort of you know, all guns blazing, um, kind of uh hard charging, aggressive stance, um, I think it definitely helped because it helped us you know tune into our environment. But I also think that um in the years that followed, we lost our way with that a bit. And I think if I'm if I'm being a cynic, I'd point the finger at Telik and the thing, the way things went down in Iraq. Um, and I think we lost our way a little bit with that. I think it was um probably General Praeus. He said something like, you know, the the the British have got the best counterinsurgency doctrine in the world, it's just a shame they don't read it or something, you know, disparaging. I think I'm I'm probably misquoting him or as a famous misquote, but you know, it's still I think it's still a reasonably valid thing to say that we we'd lost our way a little bit. And I certainly saw that you know a few years later um on Op Heric 4 when we went into Helmand. Um I think we went in with the best of intentions and it went very kinetic very quickly. And again, we there was a degree of almost reverting to type of um you know getting into a getting into gunfights, yeah. Um, and you know, I don't blame anyone for how that turned out. Um, you know, it was what it was. I had a very, very small part to play in that that operation. Um but I just I just felt like um between what we were doing back in 2003 and in that environment, um, and then the way that the world changed, largely because of the invasion of Iraq and the kind of cascading effect that that had. Um I I I felt I don't know, uh, what did I feel? I remember at the time thinking, what the bloody hell are we doing? You know, it felt like okay, well, we've done Afghanistan, let's go and do something else now. And and it just felt like half a job, you know, and that's how it felt at the time. It felt like we were doing half a job, and um, well, the rest is history, I guess. Yeah, um, you know, and I I don't want to speak too loudly about Telec because I've not served in Iraq. Um, I was given an opportunity to go out there and I actually turned it down. I just I it's a hard thing to say for an army officer, but I didn't believe in the mission, you know. I never really believed in the mission, and I believed in what we did in Afghanistan, and I still believe in what we did in Afghanistan, you know. Um with the United States enacting Article 5, we did our part, we we honoured our NATO agreement, yeah, and I think it was right to do so, and I think it had the right um short and midterm goals. I just we just didn't follow through because they because of that pivot. Yeah, and I'm I'm probably not saying anything controversial there, I think I imagine most people think that.

SPEAKER_00 56:21

No, no, I'm I think you know, I'm I'm very uh of a similar mindset with Telik. I uh I did a Telic tour, and the job that we had in the company I was in was to we were the strike company for the battalion, so we're doing a lot of strike ops in the in the city. There seemed to be a lot of searches uh and arresting corrupt coppers, yeah. Two things so searching for weapons in the Middle East, you're never gonna make a dent in it, you know. Even if you take 10 AKs off the streets, well, it's not gonna have any impact on the probably million of them that are still in the same city, and trying to you know arrest corrupt coppers that were al Qaeda, you know, of an evening or or whatever was again, you were just a bit of a fart on a fart on a windstorm, if I'm honest, you know. Um but that said it was um it was a good culmination of training, working with good people, you know, proving that we could do it again and it set up set us up well for uh the year after or the two years after when we went on on Herrick, you know. Um but yeah, it's it's it's a tricky one, Telek. And I think nowadays it's it's so openly discussed, you know, people's views on it. Yeah, tricky time, very, very, very tricky time. And I mean the regiment lost some good people out there, yeah, you know, and that that's the thing that doesn't sit sit well with us, but you know.

SPEAKER_02 57:43

Yeah, and this this kind of goes to my point where I'm not you know, for for anyone who served on that operation, you know, you you're doing your job, right? You're there as a soldier, and not everyone gets a choice. I I was fortunate that I was I was given a choice because it wasn't a mandatory thing. They were looking for an augmentee. Um, I think it was to join a um US joint effects team or something like that. I said, Have I got to go? And I was told, no, no, you don't have to go. I said, Well, I'm fine, thank you. Um, I mean the fact that I was already in Northern Ireland when I was being asked to do that, I was already on like another tour in Northern Ireland. Yeah, this was a residential as well. I was like um 18 months into a two-year tour in Northern Ireland, I I didn't fancy doing another tour off the back of that tour. Um, so yeah, I don't I don't diminish um what was being done um by the military, quite frankly. You know, you you've got to do what you've got to do and you react to the environment. I just I just think that maybe the the way that operation unfolded um, you know, slightly more of a yeah, compared to say the Taliban, for instance, so slightly more of a formed um uh military resistance initially turning into a uh an insurgency. It's a real melting pot, as you know. So you know, Shia, Sunni, different factions as well. Um, and you know, I know it isn't it incredibly complex environment. I just wish we hadn't gone in when we went in. Not saying that maybe we shouldn't have done, um, I just think that maybe the timing was was wrong. Um I mean it's easy for me to say I was a I was a bloody lieutenant slash captain or something at the time, you know, is um, you know, my opinion is you know invalid. Um, but having later in my career, much later in my career, having then worked on supporting resourcing uh Operation Shader for Iraq and Syria, and the kind of the the enduring fallout of the invasion in 2003, um I still found it very hard to sort of you know square the circle on that. Yeah. Um you know again what was going on in you know on up shader absolutely you know justifiable in terms of you know we must intervene, we must act the way we acted, and so on. But it was all a second third order effect of you know 2003, right? And and you know, um the uh political adventurism rather than military adventurism, I think. Um you know what and it's just my opinion, yeah. Um and I'm sure there's a lot of people that disagree. And I I really I I do I genuinely feel for um both of the battalions um that deployed on those those tours because I think about the time the 2nd Battalion went out there, I was in um HQ 16 Air Assault Brigade spinning up, going on Herrick 4 down south when we moved into Regional Command South and moved into Helmand, uh sort of first formation deployment into Helmand in 2006. And I I remember um the the poachers going off around about that sort of time as well. Yeah, and you know, obviously they you know they they lost a couple of guys and um and I I was I don't think I found out about it immediately. I think I was you know it's because I was I was also downrange um and I I saw there was a again the the second order effects of that loss on the soldiers and on the officers as well. And there was a good friend of mine actually who um you know we'd been you know um again same company, we were an A Company in Kabul in 2003. He'd come in as a brand new officer, and I think he'd been the company ops officer in on telec and I he took it really hard, and I know he took it really hard, so much so that he he um he actually ended up you know resigning and leaving the army and um very hard to even try and track down now and and talk to. You know, I I know it hit him exceptionally hard. Um and it's I think that's something that we we tend to you know when you're in the in the regiment, when you're in the unit, you you you you live with it every day, right? You know, it's it's it's an ever-present thing. Um there's something we don't tend to talk about too much, and that is that that second order effect of the loss of our soldiers. Uh clearly it goes without saying, you know, the families are gonna feel the loss far more keenly than anybody. Um but it's that um that impact it has on everyone else in the platoon, in the company, whatever. Yeah, um, and yeah, you do carry it, and I know you carry it. Um and it I don't know, maybe maybe you could call it Survivor's Guild or something like that, but I just remember thinking I kind of wish I could be there for the guys. You know, they've gone through this, and I wish I could have been there for the guys. Yeah, you know, it seems like a daft thing to say because you know, I'd been out of battalion a couple of years at that stage and you know it wasn't on me, but I just remember thinking of all of those guys I knew that I'd effectively grown up in the army with, you know, from sort of 99, 2000 and so on, that were on that tour, you know, whether they were company two ICs, um platoon sergeants by then, um even the ops officer, for instance, you know, um, you know, company commanders. I just remember thinking, God, that's gonna be yeah, bloody rubbish um for them um in every way. And I know and I know we might get onto this talking about kind of company command um in a moment, but it's something that I I I really tuned into when I was an OC, you know, having come in just off the back of Op Heric 15. Um sorry, 16. I I just finished Op Heric 15 and you guys were out on 16, and and when you guys came back, um again those losses and some of the injuries as well, yeah, very keenly felt by the men. And it it it slightly coloured my time in company command, I think, because I could see the impact it was having on people.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:58

