Five soldiers remembered by ‘band of brothers’
The commanding officer of a battalion which recruits from the Midlands looks back on a year in which it lost five soldiers in Afghanistan and encountered some of the fiercest fighting it has seen.
Thousands of people lined the streets for three parades to welcome home the 2nd Battalion, The Mercian Regiment, after their recent tour of Afghanistan.
Lt Col Simon Banton, the battalion’s commanding officer, said the parades in Worcester, Nottingham and Derby saw “double if not triple” the turnout of well-wishers than those held in 2007.
“The support from back home has been absolutely fantastic,” he said, adding there had been “enormous support” from Worcestershire, Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire, where the battalion recruits.
Soldiers received thousands of parcels from around the UK during their six-month tour which ended in September.
“Some days we received letters and parcels from people that would make you laugh out loud and people do the kindest things,” Lt Col Banton said.
The battalion’s main role in Helmand Province was as operational mentors to the Afghan National Army.
Teams of eight or nine British soldiers were embedded among the 5,000 Afghan fighters to provide technical expertise, communications, casualty evacuation and other support.
“The Afghan warriors don’t lack enthusiasm or courage but they are not as technically advanced as many Western armies,” the commanding officer said.
He said the Afghan army worked alongside British soldiers for all principle battles and security operations.
Lt Col Banton said the small Mercian teams and their Afghan counterparts would spend the whole six-month tour together.
“Some remarkable bonds establish themselves,” he said.
“I would see Afghan soldiers risking their lives for British soldiers and the other way round – quite routinely.”
He said the role of the Mercians meant they had to be resilient, brave, mature and extremely skilled.
“There’s remarkable responsibility for some really quite young men, perhaps even 18 or 19 years old,” he said.
Five soldiers from the 2nd Battalion, The Mercian Regiment, were killed during the tour, including 18-year-old Pte Robbie Laws, of Bromsgrove, and L/Cpl Kieron Hill, 20, of Nottingham.
Lt Col Banton said: ” We felt all of the losses very, very keenly”.
He said about 30 other soldiers were wounded during the tour, some suffering a “catastrophic wound” such as sight-loss or losing a limb.
Nine soldiers from the battalion were killed during its previous Afghanistan tour in 2007.
The commanding officer said it made them “acutely aware” of the dangers.
“The turn around to redeploy was only 17 months for us before we went back out and so they were very fresh memories,” he said.
This led to soldiers preparing themselves and their families for the possibility that they may not survive.
Some soldiers wrote letters which would be opened by loved ones in the event of their death.
“Soldiers were being honest with their families and going through the process of identifying their next of kin and the people they would wish to have notified if they were injured or killed.”
Lt Col Banton said the first death happened six to eight weeks into the tour and was a “hard blow”.
However, he added British soldiers had “enormous resilience” and after a period of grief would remember they comrades with stories and jokes before soon going back on patrol.
“We are a band of brothers, there’s absolutely no two-ways about it.”
Lt Col Banton said the brotherhood of the battalion was particularly important when a soldier died.
“They will be remembered and their wider families are part of this regiment too.”
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