"I am a veteran who served in Afghanistan" - (Reddit Ask Me Anything)

read it ask me anything I am a British Army veteran who worked alongside Special Forces in Afghanistan detaining high-value targets I am a British Army veteran I worked alongside Special Forces of all nations in Afghanistan I was tasked with assisting SF in locating and retaining high-value Taliban insurgents ask me anything modest have my proof is it true that soldiers are told to look the other way in regards to the practice of bacha bazi aka normalized pedophilia in Afghanistan yes this is completely true it happens and nobody does anything about it did you ever notice or experience any cultural clashes between the different nations soldiers that you were working with not really in terms of Special Forces the teams generally have a massive mutual respect for each other however the Americans had orders that they were under no circumstances allowed to drink alcohol or gamble with the British so you can work that one out Hannah have you ever had to enter into one of those crazy underground compounds if so what was it like conducting a mission inside there I have had to clear out cellars but on ground like tunnel systems no I think they were mainly the cave systems in the north of Afghan which the Americans dealt with the poor buggers stairs in general are hard thing to navigate but plenty of flashbangs and plenty of speed usually does the trick the element of surprise is the main ingredient to all room searches did you have any experiences which did not happen at all like you might have imagined for example a family friend who served said the first time he experienced close combat was complete chaos but just five minutes of pure panic and deafening noise the complete chaos pure panic deafening noise is completely accurate something that didn't happen at all like I imagined is the absolute boredom when you are not on a mission hours of just working out for no reason because there is nothing else to do did you have hearing protections during those situations if not did you notice long-term effects of noise exposure hearing loss tinnitus yes you have hearing protection but nobody wears it because you can't hear orders yeah mate my hearing is terrible now what's your favorite mr irrational they're all horrendous however if I had a choice it would have to be the full English breakfast to the chicken and yellow curry and rice this is gonna sound so weird but how helpful with the medics what kind of training did they have to go through also how big of a part did computer-science guys play like how much did they help and what did they do you have good and bad medics usually the ones attached to the sava best but bad medics do slip through the net of training and end up in the field the medics I've had have been amazing complete professionalism in some of the hardest scenarios not sure about computer science I'm sure they do all their sneaky intelligent stuff but I'm not even going to pretend that I understand it out loud I'm into war movies which movie in your opinion presents the tactics of combat and the emotional battles the soldiers have to endure the best to the public a British film called Kajaki I've never seen a film represent the chaos of a situation so accurately how favourably did Afghan civilians tend to perceive the British and American forces in Afghanistan were they pleased that they were being protected or did they resent you as an occupying force it differs from location to answer this in the best way you need to understand the social climate in Afghanistan you have the NATO countries who are assisting locals building schools electricity water and they are clearly grateful for this but when you leave the Taliban move in and threaten the locals for speaking to us and a lot worse if they found out a local have given information the communities where NATO held were very welcoming to the extent that they would tell you where the Taliban had planted IEDs and such however the further you go out the more the Taliban had a hold on the local population and they would all disappear as soon as they knew you were coming but again this was a massive indicator that something was about to kick off because the locals would all disappear and then you get incoming so it's extremely difficult to answer your question and it all depends on what village were in the difference in opinions were so vast how do you feel about NATO now getting out of Afghanistan with Taliban most likely back in power Eiffel 1 was really hoping we would have Afghan redditors soon it's a shame the region still needs a lot of help but money talks and I'm afraid many are sick of spending it I agree with you I made with a lot of Afghan translators really nice people and it's sad that they are still fighting the same fight what sort of training were you given for man hunting of this sort what type of support did you provide the training was extremely intense nine months pre-deployment training of close quarter battle simulations handling of prisoners handling of Intel sensitive information handling that sort of stuff the Special Forces gathered the intel on the suspects we were a section of pathfinders who were tasks with detaining said suspects usually the Special Forces would join in on the missions to try and get information on the ground and