Now You Don't Behind the Lines

..with a gunshot wound, have you seen it,

you should actually virtually pull it through,

with a piece of gauze or something? - If you're isolated and on your own,

and there's no prospect of medical treatment for the next seven days,

and you've got a gunshot wound under those conditions and you're

forced to go to ground and hide,

then yes, if you can, you must get the junk out...

..by any means possible.

It doesn't matter what size the hole is, as long as there's

oxygen circulating in the hole.

Providing of course, the bleeding has stopped.

'Pray God the bleeding in the Falklands will never start again.

'It was there that most of these young men first encountered

'the shocking reality of war.

'So too did Sergeant Commander Rick Jolly, who tended 750 wounded,

'mostly Royal Marines and Paras, without a single death.

'He lectures now to men pensive at the price that others paid.'

- This is a guy injured at Ajax Bay.

A piece of shrapnel has come past his leg

and taken away quite a lot of the flesh and skin.

Some five days later, looking at this wound, it has an unusual appearance.

It's sort of redder than real life. That's because healing has begun.

This is what they call granulation tissue.

This is Mother Nature's attempt to heal

and he's doing extremely well indeed.

It's a nice, fresh wound which the surgeon just scrapes up slightly

and then, taking a graft of skin from the other side of the other leg,

begins to cover up the wound.

And look how nice it's looking now.

Another aspect, and it's an important one,

which nobody ever thinks about in exercise, is burying your dead.

OK? How often, when we've been in a commando unit or a company attack,

you get up, you storm through the objective, and it's,

ho-hum, one day to index?

It's all been tactics and roll-on the weekend and a few pints.

It's different in war because you actually end up with the dead.

Back at Ajax Bay, these are the dead from Goose Green.

We stripped every one of those dead to make sure that we knew

what they'd died of, because some of them

were going to go back to England and the coroner would be involved.

Heartbreaking task, if you like,

to stand there in the freezing cold and strip bodies

and take bloodstained things

and put them in bags and sign for them,

and rings and fountain pens and photographs

to send back to the relatives,

but very important, because it also works out your own grief.

Anyone who says that brave men don't cry,

or it's not a feature of a man to cry at war, absolute nonsense.

If you feel like crying, you do it, OK?

Because otherwise, you're going to bottle it up and it'll be twisted.

And here are the guys, in this mass grave,

which was very important to all us around,

because we felt that this was a dignified and honourable burial.

OK? And that we'd done the right thing for these brave men.

'Much learned in the Falklands is used in the education of

'the Mountain and Arctic Warfare CADRE,

'men are training to fight behind the lines.'

- A year ago, the role was reversed to our secondary role,

which became our prime role,

and that was working as a brigade recce organisation.

This, of course, meant that we would be working

behind the enemy lines, up to 200-300k behind enemy lines.

This makes us more prone than any other troops

in the Royal Marines to capture, including the SPS.

So, it's my aim, over the next 40 minutes or so,

to give you an introduction into the art of escape and evasion.

'Many of the postgraduate Houdini tactics taught here are top-secret.

'Their significance is not.'

- The escape and evasion side, you've got to the able to

look after yourself - you've got to be able to keep clean,

you've got to know the rules to keep clean,

and although people you probably saw on the survival things

will get hold of civilian clothes and things like that,

well, that's exactly what you'd have to do.

Let's take, for instance, in the Falklands,

because most of the people there the local population, spoke English,

it would be very easy to pass yourself off as a farmer,

or anything like that and actually wander up, or very close by,

to the enemy positions.

Obviously, you just have to act completely dumb

and try and get away with it.

Obviously, you try and keep away and not do that.

The thing is, then, if you get caught in civilian clothes,

it's a different kettle of fish altogether.

And all these set rules that they're giving now,

gives them confidence for when they do go out on their own later on,

if they never do get in a situation for real,

that they don't feel so alone.

It does go through your mind quite a lot,

"What's going to happen to me if I do get caught?"

'Since not getting caught wins more marks than escaping,

'a huge premium in training is based on acute observation.

'These men are engaged in an A-level version of Kim's game,

'identifying in this landscape 12 items that the average rambler

'would probably never notice.

'You can join in yourself, but it isn't easy -

'even with a zoom lens, to point you in the right direction.'

'One axe, common or garden.'

'The marines have got 11 more to go. For you, just one.'

'One of those contraptions for penning recalcitrant children

'to the roofs of cars.'

'Life out here is full of surprises.

'Practically every piece of vegetation

'appears to be liable for income tax.

