H asks about Afghanistan. A few of his Regiment friends paid visits to the country in the 1980s, he says, training Afghan mujaheddin to use the Stinger missile. They even brought a few Afghans to Scotland to train them in guerrilla tactics and advanced communications. From a drab building behind Victoria station one or two others helped to dream up exotic operations to hinder the Soviets. But he doesn’t know much else about the place, he confesses.
I try to convey the fondness, despite all the privations and difficulties of conflict, that I feel for the place and its people. I’ve come to respect the Afghans for their bravery and hardiness, and I’m relieved when H says he felt the same mixture of sympathy and respect for the tribesmen he trained and fought alongside in Oman. From my wallet I pull a photograph taken on my very first trip to Afghanistan, and H points to the bearded Afghan posing next to me with an AK-47 assault rifle held proudly across his chest.
‘Looks like a fellow in my troop,’ he says, grinning.
He asks about politics too. I say the present conflict there can be traced back to the Soviet occupation of the country throughout the 1980s. The Soviets had hoped to establish a loyal communist regime in Afghanistan, calculating that the poorest people in all Asia would be quickly subdued. Things went badly from the start. There was widespread armed resistance to the Soviet presence, and their total failure to win popular support from the rural population was equalled by their poor strategy. Pinned down in their bases and controlling only the cities and main roads, Soviet soldiers were rarely able to move freely about the country, relying on airpower and heavily armoured operations to bludgeon their enemies into submission. There was no attempt to win the hearts and minds of a deeply traditional and religious people, who had been fighting – and beating – invaders since the beginning of time.
‘Mindset,’ says H quietly, nodding. ‘You can’t win a war without understanding the mindset.’
For ten years the Soviets fought an increasingly brutal and unsuccessful conflict, killing as many as a million Afghans in the process. They withdrew in 1989, leaving an ailing communist government in a shattered nation, which further disintegrated as rival mujaheddin factions fought each other for control. American support for the Afghans evaporated in the wake of the Soviet exodus, and in the lawless provinces of the south the Taliban were born a few years later, supported increasingly by extremists from abroad. They took Kabul in 1996 and soon imposed their cruelly medieval outlook on almost the entire country. Only a shrinking province in the north controlled by Massoud continued to resist their rule.
The counter-insurgency campaign in Oman, though on a much smaller scale, made an instructive contrast. The Regiment had made it a priority to understand the local culture, realising from the outset that without local support they could never hope to defeat the enemy. The strategic emphasis was on winning allies rather than killing the enemy, and on avoiding the death of civilians at any cost. When Adoo defectors surrendered to the government side they were neither imprisoned nor even interrogated, but gently persuaded to see the logic of fighting for a progressive sultan rather than the brutal hierarchy of their communist sponsors.
‘When we found a village we wanted to keep the Adoo out of,’ says H, ‘we’d build a well and a clinic, and a school if they needed it. And we’d never have any trouble from it again. Simple, but it worked.’
‘Imagine we’d done the same thing in Afghanistan in the 90s,’ I say. ‘The Taliban would never have got the platform they have now.’
‘Probably some accountant in the Foreign Office said it was too expensive,’ he replies.
H asks how soon I can come to Hereford. As soon as he wants, I say. He suggests we meet in two days’ time, and I stay with him until the end of the week. He gives me his phone number and directions to his home, and advises me to memorise them rather than write them down. I’ll need boots, he says, outdoor gear, and a Bergen. He doesn’t use the word rucksack.
‘We’ll go for some nice tabs, and work on some security SOPs,’ he says. It’s strange to hear army-speak again. A tab is a tactical advance to battle. Basically a long walk. SOP means standard operating procedure.
‘The SOPs are common sense mostly, but we’ll need to get them in our system,’ says H. ‘What sort of weapons do they use out there?’
‘Anyone who’s anyone has an AK-47,’ I say, half surprised he doesn’t already know. ‘Russian, Egyptian and Chinese versions mostly. There’s a few AK-74s around, but you don’t see many.’ The AK-74 is the smaller-calibre short-barrelled version of the AK-47, a prestige weapon carried by a number of distinguished commanders. There is no point in mentioning the endless variety of heavier weapons in use in the country.
‘Surprise, surprise. What about shorts?’
‘Makarov, I suppose.’ This is the Soviet-designed 9-millimetre pistol most often seen in Afghanistan. I’d nearly bought one for myself when I’d been there, but was dissuaded by my Afghan friend and driver, who said a pistol was ineffective. He carried a grenade with an extra-short fuse in his pocket instead.
‘Alright. We’ll brush up on weapons,’ says H, ‘and you can teach me about mines. I’ll see what other kit I can get out of the Kremlin. Are you fit?’
‘Been fitter.’
‘Try five K a day in under half an hour and we’ll take it from there.’ That sounds ominous. I can’t remember the last time I ran five kilometres, but all of a sudden I’m looking forward to the discipline.
‘Right,’ says H, glancing at his watch. ‘Got to get back to the memsahib.’
We walk back to the house. It starts to rain. H won’t come in again, he says. He puts up his collar, wishes me luck and walks to the end of the driveway and out towards his car. I head back inside and change into my running gear.
Then I stretch out on the sofa and fall asleep.
6
I no longer recall the exact sequence of the training that begins that week. It’s dark and drizzling when I leave for Hereford on the Tuesday morning. The sky begins to lighten only as I turn west on the M50, and soon the Malverns loom up on my right. An hour later, on the outskirts of a small village to the north-west of Hereford, I turn off a narrow lane and pull up facing a wooden front gate. Across a tended gravel driveway stands a small black and white timbered house typical of the county. An ageing dark blue Range Rover is parked in front of a detached garage.
A barking terrier runs up, and H appears moments later with an eager wave, opens the gate and invites me inside for coffee, defying once again my naive impression of the SAS soldier as a hard-hearted killer. In the front hallway of his home is a large framed photograph of H, looking youthful and wearing the unmistakable sand-coloured beret with the flaming-dagger badge. I imagine it lit up in the beam of a burglar’s torch, the muttered curses and the swift retreat.
‘Good man,’ says H, noticing that I’m already wearing my boots. ‘How’s the running coming along?’
‘Fine,’ I lie. I’ve started a five-K routine, but not without a few pauses on the way. Five kilometres seems like a long distance until you’re used to it. Boredom and the body’s resistance make it seem like about a hundred. My legs aren’t the problem. The protest comes from my lungs. No matter how fit I’ve been in the past, I’ve always hated long-distance running. ‘I’m a bit slow,’ I concede, feeling uncomfortable with the deceit, ‘but fine.’
‘Well, alright. You work on it. Come and have a look at the route, then we’ll walk and talk.’ He’s put a large-scale Ordnance Survey map of the Brecon Beacons, laminated in soft plastic film, on the kitchen sideboard. ‘We’ll start here,’ he says, pointing to a small building at the edge of a patch of forest just off the A470 in the heart of the Beacons, ‘at the Storey Arms.’ To the north of the road the light-brown contour lines thicken like a fingerprint.