TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 25, 2001
How I trained Afghan fighters against Soviets
TOM CAREW
We were there to assess the Afghan fighting capability and to retrieve Soviet equipment. It was 1980, the Russians had just invaded and the Afghans were fighting a superpower with the same tactics they had used against the British before the first world war. Watching them fight was like watching an old western: the Russian cowboys would come into a valley and down would stream the Afghans. My task was to teach the Afghans modern guerrilla tactics. Without them, they would be exterminated. I tried to go without preconceptions, but it was hard. Before leaving Britain, everyone told me to be careful. The Afghans are barbaric, they'll chop you up, they said. After a few months adjusting, however, I found the Afghans to be very pleasant. We got along. I respected their bravery; they respected the way I instructed them. I had much more difficulty coping with the terrain. When I arrived in Peshawar, an Afghan military leader warned me: "I hope you are fit, my men march very quickly." No problem, I thought, I was used to marching. But my God: up, up, up we went. We entered the Hindukush mountains and started climbing. Above 10,000 ft the oxygen started to thin and my concentration to lapse. The Afghans were used to it. There was only one thing we had over them: most of them couldn't swim, which made crossing lakes and streams tricky. As fighting terrain, Afghanistan is a nightmare. It's a natural fortress. You can't get far with vehicles - you get bogged down, and the passes are too steep. Laden infantry troops could take five days to reach a beleaguered outpost, a journey that would take a helicopter 20 minutes. The Russians, consequently, had an awful time. It's one thing to put in your infantry, but you've got to keep them within range of your artillery. With difficult mountain passes, this is almost impossible. We didn't use tents, we lived in caves or slept rough. Most of the army carried just a weapon, three magazines of ammunition and some naan, all wrapped in a shawl on their back. No western soldier could carry heavy equipment and keep up with them. For a foreign army, establishing a supply route would be very difficult. To try to carry food and water up those mountains, some of which are 13,000 ft high, would be madness. You have to carry bottled water and each gallon weighs 10 pounds. On some days, we were going through two to three gallons. A soldier in those hills is going to burn 4,000-5,000 calories a day. You need high-calorie rations and the Afghans can live on a lot less. And, of course, there is the weather. Towards the end of this month, winter starts setting in. It begins with rain, then it freezes, then it snows. By mid-October the snow will be up to neck height. A journey that takes three days in summer will take 10 days in winter - and of course in snow you leave tracks. The freezing conditions rule out helicopter support, and the mist in the valleys invites crashes. Besides, a western taskforce will stick out like a sore thumb. Most of the Afghan fighters wear sandals soled with old car-tyre treads - the ones I was given to wear were crippling. This means a western bootprint is instantly trackable. Once identified, the Russian soldiers were sitting targets. We trained the Afghans in "shoot and scoot"; they would lay a little ambush, let rip and disappear. They picked it up quickly. Before long, they had learnt to let the Russian convoys get halfway up a pass and then blow a hole through their middle. The lucky ones died instantly. The unlucky ones were chopped to pieces in the aftermath. Other training procedures we put them through included marksmanship, tactical movement, training with weapons, anti-tank weapons and anti-aircraft missiles. The Americans had been keen we teach them urban terrorism tactics too - car bombing and so on - so that they could strike at Russians in major towns. There was no officer-soldier gap, they all mucked in together, but their respect was absolute. Their discipline was hardly ever relaxed - they might occasionally smoke opium, but for religious reasons they wouldn't drink. They would get up at first light for prayers and cover some distance before the sun came up. They would stop five times a day for prayer, although never during battle - fortunately the Koran says that in combat you are excused prayers. But they always prayed afterwards. If it comes to a ground war, I believe the western forces will have a very slim chance of victory. The last army to win in Afghanistan was Alexander the Great's.
(Tom Carew, a former SAS soldier, helped turn Afghanistan's fighters into an effective modern guerrilla force) (The Sunday Times)
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