Well, let's um let's move on to that. Okay, um, let's talk about your time as company commander, D. Cambridgeshire company of the Vikings. So where were the battalion located, and what year was it when you took over company command?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:15

So uh I took over company command um officially at the end of 2012. Um uh the battalion was in Bullford, um, and uh actually what had happened is I'd um prior to that I'd actually been on an op tour. Um it was my final tour in Afghanistan. Um uh I was on OP Herrick 15 and I was doing a bit of an unusual job actually. I was actually um a major staff officer, so SO2 staff officer within the um uh ISAF uh Special Operations Forces and I was working on a lot of the special police mentored programs, so what later became or became known as the triples, right? So triple three, triple four, and so on. Um so a really interesting tour. Um, and that was when I boarded for company command, and I remember having to sign a waiver to say that you know, if I was going to serve with um the Vikings, I had to be prepared to do effectively a back-to-back tour because you guys were going out on Herek 16. Um, and I obviously I I think I rang rang the wife, you know. I think she was enjoying having the peace and quiet of me being away. She was like, Yeah, sure, go for it, you know. And uh uh but it again it was a bit of a non bra uh a no a no-brainer for me. Um but as it turns out, not not the way it unfolded. So um I I finished up Herek 15, and I think I'd actually popped in to see uh the CO while I was on leave, when I was on mid tour leave, um, to sort of see what you know his thoughts were and so on and so forth, um, before going back out and completing that tour. And uh the the plan was look, you know, come back, um, get your own post op tour leave in, you know, take some time off. And um, you know, there's there's a whole bunch of things that we would like you to do while we're away on the rear ops group, and so you know, um, it made sense, and I I also didn't want to dig my heels in too hard because you know no actual agreements had been made at that point. Um, and again, uh, if memory serves, um while there was technically a gap with OCD, I think I think the guy who had been OCD had been moved on. He wasn't a Royal Anglian officer, he'd come in from another regiment and um hadn't, you know, for whatever reason hadn't gelled very well with the the the command team. Um I think there were a few mistakes made and um they weren't prepared to take him on operations. And so my my old mate Bev Allen, you know, who was also post company command at that stage, was asked to come in and and uh Command D company and uh off you went to to uh Herrick 16. And so there I was on the rear ops group um for a bit and I was you know organising various things including like sort of the homecoming um uh events and what have you. And uh then I finally got to meet my company um right at the end of of uh 2012, yeah. Um and obviously you came in very quickly to be the company sergeant major, which was um a bit of a relief um for a number of reasons, um, because I think you and I both know the challenge that we had um or the challenge that had been set for us was to take D Company, which had been um obviously very specialist, whether it be Recce Snipers, mortars, um they were running the old uh fire support group, you know, that combined two teams of javelin anti-tanks and machine guns and and so on. Um and uh kind of re you know that and also also been working quite maybe not independently, but yeah, you know, all over the place around you know Afghanistan, around Helmand, um, you know, attached to different companies and so on. And we were we were tasked with like bringing it kind of back in, reforming a company, giving it a company identity, and uh rebalancing that company for more of a conventional warfighting uh footing. Yeah, um, and I think that pretty much sums up um what we then spent the next year doing between us, um, and again, not without its challenges. Um, you know, I think we had a I wouldn't say I had a bit an uphill struggle, but I definitely had a um a number of considerations that maybe some of my rifle company colleagues didn't have. Yeah. Um and you know, without getting into it too much, uh I I think I sort of alluded to the fact that you know, when you when you experience loss, you know, um on operations and and so on, uh it does have an impact. And if there's one thing that you can say about uh a fire support company or ISR group, high star company, whatever, um they're your more senior soldiers in the battalion. They've been around, they've done it, they've got a couple of tours under their belt usually. Uh certainly back in those days they did. And uh and certainly within that context with the Vikings have done a number of fairly kinetic tours as well. So, you know, unlike having a you know 19-year-old, 20-year-old, you know, private soldier in a rifle platoon, fairly fresh out of training, you know, maybe it's his first tour, something like that. You know, these guys have have seen a bit more and have experienced a bit more and are carrying a bit more as well. And that that comes with its own challenge. And don't get me wrong, the the G1 challenge is you know, that kind of welfare admin challenge that everybody's has with commanding soldiers, you know, platoon level, company like level, you know, battalion level, whatever. Um but D Company, first of all, it's it's it's a much bigger beast, you know, it's it's not quite double um the size of a rifle company, but I think at one point, you know, I mean a rifle company is normally around about a hundred people, isn't it? You know, or all up. Um at one point I think I had something like 165 names on the uh on the roster.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:14

172, it'd be really boring now. 172. 172.

SPEAKER_02 1:10:19

Uh yeah, yeah. I'm embarrassed by that.