'These are snipers, training for their lonely, dangerous job.

'For obvious reasons, their faces will not be seen.'

- A commander could use a sniper in a reconnaissance role,

because they're highly trained in reconnaissance

and various aspects of it on the internal security side,

not only in conventional warfare,

like the type of country we're in now,

they could be used in an urban guerrilla situation.

'The professionalism of these men can be blood chilling.'

- If you want them to put down Harrison fire,

you can deliberately aim to wound a man,

so that it takes anything up to five to 10 men,

depending on the terrain, to get him out.

Effectively, by shooting one man, if you know that the people

you're shooting at are concerned about leaving wounded men around,

then they'll take up the 10 men to get him out of a particular terrain.

If you want him to kill somebody, for instance,

if you want him to hit

any high-ranking officers or commanders on the ground,

the task has got to be so that the man warrants being shot in head.

So, to go in close for a head shot

when you can actually shoot somebody at maybe 500 metres

is a waste of a sniper, if he happened to get caught out.

So, the task to go in and shoot somebody at close range in the head,

for a head shot, would have to be somebody quite high ranking.

'This is a head shot, from 200 metres.'

GUNSHOT

'This is the same exercise from 600 metres.'

GUNSHOT

GUNSHOT

GUNSHOT

- If you look here, you can see the exit holes are quite big.

You can see that the four shots that he fired into the body,

and the range he fired at was approximately 600 metres.

So, the first shot was on and he was slightly left,

and then his next shot is easier into the centre of the body,

and you can see here, the centre of the dummy's head.

And that was his four shots are on, and we're quite happy with that.

- I've found, in talking amongst some of you, a very hardened

attitude towards death, to the point of callousness.

I'm not thinking about battle here now, I'm thinking about once I heard

where there was a colleague who had died

and it was seen without sentiment.

Do you think you become hardened people?

- Yes. - Probably.

- Does that disturb you?

- No, I think it's an advantage.

- A fact of life, I suppose.

As he says, it's probably an advantage, to be able to accept it

and still carry on.

- Could you accept that, or have the same attitude about

a member of your family dying?

Not necessarily close, but a member of your family.

Would you be more prepared for that than the rest of us?

- Definitely.

- It's probably happened since I've been in the corps. You, er...

It's something that carries on from the people you work with.

Probably the people you work with are as close as family anyway.

When family die it's, you...

It's not such a big deal as it used to be before you joined up.

- And you think you've been hardened to that by your training?

- Not in training, but probably experiences as well.

I mean, it just becomes part of the job and hopefully, you just carry on.

I mean, you know, every time, if you came across a dead body,

and you broke down or went to pieces, it wouldn't be too good really,

it's not a great morale booster

to suddenly break down in front of everybody.

So hopefully, you can just get through it and carry on.

- If you have an enemy in your sights,

is there any hesitation about pulling the trigger?

- There can't be, can there? There mustn't be.

Basically, it comes down to it's probably you or him,

and hopefully it's him each time.

So, you can't hesitate, really.

- What do you think this has done to you as men?

We're talking about going later into civilian life.

Can you ever get rid of that attitude?

Or will you take it with you to your own graves?

- I don't think it's something

that you ought to be particularly ashamed of.

If you considered a death as being something that...

Death, obviously, is a very sad affair and I don't decry that at all.

But if you take death very badly

and you become very emotional about it, that's no way to carry on life.

People die all the time. You've got to carry on with life as it comes.

I think it can only be an advantage to realise that.

- What we're really saying is that you are trained killers

in the defence of your country.

- That's a very dramatic way of putting it.

- But is it correct?

- Yes, yes, if you're saying that is the right question, yes, it is.

But I don't think anyone actually physically thinks, you know,

wakes up in the morning and says, let's go out and kill someone.

You have to do it as part of your job and if you hesitate,

if it is part of your job,

then you're not fulfilling your role as a good soldier

and you will not be a good soldier.

Unless you want to be a good soldier, you'll probably end up dead yourself,

that's what it boils down to.

'To minimise that risk,

'camouflage and concealment are as vital as marksmanship.

'In this exercise, they're given two minutes to scatter,

'blend into the landscape, yet still establish a vantage point

'from which to fire two blanks at their examiners

'from a range of 200 metres.'

- 09. - Cheers.

'The observer's role is simply to spot the snipers.

'The rules are unconditional.

'Exposing a square inch of anything - uniform, skin, or rifle -

'means failure.

- Roger. Where Tony is now is about 190 metres, all right?