collect the evidence such as laptops and staff but have you ever come under an ambush while moving around the country if so how did it happen what skills did you learn in the military that you use in your everyday life teamwork and hard work if you are allowed to briefly summarize did you ever have a favorite successful capture the one that sticks out in my mind it was funny afterwards but at the time it could have gone horribly wrong we had solid Intel that a man will call mr. a was gonna be in a compound at a certain time we had quite a while to prepare and the usual nerve staff to set in getting your equipment ready cleaning weapons and checking explosives for entry we arrived there at that certain time and not only was it incredibly dark no moonlight the compound they had told us about was actually three separate compounds connected like terraced houses our radios were absolutely useless at the best of times but we did our best to clarify which compound mr. a was in and got sweet FA back if the officer in charge on the ground decided we'd gamble on the three in one chance so we stacked up on the first compound and detonated the side of the wall out I was first in and I was met by a very confused and aggressive farmer who wasn't overly pleased that we just destroyed the side of his house so after doing a quick sweep and clearing each room nothing we stacked up on compound number two in sort of a frantic rush as now we were sure they knew we were coming we blew the wall out again and entered with a lot more aggression this time expecting to come under contact as soon as we entered but the odds were clearly against us as the second compound was empty and it looked like it was used to some kind of storage now the panic had really set in as we knew what we were entering was now going to be an extremely dangerous bloke who knew we were there and we had to go in anyway we blow the side of the third house and enter half expecting the first man and to be shot instantly to our prize and luck mystery and one of his buddies were still fast asleep on the floor they were so out of it from smoking opium they'd not even heard the first two blasts and they woke up to me screaming at them with a rifle in their face all in all a massive [ __ ] show that we all absolute piss ourselves about now I've never gambled at a casino or anywhere since now compensation was paid at way above market price for the damage to the father's house also thank you for your work and doing this ask me anything I have a few questions of course feel free to answer as many or as few as you'd like sounds like you worked alongside both conventional and special forces what do you think on a personal level personality mindset intangibles Setzer SF guy from a typical infantryman and what are a few words of advice you would give to people that will soon join the military especially working in the Middle East what do you think you feared the most did this differ from what your team mates feared the most thanks again personality not much although I think SF hold themselves to a higher level of professionalism you wouldn't see us joking around in front of other units and such as much as reg INF + SF blokes have an inhuman way disconnecting their brain from feeling pain in terms of fitness I've never seen anything like it running insane amounts of distance with instance amounts of weight on their back incredibly painful and they just have the ability to get on with it it's very impressive as it was my first time in combat I will honestly say I feared freezing under contact more anything I never told anyone that but I was worried that I didn't know how I would react that to as soon put to rest Ohana I guess that's different from the other lads in my team as there had been in combat I don't know what they feared probably losing a limb what was your loadout and as your loadout changed depending on the Intel it changes on Intel like you said but standard for everything is weapon and VG's a no radios standard grenade FAR's grenade smoke grenade med kit snacks water tie wraps for detaining warm clothes temperature drops a lot someone will have metal detector for minesweeping someone will have ladders we moved quite light but a lot of infantry units would be out with 60 100 kilograms on their backs what's the worst thing you saw there did you have many nightmares at the time and after the time worst thing I saw was the aftermath of a Taliban school shooting the engineers I am not sure if British or American have built a school for a local community the Taliban weren't happy because girls were allowed to go to the school there I think the school was operational for about two weeks before we got reports of an attack when we turned up they had shot every young girl at point-blank to send a message that one stays with me nightmares whilst I was there no you're so busy you don't get a minutes to dwell on things but since I have left the military I started struggling I've received a lot of help from charities and I'm getting a lot better I had been given advice about talking to people about what I experienced hence the idea to do and ask me anything so it's sort of therapy for me and I guess it's interesting to others that's heartbreaking I can't imagine how traumatic that was to see and for the families of the girls what's your favorite