Victor Two: Inside Iraq: the Crucial SAS Mission

Prologue

It was 0200hrs. We were tasked with destroying an Iraqi communications centre. Thirty-four members of the SAS against – unknown to us – a force of three hunded Iraqis.

I had already opened the bidding by taking on an Iraqi conscript at close range; it was either him or me – the Iraqi lost. He had been dead for three minutes before the Iraqi comms station came alive.

As we moved quickly away from the desert installation, I saw a group of figures 20 metres away, standing on top of the sand dune, silhouetted against the dark velvet of the desert night.

‘Who the fuck are they?’ I whispered.

‘It’s okay, they’re only civvies,’ someone said.

Dead wrong. The silhouettes suddenly opened fire on us and all hell broke loose. Nearby, Slugger dropped to the ground as the vortex of a high velocity Iraqi round, passed through his trouser leg. Matt, Ian and I reached the side of the Mark 19 wagon and quickly put the vehicle between the Iraqis and ourselves. To my left the roar of an engine drew my attention to the fact that one of our wagons was taking off. Where the fuck’s he going? I thought to myself. We’re in the middle of a fire-fight.

But suddenly I had more important things to think about. Matt and Ian stood by the truck tailgate putting down fire on the enemy. I jumped up on the wagon, pointed at the Iraqis and shouted, ‘Leslie, get some fucking fire down!’

Leslie started firing blindly into space, totally in the wrong direction.

‘You fucking idiot!’ I grabbed hold of the weapon and turned it towards the enemy, ‘There! Over there!’ I yelled at him.

I jumped off the truck and joined Matt and Ian at the rear of the wagon, from where all three of us fired for all we were worth towards the enemy position. By this time the rate of the incoming Iraqi fire had increased dramatically, but we tried desperately to stand our ground. Looking to my left, I saw more of our lads putting down fire.

‘Where’s Brian?’ I shouted.

‘He’s fucked off in a wagon,’ someone yelled.

As soon as the shooting started, Brian had dived into the front of the nearest wagon and screamed at the driver to get the fuck out of there. One or two other men had also managed to jump on the back as it raced off into the darkness, leaving the rest of us behind.

1

Tough Beginnings

Killing is a serious business. I should know, because it is what I do for a living – or did until recently. I have often wondered about the effect of the sudden and violent extinguishing of life on the rest of us, and on the universe in general. We kill animals bred for food; we also hunt and kill rats, rabbits and other creatures classed as vermin – and we do it without thinking. The serious part starts when man kills his fellow men. Sometimes we can square our conscience here too: Jews, Palestinians, and, of late, Iraqis have all been regarded in certain quarters as the human equivalent of vermin.

It is claimed that over a hundred thousand Iraqi soldiers died in the Gulf War. Many died, and were buried at the same time, during the relentless bombing of their trenches by the Coalition air forces. Many others met their end in the retreat from Kuwait city, as tanks and military trucks intermingled with civilian vehicles. But when the Coalition war machine found them, hell swiftly followed: not the end of a useful life; not the comfort of an aged death surrounded by family members; but the burning flesh, insane screaming and white-hot metal delivered by modern weaponry. We of the Coalition rejoiced, having mentally dehumanised these young Iraqi soldiers. To us that long convoy winding along the road to Basra, staggering under the weight of loot extracted from Kuwaiti citizens, was just a single poisonous snake which we had beheaded with smart bombs, fired from an untouchable distance. But what we had really killed were students, peasant farmers, husbands and fathers. They were men who would be mourned by those left behind, men who had been loved, men who had lived their lives with dignity, men who had now inhaled the burning air and felt the pain of seared flesh.

Five years on, and the memory is still there. Whether rightly or wrongly, we should not kill without feeling guilt. As I watch my own dying son suffer, perhaps those hundred thousand voices are echoing through the universe and blaming me, for I am not without guilt.

I killed the first Iraqi of the ground war during the Gulf conflict. This book tells my remarkable story, and the truth about what really happened to an SAS fighting patrol deep behind the lines. Just getting into Iraq proved to be more of a comedy than a military operation. Then we were instructed to search out Scud missiles. It was a vital mission, for it was the only way the Americans could persuade the Israelis to stay out of the conflict and save the delicate balance of the Coalition.

