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Opening doors in Helmand

A Military Operations news article

6 Aug 07

On a mission out of Lashkar Gah to visit the Afghan National Police, the Land Rovers stopped by a small building flying the national flag: a police station that had appeared since the unit's last patrol in this part of the city. Report by Roy Bacon.

Open door: a soldier inspects an Afghan police station
[Picture: Cpl Jon Bevan]

No one had known the police station was there. That kind of thing happens around here. Just when you think you know what is going on and where, someone does something and doesn't bother to tell you. A week spent travelling round British bases in Helmand is enough to convince anyone that the job of British troops mentoring the Afghan Police and the Afghan National Army is, to a huge extent, about getting the doors of communication wide open and keeping them that way.

Beside the Kandahar Gate on the road into Lashkar Gah from the east, Afghan policemen operate a permanent checkpoint, searching every vehicle entering the town. It's difficult to be sure how good a job they're doing, but when we visit they seem to be on top of it.

Inside their walled compound is a supply of water and a radio-phone, but living conditions for the 15-strong police detachment, who spend two weeks at a time here, are basic. Chickens peck around the room used as a kitchen, and against one wall is the station's armoury of Kalashnikov rifles and rocket-propelled grenade launchers.

Next stop is Lashkar Gah's Joint Provisional Coordination Centre where Major John Kendall leads a team of British soldiers who help to coordinate all Afghan security forces' operations in the area:

"We eat together, speak together and know each other's national stories," he says. "Talking over a cup of chai is the best way to operate."

Inside the Joint Provisional Coordination Centre in Lashkar Gah
[Picture: Cpl Jon Bevan]

Communication of a different kind is the issue at Camp Bastion. The British base is sited, deliberately, in the middle of nowhere. Keeping the supply routes open to provide 2,000 troops with the essentials of life is a major logistical challenge:

"The loggies are always busy," says Captain Joel Rathbone, Ops officer of 4 Logistic Support Regiment. "The traditional opinion of loggies as being 'in the rear with the gear' is being challenged by Herrick."

The battalion's vehicles spend much of their time on front line tasks with the battle groups, and cover a lot of 'desert distance'. Each convoy deploys with more general purpose machine guns than an infantry platoon.

Long trains of vehicles make an attractive target for the Taliban as they snake across the vast open spaces, avoiding roads as much as possible. If the Taliban believe they know the likely route of a convoy, they plant IEDs (improvised explosive devices). So a bomb disposal team accompanies every convoy to identify vulnerable points and deal with explosive threats.

Force Protection Troop Commander 2nd Lieutenant Chris Wright says intuition plays a part in knowing which bit of desert is safe to cross:

"A lot of it's hair on the back of the neck stuff."

Mentoring the Afghan Police and National Army is a key role of the British troops in Afghanistan
[Picture: Cpl Jon Bevan]

And how do the loggies know where they're going? Paul Duffin is 12 Brigade's geographic sergeant. His team, operating out of a small tent in Lashkar Gah, is responsible for "anything to do with geography". That means old-style maps and charts as well as 3D models and computer-generated visuals. Using one of Paul’s programmes you can see what it would be like to march up the valley to the Kajaki dam, and which high points overlook the section house you are going to spend a month defending.

Part of 42 Engineer Regiment, the mappers work closely with 12 Brigade's intelligence cell, as well as commanders on the ground. One of their current projects is getting 'data-loggers' into the hands of troops. Soldiers will input the presence of mines or contacts with enemy forces into the hand-held GPS devices and then relay the information to anyone else with one of the gadgets, building up a highly up-to-date map of conditions on the ground.

"Ground truth" is a phrase you hear a lot in Afghanistan. It means what is really happening on the ground, not what you'd like the situation to be, or what someone who hasn't seen it thinks it might be. Finding out what ground truth is, and communicating it to everyone who needs to know, is the most important job. It opens doors, and, with a little luck, keeps them open.

This report is taken from the September issue of Defence Focus, due out 14 August 2007.

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