Hellfire

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The helicopter god was nearly out of miracles.

3 Para’s A Company had never intended to stay in Sangin; they’d just dropped by to reassure the local elders that we were on their side. Then Intelligence reported that they’d walked right into the hornet’s nest – the Taliban’s only senior command and control location in southern Helmand – and the head shed ordered them to hold out at all costs.

Sangin had been under siege for weeks now; the Taliban had been hammering the place morning, noon and night. Their objective was simple: to injure a British soldier seriously enough to force a casevac helicopter insertion, and take out the ‘cow’ as it landed.

In the meantime they were amassing enough anti-coalition militia to rip the District Centre (DC) to shreds.

Thirty or so Paras were locked down in the platoon house, running perilously short of food and ammunition. Three of them had died a couple of days ago, and another was killed this morning while trying to secure the landing site for a casevac mission launched to recover a badly injured survivor. The Taliban were a hair’s breadth away from bringing down a Chinook with its crew, surgeon, anaesthetist, and the rest of the medical team on board.

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