SPEAKER_00 1:10:21

Um 172, really. Okay. You're an officer, you've got to lose a few. Uh joking. But I mean it was it was I I think where we were very lucky, and you're right. I think one of the challenges we had was growing that cohesion again. Yeah. The company after it reformed after the the Herit days of the fire support groups, where you imagine the company's like a pizza, gets cut into loads of slices, and every rifle company gets a slice. Yes. You know, um, growing cohesion takes time, but we had a very clear line in the sand, which was Kenya for us. Yes. Um, and Kenya, for those that don't know that are listening, uh, used to be, and I think it still is it was an assessed exercise uh over obviously in Kenya for a few weeks, uh, where you get looked at and get given the green light for operational readiness. So the better you do, um the more chances of you deploying are, depending on what's going on in the world. Um but going back just slightly, I and I also think one of the things that we or I certainly made a lot of noise about was having the getting the permission and having the ability to select into D Company because there was a real there was a phase of time where people were just sent to the specialist platoons and not a lot of thought was given. Now the rifle companies would never want to send their really good blokes because they don't want to lose their good blokes, so they'd send a bit of a mixed bag. Now you can always bring people up to the sort of standard that you need them to be, but that takes time, and at the time we didn't have the time, you know, um, because there was so much going on. And uh I remember being quite noisy to the RSM at the time, Andy Fapel, yeah, and saying that I need to have the ability to select in, so we run courses. We've got no interest in thrashing people, but we want to pick the right people for reconnaissance snipers, and yeah, and then we put a truol out for volunteers and and the rest was history, and that worked really well for us.

SPEAKER_02 1:12:09

I think I I think I mean you know, I was I was right there with you, and I was you know making that point to the commanding officer, and and in fairness, the commanding officer was of the same mindset, yeah. You know, particularly when it came to you know recce snipers, you know, the um the the credibility of that platoon rested on the quality of its men, yeah. And I say men, you know, because back then that's you know where we were at. Um and so getting that acknowledgement that we had to run a filter system, you know. And don't get me wrong, there was definitely a you know, you selected yourself out, um there was still that mindset of train in, and we put a lot of time and effort into running those cards, and it wasn't just for Wrecki and snipers, we had the same thing for mortars, same thing for javelin and and so on. Um, maybe a little bit less for machine guns because obviously they were also core of drums, at least initially. Um, but certainly, you know, I remember we went on a it was almost like a PR campaign, if you remember. We I we literally ran a briefing and got soldiers in from the rifle companies to explain what Life and D Company was about. And for my money, I would say that um the thing that sells the specialist platoons is the soldiers in those platoons. It's not me as the company commander or even you as the sergeant major, um, it's the guys that are in those platoons and the pride they feel in you know wearing that wrecky, you know, Christmas tree on their arm or wear you know, wearing the cross rifles uh as a sniper, whatever it may be, you know, that that this is a natural progression, not something to be afraid of, and that if you want to be taken seriously as a as an infantier with a a long career in front of you, and certainly if you want to climb to you know the dizzying heights of you know, platoon sergeant, company sergeant major, RSM, then you've got to diversify in your career. You can't just be you know down that very one narrow, dare I say it, you know, rifle platoon, rifle company, you know, your whole career. You've got to you've got to experience everything that that unit has got to give. Um and I think I think we also realized fairly early on that while the training or the selection and the training um programs that we pulled together, well, they were critical in enabling that, um, there was also a degree of if you're coming to D Company, you're gonna do something a bit different. You know, the quality of the training or the creativity of the training um has got to be a little bit different, it's got to be a little bit more um grown up, dare I say, exciting, something that you're not necessarily gonna have even expected to do. Um, and I I remember pressing that point quite hard with uh the platoon commanders at the time, um, as they were you know writing and you know developing their training prank um training plans. Um, you know, don't just go off what the pamphlet says, don't just go off what you know the uh the template says, you know, be creative, ask, ask, and I'll do my best to try and resource you. And you know, in fairness to the the the um the battalion headshead at the time, that we did get a lot of support. Um we did also get a lot of pushback from, as you say, some of the rifle companies. Um and yes, no one wants to give their best soldiers away. Um but to me, a um the kind of the kind of soldier you're after is the kind of soldier that's gonna volunteer because you don't want pressed men. You can't have a pressed man going through a recce selection carder. He's gotta want to be there. Um again, same with snipers, same with javelin as well. You know, if you're gonna be carrying that that missile tube on your back or that clue sight, you know, or if you're a mortar man and you're carrying those bombs or carrying that mortar tube on your back, you you don't want to be a pressed man doing that, you know, because you'll go onto that carder, you'll screw them up for a bit, and then you'll find a way to you know bleed out naturally, or you know, whatever. And I only ever wanted volunteers, and you know, don't get me wrong, you know, that's the plan. And if uh the old adage goes, you know, if you want to give God a laugh, tell him your plans, um you know, and and and it didn't always go according to plan, it didn't always run smoothly. Um there were definitely a few, um, if you remember, there were a few um heated encounters, you know, where we were fighting to keep keep that um that train going, yeah, you know, keep that train rolling. Um and I I'd like to think we achieved the aim. Oh, yeah. And I'd like to think that we're first of all we we developed a company ethos that was a company ethos and not just like you say, yeah, a bunch of independent platoons. Um I think that we uh also um came away with a well we definitely came away with a quality product. Yeah, you know, the machine we built was fit for purpose, and there's no two ways about it. And as you've already pointed out, Kenya proved that, and we can talk about that if you like. Um, but that absolutely was you know, they delivered in spades, and that was very, very well highlighted on that um on that exercise. And I can tell you want to say something about that, so I'll I'll I'll pause for a second and let you uh no really.

SPEAKER_00 1:17:42

I'm I'm I'm just you're taking me back, actually. You're sort of uh blowing the dust off my aging memory, right? And uh and you and you're right, I think what we what the company the boys and girls of the company delivered was incredible. And um I mean I'd served in D Company of the Vikings for quite a few years in uh both the wrecking sniper platoons, but arrogantly, probably back in them days, I didn't pay a lot of attention to anti-tanks and mortars, and you know, I I knew they were good at their job, but it was a really refreshing experience to be able to go and visit as a company start major mortar platoon, yeah, and say, tell me about your craft because I know nothing about it. Yeah, and bearing in mind, we'd been you know, I I'd mortars had got me out of shit so many times in previous years in in the Herit Tours, especially Herit 6, and watching these men put mortar bombs through they can put them through a letterbox, you know, they're incredible. But to learn it and understand the science behind it was was really good, and and the thing you immediately notice about a senior platoon like that is that it's the privates telling you the business, you know. I'd argue, and we've all spent time in rifle company. That if you got a young private up and asked him to taught you through platoon tactics, he'd know it, but he wouldn't have the confidence. I was always really impressed for that. And then you know, the anti-tanks, you know, the javelin, a 60,000-pound missile, you know, without that's just without the equipment and the tactics behind it, the screening tactics and how it interlinks with the reconnaissance platoon. Yeah, it was all it was so I was learning as a SART major, and I was learning from my blokes, and I loved it. You know, it was really good, and I massive amount of respect for him. I remember when we took uh the mortar platoon up, Penny Fan. Yes, and they had a platoon photo up there, which is unheard of.

