Midday. I’d been going eight hours and I reckoned I was still less than halfway round the course. The sun was extraordinarily hot for the time of year. Just our fucking luck, I thought, on the very day we could have done with some cloud cover and a cool breeze. As I paused momentarily to get my bearing, my legs began to give way under the load of the bergen. My lungs felt raw, as if someone had thrust their fist down my throat and ripped a layer of skin off them. My facial expression became set in a glazed stare. ‘What the fuck am I doing this for?’ I asked myself. Do I really want to suffer like this? No answer came back. I scanned my brain but could find no logic with which to talk myself into any more pain.
I mopped my brow with my sleeve. ‘It’s worst than the fucking desert, this,’ I murmured to myself. At the mention of the desert, my breath suddenly got quicker and I felt a stirring deep within my guts. I stared into the heat haze liquefying the ridge up ahead. But it wasn’t the ridge I saw. Through the shimmering haze emerged gradually the sight that had haunted me for the last two years: Silent Valley, the neat rows of white headstones gleaming reproachfully in the fierce desert sun of Aden; the final RV of mates in the Royal Engineers who’d worked alongside me to keep the machinery of the British Army in tiptop condition so that the infantry could keep up the fight against the Communists and prevent them from overrunning Aden.
I’d joined the Royal Engineers intending only to stay long enough to learn a trade that I could then take back with me to Civvy Street. I wanted it all nice and quiet, none of the Boy’s Own heroics for me. Then Aden turned my life upside-down. I’d been there only two months when the British Army was slung out of Aden by the Commies. What use all the constant bullshit and training? I couldn’t believe it. We were loading our kit, we were surrendering, jacking, sold down the river by the politicians. Men had died for this; what the hell were they giving it all away for? Could they not see the huge strategic importance of Aden, dominating the entrance to the Red Sea and the Suez Canal? What the fuck was going on? I was twenty-one and didn’t have a clue. I knew nothing about politics. All I knew was that it was my first campaign and we were pulling out. In my book it was abject surrender, a personal insult.
In my naivety, I had thought that after Aden we would return to the UK. Instead we found ourselves dumped in RAF Sharjah, another shithole. We spent nine months in 1968 building roads, helipads and landing strips in the area. For me it was nine months of questioning, nine months of restless soul-searching, until finally I seized my chance the day I saw on the notice board the DCI, the monthly British Army bulletin: ‘Wanted: men of exceptional morale and motivation for highrisk operations and exercises world-wide. Contact 22 SAS.’ I knew absolutely nothing about 22 SAS. Nor did any of my mates. Nobody had even heard of them. I was intrigued even more; my appetite was whetted. It had to be better than building airstrips in the desert. That was thirsty work, but my thirst for action and revenge was even greater.
That was it – revenge. That’s what had kept me going through the pain barriers these last three weeks. I’d heard vague rumours throughout selection of a stepping-up of Communist activity in the Middle East, and that moves were afoot to do something about it. It all suddenly made sense. Here was my chance to get my own back on the CTs after that humiliating withdrawal. My vision cleared. I took a deep breath, hoisted my bergen higher and pushed on, my body refuelled by the recollections that had drifted through my mind.
I kept a steady mechanical pace going through the rest of the afternoon and early evening, pausing only for water and the occasional Mars bar. My luck held and I got round in under twenty hours. I had cracked the greatest physical challenge of my life. Of the thirty-seven runners who had set off from Talybont at first light, only seventeen of us made it, seventeen out of the original 135 who had put themselves forward for selection. With extreme relief, I removed my 55lb bergen, eased it into the back of the four-tonner and, with rifle in hand, struggled up the tailgate, crawled into a corner and collapsed into a merciful sleep.
Back at training-wing basha, I was told to take twenty-four hours’ rest and recuperation. I needed no second bidding after my extended ordeal. I’d overcome three weeks of discomfort, despair and desolation. I’d finished the course – but whether or not I’d passed was another matter. The tension grew as the hours ticked by. Hardly anyone spoke; the die was cast. The frustration at not being able to do any more, not being able to improve on my performance in any way, was enormous. It was a highly nervous trainee who was summoned to training wing the next day to see the OC. I stood before him like an exhausted gladiator looking up at Caesar’s podium. Which way would the thumb point – up or down? When he spoke, only one word pierced through my battered brain.
5
From Hereford to the Jebel Massif
Badged!
The prize was mine. After passing initial selection and spending five more months doing exhaustive tests, I became the proud owner of the famous beret and SAS wings. I was now a member of the Praetorian Guard! Somehow I had come through the continuation training unscathed: weapons, explosives and first-aid training; language and initiative tests; a 1,000-yard swim in the OGs; jungle training and survival; and resistance-to-interrogation training. I was on the road back after the humiliation of Aden. As I reached the door on my way out of training-wing basha I looked up at the sign above the exit: ‘For many are called but few are chosen’. A few years later, Lofty Wiseman would amend this to read, ‘Death is nature’s way of telling you that you’ve failed selection’.
I headed towards the Sabre Squadron lines. I had been posted to B Squadron along with two other trainees called, in characteristically colourful fashion, Clutch-plate and The Honk. The latter looked like a working-class Charles Bronson. Of my original patrol, Tommo had long been back in his parent regiment; Geordie had put himself out of the running by breaking both his ankles jumping from a bedroom window to escape a jealous husband; while Jim had sailed through in a seemingly effortless manner to be posted to G Squadron, having survived six months of selection as he had survived his six years down the pits. Out of the original 135, only a handful were left to be spread between the four Sabre Squadrons. As Tim had forewarned, it had been more of a rejection process than a selection process.
We entered B Squadron office and turned left into the squadron interest room. The first thing about the room that caught my attention was the sight of a huge buffalo head, complete with horns, high up on the wall at the end of the room. Some trophy, I thought. The unfortunate beast must have strayed onto the live firing range. The rest of the walls were covered with memorabilia from campaigns going right back to Malaya in the early 1950s: photographs, certificates, old ammunition belts, bits of webbing equipment – it looked like a military museum.