dinosaur Velociraptor would you suggest this as a career absolutely my time in the army provided experiences that people would struggle to even imagine in good and bad waise but even when you're in the bad situations your bond with the lads around you is enough to get you through anything always laughing and always part of a team and I think being part of a team is so important in life you feel like you can take on anything and it carries with you when you leave the army the confidence shows in job interviews and such what was one of you best most rewarding moments while working overseas also please tell us something interesting about Afghanistan we foreigners may not know by a cool cultural or traditional thing most rewarding was probably my time in Africa during the Ebola crisis we were taking supplies to affected regions water and food the usual suspects run straight up to the truck and start trying to grab stuff that I used to take a box of water and food and walk around to the kids and elderly who were too weak to come to the van I didn't have to do this as the community are supposed to distribute it amongst themselves but seeing these kids who are so weak they can't even get up to get food crack a smile when you sit with them is honestly the best feeling in the world and something about Afghan the rural areas don't have toilet paper so if the locals go to shake your hand with their left hand it's probably very unclean and they do it as a massive sign of disrespect to you and I think many middle-east and people take a left handed shake as a big sign of disrespect hey do you guys still use those shitty zap straps to tie people's wrists in 2008 that was a NATO standard in my training as a Canadian yes yes we do I've heard it from a few vets on reddit and elsewhere do you also get irritated or uncomfortable when people thank you for your service I don't get irritated no it is uncomfortable in situations like if you're in a Russian stuff and someone wants to know what unit you were in and if you know his cousin Dave who's in the Navy how how how many men did you typically work with and what was the chain of command like sorry I'm ignorant about military just curious what the infrastructure of your team was like if you're able to comment on it usually a team of six with a section commander usually a corporal or sergeant in charge of that six which would include two riflemen a marksman an LMG gunner the tech who has the door charge in the section commander for bigger missions it could be anything up to a full company of blokes what hobbies did you take after retiring also what education did you do and did it ever help you in life either before during or after deployment as a Brit thank you and I appreciate that you have opened up on here have seen some negative comments which you seem to have handled much better than I think I cut off just wondering what you get up to in downtime nowadays and do you still keep in touch with others from the army cheers pal I wouldn't be setting a very good example if I struggled with a bit of confrontation on reddit II half of who I go to a lot of football games and play golf mainly mate and yet I'm still in touch with pretty much everyone I went to Afghan with we meet up once every year and then more if people have like stag dues and stuff always a lot of dongs swinging about the most hardcore of SF between countries what was your take on who you work with yeah there are some extremely big egos how are you finding civvy life I left about 18 months ago in Duc me I miss just being around the lads absolutely mate miss the bloc life try and keep in contact with as many as you can my mates and the forces and always manages to find a dog to the friend and look after wherever he goes did you ever do so and with a good boys there is a lot of stray dogs in Afghan personally we were never in one location long enough to befriend a dog as our job was to clear buildings and detain a suspect and get out more often at night - and yes they were always the goodness did you ever refuse an order what was your highest value target that you had detained is there any misconception about British Army role in Afghanistan that you find annoying it's different in real life there is a little more discussion amongst the men rather than solid orders I've questioned orders and discussed solutions to improve certain decisions but I wouldn't say I've ever refused an order to know I detained a bomb maker who was pretty well known they told us he was responsible for about 20 percent of all the bombs in hell all you have to do is read some of the comments on this threat to see the misconceptions my friend row you made it to the end you're ducking beasts I'll cut you a deal smash LIKE and subscribe for more curated content mod it's free and that's a great price

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Keywords: reddit, askreddit, askreddit funny, top posts, top posts of r/, r/, r/askreddit, reddit top posts, reddit compilation, top posts of all time, askreddit question, askreddit top posts, ask reddit, askreddit reading, subreddit, reddit stories, best of r/askreddit, funny reddit, best reddit posts, best of reddit, reddit ama, ask me anything, reddit ask me anything, r/IAmA, veteran

Id: OhaiNyB1pxs

Length: 15min 32sec (932 seconds)

Published: Tue Aug 27 2019