SPEAKER_02 1:19:20

I've still got that photo, and uh the one of the other photos I've got as well is it if you remember, I also took the Padre um up there as well. So we both had our bergons on and um full of Harribo. He yeah, uh I think I also put a rock in the top of his burgen just for the for the giggles, and he he he found it afterwards. And um, rather than being upset with me, he thought that that was that was belonging, you know. Um, but I I if you remember um Padre Um Martin Groves, um such a fantastic guy. I'm gonna I'm gonna shout out to Martin Groves if he's even listening to this, because he was such an advocate and supporter of D Company. Yeah, um, because he he also he also recognised that you know some of those guys were carrying a little bit more emotionally, you know, um psychologically because they'd been in longer, they'd done a few more tours and all the rest of it. Um so he recognised that sort of welfare challenge that we had, and some of it was some of those challenges were actually very, very serious challenges. Um, and they did, you know, the the way G1 does, it can consume a lot of your bandwidth as a uh certainly as a company commander, but also as a sergeant major. Um and and I just remember taking Padre Martin out on um it always seemed to be mortal stuff, strangely enough. You know, we whether it was night firing, you know. I remember we went night firing and we were putting out loads of a loom, and because it was a loom, he was allowed to do it because it wasn't anything kinetic, it was okay to touch it, you know, and he he bloody loved it. And I think we also got him out onto a onto a uh a range with Wrecky and Snipers. Remember, you you got a uh an old mate from Hereford along with us right yeah, trunk full of guns, and uh we had a we had an absolute whale of a time. And we're not in beckles after. I don't think I was there for that. But yeah, um, but you know, all those little things like that, and and having the the padre along with us for a lot of those things as well. It also it helped I think it helped spread the word what was going on because he'd he'd go off and he'd talk to other people about it, yeah, you know, um, and uh and we got a lot of support from him, but yeah, I I I I had never really spent a lot of time in mortars either prior to that, you know. Um, and I I was absolutely sold on our mortar platoon, certainly by the end of that pipeline, and as we were getting into Kenya and probably beyond Kenya, I genuinely think they were probably the most capable infantry mortar platoon out there. Yeah, you know, I can't make comparisons too much with you know other specializations that we had, whether it was Recce or Snipers, all fantastic or what they did. But when you really start to see the art of what the mortar platoon does, yeah, and how quickly they can get those barrels into action, and you know, and again remember we were light roll as well, and then pick that kid up and move somewhere else and have that effect again somewhere else, accurately, quickly, professionally. Um, the amount of and it helped that we were on the edge of Salisbury Plain as well, yeah, you know, in Bulford. Um, you know, they did a lot of cross-training also with the artillery as well, as I recall. And I I I I think those guys stack up against any other mortar platoon at that time, anywhere in the British Army. Yeah, I agree 100%.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:39

I think um we'll just touch on Kenya because I think I'm gonna we'll finish on. I've got a tricky question to ask you about being an OC, especially in a fire support I star company. But I think Kenya is definitely worth an odd. I mean, I I'd done so I did 10 trips to Africa in my time in the army, a varied mix of Wessex Storms, uh Wessex Storm, Ascari Thunders, Grand Prix, and various other stuff that I did out there, but the output of D Company, I think, on that exercise was just formidable, you know. And I was I think I broke the mould by being on the ground with the blokes, and I sort of cited myself centrally because the Casivac plan for a fire support company and those men and women that are forwarding OPs and screening and and doing all the all the all the fact-finding, I'd never it was always just brushed over, and I tried to sort of understand the art of getting myself out there, so I actually Casivak the blokes, and it was tricky because the frontage, I mean, I can't we're talking a good few kilometres, aren't we? Yeah, yeah, um, across them big sort of fingers in uh in Kenya. So I was learning as I was doing it, so it was a really it was a really good experience for me, but and I remember people couldn't get their head around the fact that your site majors extracted the casualty from the screen, but yeah, yeah, you know, and it was it was just and the only way I could do that was through those blokes being prepared and and up for that and being part of that plan, which is also a very different mindset to that of a rifle company, not talking ill of a rifle company, I've spent a lot of time in one, but it's a two-way street when you're organising an event like that because you need the men forward to suggest a plan, you then create a plan, then you execute the plan rather than you think you've got the answers. So it was really you know, I was learning as a site major, which was fantastic.

SPEAKER_02 1:24:28

Yeah, and you know what? Um, because I remember that very clearly, because uh again, you know, when you're deploying on an exercise like that, or indeed on operations, because you're you know you're you're there to train um as you fight, right? Yeah, so you know, I was in the um the um battle group headquarters in the CP, and uh um yes, part of the planning team, you know, battle group planning team, but also there to be effectively the iStar officer and to just make sure that those feeds that were coming in from the Recce screen, you know, and by which I don't just mean reconnaissance platoon or snipers, the javelin, you know, the the MFC alphas, whatever, you know, all those feeds trying to coordinate, you know, the maybe the non-organic assets, whether it's a UAV or something else, or a crude asset, you know, that's been chopped to you for that operation. That's all coming in, it's all getting fused where it needs to be fused, you know, with the incel and that decision support is going where it needs as well. Um, and I I just remember you know, I think this is probably one of the only times you and I maybe had words, and I know I was wrong. I was wrong about it, but at the time I felt well, it's like anything, you're on that you're on that exercise, and you're um it's it's sleep deprivation, isn't it? You know, remember everybody's like a zombie after a few days, um, and you know, tempers start to fray a little bit, and I I just remember thinking, why why isn't my bloody sergeant major here helping me out with all of this, you know? And um I think it was just because I was jealous because you were out on the ground, cammed up, quad bike, whatever it was. And and I think I remember thinking, you know, and I remember you and I had a had a bit of an exchange, and you made your point very strongly. I made my point quite strongly. We both kind of like went off into our respective corners and then came back, and I was like, right, fine, forget, forget all of that. Just let's just carry on as we are, because it was working, it was what it was painful, but it was working. Um, but definitely in hindsight, I think that as you say, you were also finding and feeling your way to how that was going to work, um, and in that kind of environment as well. And also, let's not forget that one of the things that we were experimenting with at that time was fight light. Yeah, that's right. Everybody was doing the fight light thing, you know, and it was all about quick, punchy resupply, you know, last mile resupply and stuff. Um, and it's that's easy to do-ish with a rifle company, much harder to do with a support company that's several kilometres forward, you know, doing that um that find function. Um, you know, and yeah, I my hands up, I was probably tired and a bit a bit moody, and I and I and I and you probably don't even remember it, but I I remember it very clearly because I think it's the only time in probably 13-14 months that you and I didn't quite quite click, and I I will say I was probably wrong.

