I don’t know about PTSD but PRAC (Post-Regimental AntiClimax) can be just as big a problem. That’s why I needed to keep active, to keep involved with projects and that’s why being laid up on crutches was such a ballache. Too much time to think. Too much time for the guns to roar in my mind. I couldn’t let it get to me, though. Self-discipline, that’s what I needed. I drew on my military training to pull me through, those dark days in the Woolwich hospital and those first days out of the Army when I felt cut adrift from the world I knew and loved. I knew that I was alone. I had only myself to rely on to ensure that I didn’t go the way of Nish and others like him. Andy McNab had the right idea. He’d seen his fair share of action and he states to this day, ‘I only ever think about the next three hours. Today’s today. If it works, it works. If it doesn’t, it doesn’t. You control what you can and the rest, fuck it!’
27
On the Ragged Edge
There was nothing to cling to apart from my deep-down stubbornness. Nil Carborundum – don’t let the buggers grind you down. Somehow, I had to pull myself out of this dark pit I’d fallen into.
I compiled a hit-list of firms on the circuit and contacted them all. Zilch. Word had well and truly got round. There was nothing for it but to try to set up my own network of contacts. Being banned from the SAS, I could no longer get the mainstream jobs on the established circuit. I had to completely change my outlook, force myself to ring round for the fringe jobs that were often not only dubious to the point of being only borderline legal, but were considerably less well paid as well. When at last one of my calls was returned I was mightily relieved. A spark of daylight at last! Then my heart sank. I thought it was some kind of cruel wind-up.
‘I’ve got a bit of work for you, Pete, if you’re interested.’
‘You bet.’
‘A bit of BG work. This is the most intelligent principal you’ll ever have looked after.’
‘You’ve got me going now. What’s the principal’s name?’
‘Flipper.’
‘Flipper? Bit of an odd name that.’
‘Not for a dolphin it isn’t.’
‘A dolphin? A bloody dolphin?’
‘Very intelligent creatures, dolphins.’
‘Yeah, but are you having a laugh? Bodyguard a dolphin?’
‘Well, not bodyguard exactly…’
My caller went on to detail the task in hand. Windsor Safari Park had hit the rocks and gone into receivership. We heard all the staff were on the fiddle and were raking off a fortune because of the lax supervision. So some mates and I went down and kicked everyone out, including the gate and security staff.
The park had managed to rehome all its animals apart from one baby dolphin. The animal rights activists said it was cruel to keep it in captivity in a small pool, and that it was suffering. They threatened to break in and kill it, put it out of its misery. But in the event they took one look at us guys and decided against it, and eventually Winsor Safari Park managed to find a home for its dolphin. The park’s still there, now called Legoland Windsor. So everyone lived happily ever after. Apart from me.
My career went downhill from there. My career was really bumping along the bottom. I had a string of similar jobs: safeguarding salmon from poachers on the River Dee in Scotland; protecting pheasants against gangs of thieves on the Lichfield Estate near Whitchurch in Hampshire; watching over beagles, rats and guinea pigs when animal rights activists planned to raid Ledbury Animal Testing Station; preventing elvers on the River Wye being stolen and spirited away in the dead of night to end up on the tables of rich Japanese businessmen. It was work, Jim, but not as we knew it. Champagne and diamonds this most definitely was not. But at least I was getting paid. That’s always the bottom line.
Just when I thought it couldn’t get any worse, it did. I was up against pond life of a different kind. Hippies! Every year at the summer solstice, druids flock to Stonehenge. The druids say that they can trace their roots back 4,000 years and claim it’s their birthright to touch the stones. During the Seventies and through to the mid-Eighties they’d been allowed to have a free festival there every year at the solstice. In 1985, for some reason, the police and English Heritage decided to put an end to the festival gatherings.
Despite the ban, a large convoy of New Age travellers – calling themselves the Peace Convoy – headed for the stones. A four-mile exclusion zone was set up, the police tipping lorry-loads of gravel across the roads to prevent access. The police’s infamous Special Patrol Group was deployed, and after a standoff lasting several tense hours the shit really hit the fan. The Special Patrol Group went in with all guns blazing, beating people with truncheons and smashing their vehicles with sledgehammers. It was ridiculously hard. There were women and children caught up in the battle, whole families arrested and separated, children locked up away from their parents. A court case later found the police guilty of wrongful arrest, assault and criminal damage. Ever since then at the solstice, the stones have been roped off and guarded.
At the solstice of 1995, the authorities were expecting trouble – Combat 18 types had taken to beating up the festival-goers at Stonehenge. That June was also the tenth anniversary of the Special Patrol Group’s notorious deployment and the police didn’t want to know. So the authorities hired us – all ex-SAS veterans, with combat experience stretching across three continents and two decades – to protect some stones from some hippies and some hippies from some thugs. My days guarding Flipper were starting to look like a career highlight.
The trouble all kicked off on the eve of the summer solstice. We had set up Hippie Control in the Stonehenge car park, which was nearly a quarter of a mile north of Stonehenge itself. Big Fred the Fijian, a good friend of Laba and Tak, was the team leader. The rest of us were ex-B and G Squadron. The most impressive guy there was John Barker (JB), ex-G Squadron. Tall, muscular, and dressed in a black karate suit, he could have quite easily starred in a remake of The Terminator. I looked at my watch. Nearly time to go on stag over at the stones. Suddenly something very colourful caught my eye. A double-decker London bus pulled into the car park and rolled to a halt. It was covered in psychedelic paintings that would have put John Lennon’s Rolls-Royce to shame and the occupants looked like leftovers from Woodstock. ‘Fucking amazing! I’m back in the Swinging Sixties,’ I thought to myself as I left the car park.
I checked my radio was on and began my patrol round the stones. I stopped for a breather over to the south-east of the circle. I was stood marvelling at the construction and wondering how the fuck they managed to get those huge stones into position, when a glint of sun on glass caught my eye.
Looking south-east from Stonehenge, the ground dropped away towards the A303. Once across the road, the land formed a small hill with a wood on top. The horizon was about a thousand yards away. Through the mini-binocs I could see figures forming up out of the wood and making their way downhill. I knew instinctively this was the thugs’ main assault group. I spoke into the radio, ‘Contact, contact. The bus is a distraction. I repeat. The bus is a distraction. Deploy immediately to the south-east of the stones. Rent-a-crowd is coming in through the back door.’
‘Roger that,’ said Big Fred the Fijian. Within minutes the guys had arrived, Big Fred and JB leading. We did a quick appreciation of the situation and all came to the same conclusion. We shook out in extended line, Stonehenge behind us, and awaited the arrival of the opposition.