First Into Action (15 page)

An undercover unit that operated from the early 1970s was the Military Reaction Force (MRF). The MRF was the root of this new undercover unit. By the time of my first visit to Northern Ireland this new unit, called the 14th Intelligence Detachment (14 Int, or ‘the Det’), had replaced the MRF. After some early successes using their ‘softly, softly catch a tiger’ philosophy, RUC confidence was restored in the Army’s intelligence-gathering operations.

The SAS, along with the Army Intelligence Corps, trained 14 Int operatives, who were recruited from all branches of the armed forces. The Intelligence Corps provided surveillance techniques learned from years of spying on foreign diplomats and the SAS developed and taught field-craft and pistol-handling tailored to the needs of an operative working alone and undercover in a hostile environment. Locals could never be fooled for long by put-on accents or cover stories, something that Nairac found out the hard way (Nairac was a maverick and did not work for any undercover units). The SBS had provided manpower for the MRF in its heyday and continued to do so for the restructured 14 Int as well as providing the occasional instructor. The SAS were not permitted to provide men for 14 Int because London was keen to dissociate them from activities in Northern Ireland, even though everyone knew the SAS were over there, including the newspapers. It was in this area that the SBS’s anonymity proved advantageous to its operatives. Few people had heard of us, and any publicised operations conducted by the Branch were credited to the SAS anyway. And so SBS operatives were permitted to join 14 Int. If the government was accused of putting in SAS undercover men they could honestly deny it.

14 Int was taking on a heavy workload and, although highly effective, their history of successes is dotted with the names of operatives killed in action. One of the earliest incidents for this revamped and newly named group occurred a few months after I left the province and was directly related to a loose string of my own.

Two operators from 14 Int had set up an OP in the countryside in an area close to where I had been working on my tour. They were hidden in a hedgerow that ran the length of a field and were watching a house a hundred yards away. Regular soldiers were not allowed into the immediate area, except in an emergency or as part of a pre-planned contingency, for obvious reasons: one group might engage with the other.

As the two 14 Int men sat in their OP they suddenly saw a dozen armed men walking down the side of the field towards them. This means instant, screaming action-stations with minimum movement and noise. The rush of adrenaline is very much appreciated in assisting muscles and joints to work effectively, having moved little for days in the wet and cold. Safety-catches are flicked off and weapons brought to bear. If there is time, a ‘standby’ message is sent over the radio to the operations room.

The two operatives waited for the men to draw closer before opening fire. They did not feel confident to remain hidden, especially since the patrol appeared to be alert and searching. Seconds before they squeezed the triggers they realised that the armed men were not terrorists but British soldiers. The soldiers themselves had not yet detected the two men hidden in the bushes and the immediate problem for the operatives was how to alert them to the OP’s existence without prompting them to open fire.

There was nothing else for it. One of the operatives cried out, ‘Halt! We’re British soldiers.’

The soldiers instantly went to ground but did not open fire. It turned out they were members of the Ulster Defence Regiment (UDR), the Army group tasked with patrolling this county.
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They had strolled into the out-of-bounds area, but as it turned out later, their intrusion was far from accidental. They had entered the out-of-bounds area deliberately after discovering the exact location of the OP by a breach of security and simply wanted to have a look.

As special forces are small organisations and spread thinly on the ground, they do not have the manpower to provide their own Quick Reaction Force (QRF) to support their own operatives in the event of an emergency. They rely on the regional Army group to provide a temporary standby troop for the duration of each separate operation. A standby troop, usually made up of three sections, provides one section at a time, about eleven men, on an eight-or twelve-hour rotation. They spend that entire time together in a room, fully armed and dressed and ready to ‘go’ at a moment’s notice.

Operational secrecy is of the greatest importance to special forces but the local QRF need to know where to go in case they are called. To satisfy this requirement while maintaining the secrecy of the operation, a detailed map and description of the OP location, including the number of operatives, is placed in an envelope along with special instructions and then sealed. It is handed to the Army commander responsible for providing the QRF at the start of the operation with instructions to be opened only on the order of the undercover unit’s commander. If the envelope is not used, and it rarely ever is, it is collected at the end of the operation when the QRF are stood down.

