It was like being in an enemy pen, except the guards wore white coats. I’d been told there was even an escape committee – the boys in the pathology lab. They’d test my blood every day and wouldn’t let me go under the wire until my LFT count was down to normal.
I came in on a Thursday. The first few days would be observation. I knew what that meant. I knew all the tricks of the interrogation trade. They’d put me under stress by making sure I was completely bored. Completely deprived of all my normal activities and pleasures. Then they’d monitor me to see if I was showing any signs of stress or unusual behaviour: apprehension, restlessness, weird tendencies, withdrawal symptoms. Then, after they’d softened me up, the advanced sentence, the brainwashing would begin.
The door opened and a white-coated nurse came in. He looked at me very closely. Not a flicker of emotion registered on his face. He said nothing. I wondered whether he was one of them, part of the system. I imagined him making mental notes, assessing the situation in detaiclass="underline" where I was in the room, whether I’d arranged my things, my general demeanour and my facial expression. He put a small, brown tray on the bedside table, glanced at the pin-up, then at me. I wondered if this had been my first mistake. There was a plastic beaker of water on the tray and two torpedo-shaped pills, bright green at one end, pink at the other. ‘Take both of them,’ was all the orderly said as he quickly retreated, locking the door behind him.
I decided to go along with the game at this stage, play it by their rules. They’d know anyway from the urine samples whether I’d taken the pills or not. I picked up one of the torpedoes, held it up to the light and rolled it between my finger and thumb. I wondered why they’d chosen these particular pills, what mind-bending drug was concealed in the thousands of tiny balls cascading around inside the coloured cases. I wondered what ragged phantoms would come springing out to haunt me from deep within my psyche after being locked away for all these years. I wondered who ‘they’ were, the faceless doctors I’d yet to meet. Would they be distant and calculating like the orderly, or would they be friendly and sympathetic, creep up on me and catch me with my guard down, trick me into trusting them? Was that the deadly ambush that awaited me? Sod it! Who dares wins! Here’s to Queen and country… I grabbed both the pills and gulped them down. A faint smile of steely defiance curled on my lips.
Outside, the wind grew stronger and the dark clouds jostled and thickened. Scuds of rain crackled against the window with increasing frequency. Suddenly, the pregnant clouds burst their waters and spawned tiny, watery serpents which slithered down the glass panes, frantically seeking the sanctuary of some unseen pool below.
I sank onto the bed and closed my eyes. ‘You’re a time bomb, trooper, a time bomb just waiting to explode.’ I tried to shake the Colonel out of my head. Then, from nowhere, a confusion of pictures burst into my mind. A kaleidoscope of scenes from fourteen years of remote battles and secret operations spun in front of me. It was just like the high-speed slide show of farms, villages, towns and cities that had flashed before my eyes as I’d gazed blankly out of the car window driving down the M4 from Hereford to London. Back through time my mind slid on a crazy helter-skelter ride: the Falklands War, the Embassy siege, Hong Kong, Northern Ireland, the battle of Mirbat, Operation Jaguar.
Before I knew it, the sharp odour of cordite was stinging my nostrils again. The hair on the back of my neck prickled as I heard again the distinctive thwack of a bullet hitting bone and flesh. I shuddered at the banshee-screams of the wounded, grown men reduced to grovelling, frightened children calling unashamedly for their mothers, amid the roar of battle – shrieks of terror whose echoes would resound forever.
Round and round I tumbled, freefalling through the whirling pictures. Then, suddenly, I was sucked through the black hole at the centre of the spinning kaleidoscope.
2
Initiation
‘Good morning, gentlemen, welcome to Bradbury Lines.’
It was spring 1970. A dozen rows of hopeful recruits sat facing the Colonel, 135 of us in all. The Colonel smiled a cold half-smile. At his station in life, he had left far behind the feelings of trepidation that we were now all experiencing at the start of this new venture. He stood in front of us on the stage of the training-wing theatre, a slightly weatherbeaten figure dressed in an old camouflage windproof and a pair of faded OG trousers. Even the famous beret looked a little discoloured. He was leaning on the lecturing stand, smoking an old roll-up and flicking the ash into an empty pyrotechnic container. He had the appearance of a man who was used to roughing it, but the unruly look went only as far as his dress. His hard, chiselled features and steady unflinching gaze told a different story, the story of a man who knew his mind with clinical precision.
‘You have a difficult task ahead of you. First, three weeks of rigorous selection, during which time we subject you to what we colloquially and, I might add, very appropriately refer to as Sickener 1 and Sickener 2. Then, fourteen weeks of continuation training, a parachute course, and finally combat survival training. Nearly twenty-six weeks of exhaustive scrutiny. Half a year of uncertainty. You could get your marching orders at any point along the way – usually when you least expect it. We’ve even been known to fail someone on their very last day!’
A ripple of unease and a hardening of resolve flickered through the assembled rows.
‘The SAS is only as effective as the people in it. Think about that. It’s a crucial point. A field commander might devise a perfect plan for winning a battle, but without strong, co-ordinated support from the men on the ground, all would be lost.’
The Colonel’s eyes penetratingly scanned the intent faces of his audience.
‘It was said of Lord Nelson that his whole fleet acted as if they were one great marine body directed by a single intelligence. What we are looking for over the next few weeks are men to join our regimental body, to become one with us. But not just any men. They’ve got to be the right men, special men. Men with initiative, stamina, intelligence, patience and not least a sense of humour. In Korea, the British Army had thousands fighting thousands. With the SAS it’s different. We are a specialist group within the British Army. We are special because we operate in small groups and we move alone. We are not looking for team players. What we want is the individualist, the man who can survive on his own but who has the self-discipline to work as part of a team.’
I gazed abstractedly at the Colonel, taking in the details of his clothing. I noticed the winged-dagger badge sewn onto his beret. I fixed my eyes with envy and determination on that badge, and for a moment I was mesmerized as his head moved in rhythm with his speech.
The Colonel flicked the ash off his roll-up and his eyes took on a hardened look. ‘There’s always been war and there always will be war. Look at any decade, it’s always the same: 1961 Kuwait, 1962 Brunei, ’63 Borneo, ’64 East Africa, ’67 Aden, ’68 Belfast. It’s an endless litany. When the social workers run out, someone’s got to wave the big stick. When society’s body is ill, someone’s got to take care of it. Whether it’s the ice-laden mountains or the scorching deserts, the steaming jungles or the stinking souks, the windswept moorlands or the sinister streets, we’ll be there. Terrorists, guerrillas, insurgents, freedom fighters, call them what you will, we’ll be there.