As the Scud threat lessened, new orders were received, this time to assault the Iraqi microwave station known as Victor Two. It was a daring raid, claimed to be the largest single action undertaken by special forces inside Iraq. One half-squadron of SAS men were committed to the operation, which required both daring and stealth. Despite the staged attack that we had carefully planned, when the time came we just drove our heavily armed fighting column straight into the position. After placing the explosive charges under the very noses of the Iraqis we made to leave. Then all hell broke loose. In the ensuing fire-fight we took on odds of thirty to one before eventually breaking out. With the explosive charges echoing in our rear, the whole column disappeared into the darkness once more.

You might think we should have come home as heroes, but, as with all SAS operations, anonymity followed. And my personal life was never to be the same again. I returned to a broken marriage and a dying son. I am far from perfect, and I admit I have been unfaithful; still, I love my two boys and I loved my job. But trying to hold together both my professional and personal life created unbearable pressures. My son Matthew has muscular dystrophy, and his health is steadily declining. Now, at eighteen, it is just a matter of time. Eventually I looked for happiness in a second marriage, but that too ended in disaster. The SAS was indifferent and did little to help.

So in the dark hours when most of you are asleep, I lie awake and the tears roll down my cheeks. When I do sleep, I have nightmares. Matthew’s face replaces that of a dead Iraqi soldier, as if my own violent actions are somehow responsible for his illness. Then with the dawn I have to face the world once more. So this is not just the story of another SAS soldier – it is about a man who has been to the very edge of life, and who for the past five years has faltered on the brink. I cannot step back, not until the day Matthew dies.

My name is Peter, but everyone calls me Yorky. I got the name not because I eat a lot of chocolate, but because I come from Yorkshire. I was born in Leeds in 1961. Three days after my birth my mother developed thrombosis, and it was several weeks before she and I could go home to our family’s modest two-up, one-down terraced house with its outside toilet. But after only three days she suffered a heart attack and was rushed back to hospital. One week later, on Friday, 29 November 1961, Mum died. She was just twenty-nine.

At this terrible time for everyone the question of what was to happen to my two sisters, then two and four, and their new baby brother had to be resolved. At first it was suggested that I should be adopted: my Uncle Terry and Aunt Barbara, and the matron of the maternity hospital where I had been looked after while Mum was being treated for her thrombosis, both offered to take me. Dad was uncertain: he wanted to keep the family together if at all possible. In the end it was Nana, my maternal grandmother, who settled the matter. She and Aunt Barbara between them would bring up us children.

Nana was at that time fifty-six years old. She had brought up her own family while working full-time in a textile mill, and was still working when she made the decision to retire and raise this second family. But as Nana used to remind me as I grew up, we were the children of her daughter Kathleen, and she loved us.

Being just a few weeks old, I was of course totally oblivious to all these happenings. But I do remember Nana saying years later that it had been an incredibly difficult time for everyone. My two sisters continually nagged her with questions. Why had Mum gone away? When was she coming home? Both Nana and Dad told the girls that Mum had gone to heaven to see Jesus, and would be looking over them to make sure they were always safe. When I was older I learnt that my mother had foreseen her own death, and had written a letter to my elder sister, Christine, explaining that she had to go away and telling her to look after her young sister and new baby brother. I began to draw strength from her memory. Mum, knowing that she was dying, must have called on every ounce of courage she had. Her courage became my courage and today I need it more than ever.

Dad spent the next fourteen years trying to make ends meet by working all the hours god sent, at day in the mill and at night behind the bar at the local working men’s club. Then, just before I left school, he became ill. One Monday evening in December 1975 he failed to go to work, which was unheard of. Dad had worked behind the bar at the local working men’s social club for years – it was his second job, which brought in some much-needed extra money.

As a young man he had played Rugby League, and had even signed to go semi-professional for Keighley. That had all ended when he had shattered his ankle, but he had kept his fitness up. After Mum’s death he had, however, taken to drinking more than was good for him, and he always smoked fifty cigarettes a day. But I had never known Dad feel ill before, and to see him in this condition now frightened me.