It transpired that the UDR’s QRF that night, having sat around staring at the envelope for several hours, were overcome with curiosity. They steamed open the envelope and read the 14 Int OP details. Word quickly spread throughout the camp and before long most of the company knew the whereabouts of the operation.

Steaming open the envelope to find the location of the OP was bad enough, but for a troop sergeant to then take out a patrol to look for it was nothing short of stupidity.

The 14 Int men told the UDR patrol commander to get his men out of the area ASAP, which he did. 14 Int were naturally concerned about their security from that moment on, but decided not to pull out just yet. A short time later, incredibly, another and different UDR patrol came along. The operatives could not believe it and they again waited to discover who they were. The operation was becoming a complete farce.

After this second UDR patrol was told to move out, the 14 Int men prepared to pull out themselves. This secret OP had become an exhibition booth. They radioed for a mobile pick-up and made ready to head across country to the road. But just as they were leaving, they noticed suspicious activity at the target house.

They lay on their bellies and turned their attention back towards the target. They did not notice yet another patrol, this time moving in more stealthily behind them. The leader of this latest patrol crept forward to where he could challenge the operatives. The operatives became aware of this latest intrusion and watched by the dim light what they assumed to be yet another UDR patrol, even after they heard an Irish voice call out to them. But this new patrol was PIRA, and the man who was challenging them was Simon O’Sally.

O’Sally had been patrolling the area himself at the time and had watched the UDR’s movements back and forth along the same hedgerow with great interest. O’Sally deduced the presence of an OP and moved forward to investigate. He did not know it was a special forces OP or he would never have moved in so close before challenging it. Even so, O’Sally had not acted hastily and prior to moving in he had worked out that the OP was observing the house. He quickly arranged for some activity to take place to distract the OP’s occupants, which gave him the diversion to move in behind them. This man was no amateur.

O’Sally and the operatives stared at each other in the darkness for a moment before realising that what each of them saw was not what it first appeared to be. O’Sally noticed the unconventional appearance of the operatives – long hair, facial hair, civilian clothes – and instantly knew he had more than just a couple of UDR on his hands.

The long weapons of the operatives were lying beside them facing the target, the wrong way to engage O’Sally. O’Sally did not hesitate a second longer. He squeezed the trigger of his M16 and emptied the magazine towards the men. Both were hit, but one managed to draw his pistol and return several rounds, hitting O’Sally in the thigh. O’Sally’s men instantly scattered when the fire was returned and left him behind. Bleeding like a stuck pig and unable to stand without help, O’Sally crawled away.

The two operatives were alive but seriously wounded and could not move.

The UDR QRF were alerted, and considering they already knew where the OP was, they were not quick to arrive on the scene. It was in fact 14 Int members themselves, in the area because of the earlier ‘standby’, who were the first on the scene and one of them, Robbie, was a man I knew quite well. He was SBS and had been one of those who had passed my SBS selection course.

Robbie was a large, powerful, black-haired Scotsman with a mellow demeanour who had been a seasoned Royal Marine before joining the SBS. He was a close friend of one of the wounded operatives, and when he saw them both lying shot to bits something inside him snapped. Only war or a conflict of equal horror can unearth the extremes of a person’s true character, and this was Robbie’s first war.

He backed away from the OP as those medically trained did what they could for the two wounded men. In the distance the UDR QRF was making its way up a track towards them. Robbie surveyed the scene and spotted an M16 in the grass. He could tell immediately it was not one of their own, nor did it belong to any regular troops such as the UDR, who did not have M16s. It had to belong to one of the PIRA members involved in the incident. He quickly checked the ground around the weapon and found a trail of blood. He followed the trail to a clump of crumpled foliage in front of a bush. He carefully peered under the bush, using the barrel of his weapon to part the branches, and saw O’Sally lying there like a wounded animal, wide-eyed and vicious. O’Sally had no other weapon or he would have tried to use it. Hatred surged through Robbie. He knew O’Sally. His initial urge was to blow him away there and then. He reached in with his powerful arms and dragged O’Sally out of the bush and to his feet. O’Sally winced with pain as blood seeped from his wounded thigh, but he was a hard man and did not cry out. Robbie pulled out his pistol and shoved it into O’Sally’s head.