'There are 13 men out there somewhere.'

- Just follow that path down that you've just taken up there, Paul.

Prepare to fire shot.

GUNSHOT

'Although the gun smoke exposes the sniper's whereabouts,

'the observers have positively to see him.

'If they still can't, they call up a marker, a sort of human gundog,

'to close in and place a hand directly on the sniper's head.'

- Hand on head.

'You may think, this must be the ultimate giveaway.

'But no, to pass, the sniper must remain invisible to the observers.'

Roger. I can't see nothing. Do you reckon he can see me?

- Yeah, he's got you dead to rights.

He is learning a lesson of life and death.

No, that was a good position. What's his name?

Andrew Dicks.

Corporal Dicks, pass.

- Any more snipers about?

Go back to your right again and step back two paces.

- I've settled about 180-200 metres away here which is just right.

I can just about see the observers although it's a bit misty.

DISTANT CHANTING

Sounds like the Paras just running by. Somebody's just been pinged.

Craig.

Craig? Corporal Craig, Tony.

Did you get that?

What he can see,

you created a big black hole here by putting yourself in there.

If you look hind you, you've got a lot of shadow

and you would've been a lot better in there into the shadow.

What you've got is a big green bush

and then you've got brown here in the middle.

You have to really think about your surrounding area.

I was trying to blend in with that bit.

Ideally, you want to be forward of it so that that's your background, OK?

If you stand up then and just move over to the left-hand side there.

OK, any more snipers about?

At the moment, I've got a shot just over the right shoulder of

young George about five metres in front of me.

He's meant to fire a shot.

GUNSHOT. There he goes.

This is a dodgy time as they're looking straight at me

as well as him, so I'll keep very still.

Tell him to fire.

GUNSHOT

OK. Not too bad. Not too much smoke.

Don't worry. He won't give you away cos of smoke.

No, I can't see nothing, Tony.

GUNSHOT

And going down, down down, down, down, down, down.

Hand on sniper's head now.

OK, can you make a move, then, Tony, please?

He's moving his hand up and down.

Yeah, OK, that's good enough. OK, Tony.

What's your name, please? Lieutenant Smith.

OK, that's Lieutenant Smith passed, Tony.

Stand down. Ease! Stand easy. Listen in.

What gave most people away yesterday was

straight edges on your hat causing a shadow, darker than the area

you were working in. It's all light bracken.

The main criticism of this fine body of Royal Marines

in the subsequent debriefing was that some of them looked too smart.

What was it that give them away?

Straight edges. This'll give you away.

Most people yesterday got caught out. Same again, straight edges.

Go and get your weapons now.

In the wagon by 8:55am, everybody seated, ready to go.

Anybody got any problems before we set off from camp?

For their next devious operation,

they're required to stalk one mile along the river bed

to positions from which they could assassinate their instructors

without a lot of fuss.

Come five o'clock from the house.

You've got that gap with prominent green, light green.

I think they're using that as a gateway across.

Roger. There is a bit of dead ground there as well.

They're not using the dead ground, just crawling.

And also by the back of them trees.

They're moving off from them trees, I'm sure they are.

For some, assassination proposition is becoming increasingly appealing.

But the problem this time is they don't know where the observers are.

They could actually stumble over them.

There seems to be a group breaking away to the right, look.

This is another exercise which carries many Brownie Points.

To fail at this is to jeopardise one's whole future with the cadre.

And Russ Craig hasn't excelled so far.

Go left. Left.

Determined to pass this one

because I've field at everything this morning and yesterday.

This is the only chance I've got to redeem myself.

This is looking good. Nice stream.

Yeah, I think there's someone just...

Yeah. Let's get right onto it.

OK, I'll just walk round, Tony, cos it's all dead swampy here. OK?

Here we are, here we are.

Ostensibly, Craig has every reason to reckon

he could out-ambush Baden Powell.

He's within 40 metres of his prospective victims

and quite undetected.

GUNSHOT

What's his name?

Corporal Craig, right. Tell him to stand up. He's failed.

He's failed not because he was seen,

but because he's taken an unnecessary risk

in getting too close to his target.

Craig is so narked by this that he blazes off his second shot

at the passing fish.

GUNSHOT

How many more have we got? One. One to go?

What time we got left, Tony? Five minutes. Five minutes. Roger.

Let's have a quick scan, then.

Now I'm going to ease my rifle into a firing position.

Got a good view of them. I've got a nice backdrop

and hopefully I should get away with this.

Nice and steady.