SPEAKER_00 1:27:29

Very earnest of you. I I don't remember it. I think um, but yeah, I mean it's and I do know what again I forgot about the fight light thing. That was a and we were trying it as a risky time to trial that when we were getting assessed, but um we adapted really well to it, and and the more I think about it, I think we were asking because if you took me out of the equation, it would be down to the CQMS who had two four ton trucks, yeah, you know, couldn't move tactically. So that was his sole job, and I took on the Casivac, and that meant that the frontage screen was. Quite well overlapped. Yeah. Um, and it just happened to work. Yeah, everything was a bit of a gamble. I mean, you meant to make mistakes and try things in training, but to do it on an assessed exercise like that was a bit of a risky move, but we the blokes pulled out of the bag, didn't they? Yeah. We had a platoon of uh or a section of rifles, didn't we? Yeah, yeah. They were good good guys. Yes. Um, I do remember that. They were fantastic, actually.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:23

I think were they from they they also recce, were they?

SPEAKER_00 1:28:26

They were, yeah. A guy called uh was it James Watson, I took him through senior Brecken. Lovely, lovely bloke. He's out of the army now, but they gelled him really well with the Wrecky guys, and yeah, we just mopped up. But one of the highlights I remember of that is when uh we did a raid, it was outside of the assessment exercise. But we had the opportunity to do I think it was live, so Recce raided onto a trench complex.

SPEAKER_02 1:28:50

I remember because I I did all the templates for it. That's right, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:53

And then snipers did a coordinated shoot, fired them in, and they were firing at watermelons. Do you remember? Yes, yes. I'm gonna get some hate from the if they're listening now, but um, they learnt such a valuable point on the exercise. So they did a coordinated shoot where four teams fired onto I think it was eight targets, and not one of them watermelons was hit. Yeah, and I remember thinking, and I was fairly grumpy about it, but then I remember thinking, well, actually, they've just experienced issues of thermal crossover.

SPEAKER_01 1:29:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 1:29:21

What a great place, what an ideal time to learn it and experience it rather than be in an FUP in Helmand or somewhere.

SPEAKER_02 1:29:29

Well, I I I remember I mean I remember that very well because we were up at Archer's Post, right? Yeah, and it was great because obviously D Company were up there and we were kind of working independently. All of the the the platoons were were cracking their own training. Um, we had a little bit of issues with uh mortar ammo. Let's not get into that. Um we caught it. Let's just say let's just say that we we caught what was uh we sent it, yeah. Yeah, we definitely sent it. We sent it too much. That was the problem. Not my fault. Uh um, yeah, uh God, we're pretty to edit that. Um, but the the uh so what for me was I wanted all of the platoons that were doing their their thing, honing their skills, I wanted to bring them together and I wanted a combined company. This is what a D company can do when brought together. Um, even, dare I say, even without a rifle platoon within that or a rifle company within that context. So that's why we designed that that serial the way it was, which was a uh I think we'd put like a Recce and snipers um and javelin, you know, put them out into the screen. Yeah, there was some very high features there, and in the low ground, I think we built like a little village. Yeah, there was some uh scenario I think that we developed of um uh you know a belligerent force that was holding you know that ground, holding that valley or whatever with a trench system and command element in the village, and there were still you know people in the village, there were still you know civilians in the village and so on, and that's why we had those targets up. Like I say, Red, I think I sent someone down to the market to go and buy some watermelons. Right, yeah. So I wanted I I desperately wanted to see that effect. Um and um I remember uh they say we put more to fire in, Rekce did the raid. Unfortunately, we couldn't fire javelin live, but we had the the sort of TES targets for the javelin as well. Um, and obviously snipers, it was, I think it was a sniper-led option, wasn't it? It was almost like you know, as soon as H hour sun was coming up, starter pistols basically, yeah, yeah. And it was the coordinated shoot against the what was identified as the uh high value targets in the village, um, and just as Recy then did a break-in to do that raid cleared through the trenches and so on, and then we've melted back. Um yeah, it was fantastic. I remember it was it was it was one of the um yeah, yes, it didn't go 100% according to plan, what does you know? But I think it was a valuable um, as you say, particularly for snipers, a valuable sort of um learning point. Um and uh and the fact that we did it the way we did it, and the fact that those guys pulled that off, um, and and it was some pretty it was a pretty crunchy life, close in life firing as well. Yeah, it was, yeah, it was right on the cusp. Yeah, right on the cusp. Yeah, um, you know, and obviously it was all been signed off by the SASE, but even some of the platoon commands were a bit, you know. But I was like, nope, it'll be fine, it'll be fine, and it was. Um, and as you say, you know, going forward into the um the final phase of that that whole exercise where you're being assessed, um you know, the I just remember the um that that that screen, the the iStar screen, um that was forward, they they genuinely struggled to throw anything at us that that penetrated that screen that didn't go undetected. Um, and some of that was a coordination with the you know the the non-organic iStar as well, and you know, we'd get these tracks and we'd kind of hand off the tracks to the guys on the ground and so on and so forth. And I think it I think by then it had worked really well. And one of the things that worked well was how dynamic the platoons were on the ground, yeah, thinking for themselves, thinking on their feet, saying where we are is now now is no good, we need to move, yeah, you know, and and being given that freedom of manoeuvre. And that comes from trust, you know, and and it only comes from um faith not just in in the the character of the soldiers and the um the uh uh command and uh decision-making ability of those soldiers. That was very poorly articulated, but um, but that that comes from having taken them all through that training pipeline over the sort of 12 months prior, seeing that progression, seeing that growth, seeing the um I can only liken it really to you know when you're um you're a platoon commander in a rifle platoon and that you know you've got your attack dogs, you know, you've got your section commanders, you've got your sections, and it's letting them off the leash and having that trust to let them off the leash and do their business micromanagement. Yeah, you know, and we saw that that same I guess that same trust, that same mission command, I guess you could say, um, that freedom of action a little bit, um, which is a big thing, especially when you're a you know battle group or even a brigade level asset, you know, having that that trust to um manoeuvre um and read the battle, read the battle on the ground and having that that freedom to manoeuvre as required. And that that absolutely paid off. And we were I'm trying to remember who the op for were on that exercise. Um was it the Welsh? Was it a Welsh regiment? I can't remember. I can't remember, it might have been the Mercians, I can't remember. I I I genuinely can't remember, but whatever um we were we were all over them. We were absolutely all over them. Um and that I mean again that was that was very very neatly illustrated in the the final attack on that exercise um but you know for battlegroup attack onto that, remember that that feature? Yeah, and we just applied I mean I remember that actually because just to kind of step back and you know think about my my role within the battlegroup headquarters, I remember um we were all really tired, we were absolutely you know on our chin strap by the end of that exercise. And I remember talking to um uh Adam Wolf, you know battalion second in command, and uh he said, step outside the tent, come on, come on, watch me have a cigarette, and like I followed him out, and we you know he had a he had a cigarette and he just sort of looked at me and said, How are we how are we gonna crack this nut? You know, what what's you and you can tell that you just you just like we just we just need to come up with a plan to say the final push, this is the final push, how are we going to do this? And I think I remember saying to him, I said, Well, you know, from what I understand, we've got a one-to-one night fighting advantage in that every everyone in you know, every one of the blokes has got night viewing devices, whereas the op four is like one to four, yeah, you know. Um, so it makes sense that we do a a night attack. I don't mean a dawn attack, I mean a night attack. We use our night fighting advantage, and just from our our i star, we could see where the enemy trenches were lined up, you know, where their arcs, pretty much where their arcs were, and it was all pointing, I think, off to the west, because just about everybody on that final attack does the long attack in from the west, you know, and eventually rolls up that position. Yeah. I was like, what if we came from the east where it's a little bit shorter, sharper, you know, maybe a little bit cheekier in terms of the you know the climb up and what have you else, and you know that that became the plan as I recall, and um I remember flying over and doing a bit of a standoff recce with the CO in a gazelle helicopter, and um yeah, we spun up the plan and kind of the rest is history, and we rolled up that position so quickly, yeah. And even though the DS were trying to engineer um uh uh reinforcements or whatever, uh in fact, if I remember they tried to bring in reinforcements, but we all already had Javelin covering it. That's right, yeah, and they they were they were deliberately engineering failures on the javelin, yeah, you know, yeah, yeah. And uh I remember sitting in that that that that tent listening to it you know unfold, listening to them calling, you know, um fires, and it's like you know, weapon not firing, weapon not firing, all missile not firing, something like that, missile firing, and everyone's like and we obviously it was so childish, but it was just the relief because we if you've never experienced this of the people listening, if you've never experienced this kind of environment where you're just so tired, you've been on an exercise or an operation for so long, and you can see that that light at the end of the tunnel, and somebody's almost they're almost trying to palm you off, you know, um, from from from completing, and it just got to the stage where they just they just couldn't hold us back any longer, and yeah, they had to call index. I think we finished something like six hours early.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:37