‘Do it, you bastard,’ O’Sally said defiantly.

Robbie would have happily pulled the trigger, but he was aware that the UDR patrol was rapidly closing in, led by one of their officers. If Robbie pulled the trigger he would be charged with murder. The UDR officer, regardless of how he felt about O’Sally’s execution, would have to arrest Robbie, as a delegated police officer, for the most serious crime. Robbie was not about to risk jail for O’Sally and he still had a card to play, if only he had enough time to play it.

O’Sally saw the UDR patrol too and realised why Robbie did not shoot. Robbie pulled O’Sally along the hedge away from the UDR.

‘We’re going for a little walk,’ Robbie informed him.

Robbie’s intention was to keep O’Sally moving until he bled to death. Robbie held him up and made him walk briskly to keep his heart pumping faster and force more blood out of the open wound. O’Sally was losing blood rapidly, but he did not complain. He accepted it. He had killed enough Brits in cold blood. He understood this was not torture. It was simply Robbie’s way of getting the job done.

Robbie did not get far before he heard a voice call out behind him.

‘Hey, you! What are you doing with that man?’

It was the UDR officer. He had seen something odd going on and had run over to investigate. Robbie let O’Sally drop to the ground.

‘What do you think you’re doing?’ the officer said as he closed in with his men behind him, highly suspicious now.

Robbie stared dangerously at the officer and the men ultimately responsible for all this. It’s possible the officer was not aware of that side of the story yet.

‘Go fuck yourself,’ Robbie said as he held the officer’s gaze. The officer could see the murder in the big Scotsman’s face, which had not felt a razor in several days. Robbie’s wild, dark hair was long and unwashed. The officer sensed this was not the time to pull rank on this man. The fact is there would never be a time when that would be appropriate. Robbie would always blame the UDR for that day. O’Sally was given immediate first aid and taken away on a stretcher.

The two wounded operatives were also sped to hospital. By the time Robbie got back he heard that one had died on arrival.

The rest of the 14 Int Detachment retired to the bar which was the traditional response to the death of a fellow operative. Robbie calmly walked into the empty galley and made himself a wet of tea. He did not feel like company. In the solitude of the kitchen, surrounded by hanging pots and pans, whatever had snapped in him earlier now came loose and he picked up his high-velocity rifle and cocked it.

The makeshift 14 Int camp was on a piece of open ground made up mostly of thin-shelled Portakabins and caravans and it had the feel of a temporary location. Robbie aimed his rifle at the ceiling and fired. Every man in the camp hit the deck as the loud boom echoed across it. They were all aware that the flimsy buildings would not stop a high-velocity round. Many thought the camp was under attack. The word quickly spread that it was Robbie in the galley and that he had gone a little nuts. A couple of men crawled to the cook-house doors and tried to talk Robbie into calming down, but he was intent on venting his anger on pots and pans, since O’Sally had been denied him.

By now O’Sally was in a military hospital being operated on. He refused any anaesthetic, drugs or painkillers for fear he might talk while under their influence.

Throughout the camp, operators, technicians, cooks, admin staff and the unit commander lay on the ground waiting for Robbie to spend his ammunition or calm down. No one was injured and Robbie was eventually led away and kept under supervision until he could be flown back to England.

When I saw him, back in Poole a few months later, he was cheerful and seemed indifferent to all that had happened. But inwardly he had changed. It was not just the loss of a friend that caused him to lose control, it was the whole senseless bloody conflict. When you dug through the hatred and the egos, the reasons for it all started to look pathetic. But we had not joined up just for Northern Ireland. There were many other responsibilities more worthwhile. Robbie’s problem as a member of special forces was that he did not experience any instinctive gratification in taking a life, no matter how deserved it was. He had no primaeval sense of the hunter-killer. Any killing revolted him. He never knew that about himself until he looked death and murder in the face. Few people get to know themselves that well.