GUNSHOT

Roger. I can't see nothing. His camouflage looks pretty good.

He's got a good background. Just check and see.

Stand up, make his way to transport.

OK, son. Well done.

Just make your way round the back and back up to transport.

Now, I think you all agree that the aim was to get you through

all your little bits and pieces like judging distance,

observation, calm concealment,

and the final aim was to get you through a stall.

No, we got nearly 50% of you through the stalk.

So over a period of two days, that wasn't bad.

Corporal Craig screwed it up.

All right? He done well, he got to within 40 metres.

In fact, he scared the shit out of me. All right?

That was good, getting up to 40 metres.

You were too close. You've got to think of an escape route.

I thought you were going to do a bayonet charge or throw a rock at me. All ri

ght?

So what you should have done was retreated to a safe distance.

Remember, all you had to do was to get anywhere within 200 metres.

And why shoot somebody at 40 metres

when you can shoot him safely at 200 metres?

I think, if you'd have fired, if you'd missed, you'd have probably

got up and run like the clubbers.

Fine? So, point taken? You screwed it up by losing your temper

and firing a shot in the river. All right? Don't do that again.

Point taken? I don't need to tell you any more. NCO, shouldn't do that.

Well, what it was, he said, I was doing the camouflage concealment

and I kept getting pinged and I couldn't understand why.

He's using the same old excuse - the nickname of the Pink Crash-helmet

cos of my receding hairline.

I couldn't understand why I kept getting pinged

because I was digging out blind. Everyone else around me

wasn't getting seen and I was. Couldn't understand it.

It started to get to me after a while,

and then when we done that final stalk,

I went the muckiest, muddiest and most horrible route,

the most difficult route I could find to dig out a blind

and prove that could do something, and I did.

I ended up getting so close,

I'd have been better off using a bayonet on them

cos I got that close. Consequently, I'd run out of time anyway.

And that's when I fired my shot off.

Obviously, I'd failed because I was only about 22 metres away,

22 paces or something.

And that's why when I was walking away I had a bit of a bazzy on,

lost my temper a bit and I got in trouble for that, anyway.

Discipline problem. I've already had my wrists slapped for that.

But I forgot about it now.

It was just taken the wrong way at the time.

That's life.

The way it's going, Corporal Craig's ambitions

appear to be scattering on the winds.

However, there are always fresh challenges.

Abseiling down into trees is not a recommended sport,

if for no other reason than it's governed by one infallible rule.

If a sudden emergency threatens the helicopter,

then the rope is cut, even in training.

Another skill to be learned

is the accurate calling down of artillery fire.

Hello, Golf 11, this is 23 Bravo. Fire mission, over.

Golf 11, fire mission, over.

23 Bravo, grid 451809,

direction 3350,

enemy patrol in building, neutralise now for two minutes.

Over.

Golf 31, grid 451809,

direction 3350.

23 Bravo - Golf 11, this is 23 Bravo.

On target. Out.

Stop or you're going to split.

Stand up. Up. Help him. Help him up.

He can't get out. OK, help him to his feet.

Keep him in sight. Do not resist.

Stand up.

OK, moving forward.

Get those arm-locks on. Get them up! Stop resisting!

OK, back down. He wants to go down.

You don't have to put him to the ground if you can immobilise him.

He's only a small man. Get those arm-locks on, get hold of him.

Up, up, up, up!

Away we go. Good. Guy at the rear.

Stay out there...

There are some acts of aviation which make shear common sense.

That was a better one. Didn't put him on the ground.

The viewer should remember there are certain aspects of the training

of a special forces fighter which are not for domestic application.

Looking at the throat then, we can attack it from two points -

we can be hitting down if we get the opportunity, or hit it up.

We've got the Adam's apple and the breathing apparatus around here.

If you smash that in there, you're going to have problems.

Go down.

Lie on your back, lie on your back.

You may have knocked him out to the ground for a split second

but you want to finish him out. You've got no great weapons.

Instead of just kicking him to the side,

a good heel straight into the solar plexus can really do the job.

OK, stand up.

Anybody got any particular points

they want to bring up about this area here?

No?

Similar to the mouth I was talking about earlier on.

It's not only the pain it inflicts, but also fear.

If you get hold of somebody here and say "Move!"

he wants to go move. Cos he wants to go everywhere his balls go.

THEY LAUGH

Unarmed combat, the weapon of the silent attack.

That's what you'll see in next week's programme

during a night assault on a radar station.

It involves a client

that would probably make Chris Bonington think twice.