Yeah, I've got eight hours in my head, eight hours. And everyone thought, well, that can't be it. Yeah, you know, yeah, I remember that. And I also remember one of the um and the the DS were trying to because we were so effective as a as a screen, they were saying that our fire missions had no effects on some of the vehicles coming forward. And I remember the rifles guy saying, All right, then what this vehicle's on the way, I'm just gonna go and ambush it. So the between two of the OPs, they threw a band of merry men together and did an ambush on the road textbook, yeah, shot them all with their rifles, and I think they nicked their vehicles if you remember. Oh, right, took them down the road a bit and just like ditched them. Yeah, and I was thinking, well, I wonder how that's gonna pan out. But then yeah, not sure I knew that, but yeah, fair enough. Bottom line is you've got a very effective screen here. Oh, it was great, it was really good. Yeah, such a and that was such a culminating experience. Yes, and the company, going back to your point earlier, we had the work to do to try and you know, we grew the cohesion again to see all of that unfold like it did. I think you know, we'd won them over, and they they just got it like ah right, you know. Um, the days of fire support grouping with four different soldiers from D Company in one vehicle that all had a trade now, and I think it it stemmed from that raid that we did where we that should have been an advert for a fire support company. It was so you know, yeah, work the target, kill the target, you know, and it was it was it was brilliant. Um, yeah, real, real highlight that was. And I think that was probably the back end of our time at D Company.