The doctor came, said there was nothing to worry about, and wrote out a prescription for some pills. The nearest chemist was some three miles away; I ran fast all the way, thinking that the sooner I got back the sooner Dad would get better. But the pills had no effect. After Christmas Dad got worse, and in January 1976 he went into hospital where he was kept heavily sedated. I was only fourteen and didn’t really understand what was going on.

As Dad’s condition deteriorated he started doing things which were totally out of character. One day, while most of his family were visiting, a young nurse came over to the bed. Out of the blue, Dad stuffed his hand straight up her skirt. The female members of the family tried to hide their embarrassment, while the men just burst out laughing. Later on, Nana told me that the drugs he was taking had made him delirious.

One afternoon while I was sitting with him he turned to me and said, ‘Son, son.’

‘Yes, Dad. I’m here.’

‘I love you, son.’

I felt slightly embarrassed. I loved him, but the words had not been spoken since I was a baby.

‘I love you too, Dad,’ I replied, wishing I had said so more often. Today both my own lads still tell me they love me, as I regularly do to them.

The following day was a Saturday, so I didn’t visit Dad because I was playing football. I told him that I would go and see him the following morning. At twelve minutes past six on Sunday morning I suddenly awoke from a deep sleep. About nine o’clock my sister Christine turned up at the house and told Nan and me that Dad had gone. He had died of cirrhosis of the liver and cardiac failure at the exact moment when I had woken up.

Nana and the rest of the family said many things about Dad and his health; from what I can deduce he had not been the same since Mum’s death. I cannot recall a single occasion on which I saw him with another woman; instead, he had found his solace in the bottle. At least Mum and Dad are together again now.

I left school at fifteen and got my first job working as a warehouse boy for a cash and carry firm, unloading trucks and pricing products before taking them into the shop where I would stack the shelves. The only thing I can say in its favour is that it paid a wage. The day started at 8.30 and finished at five o’clock, but I could increase my pay by working overtime.

During this time I struck up a relationship with a local girl. Her name was June and I had known her for years as she lived in a flat opposite Nana’s house. She was two years older than me, and a real looker. Around this time I started to realise that women found me attractive. I was quite big for my age, and with all the work in the warehouse I had become very fit and well-muscled. And I was just at the age when my sex drive was beginning to run riot. I spent most of the day dreaming about the things I could do with June, and most of the night doing them. We were both young and foolish, and she got pregnant. Nana was not amused, but the deed was done and that was that.

Matthew was born when I was sixteen years old, by which time I had moved in with June to share her small flat. When I took her to the hospital, once the nurses on duty had admitted her they told me to go home, thinking that I was June’s younger brother rather than her boyfriend. I was totally ignorant about my rights and just did as I was told!

June had originally decided to put the baby up for adoption, but that was before Matthew was born. When we talked about it afterwards we both agreed that we would stop the adoption process: seeing our own child made us realise that there was no way we were going to part with him. It was then that we decided to call him Matthew, after the name in the bible; in truth it was also the title of a John Denver song that I particularly liked.

With hindsight, this was one of the best decisions I have ever made. At that time we had no idea that Matthew was ill. It was not until he was four and a half years old, and June and I were living in Germany, that we discovered something was wrong. I was so pleased about being a father that I just concentrated on being a responsible parent. I stuck the job in the warehouse for twelve months, then got the sack for bad time-keeping. Bollocks to them – I wanted to join the army anyway!

I had originally wanted to join the Parachute Regiment, but my Uncle Peter talked me out of it. He had started off in the REME, the Royal Electrical and Mechanical Engineers, before progressing into the newly formed 22 Special Air Service during the Malayan emergency in the 1950s. I took his advice, which as it turned out was good. In the end I opted for the Royal Green Jackets, and was sent for basic training at Peninsular Barracks in Winchester on 13 October 1978. I completed my training, but because I was under eighteen I was too young to join the Battalion. So I stayed at the training depot until I joined the 3rd Battalion, the Royal Green Jackets, stationed just outside Cambridge. Then life became really interesting.

Over the years I have been extremely promiscuous, in particular when I was with my first wife. I was like a dog on heat, never bothering about who I might be hurting. In the early part of my military career June stayed in Yorkshire with the children, while I lived in the army camp. This was a God-given opportunity to act like a single man, with the added perk of going home at weekends whenever I