SPEAKER_02 1:40:03

Yes, it was. Um great way to finish. And yeah, it was a great way to finish. Um, and you know, we've been talking about D fire support company. Obviously, there was a whole battle group there, you know, um the battalion with support arms, and everybody on that that exercise screwed them up, um, and and delivered in spades for for the the command team. Um, and yeah, we had our part to play, but everybody played their part on that exercise, and and we we came away um not just with our heads held high but with a a pretty strong reputation as a as a as a battalion. Um and like you say, it in terms of you know a culmination, yeah, completely. Um and it's just very satisfying, isn't it? You know, when you you put that much time and effort, and I do mean effort, there's a lot of emotional energy poured into that as well. Lots of you know long nights, um, you know, before you even go on the exercise, and you know, and you're still back in barracks, lots of very long hours, long working hours, um, trying to pull all of this together because you know, it isn't just the training, it isn't just the um you know, the exercises you go on, or the platoon competitions, or company competitions, whatever else, or the the company fizz. They're they're all great, but there's also so much that goes on in the background, and I want to touch on this a little bit because this is where I mean you could you could take everything that we've said there, pretty much, and go, well, yeah, all right, that's what a rifle company does, just slightly differently, right? Um, but I think the thing for me was on top of all of that, you know, you and I we burn a lot of a lot of energy, and quite rightly so, on um a few individuals that were struggling, you know, and and some of those some of those guys made recoveries, some of those guys didn't. Um and there was some some pretty hard days, you know, um, where uh you know you're you're you kind of remember coming into your office or you know, whatever, and just shutting the door and going, honestly, I need I just need to just vent for a minute because there's just too much, there's just too much going on. You know, as as on top of everything that the battalion is asking us to do and on top of everything that we were trying to deliver, you know, which is what we're there for, there were all these, always the um out of left field, you know, um welfare or or discipline issues. Everybody gets them, I get it. But it just feels like they tend to be a little bit more complex when you're dealing with an older guy, a senior soldier, or even some of the junior NCOs. Yeah, you know, it isn't just one guy having a bit of a wobble, it's a family that's having a hard time. You know, it's it's real it's grown-up stuff, yeah, you know. It's not let's just nip down to the local courthouse because you know one of the lads has been arrested for you know being drunk and disorderly kind of nonsense. Um I mean there's some of that, but um, you know, uh, but it was some of it was quite deep and some of it was it really needed attention. And I remember I remember getting quite um what's the word? Partisan about it. And I I remember standing up in front of um, I think it was a Cambridgeshire Regiment um association um meeting or something like that, or or or church um Sunday, something like that. I'd been invited to, and I was towards the end of my time as a company commander, and I remember turning around to all of these, you know, some of the veterans and some of you know um reservists and what have you else uh that all turned up to this thing, all these people that that support our regiment. Um and I just remember saying, just remember, you know, the guys of the Cambridgeshire Company, they're fighting men, but they're also men and they uh they need your help because you know some of the stuff that they've experienced and some of the challenges that they're facing just in their day daily lives, you know, um sometimes just soldiering on is not the answer, you know, and sometimes hard decisions have to be made. I just remember I just remember trying to press that point onto the association because I sometimes used to feel like you'd go and stand up in front of the association members, um, and you're you're painting a glossy picture of you know what's going on. You're painting this kind of you know, the men of D Company have never been stronger, and you know, our successes are this, and all you're doing is giving them the highlights. And don't get me wrong, it's important to do that as well. But I I just felt at that particular time um it was important to just give them a slight dose of reality, you know, that after, well, like say, you know, after Herek 16, um, you know, and the multiple operations, whether it be Afghanistan or Iraq or you know, even back to Northern Ireland, you know, we had guys in that company that had done three, four highly kinetic tours comfortably. Um and and they were showing their they were show they were the the the toll that it was taken on them was starting to sort of show through. Yeah, and they were at least on I'd say on one or two individuals where they shouldn't have probably even been allowed to have deployed on Herek 16. Um you know, and you know, they came back uh a bit broken. Um and I know it's hard to talk about, it is hard to talk about, and again, I just sort of refer back to the um the title of this podcast that some of those guys were digging deep every day and fighting their own battles just to turn up to work and just to do what needed to be done, what was on the training programme and all the rest of it. And you you you were never quite sure um how how deep that effect was um and how how much they were struggling until you know something snapped. Um and I think we I think now the the British Army in general, the infantry in particular, and I'm almost positive, you know, that our regiment it doesn't just take this seriously, it it it features as a a day-to-day um consideration. You know, the the days of having you know stigma around mental health, you know, are hopefully and demonstrably long gone. Um but back then I think we were still we were still trying to figure it out. Yeah you know, there wasn't enough support. Um let let's let's just say it, you know, there wasn't enough support. Um and I don't mean within a battalion per se, I mean just wider military army support, um, you know, mental health professionals. It just I I remember I remember sort of thinking, um, how can we how can we solve this? And the short answer is well, you can't, you know. Um you've just got to you just got to try and do a little bit better every day. Yeah. And I I think there was a comment I made at the beginning of this about um you know when you were talking about me as an individual caring about the blokes and so on. It is a double-edged sword. Um I think I can't remember who I was talking to. I think he ran a local rehab unit. I think he I think he'd come out on a battalion ski trip, like the one bit of adventurous training I think I managed to get away for in the army. I went away skiing for a week with a battalion, and uh he I think he and I were sharing a room um and we had a conversation a little bit like this, and he said, Well, okay, so you know you're talking to the soldiers and you're talking to you know, in a lot of cases I'm talking to their their families as well, um, and we're getting them the help. He said, Who do you talk to? I was like, What do you mean? He said, Well, you you're you're you're you're paying out all of this emotional energy, you know, and it's it's coming from somewhere, right? But but it's got to be paid back in. And I hadn't really thought of it like that. And I think it was only at that point that I I became a bit more introspective and thought, yeah, I'm I'm actually pretty burnt out. Emotionally, physically, whatever, you know, I'm I'm actually pretty burnt out. Um and yeah, it took that conversation with the bloke I barely knew, you know, nothing to do with the battalion, to have that conversation for me to go, yeah, you know what, it's that the the well is getting pretty dry. And and I I I would say that you know, if there's any anyone listening to this that might be going into well, whether platoon command or company command, you know, I'm I'm not trying to paint a grim picture, but I'm trying to be um honest, you know, um, from my experiences, that you know, take some time for yourself as well. If you're an OC, if you're in any kind of command appointment, you know, yes, the the soldiers under your command are priority number one, you need to be priority number two. You do need to be a close second, and it's is it's very easy to just kind of, as you say, um, you know, uh turn up your collar and you know kind of soldier on, but at some point it's gonna come back and bite you, and the the last thing you want is for that to come back and bite you when it uh it's critical that you're you know in command of your own faculties, that you're making decisions, because sometimes those decisions clearly um are going to be very uh um need to be decisive and they need to be um they will have weight. Yeah, the decisions you make in command have weight, and you want to be you want to be as fit. For that fight, that mental fight is possible as well. So please take time for yourselves if you're going to be in those appointments. Yeah. Um, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:50:08

That's great advice, mate. I think um that's a good way to wind up. I think I think um yeah, no true word said. And I think I've been I having been out a little while now, I sort of uh I've I can come up for error and you sort of give yourself the time to think about these things. And I think you going back to your piece about the stigma, I think it's now still a little bit of a about, but I think it's so much easier to talk now, you know, to your mates, and it's an accepted conversation. It's just a recognised thing. Um and certainly having been a civy now for sorry, been a veteran now for uh coming on to six years, it's um and some of the people I know in my local village, some of the things they've got going on in life is incredible, and you just think how do they cope, you know, and they haven't had the ability to sort of build that mental resilience that we've been inadvertently given. I think it's uh and you're right, you're you're all one team, and if you're putting yourself in a position where you're burning yourself into the ground, and that ultimately is affecting the decisions you're making to your people in any form of life, then that's fundamentally wrong, you know. And I hate being a clicheist, but moral courage, you know, going forward, stepping forward, saying to someone, mate, like we used to, I just need to moan for five minutes. Yeah, you know, we do it here. I've done it in other jobs. Shut the door, let's moan. Feel great now. You know, that's just reinvigorated the engine for the day. But um, yeah, you're right. It's it's it's it's a great uh great bit of advice to people listening to this. So we've been talking for quite a while, and it's it's been it's littered with good bits of advice, and I think um and good dits as well, which is nice. But let's just uh I'd like to open up the floor to you and just see what advice you've got for young potential officers that are looking to join, not even so much the infantry, but just you know, your sort of lessons and leadership that you've earned over a 25-year career. Big question, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:52:13

It's a big question, isn't it? And um I I think interestingly, you know, what was true then when I was a young team commander, you know, yes, there are fundamentals that will um they'll be the same no matter what era. There is there are you know lessons in leadership. Um, some of them will be, you know, you could you could go back to the Crimea or whatever, and there would still be these fundamental tenets. And I know that some of the um the guys that you've had on this uh podcast recently have made some really great points. And I would say um if you're starting your journey towards being a uh an officer in the army, whether it's the infantry or not, you know, um research what you're going to do. You know, you will have heard me before talking about you know wanting to join the Royal Engineers, maybe being pushed in that direction, and then walking that back. Don't do what I did, you know, really research it. Don't just get fixated. Um, you know, the infantry might not be for you. The Royal Anglian Regiment might not be for you. You will find your tribe, and it's important that you find your tribe. Um, so absolutely research it. Talk to um as many people as you can that are serving, uh, as well as you know, veterans. You know, the likes of you and I now we're not current anymore. Uh, it's important to understand the army as as it is, not as it was, um, and and plan your journey. And the the the next part, the progression from that I would say is trust the process. Um, it can be a bit of a winding road, and it certainly was for me. It wasn't completely linear. Um, sometimes there's gonna be hurdles, sometimes you're gonna get injured, you know, um, sometimes you're going to uh struggle with some of the course content, you know, whether whether you're at Sandhurst or on you know your special to arm training, you know, platoon commands battle course, for instance. Some sometimes you're gonna have a bad day, and sometimes it's just not gonna work out the way you want it to work out, but just trust the process. Um, and remember that you know if you get through the Army Officer Selection Board, if you get to Sandhurst, if you get through Sandhurst and get through PCBC and turn up day one in your unit, you're meant to be there. Trust, trust the process, right? You're meant to be there. Um, there's an awful lot of time and effort and money, quite frankly, is being spent on finding you and bringing you to that point. So trust that that decision isn't been taken lightly and take confidence from that. Um, there's been lots of great advice, as I said, from some of your other uh guests on this podcast about you know, and some of it's like you know, the classic, you know, listen to platoon sergeant and so on and so forth. Yes, platoon sergeant, 100%, your junior NCOs 100%. Um but there will come a point, probably about six months, maybe within that first six months, your time in command, um, where something is going to happen, and not one of you will have a clue how to deal with it. And you'll all get together, you and your platoon sergeant, you and your junior NCOs, and you will literally say, Right, honestly, I wasn't I wasn't expecting that. What the hell do we do? Um, and you won't have the answer. And they probably also won't have the answer, but between you, you're gonna have to figure it out. Any decision is better than no decision. That's the next thing I would say. Trust the process and trust that you're capable of making the right choice. And it might not be the best choice, but as I said, any decision is better than no decision. Um, so just believe in yourself, you know, believe in that journey that's got you to that point. And the final thing I'll say is be yourself for God's sake. Don't try and pretend to be somebody else. The best piece of advice I was ever given before I even set through set foot through the gates of Sandhurst. It was a um, I think he was put former parachute regiment, um, and he'd commissioned into the uh AGC ETS, the education training service, and he was a major and he was a pretty he was actually a pretty tough guy. Um, I think he used to do jujitsu or something. He was a pretty nails bloke. And I remember he gave us this presentation and he sat down and PowerPoint, whatever, and he said, This is what an army officer should be. And the first slide was a picture of a you know young 22-year-old guy standing next to a I think it was an MG or something, you know. And an army officer should have a sports car, and he should have a Labrador, and he should have a flip phone, and he should have at least three different different coloured pairs of moleskin trousers, and so on, and so forth. And and after about you know, two minutes we realised it was all very tongue-in-cheek. And the the next slide that came up was what a load of old crap. And he just said, if you try to be someone you're not, your men will sniff it out immediately, yeah. And by men, clearly, I mean you know, your soldiers. Um, you know, your soldiers will sniff it out if you're a phony, and I have to say, sadly, during my time at Sandhurst, bearing in mind I'm going back 28 years ago now, nearly, um, there were a number of individuals who were I'd maybe known before going to Sandhurst. I'd met them elsewhere, whether it was in the OTC or something else, and I remember what they were like. I remember beer-swilling, kind of, you know, you know, earthy kind of guys, and then I've seen them at Sandhurst, and they're, you know, acting like they're already in the household cavalry, for instance. And I don't mean to cast dispersions over the household division, but you could see there was a definite pivot, even to the point where they were putting on um a different accent, let's say. And I remember thinking, what the hell's going on? I remember I even remember talking to one of them thinking, what are you doing, mate? And it's because he was 100%. I I want to go and join this exclusive, we'll call it exclusive organization, you know, certainly for that time. And he was trying to conform to a stereotype to improve his chances of being selected into that regiment. And he was he was putting on an act and everybody saw through it. Um so for God's sake, be yourself. Again, remember, trust the process, you're there because you are the right person for that job, you know. Um for God's sake, have fun. Yeah, God, have fun. It's a you know, don't just be in for the you know the the five minutes, you know. Think of it as a career, you know, attack it like it's a career and uh a marathon, not a sprint, you know. Have remember to have fun, especially in that part of your career.

SPEAKER_00 1:59:34

Yeah, I think fun lessons one three to three are held in Saracidons on PTV. Uh good lessons. You don't talk about the Saracidons, Martin. That's mega. Um we're gonna close there, but I think the backendy career and certainly what you're doing now in the in the drone world is is really interesting. So we would like to get you on for a second visit. Sure. I think the drone stuff's really relevant to what's going on now, and not only that, it's also fascinating, you know. Um, and I'm glad that you're doing well in that sphere, unsurprisingly. Um your advice today has been fantastic. Um, and I think it's a part of a series I want to go into now is is sort of talking about leadership in command in different roles, and I think a sort of support company, fire support group, i style group, however, it's packaged, is ultimately the challenges are all the same. You know, I think you the points I've taken away from today are you tend to be dealing, try and select him where you can. You you're dealing with a senior soldier that's probably been around a bit, so again, it brings it a whole other leadership challenges. Certainly, I'd love to find you try a piece. I've heard that a lot recently, but it's um the more and more I hear it, the more I agree with it. Uh, and then ultimately, any decision you make is better than no decision, which I think is true of anything. Um, it fits all across the army, I think. Um, and to some extent in Simi Street. So thanks for your time, mate. It's been really good seeing you again. Yeah, uh, and I'm sure there's people out there that will take a lot away for this, uh, and we'll get you on for a second shot of the title. That'll be my pleasure, thank you. Reshow, I think we call that. And I'll get more Jaffa cakes because what you haven't seen is we've gone through a box of Jaffa cakes uh during this meeting. You've eaten most of them all being polite. You've eaten most of them, mate. Yeah, true. All right, thanks, mate, and I'll see you soon. Nice one.